God’s Word | Wayfarer

[Jesus] told [His disciples], “The secret of the kingdom of God has been given to you. But to those on the outside everything is said in parables so that,

“‘they may be ever seeing but never perceiving,
and ever hearing but never understanding;
otherwise they might turn and be forgiven!’”
Mark 4:11-12 (NIV)

One of the most important themes in the Great Story up through the start of Jesus’ ministry is the heart relationship between God and the Hebrew people. God made a covenant with His people but they time and time again broke their end of it. For roughly four hundred years God’s prophets were center stage warning God’s people to repent and turn their hearts back to Him. They warned God’s people of the consequences of not doing so. The people continually refused to listen. They lost their Kingdom and were taken into exile. They eventually returned from exile and rebuilt their lives, clinging to God’s promised Messiah.

One of the things that is often lost on casual readers of Jesus’ teaching is His relationship to the ancient Hebrew prophets. In Matthew 5:17 Jesus said, “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” If Jesus came to abolish the prophets, then I can justify ignoring the ancient prophets. Since He said He came to fulfill them, then I think I’d better understand the prophets and their message.

In today’s chapter, Mark records Jesus’ famous parable of the Sower who scatters his seed and it falls on different types of soil. The eventual fruitfulness of the seeds was determined by the quality of the soil. When His disciples asked Jesus to explain the parable and why He spoke in them, Jesus quotes the prophet Isaiah:

Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?”
And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”
He said, “Go and tell this people:
“‘Be ever hearing, but never understanding;
    be ever seeing, but never perceiving.’
Make the heart of this people calloused;
    make their ears dull
    and close their eyes.
Otherwise they might see with their eyes,
    hear with their ears,
    understand with their hearts,
and turn and be healed.”
Isaiah 6:8-10

The relationship between God and His people had always been like a rocky marriage. Some, like the prophets, had their hearts were in the right place. They were sincere in their faith, and devout in their covenant. But most were hard-hearted and calloused towards the things of God. Jesus claims that He is the fulfillment of the prophets, God’s Messiah who has come to reveal God’s Kingdom and fulfill the promise made through Abraham that through His people would come a blessing and salvation for all people. The irony is that God’s people, the Hebrew people, will continue to be just as they always have been. Some will see it, but many won’t.

The parable of the Sower and Jesus’ quote from Isaiah are linked. Jesus’ own people, especially the institutional religious establishment have rock-hard hearts. Jesus’ words will have no effect, any more than Isaiah’s words did to the royal and religious institutional establishments of his day.

And, of course, that is the whole point of Jesus’ parable for me as a reader. What’s the quality of soil in my heart, mind, and life? Do the spiritual seeds of this chapter-a-day journey germinate? Take root? Grow? Bear fruit in my thoughts, words, and actions during the day? If so, then the fruit of the Spirit will be increasingly evident with my wife, my family, my colleagues, my clients, my friends, and my community. They will experience in me love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, gentleness, faithfulness, goodness, and self-control.

May it ever be.