Kingdom Prayer: The Gospel of Luke With N.T. WrightSýnishorn

Though not often taught this way, the Parable of the Sower showcases the history of Israel as a story of warning and promise. The Parable of the Sower presents a problem because typical interpretations of the story as a general teaching about what happens when we preach the Gospel doesn’t do much from a narrative standpoint. Why teach about how learning works? What’s the value to Jesus’s listeners, most of whom aren’t preachers? His phrase, ‘If you have ears to hear, then hear,’ clues us into the fact that there’s a deeper, obscure meaning to the story. It further indicates that this meaning would be potentially risky.

What might the risk be? The Israelites of Jesus’s day were soaked in hopeful stories about how God will ‘sow’ Israel again. Mary’s own song is part and parcel with the prayers of hopeful longing common among the people. All throughout the Hebrew Bible, the prophets had promised a return of YHWH. People had been praying for that return and redemption for a long time.

Harvest imagery called to mind themes of restoration. For most hearers, restoration further evoked ideas of cataclysmic, revolutionary uprising. Here, Jesus plays on the more common and calm associations of sowing seed that we’re familiar with, to say that when God restores Israel, it won’t be a violent revolution, but like farming. Slow. Meditative. Taking hold through deep integration. Most crucially, this restoration will encompass the whole Creation. In this reading, the various ‘bad’ soils aren’t just generic personalities closed off to the Gospel, but the rival Kingdom agendas all around Jesus.

Add one more important interpretive ripple. Between telling and interpreting the parable, Jesus alludes to Isaiah’s commissioning, where God has the prophet give the people an initial word of judgement. ‘Hear, hear, but never understand.’

All this works together to reinforce a picture of God indeed working toward the restoration of Israel, but not as expected. The Kingdom is coming forth in an unexpected way; the way outlined in Mary’s song. The humble will be raised up, and the powerful, whoever they might be, will be thrown down from their positions. Just because their soil may look good now, it will be revealed as barren when the harvest comes.

Reflection:

What are the alternative agendas (the ‘bad soils’) within which you are tempted to make the message of Jesus fit? How can you become fertile soil for Jesus’s message?