God in Sandals: Transformational Encounters With the Word Made FleshSample

The Work of Sowing Seed

Think about the principles the parable of the sower reveals concerning the work of sharing the Word of God with others. Try to identify them. How much of this process depends on us?

As was His custom, Christ took advantage of the crowds to teach the Word (Matt. 13:2). The first of His parables revolved around a man sowing seed, and it is one of the only ones He explained.

Aside from the Lord’s reasons for using them, we must recognize the tremendous capacity of parables to communicate truth. Parables can convey, by means of an anecdote from everyday life, profound truths about the kingdom of heaven. Each one holds a central truth, although in its details we find other valuable spiritual perspectives.

However, we must take care not to force the meaning beyond Jesus’ original intention.

In the story of the sower, we notice first an obvious fact: the sower took for granted that he would “lose” a certain amount of seed. If we wanted to express this in cold numbers, we would say that out of every four seeds sown, three will not germinate. I don’t think this is generally true of a farmer’s work; nevertheless, the parable is pointing to spiritual realities.

The story highlights the fact that most people who hear the Word will not respond positively. This is simply part of the process and should not in any way tempt those who are sowers of the Word to abandon the work. Rather, they should work with perseverance, knowing that they are not dealing with a mathematical process.

Second, the seeds that fell on good soil produced fruit that greatly exceeded the initial investment: “some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty” (13:8). So even though only a few seeds fell on good soil, they eventually produced a crop that more than made up for the earlier loss. The results of planting seeds are measurable only in the long term.

In the same way, spiritual results become clearer with the passing of time. Too often we get excited after a campaign about the great number of “decisions” that were made for Christ. The true fruit, however, cannot be seen until some weeks, months or even years have passed. Many of those whom we thought made decisions will fall away, just as the parable describes.

Despite this, those who sow the Word must carry on sowing seed because their commitment is not to results but to sharing what they have received from God.

Sowing the seed is simply the outcome of their identification with the kingdom of heaven, and they will do it faithfully because it is an essential part of their vocation. Even though they know the dynamics of a seed falling to the ground and growing, they do not worry about what is not their responsibility.