Gluten Free & God Seeking

Sunday, June 24, 2012

Explaining the Parable of the Sower to a Chinese Student

     My husband and I have been reading the Bible with international students for over a year.  Besides explaining difficult terms to them, sometimes their questions give opportunities to  share an illustration. Last week we were reading Luke 8 and our student admitted he didn't understand what that chapter was talking about.  
   He knows I like gardening, and so it was easy to point out that when the Lord spoke to people their hearts were like different kinds of ground.  I summarized for him what I had learned about the  different types of ground by reading some of the footnotes from my  Recovery Version of the New Testament.  (You can order a free study Bible by clicking on this link!)

BESIDE THE WAY -  Let's say I had a bunch of seed and  then started to scatter it, the Bible says some of it fell on the wayside--that's ground that's near the side of the road and because people walk on it so much, it gets packed down.  So if seeds fell on it, it would be hard for them to penetrate the ground.   That's like letting worldly traffic make our hearts hard so the Lord's word can't get in and sprout. 

IN THE ROCKS - Then some of the seed landed in the rocks, and in that kind of ground  it's hard for the seed to grow very well. This is a picture of a daisy that is growing between two rocks in my rockery.  The soil is very shallow and because of that the  plant's roots can't grow very deep.

 IN THE MIDST OF THORNS  - I pointed out to him that out by my compost bins in the alley were a lot of dandelions.  I told him that if a seed landed in there, it wouldn't get enough light or food, and the weeds would crowd it out so it would  die. Mark 4:19 says the thorns  are the anxieties of life or all the cares that take up our time so we don't get  spiritually nourished.  

THE GOOD EARTH - That evening we were sitting at the dining table that looks out on the backyard, and because we live in the Northwest, my yard is full of flowering bushes, flowers, and my small garden.  So I told him if a seed landed out there, it would grow because that's good ground.  
   
  
I like the footnote in Mark 4:28:  "...the good earth (v. 8) signifying the good heart that was created by God (Gen. 1:31) so that His divine life can grow in man.  Such a good heart works together with the seed of the divine life sown into it, allowing the seed to grow and bear fruit spontaneously for the expression of God...."       

                               
Blog update 8/5/13:  This morning I was listening to a song on Youtube called Blossom of Gold--it's about the Lord as the seed of life growing within us.  It goes to the tune Edelweiss. 

Posted by at 10:13 PM
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