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[0:00] God, we thank you for the privilege of coming together as your people. As we open your word to the book of Mark, show us Christ more clearly, so we'll love him more deeply.

[0:10] May we pray this in your son's name. Amen. Please be seated. Well, hello evening service. Hello, everyone.

[0:22] It is cold and rainy outside. It is warm and dry inside. You're sitting among all your friends. It's almost a perfect picture. The only thing you need to make it perfect is for everyone to get a Bible.

[0:34] So pick up a Bible. Scurry around in the pews in front of you. If you're going to need the Bible, we're going to look at it together tonight. We are on page 839 in the Pew Bibles.

[0:49] 839, Mark chapter 4. We are going to be looking at a section of the Bible tonight, which is the start of teaching about something called parables.

[1:00] And we're going to be looking at them tonight and over the next few weeks. The parables are going to keep coming back in the book of Mark. So we'll be looking at them for a little while. Now, before we get into Mark chapter 4 tonight, I just want to take just two minutes and kind of give what are parables all about.

[1:15] A very brief overview of parables. Okay, so on a very basic level, on a very basic level, parables are stories that Jesus tells to teach something.

[1:26] Right? So it's a story that he tells to teach something. But they're not ordinary stories. Right? They're not ordinary stories. Here's the first thing that we need to know about them as we look at them tonight and through the book of Mark.

[1:37] Number one, they have a hidden meaning. Right? So you get kind of the story, and then there's a story behind the story. And if you figure out the story behind the story, that's the main point of the parable.

[1:50] Right? They have a hidden meaning. A lot of times, it's not so clear what that hidden meaning is. Tonight we're lucky because Jesus actually explains it for us. But it's not always clear. Now, to get you to kind of understand what I'm talking about, hopefully this will help you and not confuse you even more.

[2:04] I'm going to talk a little bit about the tiger parable. Does anyone know about the tiger parable? Does anyone know where that is in the Bible? No, it's not in the Bible. I just made it up. But I do have a picture of a tiger. Let's see it up here. Okay. There's a picture of a tiger.

[2:17] In that picture of a tiger, there's another picture hiding. Right? So talk to the person beside you. Take 30 seconds. See if you can find the other picture hiding in the picture of the tiger up there.

[2:29] Can't see the picture? A little bit. I can see it. Well, there's a tiger up there. He's got stripes all over him.

[2:40] Okay. Talk to the person beside you. Can you actually see the other picture in the picture of the tiger? Some people see it? Okay. Shout it out.

[2:52] What do you see? Bunny rabbit? Okay. No. There actually is a face. Now, Chris, show us the next screen. Okay. Go. And the next one. Okay. There you go. Get it?

[3:02] Ah. Ah. Ah. See? The picture in the picture. All right. That's what it's all about. Thanks, Chris. Thanks. So there's the obvious story.

[3:18] And then there's the less obvious but more important story within the story. That's the first thing about parables. Here's the second thing we need to know about parables. And it's really important. You know that you understand the parables if and only if you respond to it.

[3:35] Right? That's one of the secrets of the parables. You really only understand it if you respond to it. And your response should be following Jesus. Right?

[3:47] That's the response. So you could be sitting here tonight and you could be a world expert in the parable we're about to look at. Academically, you could be considered brilliant taking apart this parable. But if it hasn't moved your heart towards Jesus, Jesus says, you don't understand anything about the parable.

[4:01] You've completely missed it. Right? That's a very, very important thing. And that's why as we read through these parables, as Noah just read for us, Jesus says, listen. Right?

[4:12] He says, listen. And he also says this twice. Whoever has ears to hear, let them hear. Now, we've all got ears, right? So he's not talking about cognitively having the sound go into your ears.

[4:23] He's actually saying you don't just hear it. You've got to act on it. It has to hit you in the heart. If you don't hit it in the heart, if there's no response, you haven't understood the parable. Now, why am I kind of going on about this?

[4:34] I'm going to tell you why. St. John's, we actually are committed to teaching the word of God because we believe it's a word of life. So in Sunday school, like right now, downstairs, the kids are learning from the Bible.

[4:46] In youth group, you learn from the Bible. In our small groups, we learn from the Bible. We come here on Sundays and we learn from the Bible, which is awesome. But I suspect that some of you that are sitting here tonight have heard this parable 10 times, 20 times, maybe 100 times.

[4:59] Right? And you're kind of going, okay, I know. The parable about the sower is the farmer and the seeds and the soils and I'm wondering what's for snack after the service.

[5:10] Right? And you're not thinking about the parable at all. You're just thinking, why doesn't that guy stop talking so I can go have a cup of coffee? Right? Now, let me, and this is me too, right? This is me too. One of the things that's great about the gospels, they open up the life of Christ to us, but they're also very familiar to us and that's very dangerous.

[5:29] Right? Because sometimes we just skate over top of it. And Jesus says, listen. He says, listen. Listen to the parable. If it doesn't hit you in the heart, if you're not affected by the end of tonight, you have not understood this part of the Bible.

[5:40] You have not understood the parables. Right? You've completely missed it. And in fact, maybe for some of you, years ago you understood this parable because it hit you in the heart and now you don't understand it anymore because all you do is understand it cognitively but not in your heart.

[5:54] So, as we turn to this parable tonight, as we turn to the parable tonight, let's listen. Let's all listen. This is sometimes called the parable of the sower.

[6:07] It's sometimes called the parable of the soils, like dirt, right? Soil. Parable of the soils. I think it could be called the parable of the yields. As in Y-I-E-L-D-S.

[6:20] The parable of the yields. Which is a product from a farmer's field. Right? The parable of the yields. This is a story that Jesus tells about farming in the ancient world.

[6:31] Right? And I don't know if any of us are farmers from the ancient world. Let me take a look around here. No. Probably not. So, what I'm going to do, I'm going to quickly kind of go over what the story is all about. Right? And you've got to remember, for the original hearers, most of these guys were farmers.

[6:44] Right? Most of these guys. So, they got it completely. And us? Well, probably not. So, here's how it goes. A farmer has a field. Right? A farmer has a field.

[6:54] There's different types of soil in the field. He can't tell what types of soil are in the field just by looking at it. Right? Right? The time comes along for him to sow a crop. So, sow the seeds so he'll get a crop in the future.

[7:05] So, in the ancient world, and you probably see it in some places in the world today, he had a big sack of seeds over his shoulder. And he would take handfuls of seeds and he'd walk through the fields and he'd throw the seeds out through the field.

[7:15] Right? He didn't kind of go, I'm going to drop some here. I'm going to drop some here. I'm going to drop some here. It just goes everywhere. Right? It just goes everywhere. And Jesus says, there's four types of soils in this farmer's field.

[7:25] There is hard soil. Right? Hard soil. This is soil along a path. So, people have walked along this path over and over and over again. It's like concrete. Right? Boom, boom, boom, boom, boom.

[7:36] And seed falls on it and you almost get a picture of what happens is the seed kind of hits the path, bounces up, bounces down, and a bird is waiting for a really easy meal and he comes and he takes the seed and it goes. Right?

[7:48] No crop. Right? No yield at all. That's the first soil. Here's the second soil. It's the rocky soil. The picture I kind of get of this is there's rock right underneath the surface. Right?

[7:58] There's right underneath the surface. So, it's just a little bit of dirt on top of the rock. The seed falls into the soil but not very deep so that when the rain comes and the sun comes it springs up very quickly because it's so close to the surface but it has no roots that go down deep.

[8:13] Right? So, as soon as there's stress put on the plant like heat or wind or something, it dies. Right? There's no roots down deep. That's the rocky soil. Here's a third type.

[8:23] The thorny soil. Seed goes into the ground. Maybe even goes in really deep. It starts to grow up. Right? A plant starts to come up. But bit by bit, thorns and weeds kind of wrap themselves around the plant and eventually kind of choke it.

[8:39] Right? Kind of choke it. Right? It takes the nutrients away. It takes the water away and the plant dies. That's the third type of soil. Here's the last type of soil. Throwing the seed out. Right? Throwing the seed out. It's the good soil.

[8:51] It's the money soil. And the farmers, when they heard this, when Jesus first told them, they'd be like, that's the soil I want. That's the soil that will feed my family through the winter. Right? That's the type of soil I want.

[9:02] Right? So, they would have got it instantly. It's the good soil. The seed goes deep into the ground. Into soft soil. No rocks. No weeds. And what are we told?

[9:12] It produces a miraculously huge crop for the farmer. Okay. That's your lesson in farming in the ancient world. Right? That's the parable. That's the parable.

[9:23] But, that's the story. What's the story behind the story? Because that's the important story we're supposed to get. Right? What's the parable all about? What's the mystery behind the story of the sower?

[9:35] Well, fortunately, as I said, the disciples asked Jesus about the parable. And about the hidden meaning of it. And, Jesus actually gives us a whole explanation about what the parable is about.

[9:47] And, I think the reason we got it in the Bible, that God gave it to us, is because it's so important for each one of us to understand the meaning of this parable. Right? It's so important for us to listen and understand the meaning of the parable.

[9:59] That's why we get the whole explanation. So, what do we see? What is the secret? What is the story behind the story? Here's the first thing. The seed is what we're told, right? In verse 14, is the word of God.

[10:12] Now, by that, Jesus means the whole Bible. Right? The seed is a word, and Jesus means the word of God. And, he means for us today, that's the whole Bible. Right? But, in particular, the center and the focus of the whole Bible, which is Jesus himself.

[10:30] Right? Right? So, there's a bit of an ironic thing going on here, because we know in the book of John, Jesus himself is actually referred to as the word. Right?

[10:41] So, Jesus is actually saying it's the word of God. And, for you right now, listening to me here, that's me. Accepting the word means we accept Jesus and what he says.

[10:55] What does he say to us? He says this. He says, each one of you, me, each one of you, have turned our backs on God. Right? You've thrown God out of your life. You've rebelled against his loving rule over you, and you deserve death because of that.

[11:10] But, because of God's love for us, he sends Christ to earth to die in our place, so we can have a new relationship with God. Right? This is what the word means. Right?

[11:20] This is what the word means. Accepting the word means accepting Christ and means accepting new life with God because of Christ's death for us.

[11:34] That's what it means. The word is radically life-giving and radically life-transforming. It is Jesus.

[11:46] That's what the word is. So, the soils, right? That's the seed. Here's the soils. The soils are a picture of four types of human hearts.

[11:58] Four different types of people. So, we get a picture of what happens when four different types of people hear the truth about Jesus and his plans for each of their lives and how they react to that.

[12:11] So, here's the first one. We're going to go back again now. The hard soil, I think, is a hard heart. The hard soil is a hard heart.

[12:22] Read with me. So, we're page 839 in your Bibles. Read with me from verse 15.

[12:32] And these are the ones along the path where the word is sown. And when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them.

[12:45] The picture is of the word of God that the truth about Jesus bouncing off the hard ground of being taken away. Right? Bouncing off the hearts of these people and being taken away.

[12:55] Jesus has seen this in his own ministry in the book of Mark. People have rejected him. And, in fact, we're told there's a group of people which are conspiring to kill him. Right?

[13:05] That's a hard heart against a savior of humanity. Right? Awfully hard heart. Today, we see the same thing. Today, we see people who hear about Jesus and it's like they've made up their mind years ago about him.

[13:21] They're not interested. Or they put Jesus in a box and that's a Jesus box. And the Jesus box is kind of making me feel comfortable because he's a really smart guy and a really nice guy. But not the son of God.

[13:32] And that's a Jesus box. Right? And so, I've met people. They hear about Christ and it's completely no response at all. They hear about their sinfulness and their need to actually accept Christ's death on their behalf and there's nothing.

[13:47] There's absolutely no response. Now, if that's you here tonight. If that's you here tonight. Listen. Listen to the parable. Maybe you've heard the Jesus thing, right?

[14:01] That I'm talking about. Maybe you've heard the Jesus thing many times in your life. What Jesus is saying to you tonight. He's actually inviting you. He's inviting you to accept him as your savior.

[14:12] To not just put him in a box. Take him out of the box and realize he actually is the lord and savior of your life. If you really understand the parable. If you understand what's he saying tonight. Jesus is inviting you to accept him as your savior and to follow him.

[14:27] To commit your life to follow him. That's the first soil. Here's the second soil. It's the rocky soil. The rocky soil. I think this is a shallow heart.

[14:38] I think it's like a shallow heart. The word goes in. But doesn't go in deep. Not in a life changing way. That realigns.

[14:49] Your whole life. Around serving Jesus. That will give you a foundation in Christ. In good times. And also in bad times. Read with me from verse 16.

[14:59] And these are the ones sown on rocky ground. The ones who when they hear the word. Immediately receive it with joy.

[15:11] And they have no root in themselves. But endure for a while. Then when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word. Immediately. They fall away. Jesus.

[15:22] Has seen this. Also in his ministry. I think this may be the group of people. Which are chasing him around. Galilee. Looking for miracles. But probably not too interested in his teaching.

[15:33] About repentance and following him. They kind of want the good Jesus. Kind of all that good stuff. But the stuff about changing my life to follow God. Not too interested in that stuff. I think we can see that today.

[15:44] Maybe within our own hearts we see it. We know about salvation in Christ. Forgiveness. The great blessing of being in a Christian community. Like we have here. But.

[15:55] We don't so much like the truth that the Bible says about. Every Christian will suffer for their faith. Sometimes in their life. Right. Because the Bible says that. It says if you actually proclaim Christ in this world.

[16:07] And you're a Christian. That you will suffer. For being a Christian. It says that very clearly. Right. Now it should be no surprise. Because. You're actually representing Christ in a world. Which has turned their back on Christ.

[16:17] So it's going to happen. Maybe the suffering is at. University or school for you guys. University. Wherever you are out there. Maybe it's people just kind of ignoring you.

[16:29] Maybe it's from within your family. And. I guess I've felt a bit of that myself. Where. They don't really. Get in conflict with you. They just kind of ignore you. Right. Which is probably even worse.

[16:40] To tell you the truth. Maybe it's at work. Maybe. Maybe. It's in the things that you're asked to do at work. Or you refuse to do at work. I worked.

[16:51] For about eight years. For a large Australian corporation. And. If you've been in that world. You may know. That sometimes. The dividing line. Between what is ethical. And legal.

[17:02] Gets very blurry. Right. So the company I worked for. Was pretty good at being legal. But what was ethical. Maybe not so good at that. Right. I mean. So the stuff they might ask you to do.

[17:12] Number one. It was profitable. But it wasn't always ethical. And you may be caught in a bind like that. And you may be passed over for a promotion. Because you won't do what the company wants you to do. Right.

[17:23] Or you may be passed over for a promotion. Or maybe even sidelined. Because you've decided that your family. Is more important. Than your work. Right. And your boss will figure that out.

[17:35] And you may be sidelined. You may be 45 years old. And sidelined. And thinking. You're never going to go anywhere for the rest of your life. In your career. Because you love Jesus. And you love your family. More than you love your job. That's the right thing to do.

[17:45] It's still hard. Right. It's still hard. It's still hard. So if you're here tonight. If you're here tonight. And you really understand this parable.

[17:56] Maybe you're feeling persecution for being a Christian. What do I want to tell you? Jesus is inviting you. To accept the word of God. To let it go deep. Deep. Deep within your heart. To feed yourself with it.

[18:08] And so when suffering comes. Instead of turning away from the word. You turn towards the word. And when suffering comes. You remain strong in Christ. Here's a third soil.

[18:23] The thorny soil. I think this is the easily deceived heart. It's the easily deceived heart. Now I'm going to tell you right up front.

[18:34] I'm here. I think we probably all are. If we're honest with ourselves. We are all in this soil. And I think we're going to spend a lot of our lives. Cutting down the thorns in our hearts.

[18:45] On this one. Right. What does it tell us? Let's read in verse 18 and 19. This is verse 18. And others are the ones sown among thorns.

[18:56] They are those who hear the word. But the cares of the world. And the deceitfulness of riches. And the desires for other things enter in and choke the word. And it proves unfruitful.

[19:09] See the expressions the Bible uses. The worries of life. The deceitfulness of wealth. The desire for other things. It's all kind of things in our life which we can be convinced are far more important than God.

[19:20] Right. And we can raise them up and worship them instead of worshiping God. I'm just going to look a little bit at the deceitfulness of riches. Right. So what Jesus is actually saying. It's almost like money becomes something like a person that lies to us.

[19:34] And we listen to the lies. So money might say you need money to be happy. Money to be happy. And we go yes money you're right. You're lying to me but I believe it. It sounds awesome. Right. So what are some of the great kind of lies that we can be told by money?

[19:48] Well here's the big one. Right. Money equals happiness. Right. So sometimes we wrap that up in different ways. So it can look like this. Instead it could be a car equals happiness.

[20:00] Or perhaps a house equals happiness. Or perhaps an education or a certain type of education. Perhaps at a certain university equals happiness. But it doesn't. Right. The Bible says it doesn't.

[20:10] And in fact I'm going to give you the statistics I looked up just for you. A company in the States looked at 50 of the richest people in the United States. Right. And we're not talking about 10 million dollars.

[20:22] Right. We're talking about big money here. Right. That's just pocket change to these people. Right. We're talking about hundreds of million dollars or a billion dollars. Right. That's a lot of money. Right. Think about a billion dollars. And if they ask them are you happy and they compare it to everybody else.

[20:35] And you know what they found out? No difference. Right. Now I know what you're all thinking. And you're all thinking exactly the same thing as me. Oh but it would be different for me.

[20:46] If I had a billion dollars I'd be much happier. I'd be like super. I'd be right off the scale of happiness if I had a billion dollars. Right. Because I'm thinking that too. I'm like well that's for them. But for me I'd be so happy if I had all that money.

[20:57] Think of all the great stuff I could do. And well what does the Bible say? It doesn't make you happy. Right. And the statistics actually say it doesn't make you happy either. You know Jesus has chosen his words carefully.

[21:11] I'm going to talk carefully here. Being in ministry I think 14 years or something now. I'm going to tell you the thorns come slowly but surely.

[21:23] Right. They grow slowly but they grow surely. Have you ever seen a stone fence destroyed by weeds? Right. A huge stone fence.

[21:34] And the weeds get into it. And bit by bit over years and years and years it gets destroyed by weeds. And that's what Jesus is actually saying. Right. Nobody that I know of anyways goes to bed on Sunday night and saying I'm living my life for Jesus and wakes up Monday morning and says I've decided to live my life for money.

[21:49] Doesn't happen right. Doesn't happen that way. It's like death of a thousand cuts. Right. It's a decision and another decision and another decision and another decision and another decision and the weeds kind of grow up and all of a sudden they choke you and they pull you away from Christ.

[22:07] And that's the way it happens. That's the way I've seen it happen. Right. One decision after another. It doesn't happen overnight. Right. It's a slow moving poison. Now that doesn't say.

[22:18] Yes. The Bible is not saying here that you can't be wealthy and be a Christian. It's not saying that. Right. It's actually saying where your idol is. You know. What do you love? What do you live your life for? You can be wealthy and do great things with your money.

[22:32] Do fantastic things with your money. And in fact if you want great investment advice about what to do with your money. Well I know someone who knows everything about the stock market. In fact knows where it's going to be 10 years from now.

[22:44] 20 years from now. 50 years from now. And can guarantee an awesome return for your money. And he won't charge you 3% like a financial advisor will. Who is it? It's God. Right. It's God. It's in here.

[22:54] This is your financial advice. You're all like who? Tell me who that is. I'm going to be rich. I'm going to have a billion dollars. No. It's God. Right. God's your financial advisor. Right. Come and talk to me about it after.

[23:04] I'll show it to you in the Bible. Great investment opportunities. The Bible talks about them. If you're here tonight. And you understand this parable.

[23:20] And your heart is being deceived. Slowly deceived. And tearing you away from Christ. Turn back to him. Turn back to him tonight. If you understand the parable.

[23:31] It's saying turn back. Recommit your life to follow him. Keep cutting down the thorns. Right. We're all in that soil. Keep cutting the thorns out.

[23:43] Here's the last one. The good soil. The soil the farmer wants. Right. It's the good heart. Read with me verse 20. But those that were sown on the good soil.

[24:00] Are the ones who hear the word. And accept it. And bear fruit. Thirty fold. And sixty fold. And a hundred fold. The good heart.

[24:12] Accepts the word of God. The way God intended it to be. In a radically life giving. And radically life changing manner. That is what the good soil does.

[24:23] That is what the good heart does. Jesus himself sees this with his disciples. His bunch of fishermen. And tax collectors. And they come follow him. Right. It finishes by talking about the yield.

[24:38] Right. Or fruitfulness of the seed. So. It talks about yield. What it's actually talking about. Is if you put one seed in the ground. How many seeds do you get out. Right. Now. So.

[24:48] I knew you guys would want to know. So I looked this up on the internet. So you know it's true. Right. So I looked on. And I actually had to wade through. A few academic articles. About sealed. Seed yields and crops in Russia. Which was fascinating.

[24:59] Believe me. But this is what I found out. In the ancient world. You'd be lucky. If you got a yield of eight to one. So you plant one seed. You get eight out. Right. That's outstanding.

[25:10] Doing great. If you did that. Today. With modern crop science. If you get a yield. Of twenty to one. You're doing awesome. Right. You're doing awesome. So what it's saying. Is that you can be.

[25:20] The best farmer in the world. With the. The biggest tractor in the world. With the most fantastic seeds. And the. Awesomest manure in the world. Right. You got it all going for you. As a farmer. The best you can do.

[25:31] Is twenty to one. And what does Jesus say. Thirty to one. Sixty to one. A hundred to one. What he's actually saying. Is. The yield that you will get. When you accept the word of God. Is supernatural. It's actually created by God.

[25:42] Right. It's amazing. It's an amazing yield. It's miraculous. Good soil. And a good heart. Will produce a huge crop. Because God will use it.

[25:53] To produce amazing things. For the kingdom of God. This is a. This is a parable. Among other things. For the apostles. As they're being sent out. To do ministry. He's saying. The kingdom of God.

[26:04] God will work with you. To bring glory to the kingdom of God. Beyond what you imagine. Like bringing the gospel. To the whole world. Right. Which is what. The apostles started. The kingdom of God. The kingdom of God. The kingdom of God. Okay.

[26:14] What does. This fruitfulness look like. This is. This is the last thing. What does a fruitfulness look like. What will God use good hearts. To produce. Well I think there's a whole bunch of things. Here's the first thing.

[26:27] Radically changed people. The Bible talks about fruits of the spirit. Right. The first fruit of the Holy Spirit. Within our hearts. Is to declare Christ. As Lord and Savior.

[26:38] And that in itself. Is miraculous. Because if that happens. Someone has gone from death. To eternal life. With God. You see. See the importance of that.

[26:50] How from this little thing. A massive thing happens. And even within their own life. I've seen it happen. People change radically. How they relate. To other people. What they love. And what they hate. And where their life is focused on.

[27:01] And things that they leave behind. And things that they go towards. That they never went towards before. And things that they value. Right. Radical fruit. In a person's life. I also think. The fruitfulness.

[27:13] Is about how the word. Of Jesus. Goes out. From each one of us. To the world. Right. The great news. Will go out from you. To the world.

[27:23] So. I'm saying that. Because of verse 21 and 22. So just read it with me. And he said to them. Is a lamp brought in. To be put under a basket.

[27:35] Or under a bed. And not on a stand. For nothing is hidden. Except to be made manifest. Nor is anything secret. Except to come to light. If anything has ears to hear. Let him hear.

[27:47] Alright. So what he's actually saying is. This stuff you got. This amazing stuff that God's given to you. Is meant to be shown to the whole world. Alright. As I said. The apostles go out. With the message. After Jesus ascends.

[27:58] And they bring the message of salvation. In Christ. To the whole world. So I'm going to ask you. To go through a little exercise here. As we finish up. What it's actually talking about. In the yield.

[28:08] And the fruitfulness. Is what your life is going to be all about. That's what it's actually talking about. What will you produce of value. In your life. So what I want you to do. Is just think about.

[28:20] What legacy you want to leave behind you. Okay. What legacy do you want to leave behind you. When you're gone. When you're gone. What do you want your kids to remember. And your friends to remember. And the people you work with to remember.

[28:31] And when they look back at you. What do you want them to remember about you. I'm going to ask you that question. We're going to talk about it a little bit. Think about it. Talk to the person beside you. For 30 seconds about it. Okay. What do you want people to remember about you.

[28:42] When you're gone. Okay. I'm not going to ask you what you said.

[28:58] Obviously. But I hope you had a chance to think about it. Here's one of the reasons why I've asked you this. Is I was thinking this week about the. This parable. This part of the Bible.

[29:08] And about the. The fruitfulness. What does fruitfulness mean. I'm going to give you two examples. Of what I think it can mean. I work a lot with young people. In the ministry that I work in.

[29:20] And it's fantastic. One of the great things about working with them. Is I get to find out. From each one of them. Their journey as a Christian. How they've become a Christian. Over their lives and stuff.

[29:30] And every once in a while. I get a story like this. It goes something like this. My great. Great. Grandfather. Is the first one in my family.

[29:42] That became a Christian. And. He was such. A great guy. Such a great witness. For Jesus Christ. That most of his kids became Christians.

[29:52] And then most of their kids became Christians. And one of them was my father. And because of him. I've actually become a Christian. And the legacy. Of that person. Who lived three or four generations ago.

[30:04] Comes down to the current day. You see. That is a life of fruitfulness. Right. God may choose. For you to go out. And be Billy Graham. And thousands of people come to Christ. Because of you. Maybe not. This is a life of fruitfulness.

[30:15] This is a man. You never heard about. In any newspaper headline. I do not know. What size his bank account was. And it doesn't matter. Right. It doesn't matter. But his great great grandson.

[30:25] Looks back and says. Because of Christ working in that guy. I can see how God. Has led me to be a Christian today. That's a life of fruitfulness. Here's a second example. And this is a special one.

[30:36] For the kids workers here. And also for the youth workers here. Because I know. That I know you guys are awesome. And ever since my son's been in youth group. You're like awesome plus one.

[30:47] You're even better. You're fantastic. So this one's for you. And this is once again. One of the young guys. I know I've been working with. And his story. About how he became a Christian. Went something like this. My family wasn't Christian.

[30:59] But there was this youth worker. That was. That was. A friend of a friend of mine. And I met him once. And he said. Why don't we get together. And read the Bible. And he met with me.

[31:09] At A&W. It doesn't have to be at A&W. But in this case it was. He met with me at A&W. Every week. For years. And years. And years. And he led me from being a Christian. To being a Christian man.

[31:20] To being a Christian leader. And that guy. Is actually proclaiming Christ. In Canada right now. In a place where it's very hard. To proclaim Christ. You see. That's a life of fruit. Right. That's a life of fruitfulness. For the kingdom of God.

[31:34] Here's the last thing. I want to say to you. Tonight. And that I want you to hear. Be good soil. Be good soil. Be like this. Verse 20.

[31:44] But those who are sown on the good soil. Are the ones who hear the word. And accept it. And bear fruit. 30 fold. And 60 fold. And 100 fold.

[31:56] Will you pray with me? Lord make us good soil.

[32:11] Give us soft hearts. To the message of salvation in Christ. Give us ears that hear. Give us hearts that listen. Help us to love to hear your word.

[32:23] Because it is a word of life. Thank you God. For the love shown to each one of us. In your son Jesus Christ. Amen.