Three men walked into a bar, one ducked.
Holly got it.
Three men walked into a bar, one ducked.
There's a dawning around the room, people are slowly getting it.
Who hasn't got it yet?
Don't embarrass yourself, it's okay.
I never got it the first time I heard it.
Your dad tells it too, oh well.
I know where I got it but I didn't get it from your dad.
It's great actually because you say something like that
and you just get this laugh and nobody else is laughing
because nobody else gets it.
And then you say it again and maybe a few more get it
and if you haven't got it yet, somebody can explain it to you
after church tonight.
But you heard the same words, everybody heard the same words
and some of you understood them, some of you didn't
and those on the inside, sorry, some of you,
I'm going to adjust that because I can't see.
That's my glasses.
Brian Rose not hidden, is he?
Some of you heard those words in a totally wrong way
and others got the secret.
The way parables work, Jesus says something
and some people get it and there are those on the inside
so they get what he says and everybody else is on the outside
in a sense they're excluded from what he says
because they don't just get what he's trying to say.
We're working through Mark's gospel at present.
We've been there the last few weeks.
It's not really a biography of Jesus.
Sometimes we talk about the gospels being a biography
but the more we've done Mark's gospel the last few weeks,
I've seen and for me that this is fast-paced preaching.
This is Mark telling us about Jesus quite rapidly
and making a whole number of points as he goes along.
It's a gospel that can be read in an hour.
Mark's a preacher.
He's on about Jesus.
He's throwing out a life-saving message that anyone can hear
and he knows that telling people about Jesus is going to get a response.
It will be heard or it will be not heard.
It will be accepted or it will be rejected
and you don't have to be clever, hate him or love him.
These words are powerful enough to bring people to a real faith
in the Lord Jesus Christ.
One of you took up my challenge the other week.
I was terribly encouraged by this
but one of you took the Mark's gospel from Morning Church the other week,
took it home and offered it to somebody in your family
and said, would you think about reading this
and writing any questions you've got in it as you go
and would you meet with me again sometime after you've done it
and we'll talk about whatever questions you've got coming out of it.
Now, I haven't heard the end of that story yet
but I'm really interested to hear the end of that story.
Today we come to a brand new area in this Sermon of Jesus
and it begins at chapter 4, verse 1
and I'd really like you to have your Bibles open as I speak.
Jesus began to teach by the lake
and the crowd that gathered around him was so large
that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake.
While all the people were along the shore at the water's edge,
he taught them many things by parable.
So what Mark's actually saying to us
is he's introducing this new idea
that Jesus used stories as a way of communicating.
He used parables.
He spoke in a way, he told a story to make a point.
Stories that draw us in emotionally
and then catch us unexpectedly
with a sledgehammer between the eyes.
Jesus uses stories which get under our guard.
We listen to a good story with delight.
The story gets past our defences,
it plays with our emotions
and then it drives the point home.
One of the most famous examples of a story like this in the Bible
is in the Old Testament in 2 Samuel chapter 12.
David is God's king
and David has angered God
by sleeping with Uriah's wife Bathsheba.
She is a drop-dead gorgeous woman
that he has drooled over
as he looked down from his roof
and saw her taking a bath.
She was straight out of a Jerusalem men's magazine.
She got pregnant
and David stepped in
and he didn't do the modern thing and kill the baby,
he killed the husband instead.
It's a really sordid tale
and the king who is described as a man after God's own heart
sins in a high-handed way
that he really seems to have got away with
and he can even look pretty cocky
because he can look like the man
who's taken this beautiful woman into his own family
after her husband's been unfortunately killed on the battlefield.
What a man.
Not many people know the secret
but God does
and he confronts him.
And he sends his prophet, Nathan,
to tell the king that he's under judgment.
It's a really dangerous thing
bringing the word of God to people
who might not want to hear it.
And Nathan tells David a story.
He tells him a parable.
He says,
there's two men in a town, king.
He says,
one of them's rich
and one of them's poor
and the rich man,
well, he had a vast herd of animals
and the poor man,
well, he had one little lamb
that he nurtured
and he cared for
like one of his own family.
The rich man had unexpected visitors
and instead of using his own sheep to feed them,
he kills the poor man's lamb to feed them.
And David hears the story
and he's absolutely fired up by the injustice of it
and so in 2 Samuel 12,
it says,
David burned with anger against the man
and he said to Nathan,
as surely as the Lord lives,
the man who did this deserves to die
and he must pay for that lamb
four times over
because he did such a thing
and had no pity.
So David's anger and his passion
is aroused at a story of terrible injustice
and Nathan plunges the sword in
at home with the words,
you are the man.
Now, I don't know if you realise it,
I see it with older people,
but we have this amazing capacity
for seeing injustice and failure
in the lives of other people,
not us,
and being completely blind to ourselves.
We see everything else that's wrong
in the world except us.
And it's a great story
because this is a story
that gets past our defences,
it captures our emotions
and it makes us hunger for what is right
and it drives its point home.
That's what a parable does.
So Mark 4,
Jesus tells a story,
a parable,
verse 3,
it begins,
listen,
a farmer went out to sow his seed
and as he was scattering the seed,
some fell along the path
and the birds came and ate it up,
some fell on rocky places
where it did not have much soil,
it sprang up quickly
because the soil was shallow,
but when the sun came up,
the plants were scorched
and they withered
because they had no root.
Other seed fell among the thorns
which grew up
and choked the plants
so that they did not bear grain
and still other seed
fell on good soil,
it came up,
it grew and produced the crop
multiplying 30,
60 or even 100 times.
So there's a farmer
and the farmer goes out
to plant a crop.
I used to live in
north-western New South Wales
and that is big crop growing country,
flat ground,
big crop growing country.
And when it comes close to planting,
the farmers start to get really edgy
and excited
because they really want to get going
but they've got to wait
for the timing to be just right
when they plant their seeds
because they want to give themselves
the very best opportunity
of growing the very best crop
that they can.
They're looking for results.
So when a farmer puts a seed
in the ground today or tomorrow,
he's not just thinking
today or tomorrow,
he is thinking five months
into the future
when he's going to be bringing
in his harvest
from what he's planted.
One of the funny things I saw
in the country
was the competitiveness
of farmers.
The farmers would be watching
one another
to see who'd go first.
When's the time right?
Who's going to start planting?
And I knew one bloke
who lived in this farm.
They're huge farms,
5,000 acres
and this bit of a laneway
that ran between them.
And just before planting time
was really ready,
he'd go into his shed
and he'd pull out
his planting machine
behind a giant tractor,
fire it up
and he'd drive the tractor
up and down
through his whole field
without any seed in it.
Because he'd look
into trick his neighbours
because his neighbours
would see what he was doing
and they'd go into their sheds
and get their planters
and come out and plant too.
He thought it was a great joke
and I think it was.
In Jesus' day,
farming was a lot lower tech.
The farmer worked
through the fields
throwing out handfuls
of grain
and it spread around.
The seeds seemed good.
Nothing wrong with the seed
but where it lands
determines how it grows.
That's what this parable's about.
And he tells us
that some of the seed
lands on a path,
never gets a chance
to put down its roots.
The birds fly in
and they have a feed.
Some lands on rocky soil.
It starts to grow
but as soon as the sun gets hot
it dries the roots,
they wither and they die
because they haven't gone down
deep into moisture.
There's other seed
which grew with weeds
that choked the plant
and stopped it
bearing any fruit at all.
But the other seed
landed in good soil.
It grew and multiplied
even as much as 100 times
which was a great return.
Now I need you
to help me out with this.
I think Andrew's going to
push a button
on that PowerPoint.
I want you to have
your Bibles open
and tell me
what the responses are
when you read
through this parable
especially in the
second half of it.
So when Jesus explains it
he says there's some seed
that lands on a path
and I want to know
from the text
do they hear?
The seed that goes out
to the path
is the message heard?
If the seed is the word of God
is it heard?
Yes.
Is it received?
Help me out faster.
No.
Is there joy?
No.
Does it get roots?
No.
Is there fruit?
No.
The second one's
the rocky place
the short root type stuff
it withers and dies
but is it heard?
Yes.
Is it received?
Yes.
Is there joy?
Is that in the text?
It is.
You're right.
Does it get roots?
No.
It doesn't get roots
and is there fruit?
No.
Fourth,
the third one
the thorns
does it
is the word heard?
Yes.
Is it received?
Yes.
Is it with joy?
Come on.
What's in the Bible?
No.
No, there's no joy.
Does it get roots?
Come on, be brave.
Yes, it does get roots
and is there fruit?
No.
Last one
is it heard?
Yes.
Is it received?
Yes.
Is it with joy?
We presume so.
Does it get roots?
Yes.
And is there fruit?
Yes.
See what it shows us?
There's only one of these settings
where there is a result
where there is fruit
where the word of God goes out
and there is fruit.
Now it's a great story
you've got to ask
what does it mean?
And at first telling
no one gets it
not even Jesus' disciples.
So in verse 10
it says,
when he was alone
the twelve and the others
around him asked about the parables
and he told them
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
ever hearing
but never understanding
otherwise they might turn
and be forgiven.
And then Jesus said to them
don't you understand this parable?
How then will you understand
any parable?
So Jesus very clearly says
some people get it
and some people won't.
And he says
you guys will get it
because God has made you one.
I'm going to do something.
My fault.
Guess what I did tonight?
I turned the fans up to full bore
and guess what's happening here?
My paper's blowing everywhere.
Now I can use both my hands
and I can look properly.
Jesus says
you guys will get it
because the secret of the kingdom of God
has been given to you.
The disciples are not smart enough
to work it out for themselves.
They become insiders
because God gives them
what they need to become insiders.
So if you're a Christian
it is because God has made you one.
Faith is God's gift to you.
There are no self-made men or women
in the kingdom of heaven.
We don't get ourselves there.
God brings us into his family
and into his kingdom
and we are there
because of his incredibly gracious
kindness and love.
Jesus quotes Isaiah 6
from the Old Testament
and Isaiah is being commissioned by God
to tell people about God
and his coming judgment.
And it's a really interesting passage
because God knows most people
will not respond to the prophet's message.
He knows in advance
that most will come to judgment
and nevertheless
he sends his prophet out
in a very unpopular role
to a group of people
who mostly won't listen.
The word of God will be veiled to them.
They may be ever seeing
but never perceiving
and ever hearing
but never understanding
otherwise they might turn
and be forgiven.
They see,
they hear,
they don't understand.
So you can be sitting
in church tonight
and see and hear
and not understand.
But the point is
if they listen properly
to the word of God
they might turn around
and repent
and be saved.
So in the parable of the sower
the very first word
in this parable
is probably the most important.
Listen.
It's Jesus speaking.
Listen.
It's very emphatic.
Listen.
He's saying hear this right.
Jesus is not mincing word.
He is saying
it is imperative to listen.
You've got to hear
and understand
what I am about to say.
Now the disciples
do not understand it all
and Jesus needs
to explain it to them.
So Jesus takes
his disciples aside
and gives them
a ball by ball
description
of what this parable means.
He unpacks it
for his followers
who want to understand.
So verse 14
the farmer
sows the word.
The seed
is the word of God.
And so
in a story
which begins
with this really
urgent appeal
to listen
Jesus now explains
that they must
listen to him.
He is the word of God.
And once you've been
shown the secret
it's like
aha now I see
I understand
what this parable
is about.
And the story
is about
four different ways
that people
listen to Jesus.
It describes
how his word
impacts us.
And so
this is a parable
this is a story
which is about
us.
The parable
explains
where every
person
sitting here
in church
tonight
it explains
where we sit
with regard
to Jesus.
No exception
I'm in this
parable
and you're
in this
parable.
The seed
is good
Jesus
is good
his word
is good
it's powerful
in its own
right.
John tells
us that
the word
became flesh
and camped
amongst us.
The writer
of Hebrews
says the
word of God
is living
and active
stronger than
any double
edged sword
it penetrates
even to
dividing soul
and spirit
joints and
marrow
it judges
the thoughts
and attitudes
of the heart.
And so
Jesus says
to us
we've got to
listen to him
and he's
really saying
to us
we must pay
very careful
attention to him
and what he
has to say.
And he's
saying that
how we
respond to
him is
how God
will determine
how fruitful
your life
is from
God's
point of
view.
See
God
views
success
and
fruitfulness
in a
very
different
way
than
the
world.
He's
not
looking
for
long
and
impressive
CVs
and
PhDs
and big
bank
balances
and property
portfolios
and
legacies.
God
might
allow us
to have
some of
those things
as we
age and
mature
or whatever
it is
but
fruitfulness
will be
seen
in a
life
which is
rich
in walking
with Jesus
and trusting
him.
A life
of faith
a life
where he
impacts
who we
are
and
everything
we
do.
People
who are
impacted
by Jesus
Christ
to our
core.
So what
are the
four responses
to the
spoken
word of
God?
Verse
15
some
people
are like
seed
along
the
path
where
the
word
is
sown
and
as
soon
as
they
hear
it
Satan
comes
and
takes
away
the
word
that
was
sown
in
them.
He's
really
saying
to us
that
some
people
are
hard
paths
with
hard
hearts.
They
hear
the
word.
There's
no
response.
There's
no
interest.
It's
like a
male in
our
family.
You
know,
me or
my son
or one
of us
sitting in
the lounge
room with
the remote
control in
our hand
and Kerry's
calling us
to dinner
and the
word goes
out and
nothing
happens in
response.
It's
ignored.
And it's
saying to
us that
people like
that have
no reason
to even
think that
there's a
God that
they need
to respond
to.
There
can be
people
talking
around
them all
the time
about
God and
who he
is and
what they
believe about
him but
they don't
even notice
because they
are not
even prepared
to go to
first base.
And
Jesus
describes them
as the
ones from
whom Satan
comes and
snatches it
away and
God's
judgment day
will come and
they will be
like,
oh did you
say something?
Why didn't
you warn
me?
In
2 Corinthians
chapter 4
it says
the God
of this
age has
blinded the
minds of
unbelievers
so that
they cannot
see the
light of
the gospel
of the
glory of
Christ who
is the
image of
God.
They are
deaf and
blind to
God's
saving
truth.
The
second
group of
verse 16
others like
seeds sown on
rocky places
hear the
word and at
once receive
it with
joy but
since they
have no
root they
only last a
short time and
when trouble
or persecution
comes because
of the word
they quickly
fall away.
These are
people they
make a great
beginning but
they don't go
anywhere.
They come to
church, they
come to youth
group, they
get involved in
a group or
a small group
or a bible
study, something
like that and
they say oh
how fantastic
everything is and
they are even
joyful about
what they have
begun to
experience.
they seem
like they
want to get
involved and
then they're
just gone.
And it's
almost as
though they
were never
here.
It worked
for a
while, it
was a
great
experience for
a time and
then they
just moved
on.
People
encounter
Jesus, they
hear his
word, they
become convinced
of the truth
of it, they
want to
respond and
then the
implications
start to
weigh really
heavily.
it might
make a
difference to
my living
arrangements or
my relationships.
They can
see that it
might impact
Sunday or
discretionary
time it
has.
In some
places they
might think
it's going to
lead me into
persecution, I'm
going to be in
strife at work,
I'm going to
lose opportunity
for advancement.
And what they
start to see is
that God is
getting in the
way of the
life that they
have mapped out
for themselves
and they just
fizzle.
They are not
prepared to
bear the
cost.
But the
third group of
hearers are the
most disturbing
from a local
church point of
view and I
guess for us
tonight.
It says in
verse 18,
still others
like seeds
sown among
thorns hear
the word but
the worries of
this life, the
deceitfulness of
wealth and the
desires for other
things come in
and choke the
word making it
unfruitful.
And this is the
really sad one
because if you
could just strip
away the weeds
and strip away
the thorn plants,
these plants look
pretty good.
I said this
morning they
look really good
and they're quite
magnificent but I
actually think I'm
probably wrong.
They look pretty
green and they
look okay but
they're not as
good as what
they could be.
They're lush,
they're well
cultivated, they're
fed, they're very
fine botanical
specimens.
And whether it's
an individual or
whether it's a
whole church,
these people can
look pretty good.
This church can
look pretty good if
it's full of
people like this.
But they're
massively flawed.
They don't
reproduce.
There is no
fruit.
These people
grew, they
choked, they
don't come to
fruitful maturity
because they're
choked out by
weeds and
thorns.
Get this, they
understood the
word of Jesus,
it began to
change them,
other things
took over,
look at what
they got
choked by,
they got
choked by
worries of
life, deceitfulness
of wealth,
desire for
other things.
And they
didn't suddenly
get choked,
weeds and
thorns grew
amongst the
good plants.
In another
place Jesus
told a different
parable where
an enemy of
the farmer
came along and
he sowed weeds
into a good
crop, he
intentionally
tried to
ruin it.
I don't
think most
of us
intentionally
try to
ruin our
response to
Jesus'
command to
listen.
We just
try to
listen to
too many
different
voices at
the same
time.
We want
to prosper
in our
work, that's
a good
thing, we'd
like to be
successful in
business, that's
a good thing,
we want our
kids to
achieve at
school, that's
a good thing,
but it
becomes a
two masters
sort of thing
because, and
Jesus says to
us things like
no one can
serve two
masters, he'll
love one and
hate the other
or vice versa.
And so we
tell kids, some
of us as
parents have
told our kids
things like,
well you've
got to listen
to that voice
at school
because school
is what's
going to open
up opportunity
into the
future and
that will
unlock the
keys to
career and
therefore income
and wealth
and wellbeing.
And if you
do the thing
properly at
school through
the week, then
I just might
let you go to
youth group on
Friday night.
I have a
wealthy friend
really interested
in Jesus as
a young adult.
His dad always
had great
ambition for
him.
He lived to
please his
earthly father
and himself.
He went
after money,
he got it,
he's felt its
power and he's
used its power
to intimidate
other people.
He went
after sex,
he got it,
had choked
his relationship
with the Lord
Jesus and
he has been
fruitless in
terms of
God's kingdom
and its
values ever
since.
Churches can
be full of
people who
have choked,
churches are
full of people
who profess
faith in
Christ and
bear very
little fruit
for it.
I had quite a
wonderful
conversation after
church this
morning, a
man came to
me and he
said, don't
just tell people
the negatives,
tell people the
positives about
this, he
said, I was
a man who
had choked.
He came from
a church up
the north shore
of Sydney, he
said, I was
wealthy, I was
successful in my
business, I was
starting to think
about the Audi
that I deserved
to drive.
He said, I'd
walk down the
street and look
in the real
estate agent's
windows at the
next house that
I might move
to.
I had a
Christian heart,
my Christian
heart I wanted
to be a
Christian
philanthropist,
you know,
that means
somebody who
gives away
lots of money.
And he
said, my
plan was to
make the
first two or
three million
for myself to
set myself up
and then
everything else
that came in
later I'd just
give to the
Lord.
And he
said, I
had no
joy in
the thorns,
no joy.
And he
said, God
brought me to
a point where
I had to
acknowledge that
I was living
for me and
not for him
and I had to
relinquish some
of my dreams
and ambitions.
And he
said, guess
what I got?
joy.
I got joy
and my life
started to
become fruitful
for the Lord
Jesus.
And he told me
this morning that
he now works as
a lay minister in
his church, not
that everybody's
got to do
that.
But he said,
to say to
people, if I
preach this again,
to say that
when we give up,
we give up our
idols because God
gives us something
much better.
That's the
motivator.
God gives us
joy when we
submit to him
and yield to
him in terms
of his
purposes.
I went to a
conference the
other day and
the speaker said
that we have
churches full of
consumers.
And I don't
think I'm talking
to you like that
tonight, but I'm
using it as an
example.
He said,
sometimes in
churches people
are like Russian
ice skating
judges.
They hold up
scorecards.
So let's
give Nick and
the Musos an
eight for the
music tonight.
But if it
drops below
five or six,
we're out of
here.
We're going to
another church.
Maybe the
preaching's a
7.5, but we
really expect
nine in this
church.
Our preaching's
good preaching.
And the
speaker was
urging us to
listen to the
voice of the
Lord Jesus and
to act on what
he said to
us and to
move us into
mission mode and
to bear fruit.
The last word
that the Lord
Jesus spoke to
his disciples
before he went
back into
heaven, he
said, all
authority in
heaven on
earth has been
given to me.
Go into all
the world and
make disciples,
baptising them
in the name of
the Father and
the Son and
of the Holy
Spirit, and I
am with you
always to the
very end of
the age.
Now the man
speaking to us
the other day
was not a
young man or
a hot gun or
anything like
that.
He was 70
years old,
and he
said to us
very plainly
that he is,
and I quote,
this is his
quote,
damned angry
with people
and churches
that do not
give a damn
about people
who are
currently damned
by God.
He said that
with some
feeling.
The last place
the word is
planted is in
good soil.
Verse 20,
others like
seed sown on
good soil hear
the word,
accept it,
and produce a
crop 30,
60, or even
100 times what
was sown.
Jesus is
fruitful in the
lives of people
who don't just
hear his word,
but also take it
to heart and
accept it.
And I think
when I think
about fruitfulness,
I'm thinking
broad acceptance,
broad change,
broad fruitfulness,
lives which
overflow with
the fruit of
God's spirit,
love, joy,
peace, patience,
kindness,
gentleness,
self-control,
lives which
have mission-hearted
care and concern
for people that
we know who
don't know the
Lord Jesus.
People who are
unashamed to
go to school or
to go to uni or
to go to work and
say, yes, I
believe in Jesus
Christ as Lord.
Not necessarily
like that, but
however is
appropriate in a
place that you
find yourself.
Churches full of
people who are
impacting others
with the very
good word of
the very good
Lord Jesus
Christ.
I'm not sure
how you judge
yourself tonight,
where you fit in
this spectrum of
responses to
Jesus' word,
and I want you to
judge yourself,
I don't want you
to judge others,
because in telling
this story,
Jesus makes it
very clear that
there is only one
response that he's
looking for,
and it's the
response which
bears lots of
fruit joyfully.
And he says,
listen intently
to him.
And I think I
want to say to
you tonight that
if you haven't
been listening or
you haven't known
how to listen,
you can change.
You can move from
a wrong response to
the right one very
simply, really.
Haven't been
listening at all,
been excited, but
that was a long
time ago.
Got stale in
church with too
many competing
voices, too
many masters.
Jesus invites us
to begin again
today to listen
very intently to
his voice, to
seek after his
kingdom, to
pursue his
righteousness, to
become very
fruitful in God's
hands in a way
which will bring
him much glory
and bring you
much joy.
If that's
something that
you would like to
begin afresh today,
tonight, then I'm
saying to you I'm
going to stay down
here with one or
two others at the
end of the service
and I would love to
pray with you in
making that sort of
commitment and
beginning again with
the Lord Jesus.
Amen.