And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprung up, and choked them:
Some fell among thorns means the word of God is truly sown in the heart and springs up, yet is smothered so it yields no harvest and forms no complete Christian character unto eternal life. The thorns are worldly cares and anxieties, the pursuit of gain and deceitfulness of riches, and love of earthly pleasures and honors crowding out the word until there is no room for heavenly things. They are also sins and selfishness growing naturally beside grace, with covetousness which is idolatry, perverted teachings and traditions obscuring Scripture, and doubt sown by the enemy taking deep root until the life is not controlled by heavenly influence. Thorny hearers need not remain so, for the heart can be reclaimed by repentance and diligent labor in Jesus’ strength, breaking up the soil and uprooting evil tendencies at the roots so cherished truth cleanses from sin and bears fruit.
Parable Setting and Purpose
This verse belongs to the parable of the sower illustrating the kingdom of heaven and the sowing of the gospel seed of truth. The same laws that govern sowing seed in the earth govern the sowing of truth, and earthly facts of daily life in sowing and reaping illustrate heavenly truth. In the parable the teaching is heavenly seed that those who desire light and knowledge may gather as treasure, and the mind is led from the natural world to spiritual realities. God is at work in nature to make the truths of the kingdom plain, and Christ who came from heaven gives light on that law in material and spiritual seed-sowing. Learning from Him is higher education, throwing back the reflection of heavenly light not on human beings but on Christ, with glory given to the One who came to enlighten every man that comes into the world.
It was spoken to an eager company gathered to hear by the Sea of Galilee, and taught outdoors from the surrounding scene. It uses familiar field work, soil and grain, and everyday objects to make divine truth clear, memorable, and appealing to people of every class. Seeing those everyday objects would bring the teaching back to mind, and thorny ground and its growth served as an emblem through which divine truth was taught. The sower's parable applied broadly to its hearers.
The parable sets out the tendencies of the human heart and the different kinds of people taught, showing how different hearts receive the teaching. It explains why the ministry had limited immediate results, when people were disappointed that a political kingdom was not established and many rejected the Redeemer. Human response is a matter of choice, for belief and obedience were not forced, and understanding the kingdom requires openness to instruction and willingness to believe. The gospel is sown as good seed in the hearts of hearers but bears no fruit because the soil was not prepared, and under opposition where evil angels in the form of men mingle with hearers to suggest, criticize, misapply, misinterpret and misconstrue words of life until hearts are not moved, truth presented in parables could rebuke sin without causing personal offense. Though many hear and refuse to heed, the warning is still to be given to all in clear plain tones in public assemblies and by house-to-house work, with heavenly angels as companions to resist the enemy's attacks on those cooperating with God. The parable applies to all.
Christ Himself is the sower scattering the heavenly grain of His doctrines in the field, a sower from a higher world going forth to sow the world with the seed of truth. The seed is the truths contained in the Scriptures, grand, elevating, uplifting and ennobling and graced with such simplicity that they could not possibly have originated in any human mind. His parable teaching is sown with the most precious doctrines of His grace, and His similitudes from nature are God-given lessons teaching principles of His working in the spiritual kingdom. These doctrines are like precious jewels requiring clear spiritual eyesight to discern and gather up and constant searching to master, for truth is hidden from those who do not take pains to seek and dig for it as for hidden treasure. Precious gems are passed by when their value is not discerned, but truth searched out below the surface by a student who puts the mind to the tax instead of remaining satisfied with surface truths is planted as heavenly seed, and the teaching of the Word holds a beautiful harmony beyond ordinary searching that rewards digging with wonderful development. These truths must be cherished if the lost image of God is to be restored and loyalty to God restored, and this higher education alone prepares students for the higher school where Christ and God will be teachers and where throughout eternity they will learn how best to magnify and glorify God's name.
Seed Thorns and Choking Defined
The seed is the word of God, the principles of Bible truth sown in the heart and mind, and its growth is the development of character. The heart is a garden that must be prepared for the seed of truth just as soil must be prepared for natural seed, and the correspondence between natural sowing and spiritual sowing is to be made practical, even by having children prepare soil and sow seed while learning of the garden of the heart and watching the plant grow. That truth has in itself a germinating principle, yet it becomes fruitful only as it receives sunshine and living water from the Source of truth. The truth itself softens the soil of the heart so that it is ready to receive the seed continually and yield a harvest, and some hearts show this readiness by a tendency to grow upward.
Thorny soil is hearts in which evil growths and evil tendencies prevent the word from developing, like a garden of the heart overgrown with weeds where good grain is the seed of truth. The mind is like soil, especially receptive in early life when good seed planted can bear fruit unto eternal life, but competing influences can choke what is sown and keep it from bearing fruit. Seed falling among thorns is truth received into a heart where worldly concerns and other competing influences grow up and choke its life and fruitfulness. The outcome of the seed is revealed in the heart and life, where thorns and brambles may overcome it instead of letting it take root and bear good fruit.
Thorny-ground hearers receive the gospel at first and feel its appeal with new purpose, but its influence is smothered by worldly cares, temptations, and unfavorable surroundings when they reenter the world, leading them back to indifference and to sins they had recognized as wrong. People may be impressed without fully understanding the truth or obeying it, yet when the light of truth becomes clear the honest break free and take their stand for God. So it was with Nicodemus, in whom for three years truth showed little apparent fruit while he weighed Christ's claims, watched His life and works, and remained deeply interested without opposition.
Seed falling among thorns springs up but is choked so that it brings no returns and bears no fruit, showing how the good seed of truth can be crowded out and made unfruitful. In this condition some hearers do not bring forth fruit unto eternal life, and the different soils illustrate the varied experiences of those who labor to sow gospel truth, whose message may be rejected and bring condemnation rather than salvation. This failure stands in contrast to seed on good ground that springs up and bears abundant fruit, while the same choking that yields no fruit also pictures enterprises begun without sufficient thought that consume without producing and create burdens of debt.
Influences That Choke the Word
The word is choked when worldly cares and the deceitfulness of riches crowd the heart, with anxiety about gaining or keeping money, deceitful dealings, pursuit of gain, and putting temporal affairs first leaving no room for heavenly things. Attachment to possessions, business, and selfish interests overgrows the heart and overpowers the call of truth so the hearer remains unfruitful. Even intended liberality fades as riches increase, turning the heart from truth once loved, and spending the Lord's money on pride or selfish indulgence extinguishes love for the seed. Fruit comes only when truth is cherished, weeds are uprooted, objectionable traits overcome, and the heart kept under God's control through moral transformation and abandonment of sinful habits.
Love of earthly pleasures and worldly honors, the spirit of the world, indifference, spiritual sloth, and careless choices crowd out spiritual life and leave a person unprepared to bear faithful Christian character. Worldly desires used for self-glorification, power, and riches, as when Israel used its advantages to bless self instead of honoring God, keep warnings and instruction from producing obedience and good fruit. Truth so received has no saving, sanctifying effect when worldly affections are not withdrawn, failing to produce zealous action, and such pleasure-loving influence can lead others away from God.
The thorns are perverted character and errors that have taken deep root and must be removed at the roots for truth to take hold. They are perverted teachings cherished as truth, traditions and interpretations obscuring Scripture's plain meaning and robbing the word of power, books mixing skepticism with Scripture, seeds of doubt growing to infidelity, and seeds of evil insinuation and weakened confidence that later move hearers to turn others away. Satan guards the errors he has sown so they grow and eclipse truth, and when pointed testimony is withheld evil besetments flourish, heavenly graces die out, and sin and error become harder to root out. Truth must therefore be presented plainly and in contrast with error, like a plowshare removing thorns by the roots, so error is recognized and discarded.
Thorns are also sins growing naturally and spontaneously alongside the tender plants of heavenly grace, which thrives only by careful cultivation. Every species of selfishness and covetousness, which is idolatry, must be kept from the mind so grace may rule, captivate with contemplation of God, and work God's works. Thorn tops may be cut off while roots stay living, suppressed yet never fully uprooted through yielding to temptation, ready to send up shoots when indulged until indulgence lets them grow unchecked, shade the heavenly plants, occupy the field, and show the life is not controlled by heavenly influence. Cherished sins must thus be separated from the soul lest they choke the good seed.
The seed is choked by inattention and distraction during preaching, which may cause hearers to miss reforming words that would keep them from straying. Hearing sermon after sermon while other things crowd into the mind leaves only a few points that lose force, and truth sown in a preoccupied heart cannot take root or bring life-giving power. The enemy's suggestions and insinuations, evil influences misapplying Christ's words, and opposition or lack of cultivating care after sowing rob the words of life of force and keep planted truth from bearing fruit. The soil must be prepared and truths for eternal interest planted point by point so the seed springs up instead of being choked.
A self-exalting, condemning attitude makes the heart unproductive soil where heavenly truth cannot take root, choking hope and courage. This was seen in the Pharisees' cherished feeling of superiority, exalted self claiming faith, honor, and love, supposing others at fault, thinking evil and suspecting the purest, speaking strong hard words of reproof that crush the soul, making a man an offender for a word, and growing roots of bitterness whereby many are defiled when confronted with true Christian goodness. A neglected, uncultivated mind likewise becomes overgrown, where ignorance and evil choke out good and even natural abilities become means of ruin. Fictitious reading and storybooks preoccupy the field, captivate thought into a wrong channel, and leave no prepared soil for God's impress, while trashy exciting tales feed the choking growth and sensible reading that throws light on Scripture quickens desire to study Bible story, history, and argument and helps the good seed live.
Knowing or professing truth without changed thoughts and character shows the seed has not taken root for lack of faith working through love, leaving the person unconverted. Many receive truth only partly with half sympathy, appear to take Christ's side, then turn away when obedience requires self-denial such as paying tithes, sacrificing all for Christ, moral courage against the world and unbelieving relatives, or standing trial on returning home. In that half-hearted state Satan sows his seed to hinder, perplex, burden, choke, and destroy the good, while practicing truth that cleanses the heart from sin, searching the heart by God's law, and promptly uprooting every defect give thorns no chance.
The sowing work itself is hindered when its agents cherish choking thorns of fretting, contention, unbelief, sluggish spiritual senses, self-indulgence, and needless adorning, making efforts feeble and disqualifying for labor. Grasping for high wages and extravagant use of means weaken good influence, while self-denial, economy, spending less on self, using the Lord's money for His cause, and training children to missionary offering allow more workers to sow. Restaurant and mission work that gathers large numbers at too low a price without fortifying souls against temptation, without well-defined methods to save patrons and helpers, and without encouraging helpers that they are doing God's service leaves them indifferent and exerts influence against truth, so numbers are no true evidence of success and sowing truth must be first. Truth may thus spring up and promise a harvest yet be choked, as when Josiah removed idolatrous shrines but unchanged hearts returned to backsliding toward disaster, showing loyalty to God was necessary for favor and prosperity.
Reclaiming and Preparing the Heart
Thorny hearers need not remain thorny, for the Spirit seeks to free them from absorption in worldly things, yet by resisting the Spirit they become inattentive to and neglectful of the word and are themselves responsible for the hardness and evil growths that check its rooting and development. The soil can be reclaimed through repentance and diligent labor in the name and strength of Jesus, by earnest effort cooperating with God in intelligent harmony of the divine and the human. That work must uproot evil tendencies and evil growths at their roots rather than merely cutting back their tops.
The heart is garden soil that must be prepared to receive the good seed from the Sower, and unless the Spirit works upon it to refine and discipline it, it cannot bring forth fruit. Hardened soil must be broken up and subdued by painstaking, skillful plowing and harrowing, for where the soil has not been under plow and harrow the seed fails to produce a harvest. Uncultivated land does not yield a harvest at once, and surface work and haphazard half-effort reveal themselves in the harvest that is garnered. Awakening to danger from sin, conviction of sin, and a sense of need break up the heart and prepare a person to seek healing. Those who watch for souls are to apply the farming lesson with all discernment, knowing that as students working the land are themselves God's husbandry and part of the Lord's farm, so hearts needing much more labor must have it bestowed upon them with skillful planting preparatory to harvest.
The seed bears fruit when truth is cherished and practiced and allowed, under God's control, to cleanse the heart from sin, with objectionable traits overcome and sinful habits abandoned. Cherished sins must be separated from the soul lest they choke the growth of the good seed, for without moral transformation the weeds overgrow and kill the wheat and leave the hearer unfruitful. The heart must be searched by God's law so that every defect is promptly uprooted and cares, riches, and pleasures are removed and given no chance to grow. Receiving truth only partly, with appearance of taking Christ's side but turning away when obedience requires self-denial such as paying tithes, shows the truth has not been truly received unto conversion.
Believers must be taught the foundations of Christian life: living Christ's life and character, bearing burdens, denying natural inclination, serving in self-denial, and enduring hardship. Working for Christ and caring for the lost turn the heart from self and weaken the world's power to attract or discourage, so that worldly cares and attractions do not stifle the gospel. Truth is to be presented in love after the heart has been won, in dignified, godlike manner of heavenly birth that gives character to its influence, with practical godliness woven into doctrinal discourses and with great care in how it is set before minds. Personal ministry, acquaintance gained by humble teachable labor, hospitality of effort, publications and papers preparing the reading class, and regular prayer meetings soften and subdue even hard hearts so the seed can take root instead of being lost for lack of cultivation.
Tilling the soil pictures God's work in the human heart to have truth sown there so the life bears the beautiful fruit of the Spirit. His impress upon the mind molds crude physical and mental energies into graceful symmetry for the Master's service, training life and character to produce precious fruit for the benefit of all. The kingdom's truth has a germinating principle, yet like the tender plant it needs sunshine and living water from the Source of truth, with sunshine and shower, summer and winter, dew, frost, and wind, to develop and bear fruit. All who receive the word into good and honest hearts will reap if they faint not, for Christian character is formed by the grace of Christ. What is sown will be reaped again in its kind, whether seed for harvest or trees for rich fruit, so sowing in hope and faith even on unpromising missionary ground will not disappoint but will yield spiritual and eternal results.
Sowing Everywhere and Waiting for Fruit
Poor soil never justifies stopping the work, for the parable of the sower pictures both Christ's own work and the work of His servants scattering the seed of truth everywhere even when no immediate result appears. The sowing is not to be confined to planned classes or expected ways and places but is to follow the Lord's own plan, reaching highways and byways, rough places, cities and neglected fields, so that multiplied seed may reach thousands who never heard. As Christ sowed wherever He went, so His followers are to witness wherever they go, sowing among people in every kind of setting. In the Southern field this brings a divided response, for many harden their hearts against conviction while many hungry for the bread of life receive the message and then go forth themselves to sow for others, and through humble workers, new institutions and overcoming indifference the work advances.
Much sowing seems fruitless for a time because the precious seed may lie dormant in a cold worldly heart until God's grace convicts and awakens it to spring up and bear fruit to His glory. Sowers must therefore work carefully, perseveringly and unselfishly, with care, anxiety, self-denial and continual sacrifice for others' good after Christ's example, trusting God to quicken the seed into life and not becoming weary in well-doing. The outcome is not always immediately visible, for seed may remain hidden before it springs up through the Spirit's work, and truth may take longer to germinate yet grow surely, as in Britain's hard cold soil. So it was when pointed words spoken in the temple cut hearers to the heart yet did not show effect at once, springing up afterward after the crucifixion and resurrection when lessons were revived in attentive listeners who repeated them for future generations to the close of time, saving many souls.
Sowing restores the image of God in man when true medical missionaries carry in one hand remedies for physical suffering and in the other the gospel for sin-burdened souls, planting truth in many hearts. Hygienic restaurants with connected rooms for lectures on health, temperance and wholesome food, with prayer, singing and Bible subjects, provide many opportunities to sow the gospel seed of the kingdom while teaching preservation of physical health. The way is prepared by meeting people where they are without sacrificing principle, by brief interesting prayer and social worship that builds confidence, makes patients feel at home, weakens prejudice and works by silent influence rather than open controversy. Pressing denominational terms such as the Sabbath and the third angel's message on minds that do not understand them without clear explanation only harms and hinders the seed, while in the house of God essential points of present truth are to be dwelt upon with clearness and obedience urged in love and tenderness so truth can convict hearts; in the same manner well-trained nurses going among families and evangelists and Bible workers in cities such as Boston and New Bedford awaken interest, and a physician's gentle care with religious counsel plants truth in the suffering heart.
Preaching the Word is sowing seed, illustrating the rise and progress of the work that follows, and after sowing the work continues through the Spirit's power so the harvest can be gathered. Truth springs up and bears fruit when Christ the Saviour and His redeeming love are presented, whereas preaching theory alone leaves hearers unwon. The seed is sown into hearts through gentle courteous conversation even in ordinary settings, through books containing light and valuable spiritual lessons, and through teaching people how to share the message. It is sown where the light never shone, as by using a boat as home and meeting place where novelty excites curiosity and many come to see and hear and some first see the light, and more broadly by personal house-to-house labor, hospitality such as meals for inquirers, words of consolation and hope, Christian teaching and singing, neighborhood meetings, and clear attention and order that prepare outsiders to obey.
The chapter stands as a warning to heed Christ's teaching and be ready to stand acquitted at the judgment, for worldly cares and pursuit of gain crowd out Christian life and faith. Those saved must form characters without fault, without spot or stain before a pure and holy God, each doing God-given work while cooperating with Christ, wearing His yoke and learning His meekness and lowliness, since every man will be judged according to deeds done in this life and no human sophistry or mocking of sacred things must blind the mind. Those called to sow must have the mind of Christ, leaving familiar ties and earthly hopes to labor in toil, tears, solitude and sacrifice. The harvest appears after the ascension when the Spirit equipped the apostles to gather fruit, in former-rain growth at the Christian era's start helping seed germinate and take root, and in truth scattering widely despite persecution, as when the truth Huss preached was thought destroyed with him yet his ashes became as seed producing many witnesses.
Teaching Children and Guarding Mind
Children's hearts are soil for the great Sower to scatter with the seeds of truth, and that soil must be prepared from the earliest years rather than left to competing growths that choke the seed as it grows. This preparing work belongs to parents themselves, who are to educate their children for usefulness and bring them up in home nurture and admonition with the Word of God as the standard instead of the fashions of the world. Mothers are to make this education the highest aim of life, keeping young children with them and leading them to cheerful, willing obedience, since future happiness depends on early training, and when done bravely and cheerfully without fainting this preparation brings a harvest of Christian men and Christian women. Parents are to be the best teachers of little children and not trust the molding of the infant mind to other hands, keeping them home from school until eight or ten years old and making the schoolroom the open air amid flowers and birds. Their textbook is to be the treasure of nature, God's great book of nature opened before children as fast as their minds can comprehend it, so the lessons will not soon be forgotten. Such preparation takes great pains and time and labor, and if half the time and labor now worse than wasted in following worldly fashion were devoted to cultivating children's minds and forming correct habits, a marked change would appear in families. Neglect of this early heart-preparation is unfaithful stewardship, while early instruction planted in a prepared heart produces good fruit and is remembered, with lessons taught to one child also benefiting another. Children's Bible lessons are seeds of Bible truth falling into the soil of the heart and making impressions on both children and parents, yet thorny ground warns that this sowing must contend with what can choke the seed before it bears fruit.
In a boy the seed sown in the heart is parental teaching of truth, candor, obedience and right plans, and the thorns and briers that spring up and choke it are habits of disobedience, strong self-will, secret plans, concealment from parents, deception and falsehood. Even departures from truth called little trifles are not trifles, for every violation of conscience hardens it and binds the transgressor more firmly as a captive under Satan's control. Cherished secret notions kept when opposed, outward compliance with inward rebellion, and long indulgence in concealment, prevarication and self-justifying grow into rank weeds that choke the precious plants of candor and truth. That growth makes character habitually secretive, unstable, unsatisfactory and insincere, and in youth fixes the traits of riper years. A child's heart as a seed plot becomes a field of thorns and briers when a father's care and love are withdrawn where they are doubly needed, robbing tender plants that might have grown beautiful for heaven of nourishment and leaving them to harmful circumstances that make the bad worse and weaken good impulses that love and wisdom could have developed. Then a blight falls upon young lives that leaves them deformed in character and not favorable subjects to educate and train. The weeds of natural imperfection in children's hearts must therefore be removed through parents' unceasing, wise and vigilant correction.
Teachers are sowers and students' minds are the ground where the precious seeds of truth must be sown, with the seed as the Word of God for food, the glorious truths concerning the life of Christ the Great Teacher, and the elevated standard of virtue and holiness placed before all in the gospel. Sowing must be done after the order of the teaching of Jesus Christ as the standard Teacher, by souls transformed by His grace and minds absorbed in meditating His life and following Him to the very letter, to prepare students to be transformed to the higher grade. Teachers must not sow with pen or voice their own ideas and plans and imaginings and schemes and ambitions and likes and dislikes as if essential, nor exalt as all-essential what Christ never taught, giving such things no standing room before students. Hearts of Sabbath-school scholars are soil in which teachers may sow heavenly seed, requiring patient sowing despite stubbornness and resistance even where the choking by thorns is not explained. Students themselves can sow seeds that produce precious grain rather than thorns, since school life is a favorable time to live by God's law and Christ's saving grace, with choices and influence helping lead others toward Jesus. Truth is to be taught plainly and repeated so it takes hold and continues through the Spirit to a harvest for eternal life, and likewise a physician's gentle care and religious counsel give opportunity to plant truth in a suffering person's heart where other influences might otherwise choke it.
Some fell among thorns means the word of God is truly sown in the heart and springs up, yet is smothered so it yields no harvest and forms no complete Christian character unto eternal life.
The thorns are worldly cares and anxieties, the pursuit of gain and deceitfulness of riches, and love of earthly pleasures and honors crowding out the word until there is no room for heavenly things.
They are also sins and selfishness growing naturally beside grace, with covetousness which is idolatry, perverted teachings and traditions obscuring Scripture, and doubt sown by the enemy taking deep root until the life is not controlled by heavenly influence.
Thorny hearers need not remain so, for the heart can be reclaimed by repentance and diligent labor in Jesus’ strength, breaking up the soil and uprooting evil tendencies at the roots so cherished truth cleanses from sin and bears fruit.
Parable Setting and Purpose
This verse belongs to the parable of the sower illustrating the kingdom of heaven and the sowing of the gospel seed of truth. The same laws that govern sowing seed in the earth govern the sowing of truth, and earthly facts of daily life in sowing and reaping illustrate heavenly truth. In the parable the teaching is heavenly seed that those who desire light and knowledge may gather as treasure, and the mind is led from the natural world to spiritual realities. God is at work in nature to make the truths of the kingdom plain, and Christ who came from heaven gives light on that law in material and spiritual seed-sowing. Learning from Him is higher education, throwing back the reflection of heavenly light not on human beings but on Christ, with glory given to the One who came to enlighten every man that comes into the world.
It was spoken to an eager company gathered to hear by the Sea of Galilee, and taught outdoors from the surrounding scene. It uses familiar field work, soil and grain, and everyday objects to make divine truth clear, memorable, and appealing to people of every class. Seeing those everyday objects would bring the teaching back to mind, and thorny ground and its growth served as an emblem through which divine truth was taught. The sower's parable applied broadly to its hearers.
The parable sets out the tendencies of the human heart and the different kinds of people taught, showing how different hearts receive the teaching. It explains why the ministry had limited immediate results, when people were disappointed that a political kingdom was not established and many rejected the Redeemer. Human response is a matter of choice, for belief and obedience were not forced, and understanding the kingdom requires openness to instruction and willingness to believe. The gospel is sown as good seed in the hearts of hearers but bears no fruit because the soil was not prepared, and under opposition where evil angels in the form of men mingle with hearers to suggest, criticize, misapply, misinterpret and misconstrue words of life until hearts are not moved, truth presented in parables could rebuke sin without causing personal offense. Though many hear and refuse to heed, the warning is still to be given to all in clear plain tones in public assemblies and by house-to-house work, with heavenly angels as companions to resist the enemy's attacks on those cooperating with God. The parable applies to all.
Christ Himself is the sower scattering the heavenly grain of His doctrines in the field, a sower from a higher world going forth to sow the world with the seed of truth. The seed is the truths contained in the Scriptures, grand, elevating, uplifting and ennobling and graced with such simplicity that they could not possibly have originated in any human mind. His parable teaching is sown with the most precious doctrines of His grace, and His similitudes from nature are God-given lessons teaching principles of His working in the spiritual kingdom. These doctrines are like precious jewels requiring clear spiritual eyesight to discern and gather up and constant searching to master, for truth is hidden from those who do not take pains to seek and dig for it as for hidden treasure. Precious gems are passed by when their value is not discerned, but truth searched out below the surface by a student who puts the mind to the tax instead of remaining satisfied with surface truths is planted as heavenly seed, and the teaching of the Word holds a beautiful harmony beyond ordinary searching that rewards digging with wonderful development. These truths must be cherished if the lost image of God is to be restored and loyalty to God restored, and this higher education alone prepares students for the higher school where Christ and God will be teachers and where throughout eternity they will learn how best to magnify and glorify God's name.
Seed Thorns and Choking Defined
The seed is the word of God, the principles of Bible truth sown in the heart and mind, and its growth is the development of character. The heart is a garden that must be prepared for the seed of truth just as soil must be prepared for natural seed, and the correspondence between natural sowing and spiritual sowing is to be made practical, even by having children prepare soil and sow seed while learning of the garden of the heart and watching the plant grow. That truth has in itself a germinating principle, yet it becomes fruitful only as it receives sunshine and living water from the Source of truth. The truth itself softens the soil of the heart so that it is ready to receive the seed continually and yield a harvest, and some hearts show this readiness by a tendency to grow upward.
Thorny soil is hearts in which evil growths and evil tendencies prevent the word from developing, like a garden of the heart overgrown with weeds where good grain is the seed of truth. The mind is like soil, especially receptive in early life when good seed planted can bear fruit unto eternal life, but competing influences can choke what is sown and keep it from bearing fruit. Seed falling among thorns is truth received into a heart where worldly concerns and other competing influences grow up and choke its life and fruitfulness. The outcome of the seed is revealed in the heart and life, where thorns and brambles may overcome it instead of letting it take root and bear good fruit.
Thorny-ground hearers receive the gospel at first and feel its appeal with new purpose, but its influence is smothered by worldly cares, temptations, and unfavorable surroundings when they reenter the world, leading them back to indifference and to sins they had recognized as wrong. People may be impressed without fully understanding the truth or obeying it, yet when the light of truth becomes clear the honest break free and take their stand for God. So it was with Nicodemus, in whom for three years truth showed little apparent fruit while he weighed Christ's claims, watched His life and works, and remained deeply interested without opposition.
Seed falling among thorns springs up but is choked so that it brings no returns and bears no fruit, showing how the good seed of truth can be crowded out and made unfruitful. In this condition some hearers do not bring forth fruit unto eternal life, and the different soils illustrate the varied experiences of those who labor to sow gospel truth, whose message may be rejected and bring condemnation rather than salvation. This failure stands in contrast to seed on good ground that springs up and bears abundant fruit, while the same choking that yields no fruit also pictures enterprises begun without sufficient thought that consume without producing and create burdens of debt.
Influences That Choke the Word
The word is choked when worldly cares and the deceitfulness of riches crowd the heart, with anxiety about gaining or keeping money, deceitful dealings, pursuit of gain, and putting temporal affairs first leaving no room for heavenly things. Attachment to possessions, business, and selfish interests overgrows the heart and overpowers the call of truth so the hearer remains unfruitful. Even intended liberality fades as riches increase, turning the heart from truth once loved, and spending the Lord's money on pride or selfish indulgence extinguishes love for the seed. Fruit comes only when truth is cherished, weeds are uprooted, objectionable traits overcome, and the heart kept under God's control through moral transformation and abandonment of sinful habits.
Love of earthly pleasures and worldly honors, the spirit of the world, indifference, spiritual sloth, and careless choices crowd out spiritual life and leave a person unprepared to bear faithful Christian character. Worldly desires used for self-glorification, power, and riches, as when Israel used its advantages to bless self instead of honoring God, keep warnings and instruction from producing obedience and good fruit. Truth so received has no saving, sanctifying effect when worldly affections are not withdrawn, failing to produce zealous action, and such pleasure-loving influence can lead others away from God.
The thorns are perverted character and errors that have taken deep root and must be removed at the roots for truth to take hold. They are perverted teachings cherished as truth, traditions and interpretations obscuring Scripture's plain meaning and robbing the word of power, books mixing skepticism with Scripture, seeds of doubt growing to infidelity, and seeds of evil insinuation and weakened confidence that later move hearers to turn others away. Satan guards the errors he has sown so they grow and eclipse truth, and when pointed testimony is withheld evil besetments flourish, heavenly graces die out, and sin and error become harder to root out. Truth must therefore be presented plainly and in contrast with error, like a plowshare removing thorns by the roots, so error is recognized and discarded.
Thorns are also sins growing naturally and spontaneously alongside the tender plants of heavenly grace, which thrives only by careful cultivation. Every species of selfishness and covetousness, which is idolatry, must be kept from the mind so grace may rule, captivate with contemplation of God, and work God's works. Thorn tops may be cut off while roots stay living, suppressed yet never fully uprooted through yielding to temptation, ready to send up shoots when indulged until indulgence lets them grow unchecked, shade the heavenly plants, occupy the field, and show the life is not controlled by heavenly influence. Cherished sins must thus be separated from the soul lest they choke the good seed.
The seed is choked by inattention and distraction during preaching, which may cause hearers to miss reforming words that would keep them from straying. Hearing sermon after sermon while other things crowd into the mind leaves only a few points that lose force, and truth sown in a preoccupied heart cannot take root or bring life-giving power. The enemy's suggestions and insinuations, evil influences misapplying Christ's words, and opposition or lack of cultivating care after sowing rob the words of life of force and keep planted truth from bearing fruit. The soil must be prepared and truths for eternal interest planted point by point so the seed springs up instead of being choked.
A self-exalting, condemning attitude makes the heart unproductive soil where heavenly truth cannot take root, choking hope and courage. This was seen in the Pharisees' cherished feeling of superiority, exalted self claiming faith, honor, and love, supposing others at fault, thinking evil and suspecting the purest, speaking strong hard words of reproof that crush the soul, making a man an offender for a word, and growing roots of bitterness whereby many are defiled when confronted with true Christian goodness. A neglected, uncultivated mind likewise becomes overgrown, where ignorance and evil choke out good and even natural abilities become means of ruin. Fictitious reading and storybooks preoccupy the field, captivate thought into a wrong channel, and leave no prepared soil for God's impress, while trashy exciting tales feed the choking growth and sensible reading that throws light on Scripture quickens desire to study Bible story, history, and argument and helps the good seed live.
Knowing or professing truth without changed thoughts and character shows the seed has not taken root for lack of faith working through love, leaving the person unconverted. Many receive truth only partly with half sympathy, appear to take Christ's side, then turn away when obedience requires self-denial such as paying tithes, sacrificing all for Christ, moral courage against the world and unbelieving relatives, or standing trial on returning home. In that half-hearted state Satan sows his seed to hinder, perplex, burden, choke, and destroy the good, while practicing truth that cleanses the heart from sin, searching the heart by God's law, and promptly uprooting every defect give thorns no chance.
The sowing work itself is hindered when its agents cherish choking thorns of fretting, contention, unbelief, sluggish spiritual senses, self-indulgence, and needless adorning, making efforts feeble and disqualifying for labor. Grasping for high wages and extravagant use of means weaken good influence, while self-denial, economy, spending less on self, using the Lord's money for His cause, and training children to missionary offering allow more workers to sow. Restaurant and mission work that gathers large numbers at too low a price without fortifying souls against temptation, without well-defined methods to save patrons and helpers, and without encouraging helpers that they are doing God's service leaves them indifferent and exerts influence against truth, so numbers are no true evidence of success and sowing truth must be first. Truth may thus spring up and promise a harvest yet be choked, as when Josiah removed idolatrous shrines but unchanged hearts returned to backsliding toward disaster, showing loyalty to God was necessary for favor and prosperity.
Reclaiming and Preparing the Heart
Thorny hearers need not remain thorny, for the Spirit seeks to free them from absorption in worldly things, yet by resisting the Spirit they become inattentive to and neglectful of the word and are themselves responsible for the hardness and evil growths that check its rooting and development. The soil can be reclaimed through repentance and diligent labor in the name and strength of Jesus, by earnest effort cooperating with God in intelligent harmony of the divine and the human. That work must uproot evil tendencies and evil growths at their roots rather than merely cutting back their tops.
The heart is garden soil that must be prepared to receive the good seed from the Sower, and unless the Spirit works upon it to refine and discipline it, it cannot bring forth fruit. Hardened soil must be broken up and subdued by painstaking, skillful plowing and harrowing, for where the soil has not been under plow and harrow the seed fails to produce a harvest. Uncultivated land does not yield a harvest at once, and surface work and haphazard half-effort reveal themselves in the harvest that is garnered. Awakening to danger from sin, conviction of sin, and a sense of need break up the heart and prepare a person to seek healing. Those who watch for souls are to apply the farming lesson with all discernment, knowing that as students working the land are themselves God's husbandry and part of the Lord's farm, so hearts needing much more labor must have it bestowed upon them with skillful planting preparatory to harvest.
The seed bears fruit when truth is cherished and practiced and allowed, under God's control, to cleanse the heart from sin, with objectionable traits overcome and sinful habits abandoned. Cherished sins must be separated from the soul lest they choke the growth of the good seed, for without moral transformation the weeds overgrow and kill the wheat and leave the hearer unfruitful. The heart must be searched by God's law so that every defect is promptly uprooted and cares, riches, and pleasures are removed and given no chance to grow. Receiving truth only partly, with appearance of taking Christ's side but turning away when obedience requires self-denial such as paying tithes, shows the truth has not been truly received unto conversion.
Believers must be taught the foundations of Christian life: living Christ's life and character, bearing burdens, denying natural inclination, serving in self-denial, and enduring hardship. Working for Christ and caring for the lost turn the heart from self and weaken the world's power to attract or discourage, so that worldly cares and attractions do not stifle the gospel. Truth is to be presented in love after the heart has been won, in dignified, godlike manner of heavenly birth that gives character to its influence, with practical godliness woven into doctrinal discourses and with great care in how it is set before minds. Personal ministry, acquaintance gained by humble teachable labor, hospitality of effort, publications and papers preparing the reading class, and regular prayer meetings soften and subdue even hard hearts so the seed can take root instead of being lost for lack of cultivation.
Tilling the soil pictures God's work in the human heart to have truth sown there so the life bears the beautiful fruit of the Spirit. His impress upon the mind molds crude physical and mental energies into graceful symmetry for the Master's service, training life and character to produce precious fruit for the benefit of all. The kingdom's truth has a germinating principle, yet like the tender plant it needs sunshine and living water from the Source of truth, with sunshine and shower, summer and winter, dew, frost, and wind, to develop and bear fruit. All who receive the word into good and honest hearts will reap if they faint not, for Christian character is formed by the grace of Christ. What is sown will be reaped again in its kind, whether seed for harvest or trees for rich fruit, so sowing in hope and faith even on unpromising missionary ground will not disappoint but will yield spiritual and eternal results.
Sowing Everywhere and Waiting for Fruit
Poor soil never justifies stopping the work, for the parable of the sower pictures both Christ's own work and the work of His servants scattering the seed of truth everywhere even when no immediate result appears. The sowing is not to be confined to planned classes or expected ways and places but is to follow the Lord's own plan, reaching highways and byways, rough places, cities and neglected fields, so that multiplied seed may reach thousands who never heard. As Christ sowed wherever He went, so His followers are to witness wherever they go, sowing among people in every kind of setting. In the Southern field this brings a divided response, for many harden their hearts against conviction while many hungry for the bread of life receive the message and then go forth themselves to sow for others, and through humble workers, new institutions and overcoming indifference the work advances.
Much sowing seems fruitless for a time because the precious seed may lie dormant in a cold worldly heart until God's grace convicts and awakens it to spring up and bear fruit to His glory. Sowers must therefore work carefully, perseveringly and unselfishly, with care, anxiety, self-denial and continual sacrifice for others' good after Christ's example, trusting God to quicken the seed into life and not becoming weary in well-doing. The outcome is not always immediately visible, for seed may remain hidden before it springs up through the Spirit's work, and truth may take longer to germinate yet grow surely, as in Britain's hard cold soil. So it was when pointed words spoken in the temple cut hearers to the heart yet did not show effect at once, springing up afterward after the crucifixion and resurrection when lessons were revived in attentive listeners who repeated them for future generations to the close of time, saving many souls.
Sowing restores the image of God in man when true medical missionaries carry in one hand remedies for physical suffering and in the other the gospel for sin-burdened souls, planting truth in many hearts. Hygienic restaurants with connected rooms for lectures on health, temperance and wholesome food, with prayer, singing and Bible subjects, provide many opportunities to sow the gospel seed of the kingdom while teaching preservation of physical health. The way is prepared by meeting people where they are without sacrificing principle, by brief interesting prayer and social worship that builds confidence, makes patients feel at home, weakens prejudice and works by silent influence rather than open controversy. Pressing denominational terms such as the Sabbath and the third angel's message on minds that do not understand them without clear explanation only harms and hinders the seed, while in the house of God essential points of present truth are to be dwelt upon with clearness and obedience urged in love and tenderness so truth can convict hearts; in the same manner well-trained nurses going among families and evangelists and Bible workers in cities such as Boston and New Bedford awaken interest, and a physician's gentle care with religious counsel plants truth in the suffering heart.
Preaching the Word is sowing seed, illustrating the rise and progress of the work that follows, and after sowing the work continues through the Spirit's power so the harvest can be gathered. Truth springs up and bears fruit when Christ the Saviour and His redeeming love are presented, whereas preaching theory alone leaves hearers unwon. The seed is sown into hearts through gentle courteous conversation even in ordinary settings, through books containing light and valuable spiritual lessons, and through teaching people how to share the message. It is sown where the light never shone, as by using a boat as home and meeting place where novelty excites curiosity and many come to see and hear and some first see the light, and more broadly by personal house-to-house labor, hospitality such as meals for inquirers, words of consolation and hope, Christian teaching and singing, neighborhood meetings, and clear attention and order that prepare outsiders to obey.
The chapter stands as a warning to heed Christ's teaching and be ready to stand acquitted at the judgment, for worldly cares and pursuit of gain crowd out Christian life and faith. Those saved must form characters without fault, without spot or stain before a pure and holy God, each doing God-given work while cooperating with Christ, wearing His yoke and learning His meekness and lowliness, since every man will be judged according to deeds done in this life and no human sophistry or mocking of sacred things must blind the mind. Those called to sow must have the mind of Christ, leaving familiar ties and earthly hopes to labor in toil, tears, solitude and sacrifice. The harvest appears after the ascension when the Spirit equipped the apostles to gather fruit, in former-rain growth at the Christian era's start helping seed germinate and take root, and in truth scattering widely despite persecution, as when the truth Huss preached was thought destroyed with him yet his ashes became as seed producing many witnesses.
Teaching Children and Guarding Mind
Children's hearts are soil for the great Sower to scatter with the seeds of truth, and that soil must be prepared from the earliest years rather than left to competing growths that choke the seed as it grows. This preparing work belongs to parents themselves, who are to educate their children for usefulness and bring them up in home nurture and admonition with the Word of God as the standard instead of the fashions of the world. Mothers are to make this education the highest aim of life, keeping young children with them and leading them to cheerful, willing obedience, since future happiness depends on early training, and when done bravely and cheerfully without fainting this preparation brings a harvest of Christian men and Christian women. Parents are to be the best teachers of little children and not trust the molding of the infant mind to other hands, keeping them home from school until eight or ten years old and making the schoolroom the open air amid flowers and birds. Their textbook is to be the treasure of nature, God's great book of nature opened before children as fast as their minds can comprehend it, so the lessons will not soon be forgotten. Such preparation takes great pains and time and labor, and if half the time and labor now worse than wasted in following worldly fashion were devoted to cultivating children's minds and forming correct habits, a marked change would appear in families. Neglect of this early heart-preparation is unfaithful stewardship, while early instruction planted in a prepared heart produces good fruit and is remembered, with lessons taught to one child also benefiting another. Children's Bible lessons are seeds of Bible truth falling into the soil of the heart and making impressions on both children and parents, yet thorny ground warns that this sowing must contend with what can choke the seed before it bears fruit.
In a boy the seed sown in the heart is parental teaching of truth, candor, obedience and right plans, and the thorns and briers that spring up and choke it are habits of disobedience, strong self-will, secret plans, concealment from parents, deception and falsehood. Even departures from truth called little trifles are not trifles, for every violation of conscience hardens it and binds the transgressor more firmly as a captive under Satan's control. Cherished secret notions kept when opposed, outward compliance with inward rebellion, and long indulgence in concealment, prevarication and self-justifying grow into rank weeds that choke the precious plants of candor and truth. That growth makes character habitually secretive, unstable, unsatisfactory and insincere, and in youth fixes the traits of riper years. A child's heart as a seed plot becomes a field of thorns and briers when a father's care and love are withdrawn where they are doubly needed, robbing tender plants that might have grown beautiful for heaven of nourishment and leaving them to harmful circumstances that make the bad worse and weaken good impulses that love and wisdom could have developed. Then a blight falls upon young lives that leaves them deformed in character and not favorable subjects to educate and train. The weeds of natural imperfection in children's hearts must therefore be removed through parents' unceasing, wise and vigilant correction.
Teachers are sowers and students' minds are the ground where the precious seeds of truth must be sown, with the seed as the Word of God for food, the glorious truths concerning the life of Christ the Great Teacher, and the elevated standard of virtue and holiness placed before all in the gospel. Sowing must be done after the order of the teaching of Jesus Christ as the standard Teacher, by souls transformed by His grace and minds absorbed in meditating His life and following Him to the very letter, to prepare students to be transformed to the higher grade. Teachers must not sow with pen or voice their own ideas and plans and imaginings and schemes and ambitions and likes and dislikes as if essential, nor exalt as all-essential what Christ never taught, giving such things no standing room before students. Hearts of Sabbath-school scholars are soil in which teachers may sow heavenly seed, requiring patient sowing despite stubbornness and resistance even where the choking by thorns is not explained. Students themselves can sow seeds that produce precious grain rather than thorns, since school life is a favorable time to live by God's law and Christ's saving grace, with choices and influence helping lead others toward Jesus. Truth is to be taught plainly and repeated so it takes hold and continues through the Spirit to a harvest for eternal life, and likewise a physician's gentle care and religious counsel give opportunity to plant truth in a suffering person's heart where other influences might otherwise choke it.