Project 119: Mark 4:1-20
| Project 119 | Mary Splawn
When thinking about how this parable might help reshape our focus during this season of the year, I am drawn to the specific image of the good soil producing the crop. In order to produce a stellar crop, the ground has to be ready. It needs watering, fertilization, and perhaps a bit of tilling to make it ready for growth.
The same is true for us. As believers, we are called to prepare our hearts to make them ready to produce fruit.
In order to get our soil ready, we might ask ourselves a few questions: 1) Do I think of God as more of an idea or a person who desires relationship with me? 2) Do I give lip-service to my dependence on God or do I trust Him for my every need? 3) Am I practicing disciplines of the faith that will help me keep rooted in hard times (i.e. fasting, prayer, reflection, communal worship, praise)? 4) Am I giving of myself and my resources so that others might flourish and know the good news about Jesus?
Oh Lord, during this season of Lent, please provide nourishment for our souls. Also, please till up all the bad habits that might be buried just below the surface of our hearts. Root out the bad that is within us and make us people who live fruitful lives, in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Mark 4:1-20 (ESV):
Again he began to teach beside the sea. And a very large crowd gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat in it on the sea, and the whole crowd was beside the sea on the land. 2 And he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: 3 “Listen! Behold, a sower went out to sow. 4 And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it.5 Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and immediately it sprang up, since it had no depth of soil. 6 And when the sun rose, it was scorched, and since it had no root, it withered away.7 Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. 8 And other seeds fell into good soil and produced grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.” 9 And he said, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”
10 And when he was alone, those around him with the twelve asked him about the parables. 11 And he said to them, “To you has been given the secret of the kingdom of God, but for those outside everything is in parables, 12 so that
“‘they may indeed see but not perceive, and may indeed hear but not understand, lest they should turn and be forgiven.’”
13 And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? How then will you understand all the parables? 14 The sower sows the word. 15 And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them. 16 And these are the ones sown on rocky ground: the ones who, when they hear the word, immediately receive it with joy. 17 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. 18 And others are the ones sown among thorns. They are those who hear the word, 19 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. 20 But those that were sown on the good soil are the ones who hear the word and accept it and bear fruit, thirtyfold and sixtyfold and a hundredfold.”