Now in this parable, there's so much truth and so many thoughts that we need to dwell on. But first of all, think about this. There's only one sower and only one seed. When it talks about the seed, it doesn't say seeds. There's a reason for that. The seed is scattered. but it's just one seed. And then there are four different types of ground that our Lord speaks of. He declares plainly that the seed is his word, his gospel. The seed is planted in the heart. Christ is the sower. Now the Lord hath sent forth sowers into his field. And anybody that broadcasts the word of God or presents it or speaks it, is the sower. But there's just one sower because when the Lord sends someone to sow, it's him doing it. It's him doing it. He just sends somebody to, includes us in the ministry. All true preachers of the gospel are one in this. And we'll see that in the scriptures. We sow one seed and we are as one in the sowing of it because Christ is truly the sower. And we're just employed in his ministry. And preachers may have different personalities, different opinions on lesser things. and everything but the gospel is a lesser thing. They may be very different in their delivery of the word, but in the one thing that matters, that we do as witnesses of Christ, we're the same. We're the same, there's just one seed. And those that sow the seed, they don't manipulate the seed, they don't alter the seed. You know, nowadays they can They can produce different kinds of seeds. They can make insect-resistant seed. And if you want a purple tomato with yellow spots on it, they could come up with that. But God's preachers get their seed from God. And just as it is, they cast it around upon the ground, wherever he sends them. God made the seed and we don't change it, we don't alter it, we don't question it, we don't compromise it. There's life in the seed. The seed of the word of God, there's life. If nothing is produced in a garden, it's because the seed was bad. It's because there's something wrong with the ground. It's because the care and nurturing of the seed wasn't accomplished. Simon Peter said to the Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life. There's life in that seed, in the seed of the Word of God. There's no life in the heart by nature. It's just ground. And it can be bad ground, It is bad ground by nature, just like with a garden. You can't just throw seeds out in the field. Something might come up, but you're not going to get a harvest out of it. If there's weeds and thorns and there's no taking care of it, there's no watering. It's not the way the gardener operates. He doesn't just cast seed by the wayside. He makes a garden. Paul said to Timothy, this gospel is able to make you wise unto salvation. The seed, there's life in it because of the way God has ordained to give life to sinners. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of the gospel for it's the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes. Power of God. The preacher doesn't determine the success of the garden. And you know, the Lord can give the preacher, make him faithful, and that's necessary. In God's design, that's necessary. He's not to be credited, though, with how much is produced. It's the ground. Turn with me to 1 Corinthians 3.5. It's the ground. It's everything that God does. What makes a garden successful is everything that God does. 1 Corinthians 3. 5, you're familiar with this. who then is Paul and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom you believed, even as the Lord gave to every man. The Lord gave faith. You believed by the preaching, but the Lord had to give that. He had to give the seed and he had to give the success to the seed. I have planted, Apollos watered, but God gave the increase. All of the results are up to God, aren't they? The means can be employed by the preacher, by the witness, by the father, by the friend, by the brother, by the wife or husband. The means can be employed that God has given, which is his word. But God giveth the increase, all of it, only God. He gives all of it. Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one. That's what we referred to a while ago. We're one. The ministers of the gospel and the witnesses of the gospel are all one. That's why there's just one sower in the parable. We're one. We have one seed and as one in unity for the glory of God, we sow that seed. So they are one. And every man shall receive his own reward according to his labor. That word reward is pay. He receives his pay. Verse nine, for we are laborers together with God. What a privilege, what an honor to be included That's what it said. That's what our Lord said. Take my yoke upon you and learn of me and do what? Rest. It's not that God needs us. He does everything. He does it all. He chooses his laborers. He gives the seed to them. He gives the gospel. He gives them understanding. He gives them the ability to tell it plainly. He gives them the heart of jealousy for His glory to be faithful to the Gospel. He gives the ground. He makes it good ground if it is. He gives the increase. The fruit is His fruit, not ours. We are laborers together with God. You are God's husbandry. You are God's building. You are the result of what God did. You're the result of His work. We do well to remember that, all of us, as witnesses of Him. That doesn't mean that when He sends us out that we don't care about the results. We just don't have the power to produce them. We care. We want there to be results. We pray for it. That's why the Lord said to his disciples, pray that the Lord of the harvest will send forth laborers and that he will give increase, that he will cause fruit to be produced. Nobody plants a garden and watches it wither and die and says, well, oh, well, you know, no big deal. No, he prays and he wants to see fruit. He grieves over it. He works. and waits anxiously to see what God will provide. But he's very aware of his utter dependence upon God. Always. God made the seed. He made the water. He gives it to whomsoever He will. He made the sunshine. He gives it to whom He will, when He will. And God makes the ground. He made the ground. He made all of it. He made all four of them. He made the good ground what it is. Just as God, Paul said in Romans nine of the same lump of clay, he makes one vessel under honor and another under dishonor. Same clay. It's the same dirt. Some of it's stony. Some of it's by the wayside. Some of it has thorns and thistles growing in it. Same dirt. Some of it's good ground because the potter had the power over the clay. to make of the same lump one vessel unto honor and another unto dishonor. God has made some good ground to receive the seed, and God does all things necessary that the ground bring forth fruit. And how did the Lord Jesus say, the Father is glorified, that you bring forth much fruit? What an honor to be included in that, but he's the one that gives the increase. He gives the increase, He is glorified by it, and because of that seed and because of Christ in whom we are good and faithful servants, in Him, the Father's pleased and glorified. He's glorified in that fruit, in the fruit that's produced, the love. that we have for Him and for one another, the joy that's ours in Christ, how we are able to sing in the prison. Peace, peace with God made by the blood of His cross. Long-suffering because look at God and His long-suffering to us. All of the fruit of the Spirit is born and that's how God is glorified.

That's why we said not too long ago, and this is something the Lord taught me that I hope I'll never forget. He has a world, and this world still stands because we thank Him every once in a while, because we praise Him, because we glorify Him. When that stops happening, when He's saved the last one of us, and I think about this a lot, why doesn't the Lord just save everybody and take us to heaven and everything will be better then? There's something about it. There's something about it. He prayed to his father, don't take him out of this world yet. There's something glorious about, you know, the Lord said of the sweat of that brow, thou shalt eat bread. That's the curse. That's the curse, of the sweat of that brow. But isn't there something good about working hard and producing something? causing something to be accomplished by hard work. I don't think we're just gonna be sitting around eating grapes in heaven, do you? I believe we're gonna be, work is a good thing. He put us in his garden to dress and keep it before there was any sin. So that's a wonderful thing. And somehow, laboring under the burden of this flesh, and though we see through a glass darkly, there's something more sweet in a different way about the sight of him through that glass. Isn't there? That's why we're here. But when he saves the last one, he's gonna burn it up, isn't he? Gonna burn it up.

If the seed is the Word of God, then broadcasting the seed, or I say broadcasting, you know, to spread it, to sow it, is to preach the truth about God. It's the Word of God. It's not what we think might work. It's not what we think might produce something. And religion is all about how to produce numbers, how to produce excitement, how to produce acceptance, how to be well thought of and exalted in the flesh. No, no. God has provided everything necessary. And we're to stick to that. To preach the truth of the sovereign God, David said, my God's in heaven, he does whatever he wants to. That's the seed that's sown. That's not the God of religion. The God I hear about in religion is not the God that does what He pleases. He's the God that wants to do things if you please. And that's not the God of the Bible. That's not the seed that God gives.

The God of the Bible is holy. Holy. he must and shall punish all sin that's why christ came to put away our sin by the sacrifice of himself because if there's any sin in us or on us then we can never see god never see god a decision from man is not going to satisfy the holy god Only Christ satisfied the Holy God, and faith in Him unites us to Him, and we're found in Him, not having our own righteousness, but the righteousness which is by the faithfulness of Jesus Christ upon all and unto all them that believe. He requires sinless perfection, and if the seed of the Word of God is the Word of God. It's the Gospel, the true Gospel of Christ, and it's telling the truth about man. There's just one seed when it comes to the truth about man. We're totally depraved, completely corrupt, sinful in nature, sinful in practice, and unable to do anything about it. There's none that doeth good. No, not one. We've never done anything good, and we're not going to do anything good. Christ did something good. He did everything good. He did always those things that pleased the Father, and he is all of my righteousness before God. A leper can't change his spots, God said, and we can't do good. For the same reason, because of our nature, because of what we are, Jeremiah 13, 23. But broadcasting the word of God also means telling the truth about the Lord Jesus Christ and how a sinner can be justified before God. By our representative last Adam and his sin atoning sacrifice For sinners like us, it's to declare, Paul said, His righteousness for the remission of sins. Romans 3 through 26 talks about how God can be just and justify the sinner. It's through the redemption that's in Christ Jesus. It's not complicated. People just hate it. They're just not going to be redeemed that way. They're not going to be accepted before God that way, because it leaves them out. It doesn't acknowledge any of man's works or man's will or man's way. Redemption, justification, salvation is by the righteousness of Christ and His precious blood shed for our sins. Good works are excluded. By grace are you saved through faith, and that's not of yourselves. It is the gift of God, not of works. lest any man should boast. Where is boasting then? It's excluded. For us to feel good about anything we've ever done, that's out the window. It's out the window. It's look to Christ and trust Christ and own Christ as all my righteousness before God and my very sin offering that cleanses me from all sin. It's not by a decision of man's will. Paul said in Romans 9 15, for God said to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy. I will. That word will is not just incidental there. I will, I want this. This is why it's going to happen. Mercy is going to happen to you because I want it to happen to you. There's nothing unclear about that. I will have mercy on whom I will have, and I'll have compassion on whom I will have compassion, so that it is not of him that willeth. God said, I will, not you. You won't. Simon said, boy, I'll stand by you, Lord, to the death. No, you won't. But he said, Simon, I will. I will. It's not of him that willeth. It's not of him that runneth. say when I quote that, that it's not of him that striveth, listen to the actual definition of it, nor of him that runneth to spend one's strength in performing or attaining something. That word run, that's what that means. It's not by Him that exerts effort in order to attain. You can't attain salvation by your efforts, by your works, by your will, by your walking an aisle, by your repeating a prayer. Salvation doesn't happen like that. It happens when God says, I will. It's not of those things, not of him that willeth nor of him that spends one's strength to attain something, but of God that showeth mercy. That's the simple seed of the word of God that is hated by just about everybody. They're not going to plant that. They're not interested in that. God has mercy on sinners only in Christ. Only in Christ. The Lord Jesus said, he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live. He said, whosoever believeth on me shall not perish, but have everlasting life. Simon Peter preached, whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins. Your sins will be gone. First Corinthians 123, but we preach Christ crucified unto the Jews a stumbling block and unto the Greeks foolishness. But unto them which are called both Jews and Greeks, Christ, the power of God and the wisdom of God. To those whom God said, I'll have mercy on you. Those whom he called. whom he set his affection on, whom he foreknew and predestinated and called. Christ is all. He's God's wisdom. He's God's power. He's how we know the gospel. He's how we receive the seed. And he's the power that gives the increase. Christ, Christ alone. So there's a sower. Wherever the Lord of the harvest intends to set up a garden, wherever he has purposed to raise up a crop, he will send forth a laborer, quite a few laborers sometimes, sometimes just a handful, but he'll send them with his good seed. Being born again, Simon said in 123 of 1 Peter, being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. So this simple parable Somebody plants a seed and that seed is the Bible. It's the scriptures It's the gospel the Word of God and sinners are born again like that by these means by the foolishness of preaching It's it pleased God to save them that believe and it's like the sowing of seed. It's like when the word is preached If God is pleased he'll prepare the ground for There's no difference in us by nature now. And all of us are all three of the other cat. It's not that some are one kind and some are the other. All of us are all three of the other ones. We'll talk about that in a minute. But there's one good ground and there's one way that happens. My God, like it says of Lydia, describes it in so many different ways in the scriptures that we can't misunderstand it. He opened her heart. And what happened when the Lord opened her heart? She believed what Paul was preaching, what the others were saying. She believed on him. So the seed, the ground was prepared. And think about what a gardener does. If you're gonna go to the trouble of gardening and you're a gardener, and we're just talking about people now as an illustration, but think what kind of gardener the Lord Jesus Christ is. Every care is taken. Every need is supplied. All of the wisdom that it requires. I've, you know, kind of studied gardening for quite a few years, just kind of as a hobby. And I don't know anything yet. You've got to know everything about every plant and everything about every nutrient and everything about to really be good at it. The Lord is all wise. He's omniscient. And here's the thing about it. You know, when we plant a garden, we care. We care about what happens. The Lord has loved us with an everlasting love. He plants his garden by the rivers of waters and he tends it and he encloses it. And he gives everything that it needs, wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, all I need. And the Lord loves his garden. You know, he calls this world his garden. This world is his garden. There's some weeds, but he plants his garden in this world and he loves, and he's glorified by the fruit that's produced in his garden. What a simple, wonderful illustration it is. And we'll look more into that in a little bit.