The title of the message is,
Which One Are You? Which One Are You? Now it says,
great multitudes gather to hear our Lord speak. It says in one place, never a
man spake like this man. And when he spoke, he commanded
attention. And when he spoke, oftentimes
he spoke to the crowd in parables. And the disciples came and asked
him why he spoke in parables. And know what he said to them
and to us. In verse 11, he said, he answered
and said unto them, Because it is given unto you to know the
mysteries of the kingdom of heaven. But to them it's not given. I find that to be a very sobering
answer. To you, it's given. To them,
it's not given. To some, it's given. To some,
it's not given. We are blessed of God if we believe
the gospel, if God has given us an understanding like we looked
at in 1 John this morning. We are blessed of God for we
have the mysteries of the gospel revealed to us. The vast part
of the human race does not have that. It's like the Lord said in verse
15, they have closed their eyes. Dull of hearing. Don't want to
hear it. Don't want to hear it. Don't want to see it. But I know this, we believe the
Gospel. I believe the Gospel. You who
believe the Gospel, you believe it because God gave it to you. Faith is the gift of God. Let's
never forget that. Blessed, he says in verse 16,
blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they
hear. They hear. We could be with that
group back there in verse 15, where he says, this people's
heart is waxed gross, a dull of hearing, and they've closed
their ears. There's one thing we never want
to forget. Salvation is by the sovereign
grace of God Almighty. God saved you because He saved
you. God loved you because He loved
you. The reason for my salvation from
Alpha to Omega and the reason for anyone's salvation from Alpha
to Omega is found in God alone. is found in God Almighty alone. Now the sower here is the Lord
Jesus Christ and all His ministers. What I'm doing this morning,
I'm sowing seed. Not everyone standing in a pulpit
is sowing the seed, but every minister of God is sowing the
seed. Every one of them, they are. Now what we have here are four
types of hearers. And these four types of hearers
are present in every congregation. They're present in every congregation. The seed is the word of God. It says in 1 Peter 1.23, being
born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by
the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever. James says,
of his own will beget he us with the word of truth. The word is the seed. It's the
seed. Hear now, he says, hear, listen. Hear ye therefore the parable
of the sower. He that hath ears to hear. How
many times did our Lord say that? Let him hear. Let him hear what
I'm saying. Verse 19. He's gonna explain
the parable to his disciples. When anyone hears the word of
the kingdom, that is the gospel, when anyone hears the gospel,
and he understands it not, then cometh the wicked one. And now
over in Luke, it says, then cometh the devil and takes away or catches,
takes away that which was sown in his heart. This is he which
receives seed by the wayside." The first hearer is called the
wayside hearer. This person is unaffected. They're
unaffected. Unimpressed by who God is. I could stand here and preach
God in all His glory and they're unimpressed. Unimpressed who
Jesus Christ is. unimpressed with what he did,
have no understanding of what they are, they don't hear it.
They don't hear it. None good, no, not one. Just
goes right over their head. Right over their head. Must be
talking about you. They don't get it. This person
has no conviction of sin, no conviction of sin, righteousness,
or judgment. The gospel seed lands on his
ears, but not his heart. It never lands on his heart.
It's like seed falling on hard pavement. It never enters. It
never penetrates. It never penetrates. No penetration.
And then Satan, it says, comes along and he takes away the Word.
That person heard, and that person will never know that Satan came
along and took it away. He'll never know it. That person will never know Satan
was in the house. You just go out the door and
go on with life. He says, and he understands it
not, it remains a mystery to him. It's just a mystery to him. And because of that, he believes
it not. Now listen, whether I understand the Gospel or not, it's no excuse
for not believing God. When God speaks, God is to be
believed. Brethren, there's a lot of things
we believe that we can't comprehend. Can't comprehend. Who can comprehend
God? If I could comprehend God, I'd
be God. But I tell you what, I believe the gospel because
God said it. God said it. We have the record of it as we
saw this morning. We have the record of it. Now, the second
here. In verse 20, but he that received
the seed into stony places, the same as he that heareth the word,
he hears the gospel preach. And a man or quickly, quickly
with joy receives it, with joy receives it. He doesn't count the cost. You
know, the Lord said count the cost. You need to sit down and
count the cost before you sign up. It's not a joy ride. It's not happy all the time.
No, it's persecution. He that will live godly in this
world shall suffer persecution. If you live godly, if you're
honest about the gospel, you're gonna find out what people think
about it. You'll see what the enmity is
all about in the human heart when it's faced with the gospel.
Now this here, intellectually receives what he hears. And he
makes a fair show for a while. For a while. He receives it with
gladness. Oh, I believe that. Yes, I believe
that. I can tell you, I was preaching
one time, and I'm reaching back in history now. But I was preaching
one time to a church when I was a young man, probably 25 years
old. And I, this place called me to come
there and preach. So I went there, preached, and
I preached the gospel. And people in that congregation,
it was a small congregation, they were saying amen. They was
vocal. They're not quite as you guys.
They were vocal. They were alive. They were a
lively group. You're alive, but you know what I mean. I'm gonna
get myself in trouble here. But anyway, they were a lively
group. The second time I preached, he wasn't quite as lively. The
third time I preached, there was only one man saying amen. The fourth time, the guy called
me. This is what's interesting. That one man was in a wheelchair.
And he said, I've been watching Brother Henry on television.
He said, I believe that gospel. And then the next week, they
called me on a Saturday night and said, you don't need to come
anymore. He said, by the way, brother so-and-so, I can't remember
his name, passed away. And I thought, God sent me there
to preach that one sheep. But that congregation started
out, they started out loud, I mean, just amenin', and it got quieter
and quieter, down to one man. Oh, he receives it with gladness.
But no mention is made about his sorrow over sin. No mention is made about that.
No fear or trembling of God at all. You know, it says in Mark
6, 20, that Herod, it says this, for Herod feared John, knowing
that he was a just man and holy, and observed him, and when he
heard him, he did many things and heard him gladly. He heard
him gladly. Tell me some more, John. But here are two problems. First
of all, he received the seed into stony places. His heart
was just as hard as ever, and his mind just as dark. Just as
dark as ever. He believed the historical facts,
but he did not experience the life-altering truth of the gospel. There's a difference. There is
a difference. If God sends the gospel to you
in power, you'll never be the same again. You won't be the
same again. He believed the doctrines of
grace, but not the God of grace. He received not the love of the
truth. You know, there's one thing to
say, I believe that, that's true. I believe that's the truth. But
there's another thing to receive the love of. You love the truth.
And to love the truth is to love Christ. He said, I am the truth. I am the truth, I'm the way,
the truth, and the light. For while he appeared sincere, he
appeared sincere. The second problem is this, he
had no root in himself. The principle of grace was not
in him. And the reason the principle
of grace was not in him, the spirit of grace was not in him.
No root, no life, no fruit. And it says, when trials came,
when they came, He was offended. He was offended. Now listen,
He wasn't offended at the person through whom the trial came.
He was offended at God for the trial. I thought I was your child. Why all this? Why am I suffering
this? I thought I was your child. He
was offended at God. That's what he was offended at,
God. When God takes away, he was offended. Hell, he wasn't
offended when God's giving. But when God reached in his sovereignty
and takes away, that's when you find out. where true faith is. He was offended at God. And then
we have the third here in verse 22. He also that receives seed
among the thorns is he that heareth the word and the care... And this one
gets so many right here. This probably gets more than
any of them. And the care of this world And the deceitfulness
of riches, and over in Luke it says, the deceitfulness of riches
and pleasure, choke the word and he becometh unfruitful. Brought no fruit, it says in
Luke, brought no fruit to perfection. All three received the seed,
the gospel. But this one, This one seemed
to go a little further than the other two. He went a little bit
further. For it says, He becometh unfruitful. In Luke it says, He brought no
fruit to perfection. There appeared to be some. This
one appeared very serious, very sincere. There appeared to be
some fruit. It looked like there might be
some. He seemed to embrace it more strongly than the others. But after a while, he too shrivels
up. He may be around a long while,
but after a while, he too shrivels up and leaves. You know, the Lord will use many
different things to try faith. I'll never forget a message Henry
was preaching one time, and he brought out in that message,
and he was talking about how God tries faith. And he said
that there was a certain person who got offended over something
that happened in the nursery. Their kid was in the nursery.
And she left and never came back. And he said that woman never,
to this day, she doesn't know God tried her. She was tried
and failed over a situation in the nursery. Oh, He too will shrivel up. He
or she. It's like the fig tree. Remember
in the Gospel, the Lord was walking with His disciples and He saw
a fig tree off in the distance. And it was green. It just looked
like a very good fig tree. And He goes over to the fig tree
and He says, there's no fruit on it. There was no figs on it.
All it was was just green leaves. And He cursed that tree. And
when they came back that next day, it was all withered up.
It appeared to be a real fig tree, looked like a really good
fig tree, but it had no fruit on whatsoever. That's this man. Here's his problem. First problem. Care of this world. No care about the world to come. He got that all fixed up. I got
that all fixed up. I was baptized, made proficient.
I'm all fixed up. Now I got to just take care of
what's going on in the house. No care about this world or the
world to come. Here's what his life consisted
in. What am I going to eat? What am I going to wear? Where
am I going to live? How am I going to retire? His life was consumed with that.
It was consumed with that. Our Lord said, labor not for
the meat that perishes. That doesn't mean go out there
and be lazy and not work. But don't set your heart on it.
Don't let it get your heart. Now, don't let it get your heart. It's easy to do. Earthly care
consumed this man. It consumed him. He neglected
the Word, he neglected the Gospel. When he sat and listened to the
Gospel being preached, all he could think about was what's
going on out there, what he's going to do, or the adventures
he's got going on. That's all he could think about. He could not set his mind on
things above where Christ sits at God's right hand. He couldn't
do it. Couldn't do it. This man had no real saving interest
in the Lord Jesus Christ. No real saving interest at all.
Not at all. His conversation was always covetous. It was always about what I'm
making, how I can make this, what I can do, It was always
about that. Hebrews 13, 5 says, let your
conversation be without covetousness. Let it be without, well, am I
going to gain, get and do? And be content with such things
as you have. You can't put a price on contentment
in Christ. You can't do it. Can't do it. It is our discontentment that
puts us in a lot of debt. And Solomon said the borrower
is servant to the lender. Every time. It works that way
every time. Every time. Be content with such
things as you have for He has said, the Lord has promised,
I will never leave thee nor forsake thee. I'll never leave you. But this man can't do that. It's
not in him to do that. The care of this world has him
by the throat. It has him by the throat. Actually,
it has him by the heart. It has his heart. He's like the
rich man. He came to the Lord and asked
what he must do to inherit an eternal life, and the Lord quoted
some commandments. He said, I've done all these
things from my youth up. He said, well, go sell all you
have. Because the commandment says
not to be covetous. Go sell all that you have, give
it to the poor, and come, follow me. And it says, he went away
sorrowful, for he was very rich. He was very rich. And here's the second problem
that's mentioned. The care of this world and the deceitfulness
of riches. The scripture gives us plenty
of warnings about riches. It doesn't condemn riches, but
it gives us plenty of warnings about them. First of all, they
give a false sense of self-worth. They give a false sense of self-worth. The more a person makes, the
more they grow financially. The scripture says the rich speak
roughly, but the poor intrigued. The rich speak roughly. That's
because they think it makes you think you're up here. It does. Outside of Christ, I've learned
this. Outside of Christ, I'm not worth the powder it'd take
to shoot myself. Outside of Christ, I'm telling
you. And then riches give a false sense of security that everything's going to be
all right. Solomon said, riches have wings and they fly away. Solomon said, the rich man's
riches will not let him sleep. And then they give a false sense
of God's favor. They give a false sense of God's
favor. If you, not knowing what you
know, not knowing what you know, if you walked up and you saw
that rich man's house, and you saw Lazarus laying at the gate,
who would you say had God's favor? You'd say it's that rich man.
If you saw Jacob and Esau, if you saw them, you would say Esau
had God's favor, not Jacob. They give a false sense of God's
favor. Then the third problem is this.
They choke the word and he becomes unfruitful or brings no fruit
to perfection. The problem's not with the seed
that was planted. The problem's not with the seed.
The problem is with the here. It's with the ground that it
fell on. When there ought to be peace,
joy, love, long-suffering, it's not there. It's not there. Love of the truth is not there. Instead of long-suffering and
patient, he's impatient. Wait on the Lord. I don't have
time for that. So you go try to make it happen yourself. When he ought to be a blessing,
he becomes a stumbling block. There was a sign of fruit. I
got this from someone. I don't know where I got it from,
but I thought this was good. There was a sign of fruit, but
the frost of care and the lust of other things suffocated."
Suffocated, the word. Like weeds when they take over
a garden. I planted a garden the summer before last. Chip, the guy came there with
me, we put a garden out. I put a garden out. I put out
a nice size garden, but I was traveling so much and working
so much, the weeds overtook it. And it didn't produce hardly
anything. I mean, we plowed it under, we
just ended up, I said, I don't have time to take care of this.
I didn't, but it started out, it really looked good. The weeds
took over. The care of life, the deceitfulness
of riches take over and it says it suffocates the word. It becomes
unfruitful. But thank God through Jesus Christ
there is good ground. The Word of God, the Scripture
says, will not return void. It will not return void. So here's
the fourth one. But he that received seed into
the good ground is he that heareth the Word and understands it. Understanding. What did we read
this morning? The Son of God hath come and
given us an understanding, which also beareth fruit, and bringeth
forth some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. The good
ground is the work of God. It's written in Ephesians 2.10,
For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. which God hath before ordained,
that we should walk in them. This good ground is ground that's
been plowed by the Spirit of God. There's a real conviction
of sin. There's a real sorrow over sin. There's a real conviction of
sin and of righteousness. I need of it. I don't have it. And God provided it. in Jesus
Christ and a real conviction of judgment. The other three received seed
just as they were. But the good ground has the operation
of the spirit on it. there's a work going on, there's
some plowing going on. You know, I grew up on a farm
until I was about 15 years old. And in the springtime, Dad would
get that, well, first, I'm gonna date myself, but the first time
we moved up there, he had a team of horses and used to plow, and
then he bought a tractor later on. But he would plow that ground
and just turn it over and would move the rocks out of it and
just prepare that ground, fertilize it, Do everything to it. I mean,
it would look good disket, that ground looked good when he got
done with it. And then he sowed the seed. Sowed
that seed. Colossians chapter two says,
buried with him in baptism, wherein also he arisen with him through
the faith of the operation of God, through the work of God. In Luke 8, 15, it's called an
honest heart. He received the seed in an honest
heart. A heart that God gave him. He
received the truth about God. He bows to God. He bows to the sovereign God
of heaven and earth. He understands who God is. Well,
there are very few that understand that. Only those whom God reveals
Himself to understand who God is. He understands the person
of Christ and the work of Christ. He understands that Jesus Christ
did not just make salvation a possibility, but a reality. He's God. And He understands
what He is. Paul said, O wretched man that
I am. Before God saved him, he would have choked and went to
hell for him to have said that. He would not have said, O wretched
man that I am. But after God saved him, he cried out, old wretched man
that I am, who shall deliver me from this body of death? I
thank God through Jesus Christ. That's who. This hearer has been given a
new heart. Ezekiel 36, 26 says this, A new
heart also will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within
you, And I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh,
and I'll give you a heart of flesh. One you can feel with. And it
says here he understands it. Philip asked that eunuch. He
said, do you understand what you're reading? He said, how
can I except some man show me? And it became evident after Philip
took the same scripture, Isaiah 53, preached Christ to him, it's
evident he understood. Because the first thing he wanted
to do was identify himself with Christ in baptism. That's how
you identify yourself with Christ. Not coming to a front, but by
following the Lord in baptism. That's how you do it. He understands how God could
be a just God and a Savior. He understands His need of wisdom,
righteousness, sanctification, and redemption, and He understands
that He has every bit of that in Jesus Christ. He understands
it. He understands if God leaves
Him alone, He'll perish. He'll perish. And listen, He
lives with that understanding every day. Everything He does,
every decision He makes, He makes with this understanding. And it says He keeps it. All
the others lost it. All the others lost it. It didn't
mean anything to them. All of them lost it but the good
ground. The good ground never loses the seed. Once God plants
it, He never loses it. And this good ground here, listen,
and I'll close. He bears love to the brethren,
He bears joy in the Lord. This is the fruit, the fruit
of the Spirit. He bears peace in the midst of trouble. He has
real peace. He has peace with God, peace
in his heart. He's long-suffering. He's patient. He's gentle. He's kind. He walks
in humility. He bears faith. Without faith,
it's impossible to please God. And all this fruit he bears is
not for himself. It's for others. You know, the
apple tree bears fruit for us, doesn't it? Your love is for me. And my love is for you. Your
kindness is for me. My kindness is for you, be ye
kind one to another. This fruit is for each other,
that is the fruit of the Spirit, and it's for God's glory. It takes Almighty God to produce
this good ground. It doesn't just happen. You know, even out here in nature,
You've gotta prepare a garden and prepare it right. If you're
gonna have any good fruit out of it, and take care of it, and
God does. God prepares the heart, he gives
a new heart, he prepares that person, and he takes care of
him. I'll go over to Solomon and it
says, and you'll read where the Lord says, he came into his garden. He came into his garden. What
I'm looking at, the believers here, what I'm looking at is
the garden of the Lord. And right now, He's taking care
of it. He'll prune whom He needs to prune, fertilize whom He needs
to fertilize. It takes Almighty God to produce
good ground. But now listen, I'll close with
this. It's in Philippians. He which hath begun a good work
in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ. Okay, Ben.