Mark chapter four, I will read
from verse 26. Just a few verses, we're reading
down through verse 29. And he said, that is the Lord
Jesus Christ, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast
seed into the ground, and should sleep and rise night and day,
and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. And the earth bringeth forth
fruit of herself, first the blade, then the ear, after that the
full corn in the ear, But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately
he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come. Amen. May God bless to us this reading
from his word. The Lord Jesus Christ is at work. Here in this passage in Mark
chapter 4, we have seen how busy the Lord has been on this day. So much seems to have been crammed
into this day that we wonder how the Lord found energy to
go about this business. But here he is once again at
work. He is at work in his role as
a teacher, and he is teaching his disciples about their calling
as seedsmen. Their calling, their role, and
their task as sowers of the good seed of the gospel. Now Mark
is the only gospel writer to record this particular parable
and yet its position here I think is very interesting because it
comes after the Lord's messages about how the disciples' ministry
will be received when they begin to preach and the different reaction
and the different responses that they would get to their preaching. Indeed, he likened it as to two
or three different types of soil that the seed would be sown into,
so that there is the parable of the sower that the Lord has
just spoken about. And then he told them in the
parable of the candle and the candlestick about their duty
to preach the whole counsel of God. Their duty, as it were,
to preach withholding nothing that is revealed in the everlasting
covenant of grace and peace. Nothing was to be hidden, but
a light was to be shone upon the whole work of the Lord Jesus
Christ. in his coming into the world
and in his laying down of his life for the salvation of his
people. This was to be the message of
the disciples and the Lord Jesus Christ, in telling them about
the response that they would have, told them also about the
message they would preach. And here is another parable in
the line of these parables of teaching his disciples about
their gospel ministry. And this might be called the
parable of the seed growing. But I thought that that lacked
a little bit of punch. So I've called it the parable
of the root, the shoot, and the fruit. The Lord is explaining
about how the seed takes root, how it grows, and how it comes
into fruitfulness. And in seeing these things, the
Lord has a lesson for his disciples about how the gospel is to be
perceived as they go forth preaching it under his commission. The
Lord had explained to his disciples that understanding the true meaning
of parables was a privilege peculiarly bestowed upon them. He speaks
about that in verse 11 of this chapter. He says, unto you it
is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God, but unto
them that are without, All these things are done in parables. So, we may assume that the Lord,
again speaking a parable, is speaking to a multitude, a large
gathering of people, but specifically directing a spiritual lesson
to these men whom he has called to preach. These who are spiritually
aware in order to equip them for their calling and for their
future service. And this is the lesson of that
parable. This is the lesson, that these
disciples in their preaching, and we might assume that it is
a faithful apostolic preaching because these men never preached
lies, they never preached false doctrine. So here we see that
the disciples' faithful, honest, and true preaching will be successful. That was the message that the
Lord was giving them. Their preaching would be successful. But that success need not, indeed
in many cases will not, be evident to them. It might not be evident
at once, it might not be evident at all, nor indeed should evidence
be sought for. What the Lord is teaching His
disciples and what the Lord is teaching His church thereby is
preach the gospel and leave it be. Preach the truth and that's
all that's required of you. Because after that, the work
belongs to the Holy Spirit. And that is the lesson of this
parable. Preach the gospel and leave it
be, because after that, the work belongs to the Holy Spirit. The gospel seat, if sown and
received into good ground, which it definitely would be according
to the parable of the sower, And that gospel was in itself
the whole counsel of God, the whole message of sovereign grace
and the revealed covenant purpose of God in the person of the Lord
Jesus Christ, which it certainly was being that candle upon the
candlestick. It will be fruitful. But that
fruitfulness, that growth will be a divine work. It will be
unseen and unaided by man. It will be a demonstration of
the work of the Lord himself. And it will be exclusively to
his praise and glory. Preach the whole counsel of God. then wait and prepare for the
harvest. Before we look a little more
closely at some of the points that are drawn from this little
parable, I want to mention something in the context to the reference
that the Lord makes here and in many other places particularly
in the Gospel of Mark and Luke, and also using another slightly
different phrase in the Gospel of Matthew. But the phrase is
the Kingdom of God, used in Mark and Luke many times, and the
Kingdom of Heaven as it is used in Matthew, all meaning the same
thing. And I want just to spend a couple
of moments thinking about what Mark here says, or the Lord here
says, about the Kingdom of God. Jesus had previously spoken of
the mystery of the Kingdom of God in verse 11 when he was telling
the apostles or the disciples that parables would be revealed
to them exclusively. And he is speaking about the
Kingdom of God now. Because in this parable, like
many others, it is said to be descriptive of, or like, the
Kingdom of God. So the story that he tells, the
parable that he delivers, is said, this is like the Kingdom
of God, or the Kingdom of God is like this. or the kingdom
of heaven is like this. It's as if the Lord Jesus Christ
is saying, let me tell you what the kingdom of God is like. Or
the kingdom of heaven may be likened to And that phrase is
often used of the Lord Jesus Christ. Speaking about God's
purpose to save the elect and to gather them in as a spiritual
people. Speaking about the establishment
of God's kingdom or the kingdom of heaven or Christ's kingdom. that holy kingdom, that holy
nation, that holy people here upon earth. If we wanted to put
a single word to that whole description that I've just given, it would
be the church, the church. It is speaking about the gathering
in of the Lord's people through the ministry of the apostolic
preaching, the whole counsel of God being revealed amongst
men. Now, we speak here about this
saving of sinners being all God's work, as we are referring to
the parable before us, making reference to the fact that we
know salvation is of the Lord. We nevertheless note that God
employs preachers to sow the seed of the word. It is God's
purpose by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. So the kingdom of God is a kingdom
populated by saved sinners gathered by God through the preaching
of the gospel. And that's what the kingdom of
God is. That's what the kingdom of heaven
is. The same gospel preaching that the disciples are now being
taught about, that they are being prepared for, is this gospel
that will establish and form and grow the kingdom of God. And that's exactly what the Lord
Jesus Christ is doing now. We started by saying the Lord
was at work, the Lord was busy, the Lord was educating his disciples. And that's what he's doing now.
He's speaking a parable to the gathered crowd about planting
and growing and harvesting. But really he is explaining to
his disciples the true nature of the gospel, and their role
as gospel preachers in its success. So that is what the verses before
us are about today. The Lord Jesus Christ is building
a kingdom, a spiritual nation, a church and a people, united
not by blood or genes or nationality or history and tradition, but
by the grace of God, the grace of God in Christ, a spiritual
nation bound together in a spiritual body. with Christ as their spiritual
head, a union of men and women together with the God-man Jesus
Christ, so that when God speaks about his Son, when God speaks
about the Lord Jesus Christ, he is speaking about his Son
and his people, his Son and his bride, his Son and his body. This kingdom of Christ, this
kingdom of God, not accomplished by military power or physical
might, but by men speaking truth, by preachers informing sinners
of their need of a saviour. of simple men convincing other
men and women, telling sinners the gospel message of the Lord
Jesus Christ, crucified and risen, who came to feed the hungry and
give rest to the weary and set the captives free, not physically,
but spiritually. and to build a kingdom of men
and women redeemed by blood, called by mercy, cleansed from
all their sins, and given faith to believe on Jesus Christ, the
Saviour of their souls. These verses then, they speak
to us about a number of aspects, about the root about the shoot
and about the fruit of the believer's life in Christ. And I'm going
to take those as just three quick points and describe a couple
of aspects about them and then we will wrap up our thoughts
for today. But here the Lord Jesus is using
this parable to teach the disciples about their job. The first point
is this, that a believer is a divine work of grace. That's the root
of the matter. A preacher like a sower will
sow the word of gospel truth, but he can't make a convert. We sow the word, we preach the
gospel, we deliver the whole counsel of God as God the Holy
Spirit enables us to do so, but we can't make a believer. We can't bring spiritual life. God the Holy Spirit must initiate
the new birth. God the Holy Spirit must make
the sown seed spring to life in the soul of the dead sinner. Remember what the Lord Jesus
Christ said to Nicodemus, that which is born of the flesh is
flesh. All I could do would be to teach
you fleshy things. I can't initiate that spiritual
change, that spiritual alteration. because I'm just flesh and blood.
But when the Holy Spirit takes that seed, when he implants it,
when he nourishes it, when he makes it grow, then there is
spiritual life. And the disciples had to learn
that lesson right at the very beginning of their course in
preaching the gospel, this was a lesson that the Lord would
have them learn, a lesson which was entirely to do with sovereign
grace, that it is God's work alone to convert a sinner and
make a living soul. The sower having sown the seed,
may rise day and night. He looks at his field, he looks
at the ground, he looks at where he has expended his labour, to
see if there is any sign of life, to see if there is any fruitfulness
in the field. But like a field in wintertime,
the seed lies dormant, hidden, and to all appearances lost. But it isn't so. Why? Because the spirit is bringing
that seed to germination under the ground. The preacher, he doesn't see
it. Indeed, a preacher may not live
to see the fruit of his labours. A preacher may never live to
see the consequences of the seed that he has sown. But the true
gospel never fails to have an effect once it is declared. Grace never returns void. The word of God will always fulfil
its purpose. Brothers and sisters in Christ,
do we fear for the well-being of the Church sometimes? Do we look around and think,
Where's the new generation? What's going to happen in five
years' time? What's going to happen in ten
years' time? Once we knew about congregations here and there
and now, it seems they're so weak, they're so frail. It seems
as if many are closing down. Do we fear for the church's well-being? Do we worry about that? Shame
on us! We cannot see what God is doing. It is our job to preach the word. It is God's job to manage that
which is preached. The root and the shoot and the
fruit that we assume is not there. Jesus says it is there. It is like the dew of the morning. There is such a splendid wealth
of that making willing in the day of his power. It just is
that we cannot see it. It has not been given to us to
see it. Let me give you a very interesting
verse for your contemplation. In Luke chapter 17 and verse
20, we discover that the Lord Jesus Christ is having a time
of contention with the scribes and the Pharisees. And it is
all over this teaching about the kingdom of God, all over
the fact that the Lord Jesus Christ has said that he is going
to establish a kingdom and he is going to gather his people.
And the Pharisees said, well, what are you talking about? And
here's what verse 20 of Luke 17 says, Have you ever noticed
that before? I confess that dropped on me
like scales from my eyes when I read that. The kingdom of God
cometh not with observation. We're not going to see it, but
it exists. We may not see that evidence,
but it's happening. And we are called, as we are
called to have faith in so many things to do with the Lord's
work and the Lord's ways and the Lord's providences, we are
called to rejoice in this, that the Lord is bringing these things
to pass. according to his will and purpose
and he is bringing to full fruition that good seed that is sown in
the preaching of the gospel. I take heart in that and you
should too because this is great encouragement. It's great encouragement
for preaching It's great encouragement not only for the preacher, but
for the whole church and for every believer who serves and
witnesses and upholds and supports a faithful gospel ministry by
whatever means. You witness to your neighbours,
that seed will bear fruit. You witness to your children,
that seed will bear fruit. You may not get to see the root
and the shoot and the fruit, But we must believe that the
Lord is accomplishing his purpose and he has put us there to sow
that good seed. It isn't about numbers and it
isn't about size and it isn't about influence and power. It
isn't about political lobbying or asserting ourselves in our
community or with the government in order to achieve a religious
way of living or some moral change in our society. In John 6, verse 15, there's
an interesting little passage where the Lord had just fed a
multitude. He'd just fed 5,000, and the
people were amazed. And we're told that there was
a group of men there. I don't know who they were. The
movers and the shakers of their day, perhaps. those who aspire
to be politicians or leaders amongst their society, their
community, tells us this, that they determined to take Christ
against his will and make him king and give him a kingdom. Do you know what the Lord did? He disappeared. He went alone
back up into the mountain. Why? Because those people were
trying to give him the kingdom of God there and then. In 1 Corinthians 1, verse 23,
this is what we're told. We preach Christ crucified unto
the Jews a stumbling block, unto the Greeks foolishness. But God
hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the
wise, and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound
the things that are mighty. He is establishing his kingdom,
and he is not using power, or strength, or human wisdom, or
human might. He is secretly, without observation,
building the kingdom of God here and now. and we are just the
most recent manifestation of that. There will be more, and
we should have confidence that the Lord knows what he is doing
amongst us. See, free will preaching can't
handle that, can't stomach that lesson that the disciples were
being taught from this little parable of the seed growing,
to give it its Bible heading. The free will preacher, the free
will church can't do with this kind of talk. Because they want
to see results, they want to see the numbers. And if they
don't see them in the time allotted, they'll manufacture converts
of their own by any form of emotional, psychological, pressurized manipulation that
they can. They'll use whatever means are
at their disposal to get bottoms on seats and names on church
rolls and people baptised and their churches growing. They
don't sow the seed and leave it to germinate according to
the will and timing of God the Holy Spirit. They don't leave
it to go back to Psalm 110 to the day of his power, but rather
they squeeze that seed until it pops, and then they claim
another convert for their system, and they sign it up on another
discipleship course. Here's the second point. Now
the Lord, having spoken about the root of the matter, that
all conversion must be a divine work and nothing to do with the
preacher, explains the true nature of spiritual growth. Because
once that seed springs to life, once the Holy Spirit new birth
takes place, and the seed begins to grow, it is nourished by the
same word of gospel truth. And that nourishment is also
a work of the Holy Spirit. We need the Holy Spirit, you
today and me. We need the Holy Spirit to take
the whole counsel of God, the covenant teaching of Christ's
work, the gospel of our Saviour, and apply it to our hearts day
by day, week by week, year by year in our Christian development,
because that is the only way that we will grow and deepen
our spiritual understanding of the Lord Jesus Christ and the
way of life. It is a Holy Spirit work. And
that's the shoot. And it is just as mysterious
to nature as the new birth is and the first springing and dawnings
of life in the sinner's heart. And so whether we're thinking
about the growth of the seed or the growth of the plant, it
is all a Holy Spirit work. What can I as a preacher do to
boost greater spiritual development in my listeners? What can a church
do to organize and arrange and manage for a deeper spiritual
growth in its congregation? Only this, keep preaching the
same gospel. Keep on preaching Jesus Christ
crucified. Keep on preaching the whole counsel
of God in his covenant purpose of salvation. Only this. That is all the disciples had
to do. And it was all that they could
do. The third point is this. Fruit
takes time to grow. And in the course of its development,
it must weather a lot of trials. I'm sometimes amazed when I look
at a little shoot growing up through hard ground or growing
up through in a farmer's field and you think to yourself, how
can something so delicate ever survive? And yet, in time, It
blossoms and it grows and it's fruitful and it serves its purpose. In nature, that little shoot
will have to contend with drought and frost and storms and maybe
mildew or blight. And that will do as much as it
can to spoil that plant and spoil its fruit. But in spiritual terms, all our
spiritual provision and protection and defence is found in the same
Gospel message. It's found in us by faith constantly
going back to the blood of Christ, constantly returning to the sacrifice
of the Saviour, constantly returning to the altar in which the Lamb
of God was laid, and the cross of Jesus Christ, and the satisfaction
which He accomplished, and the atonement that He secured, and
the justification that flows from it, and the peace and reconciliation
that has been won by our precious Saviour. Believers feed and drink
and are nourished by Jesus Christ crucified. And perhaps because
it takes time for fruit to grow, a preacher will not see that
hope for fruit in his lifetime. And perhaps a praying parent
will see no evidence of grace in their child. And perhaps a
congregation will know little growth over an extended period
of time. And yet the gospel is all that
we have to bring to needy souls in the world. How important it
is then. How important is this gospel. It was the Gospel of the disciples.
It was the Gospel of the apostles. It was the Gospel of Jesus Christ. It is the Gospel of God. And
it is the Gospel that the disciples had to learn to preach and it
is the Gospel that they have taught us to preach. Because
as the Apostle Paul said, We must preach that gospel. So
when Peter rose in the day of Pentecost and employed the imagery
from Psalm 110, he was preaching the same gospel. He stood to declare Christ crucified
and risen again for the remission of sins. John wrote, in his preaching
of the blood of Jesus Christ, his Son, that cleanseth us from
all sin, saying that if we confess our sins, he is faithful and
just to forgive us our sin and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
And the Apostle Paul could say, in 1 Corinthians 2, verse 2,
Christ crucified is the apostolic message of the Gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ must be
the heart of our message because only by Him are sinners made
whole. Christ is the only way to eternal
life and the whole counsel of God, the only message by which
the Holy Spirit will implant spiritual life. Christ's crucifixion
and death must be therefore our theme. because only the blood
of Christ can cleanse the soul from sin and make peace with
God. Only the righteousness of God
in Christ fits us for heaven. Substitution, reconciliation,
the work of Jesus Christ accomplished must be our message. For except
the Lord Jesus Christ stand for us to bring us to God, we cannot
and will not be saved. Lord Jesus Christ taught his
disciples, and his disciples, the Lord himself teaches us. It's not you, Peter, and it's
not you, James, and it's not you, John, and it's not you,
Paul, that makes a convert. It's not you that enables spiritual
growth or causes a sinner to bear spiritual fruit. It's Christ. It's his death, it's his blood,
it's his gospel by his spirit, and it is all to his glory. The Lord asks his church and
his people, the Lord asks his disciples and preachers of the
gospel to do one thing, just one thing, preach Jesus Christ
and him crucified. And God will be praised when
we do that. When we do that, God will be
praised. because that fruit will be born. The Lord in his parable tells
us, when the fruit is brought forth, we shall put in the sickle. That speaks perhaps about those
days and times gone by when the first fruits of the crop were
brought in with singing and with joy, speaking undoubtedly of
the entrance into heaven of that great throng, the Church of Jesus
Christ, the kingdom of God redeemed. We will with joy sharing the
bounty of the harvest. When that fruitfulness is revealed,
when the harvest is ripe, when the church is gathered, perfect
and complete. brought home into the presence
of God forever, there to rejoice with him, there to sing praises
to his great and glorious name. May the Lord bless these thoughts
to us and encourage us to learn the meaning of these parables
as he teaches his disciples and his church therein. Amen.