The Parable of the Sower (Luke 8:4-18) can also be called the Parable on Parables.
A parable is quintessential Hebrew communication. We can talk about the mundane facts of our human existence all day long, and Hebrew can do that. But the Hebrew language was inherently focused on parable, the kind of communication that registers in your heart, but it can prepare the intellect to receive the divine truth and prepare to act on it. The Bible refers to the heart as the repository of moral truth; it’s your convictions, the moral character written in your soul by the finger of God.
To understand the Parable on Parables requires keeping it with the parables that immediately follow it.
Has it every occurred to you that one implication of that parable is that you need to discern the souls you are dealing with in your daily life. How do you know if someone is not ready for the Gospel? It doesn’t matter what they say to you. What matters is the result God shows you in their souls. Some are hardened by the high traffic in their lives, their hearts closed to the truth because they simply don’t allow their convictions to speak. Some lives are so morally dry and shallow that they appear to respond only as long as the message intrigues them intellectually. Others cannot make a faith commitment because they are too tied to the material world and the fallen existence.
There are other examples we could think of, but Jesus gets His point across with those three. It’s pretty hard to be discriminatory about living the Covenant before the world, which is why this sower’s seeds seem to go all over the place. That’s not to say you can’t be circumspect about throwing pearls before swine, but your convictions can tell you when to be reticent. Your heart knows. Just don’t be a sucker for someone who fawns over you and your message. You cannot trust your own fallen nature, so be cynical about everyone.
The business of the lamp actually addresses limited resources. The common Jewish peasant had a one-room home and one little niche projecting out of one wall somewhere just about head height for a single oil lamp. Oil for that lamp would be a moderate expense, so they were careful to trim the wick to make just enough light to get things done before bed time once it got dark. The idea of hiding that lamp was incomprehensible. Make the most of what little you have in showing the world how you live by the Covenant.
For the most part, don’t push the message too hard. Sooner or later God will use that tiny light from your life to expose sin in others. This is how the Holy Spirit works, using God’s covenant servants to highlight moral failure. Not because His servants never fail, but it’s how they handle failure that makes such a strong impact.
And finally, the gospel covenant message polarizes a fallen society. When you are living by that covenant, harvesting the blessings of shalom, it tends to pulverize rationalizations and self-deception. People who may have had some inclination to hear the message may suddenly decide it demands too much. Yes, genuine faith is entirely unreasonable, demanding from us things only God can grant in the first place. Others who have suffered too much from this fallen existence can suddenly embrace the full riches of faith and not look back.
You have no way of knowing which way someone will go. God knows, but it’s not His way to tell us such things. Just keep on doing what’s right by the gospel covenant. Let God worry about the outcomes.
