The Parable of the Seed

By Reverend Lonnie C. Crowe

Mark 4: 26. And He said, "The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground, 27.  "and should sleep by night and rise by day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how. 28.  "For the earth yields crops by itself: first the blade, then the head, after that the full grain in the head. 29.  "But when the grain ripens, immediately he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.''

Often when our lives are in turmoil, we cannot see the Lord working for our behalf. We cannot see the prayer seed that we have planted sprouting invisibly in the soil of our lives. Like the Israelites in the wilderness, we murmur because of what we have deduced to be the Lord’s unwillingness to intervene in our situation.

Psalm 119:11 if foundational in all aspects of bringing us into understanding what is happening in our lives: “Your word I have hidden in my heart, That I might not sin against You.” We must believe in the goodness if God.

Remember that old Sunday School chorus: “I stand alone on the Word of God, the B_I-B-L-E.  If we are going to stand on the Word, we must know the Word.  Consider the following scriptures: 

Psalm 27: 13. “ I would have lost heart, unless I had believed That I would see the goodness of the Lord In the land of the living. 14.  Wait on the Lord; Be of good courage, And He shall strengthen your heart; Wait, I say, on the Lord!”

Psalm 46: 10.  Be still, and know that I am God; I will be exalted among the nations, I will be exalted in the earth!  11.  The Lord of hosts is with us; The God of Jacob is our refuge. Selah.

We can also become discouraged because we do not understand how God works. 

1 Corinthians 14: 40.  Let all things be done decently and in order.  God does all things in order—first the blade, then the head, after that the full grain in the head. 

We usually want to jump forward to the full grain in the head.

When we are trying to figure God out, we must remember Isaiah 55; 8.  "For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,'' says the Lord.  9.  "For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts.

To put it simply, we must know in our hearts that God knows best.  Living a Kingdom life is, essentially living in faith.

Hebrews 11: 1.  Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen. 2.  For by it the elders obtained a good testimony. 3.  By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that the things which are seen were not made of things which are visible.

We must truly accept in the depth of our being Genesis 1:1:  In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth. 

Jonny Gibson of Professor, Westminster Theological Seminary has written that Genesis 1:1 expresses 12 aspects of the nature of God:

God is one spirit, eternal, infinite, unchangeable, self-existent, living, and immortal in his being, the omnipotent, omniscient Creator and Sovereign of all things in heaven and on earth, of all things visible and invisible.

The more we know of the nature of God, the more we will walk by faith and not by sight.  Hebrews 11:6.  But without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is, and that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.