EPISODE 30 Luke Chapter 8 ”He Who Has Ears” for Share The Word

Welcome, friends, to Share the Word. Whether you're just beginning to explore the Bible or have been a Christian for years, we believe that you'll get some great insight from our podcast as our teachers unpack the big ideas of the New Testament in a down-to-earth language. Thanks for being a listener. Now let's get right into today's lesson. He who has ears. Luke chapter 8.

During Jesus' public ministry years, as we've learned, his base of operations was the town of Capernaum on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee. When he publicly began speaking there and teaching, the religious establishment types were very skeptical of him because he was not one of them. And the more he spoke, the more they disliked him. But regular people were drawn to Jesus like a magnet. When Jesus taught, they came in droves to listen because his words seemed to carry unusual authority, unlike the typical rabbis, I guess, who put people to sleep. Wake up, Jacob.

The service is over. Oh yes, of course. Wonderful sermon, wasn't it? One reason Jesus was so effective at speaking was because he liked to tell stories. Stories get people's attention. The stories Jesus told we often refer to as parables.

They were stories which had a not always obvious deeper meaning, a spiritual meaning. Jesus drew his stories from everyday life so his listeners could relate to them. But beneath the surface, the stories were packed with important spiritual truths. One of the very best known parables Jesus told, which is recorded not only here in Luke but also in Matthew and Mark's Gospels, was a story about a farmer sowing seed. And where that seed landed. Let me explain.

Jesus was outside of Capernaum. We learn the location from Matthew's account at the shore of the Sea of Galilee, where apparently he now often publicly taught. So many people gathered from nearby towns and villages that, once again, Jesus got into a boat and was pushed out a short ways into the water, and there the anchor was dropped. Picture the people waiting to hear him, sitting and standing all up and down the shoreline and up the slope of the beach, forming a sort of natural amphitheater. With his voice carrying out over the water, here is the story Jesus told. A farmer went out to plant his seed.

The technique then was to fill a leather bag with seed, probably wheat in this case, and to distribute it by hand as evenly as possible across a field. As Jesus described it, some of the seed hit the footpaths bordering the field where the soil was packed down hard from constant foot traffic. He said seed which landed there was quickly snatched up by waiting birds who followed the farmer. Other seed landed on areas covered by a thin layer of soil hiding rocks below. The soil in these spots was very shallow, only a few inches deep. When the sun came out, the seed in these areas germinated quickly and sprouted, but because there was no way for roots to grow deep and the rock below them was blocking them, when the sun got hotter, these young plants withered and died.

Often the scrub left over in these fields of Israel from previous year's growth was burned off before the next season, which killed everything on the surface, but not necessarily the roots below the surface, like the hard-to-kill thorny weeds and bushes that were a constant nuisance. And they, Jesus said, led to a third outcome. In these areas infested with thorns, both the wheat and thorns sprang up, but in time the thorns overgrew the wheat, draining the nutrients from the soil and hoarding the sunlight. The young plants were soon overcome and choked out by the thorns. But fortunately, some of the seed fell into good soil, grew up and produced a real harvest. Depending on how fertile the soil was, some produced thirty or sixty or even a hundred times what was sown.

When Jesus told this story, which was very easy for these people to envision, he finished by saying, He who has ears to hear, let him hear. He who has ears. Check yourself right now. I think this means you too. What Jesus meant by that was, listen up. What I'm telling you is worth careful thought.

Later, some of his disciples, realizing there was more to this story than what was on the surface, came to Jesus and asked him about it. And what we learn from his reply, beginning at verse 11, is that this is really a story about how different people respond to the word of God when they hear it. Pretty appropriate for what we're doing right now, eh? Jesus told them that in his story, the seed represents the word of God. That's a perfect analogy, by the way, because like seeds, the word of God is alive and full of potential. I like the way it's put in Hebrews chapter 4, verse 12, where it says, The word of God is living and powerful.

Throughout this chapter, Luke tells about the power of Jesus' words in one situation after another, in the lives of people who were freed from demonic spirits at his command, like Mary Magdalene. How a storm on the Sea of Galilee had to obey his words. How a 12-year-old girl, the daughter of a synagogue official, died but was raised from death by only Jesus saying, Child, rise up. In one situation after another, it was the power in Jesus' words that changed situations that seemed impossible to change. The implication is clear. If Jesus' words take root in our hearts by faith and are nourished there, radical change can take place in us for the better, too, transformational change.

So the seed in the story is the Word of God. The soil in the story, interestingly, is the condition of each listener's heart. As Jesus explained, there are four types of soil, which we'll detail in a moment. The sower in the parable is anyone who shares the Word of God, who tries to plant God's Word in other people's hearts and minds. Right now, I'm a sower, actually, in the terms of this story. I'm scattering the seed of God's Word potentially all over the place because people could be listening to this anywhere on the globe.

It's landing on all kinds of soil. We're not always given such an explicit explanation of Jesus' parables as here. Often he kind of left his hearers up in the air a little bit with an unspoken, Think about that for a while, like, Put that in your pipe and smoke it. But not in this case. When the disciples asked for more insight to be sure what the story meant, Jesus gave them the definitive interpretation. And here is the explanation he shared.

You know the seed I spoke about which landed on the hard-packed pathways bordering the field? This is like people who hear the Word of God, but whose hearts are so hard the seed has little chance to penetrate. Sadly, some people's hearts are very hard by the continual traffic of sin and their continual rejection of God. They don't think about eternity or about things that matter beyond their next party, or next purchase, or next whatever. They've decided God, Jesus, the Bible, all that stuff, that's not for them, and their minds are closed. Jesus actually said, Satan, like the birds that followed the farmer, if he can, snatches the seed away from these hardened hearts before it has a chance to take root.

He has enough control in their hearts and minds that if people like this happen to hear the word of God somehow, under his influence, they usually brush it aside as irrelevant, maybe laugh it off as kooky, or even mock the messenger as a religious fanatic. This is the person with a soil of a hardened heart. I've come across many over my years of sowing. The seed I spoke of, which landed in the shallow soil covering the rocks, Jesus said, these are people who, when they hear the word, readily receive it enthusiastically, in fact. But there's no real depth there, so nowhere for the roots to take hold. These look like believers for a while, but whenever any pressure comes their way, any test, any cost to being my follower, they soon wither and disappear.

Man, this sounds like some of my best converts. I can think of people I had extremely high hopes for, people who seemed to really respond to the word of God, who seemed so enthusiastic to follow the Lord at first, but their response was shallow. When they realized that following Christ was going to challenge some things currently in their life, that it may require some changes in their values, or just whenever the immediate crisis that caused them to try God, and I'm using air quotes here, try God. Whenever that emergency passed, their newfound faith quickly withered, and they were on to something else. These people never understood or were ready for the fact that receiving and following Christ involves a real heart change, what Jesus and John the Baptist called repentance. This is the soil of a shallow heart.

Now the seed that fell on the soil infested with thorns, Jesus said. This represents those people who receive the word, who look for a time like they've become real Christians, but then have other things in their lives that so dominate their time and attention, they never really grow or bear any fruit. Their response to God's word is always overshadowed by and choked out by other things that, in reality, matter much more to them. Jesus pointed at various distractions, their pursuit of pleasure or money or other pressing worries in their lives. These are the thorns that eventually choked out the word of God in them. They might feel impacted by the truth when they hear it, but there's always something higher on their agenda that keeps the word from taking root and producing fruit, the good changes God wants to produce in their lives.

I think people in this category may suppose they can receive Jesus as their Savior, but not as their Lord, not really as their leader. They're prepared to take Him as long as it's on their terms, but not on His terms. This is a divided heart, soil filled with thorns. But, he went on, when you scatter the seed, some will certainly fall on good soil and will sprout up, and its roots will go down deep, and it will persevere the heat and storms, and it will produce fruit, a real harvest. The crop will not always be the same. In some lives, the fruit will be more plentiful than others.

But when the seed of God falls on good soil, a genuine heart hungry for Him, those people will respond to it rightly, and they will persevere, and they will in time produce good fruit. The version in Mark says they keep hearing the word, accepting it, and bearing fruit. What did Jesus mean by fruit or by producing a harvest? In the Bible, fruitfulness means, for one thing, a heart marked by obedience to God, a willingness and readiness to change our thinking and our values and our lifestyle as we understand what pleases the Lord. It also means changes in our character as the fruit of the Spirit. As the Spirit of God who comes to live inside of us begins changing us from the inside out, changing our bitterness to forgiveness, harshness to gentleness, anger to meekness, pride to humility.

And fruitfulness also includes seeing our faith reproduced in others. A fruitful Christian is one whose faith is contagious. He wants to spread it around. He or she becomes a sower too. In contrast to the hardened heart and the shallow heart or the divided heart, these are the kind of results you will see when the word of God falls on good soil, on a heart that is truly receptive, on a heart of a sincere believer. It may take some time, of course, for seeds to become plants and for the plants to produce fruit.

But put into good soil, Jesus is saying, fruit will be the inevitable result. A fellow Bible teacher I admire shared an insight with me from this parable about how different hearts respond to the word of God. The scripture verse from Hebrews I shared earlier, in its entirety, reads, For the word of God is living and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, even penetrating as far as the division of soul and spirit, of joints and marrow, and is able to judge the thoughts and intentions of our hearts. He suggested that when the word of God is heard by any set of ears, or read, or however it happens to land on the soil of a person's heart, that it always creates at least this one thought and this one intention in every heart it lands, even hardened ones. The thought is, That sounds true. And the intention felt is, I should look into this more.

But quickly, the evil one swoops in to steal the seed out of the hard heart by using lies or diversions. When the person thinks, Hmm, maybe I should look into this more, the evil one can put into that hardened heart opposing thoughts: Nah, that can't be true. Look how much science has disproven the Bible, or some other such lie. Or use diversions like introducing thoughts about how hypocritical many Christians are, even Christian leaders that they've heard about. But Jesus was clear that the devil comes and takes away the word from these hearts so that they will not believe and be saved. The truth is, no one is beyond the power of the word of God if it gets a chance to germinate in their heart.

I've seen some very hard people, when the word of God hits the soil of their heart at just the right time and under just the right circumstances, or just over a prolonged enough period of time, finally take root. I've seen some people who I thought, that person would never come to Christ, surprise me and come to Christ. And as the Word of God grows in them, they become completely different people because the Word of God is alive and powerful. I watched a short video online this week about a man who I remember as pretty famous, or maybe notorious would be a better word, when I was younger. His name was Chuck Colson. Colson was a tough military man, a Marine captain, who also became a brilliant attorney.

Already by the time he was in his late 30s, he had risen to the top. He was a special counsel to the President of the United States. He had an office in the West Wing of the White House. He helped Richard Nixon get reelected in 1972 by a huge margin. He was actually a pretty amoral political operative when you got right down to it. In the press, he was often referred to as Nixon's hatchet man.

Yet he seemed on top of the world. He achieved what most people can't dream of before he was 40 years old. Real power, a career that gave him incredible access and lots of fringe benefits. By his own admission, he was very full of himself at that point. He felt invincible. But then things began to fall apart.

And like someone pulling on a loose thread in a cheap suit, Chuck Colson's life began to unravel. He had gotten involved in illegal activities running Nixon's political operation in 1972. You may have heard of the Watergate affair. It's not only that it brought down an American president, but it also landed Colson in prison for one to three years. He suddenly felt completely destroyed, he said, ashamed, stupid, and very empty inside. In that lowest of low points, as he was awaiting sentencing, someone he knew sowed some good seed on the soil of Chuck Colson's heart.

A friend who had recently become a believer himself shared his testimony, and he gave him a book full of God's truth called Mere Christianity by the Christian philosopher C. S. Lewis. When Colson heard the Word of God, it was just at the right time. The hard soil in his proud heart had been broken up. He said the night his friend shared his testimony of how humbling himself and accepting Jesus as his Savior and Lord transformed him, he thanked him for his concern, but tried to act cool about it all, to not react.

But through his friend's sharing of his story of accepting Christ, along with and the things he was reading in C. S. Lewis, the power in God's Word was shouting inside of his heart and mind, This seems true. You need to respond to this. As he tells it, after he left his friend's house that night, before he could even drive his car from the driveway, he was crying so hard he had to stop then and there and pray. He didn't know what to say to God, but he knew what he needed was Jesus' power to change him and to renew his heart and life too.

And so he opened the door and invited him in. And Chuck Colson was truly transformed by the power of Christ into a very different person. He did go to prison for a while, but while in there, without a lot of other distractions, he studied the New Testament as we're doing now. The seed of God's Word grew down deep roots in him. While there, God birthed in him a vision to begin a ministry to inmates, to share the gospel inside prisons and create programs where inmates could experience real life change through the power of Christ and learning God's Word. When he came out of prison, he talked about being born again.

I remember many in the media scoffed, Chuck Colson of all people claiming some kind of religious conversion? Come on. But Colson's vision for Prison Fellowship, as it came to be called, was born and grew under his leadership into a powerful Christian-based prison reform movement and a ministry that has affected the lives of tens of thousands of inmates, not just in America, but around the world. He tirelessly directed Prison Fellowship for the next three decades until he went home to be with the Lord at the age of 80 in 2012. Maybe you'd like to read the transformational story of this man who was in the middle of one of America's biggest political scandals and met the Lord there. His autobiography is aptly titled Born Again.

I highly recommend it. You know, I have no idea who will listen to this podcast in the next week, in the next month, in the next year, or maybe long after I'm gone. But hey, if you have ears, listen up. Jesus said, Give this parable of mine serious thought. What would a real spiritual soil sample right now show is going on inside of you? A hardened heart?

A shallow heart? A divided heart? Or the good soil of a truly receptive, believing heart? I'm not sure how long you've been listening to Share the Word, or in what other ways the seed of God's Word has been sown in your heart and mind. But are you sensing it's the truth? Are you hearing that voice inside say, You should listen to this.

You should do something about this? If so, break up the hardened soil, break up the rocks and rake them out. Root out the thorns that distract you and let the Word of God take root. Open your heart by faith to Jesus, accept Him as your Savior and Leader, and then turn your life toward following Him, learning and obeying His Word. And please, hear this cautionary note that Jesus made to His audience at verse 18 when He said, Take care how you listen, for whoever has, to him more will be given, and to him who does not have, even what he thinks he has will be taken away. It's important to respond to God's Word when He speaks to us.

He meant if we respond to God's Word when we hear it, our understanding increases, its benefits in our lives increase. But if we turn away from it when we hear it, if we shut our hearts and minds to it when the Holy Spirit urges us, You should listen to this. You should do something about this, then Jesus warned, our opportunities could well shrink. Our chances to respond to God may well dwindle. I read something on a meme of all places that struck me recently. It said, The biggest assumption we all make is that we will have tomorrow.

He who has ears to hear, let him hear. Wow, that was some thought-provoking information, wasn't it? If it struck you that way too, you can play it again and think it through even more deeply. Everything we produce at Share the Word is free for you to use and share. If you're just joining us, all the past lessons are available to download free. The address is sharetheword.org.

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