Sonlight For The Seed
In the parable of the sower, Jesus tells us that the sower sows the seed. We see from the parable that the seed is the Word of God.
Given the right conditions seeds grow. They need to be planted in soil, watered, and they need warmth and sun light. They don’t grow in the seed packet, they must be planted. Similarly, the Word of God is no good on the shelf, it must be in our hearts.
When a seed starts to grow, we get two things:
- Shoots spring up, and they are the part of the plant we see.
- Roots go down into the soil, and they can’t be seen.
However, for the plant to be able to grow successfully, those roots have to be deep enough to support the growing plant, and they have to be healthy. The main functions of the roots are to provide a secure anchor to keep the plant in place against the elements. They also take in food and water from the soil and move them up through the plant. Without those healthy roots, the plant will not prevail for long.
It is similar in our own lives. If the seed is the Word of God, the soil is our heart. If we do not allow the seed of God’s Word to sink deeply and firmly into good soil of our hearts, we will not produce strong roots.
To produce any good soil, you have to weed it and feed it, and it’s the same in our hearts. We are receiving seeds all the time but only some of those seeds will be good seeds. That’s why the sower in Jesus’ parable sows the seed so indiscriminately. It is sown anywhere and everywhere. He’s generous and indiscriminate about how much he sows, and where he sows it. Why? Because all kinds of seed are being sown all the time in us, we just don’t realise it.
Everything that we encounter is seed being planted in us. That’s why we need to be aware of what we hear and see.
We are in this world, but we are told not to be conformed to its ways. If the soil of our heart is full of the seeds and weeds of doubt, hate, bitterness, selfishness, greed or unforgiveness, then the soil of our heart is not going to be able to support the seeds of God’s Word – those weeds will choke the seed of the Word. This process is continual.
Once we have cleared out the weeds so that the soil is prepared, the seed then needs the right conditions to grow.
We need to water the seed by listening to and meditating on the Word. Ephesians 5 v 26 says that Christ sanctifies us by the “washing of the water of the Word”. We need to continually water the seeds of God’s Word that have been sown in our hearts.
We also need to ensure our seed gets Sonlight. A clever play on words, you may think! But actually we need the SON, rather than the sun. Rather than living in the sunlight, we need to live in the Sonlight which is living in the light of the truth and not being entangled in sin or doing things which we know to be contrary to God’s Word. This isn’t to earn salvation or being a slave to the law; this is a decision to put our lives in line with what we say we believe.
If we have made Jesus the Lord of our lives, we need to live that out. Paul repeatedly referred to himself as a “Bondservant of Christ”.
Why? Because he was a slave to the law? No! Because he had surrendered himself entirely to his Lord, and even though he was a free man, he chose to live like he really belonged to Christ. He lived a servant lifestyle through love.
What do we do when we are not in church? In our spare time, do we read things we shouldn’t – horoscopes, gossip magazines? Do we watch hours of TV? Do we waste the time we have doing meaningless things, or do we make the most of every opportunity to spend time with our Saviour? (Eph 5v16).
To grow our seed we need time in the Son and with the Son.
When the seed grows, the roots are strengthened, the flowers appear and then we produce FRUIT. However, an apple tree’s fruit is not for itself. Its aim is to get someone or something to want that fruit and thus, the seeds will be spread.
The fruit we produce should bless others. As we mature we produce better fruit, and we SCATTER the seeds of God’s Word, and thus the cycle begins again with someone else receiving the fruit of God’s Word. Voila! REPRODUCTION has taken place.
But that cycle never ends in us. We aren't meant to flower only once. We are called to produce fruit in every season.
So, what can God produce in you this season?