Tag: eternity

The Parable Of The Sower

~ Sowmya Gali

INTRODUCTION

The Parable of the Sower had been on my heart for quite some time. I was trying hard to find time to sit down and pen down the thoughts that the Holy Spirit kept flooding into my mind. With the influx of ideas, I was struggling to come up with an organized approach to this powerful parable. Having devised a plan to write an article for each seed and how it was sown, I was gearing up to get started, when out of the blue, the Holy Spirit nudged me to the instance where Jesus calms the storm.

There I was scouring the Gospels for the exact chapter where Jesus calms the storm. Sure enough, I landed in Luke 8, where Jesus takes His disciples out into the lake after a day of preaching and healing. I read the portion of Luke 8: 22 – 25. Trying to put that section in perspective, I started reading a few verses before. They didn’t make sense so started from the beginning of chapter 8. Guess what! It is the Parable of the Sower. Amazed, how the Holy Spirit leads us to His truth, I surrendered and asked Him to teach me what He wants me to learn further more from this familiar passage.

Walk alongside me as we glean amazing truth from this all familiar passage. This Parable has been recorded by Matthew, Mark and Luke. I will be referring portions of this Parable across the three Gospels so we can extract as much ‘juice’ as we can. An interesting observation I made as I read all three accounts of this particular Parable is that all three Gospels record how Jesus explained this particular Parable. A key phrase we should be on the lookout is: he who has eyes, let him see. He who has ears, let him hear. Jesus knew that whoever is keen on learning the truth about God’s Kingdom, with their widened eyes, peeled to what God wants to show, they will see. With their perked-up ears, eager to hear His Word and His truth, they will hear and understand. Only such people are rewarded with the golden nuggets of His truth.

It amazes me that Jesus took time to explain this Parable in detail when His disciples asked Him. Matthew records that Jesus explains them further about the Kingdom of God in various little Parables and at the end ensures that they understood. He asks them, “Have you understood all these things?” and they replied, “yes”.

John’s Gospel doesn’t record this Parable. However, John talks about the True Vine and the branches in John 15. The analogy of the branches being part of the vine to bear fruit and to being subjected to pruning addresses a believer’s growth in faith. Jesus using the analogy of seeds, soil, garden, vine, branches, etc., to explain God’s Gospel reaching people’s hearts, flourishing in their hearts, and they thriving in His Kingdom could have made sense to the people in His day, and definitely, is relevant to us in these our current times. His Word is timeless and true!

Look Up

~ Sowmya Gali

Genesis 15: 5-6

And He took him outside and said, “Now look toward the heavens, and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” And he said to him, “So shall your descendants be.”

Then he believed in the Lord; and He reckoned it to him as righteousness.

When God called Abram out of the land of Chaldeans, He only promised that He will bless Abram and prosper him. The only condition was that he leave everything behind and follow God to the land the Lord God was going to show him. Abram obeyed the call, left behind everything. His father and nephew were the only ones who went along with him to the regions unknown. Soon after, Abram’s father died. But his nephew tagged along.

When strife arose between Lot’s herdsmen and Abram’s herdsmen, Lot and Abram decided to go separate ways. Lot chose the lush green valley of Jordan and settled near Sodom and Gomorrah, while Abram moved his tents to Hebron. It was in Hebron that God’s Word came to Abram in a vision. Abram was concerned that he still has no offspring. His nephew isn’t with him anymore. The only other male heir that Abram considered was his servant Eliezer.

That is when God took Abram outside and asked him to look up at the night sky. He asked him to count the stars if he was able to. And God promised that his descendants will be as numerous as the stars in the heavens. According to Lawrence O. Richards, today through the use of giant telescopes and radio telescopes that ‘see’ radio waves, we know that our Sun lies in a great cluster of stars, called a galaxy. Astronomers estimate that there are 100 billion stars in our galaxy and that there may be 100 billion galaxies in the universe (Richards, 1989). Astronomers have also suggested that our universe is expanding at a great rate.

God entered into a covenant relationship with Abram that night. Animals and birds were sacrificed. God and Abram entered into a blood covenant, first of its kind. Abram believed in the Lord. Isn’t it surprising that Abram trusted God more than anything or anyone at this point! He neither had a friend nor a relative to seek advice from, except for God Almighty. What God said, Abram had to take up at His Word. There was no turning back.

As we gaze at the night sky, we must realize that there is no East, West, North or South once we step outside of our planet. There is no up or down. The sense of direction is only relative to our planet. As numerous as the stars in the heavens, so many will Abram’s descendants be. Abram sure must’ve been overwhelmed by the prospect of having so many descendants. He just believed in the Lord and God reckoned it to him as righteousness. Abram recognized that what God was saying to him and showing him was absolute.

What are we believing today? Rather, who are we believing today? Is our worldview shaped by what we see around us? Or do we have a Biblical worldview? If we had the vision that Abram had about who God is, what His plans are for us, then we would be quick to believe in the Lord and take Him at His Word. Today God is asking us to ‘look up’ to the heavens. With God alone lies our redemption. With God alone lies our hope. With God alone lies our future.

Psalm 19: 1-2

The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.

Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night the display knowledge.

Romans 1: 19-20

What may be known about God is plain to them, because God has made it plain to them. For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities – his eternal power and divine nature – have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that men are without excuse.

Since there is so much of evidence all around us both visible and invisible, how can we not believe in God and in His Eternal Word. There is no other way around it. With man’s limited knowledge, there is only so little we could grasp the awesome power and divinity of God. Let us like Abram take God at His word.

Reference: Richards, O. Lawrence. “It couldn’t just happen – knowing the truth about God’s awesome creation” Harper Collins Christian Publishing, Nashville, TN 1989.