-
Well, Paul says in Philippians 2,
-
"work out your salvation
-
with fear and trembling.
-
For it is God who works in you,
-
both to will and to work (or to do)
-
of His good pleasure."
-
And so, on the one hand, he says to us
-
work out our salvation.
-
On the other hand, he says
-
God is working in you
-
to cause you to want to do what's right
-
and to enable you to do what's right.
-
So which is it?
-
Is it man's responsibility
-
or is it God working in us?
-
And it's both, isn't it?
-
And it's not like a yoke of oxen
-
where you do your part
-
and God does His part like this.
-
But it's more like two cups
-
that one fits inside the other one.
-
And God is the one moving
everything forward,
-
but He does it through
our willing and doing
-
what He's worked in us to will and do.
-
So we've heard this morning,
-
a little bit of exhortation
-
about the necessity for us
-
to work out our salvation.
-
And beloved, if you don't
spend time in the Word,
-
and you don't spend time in prayer,
-
and you don't spend time
with the people of God,
-
you're not going to make it.
-
But on the other hand,
-
God is the one that works in us
-
to cause us to want to open that Bible
-
and to actually get it open.
-
And so we're going to
get both barrels today, I trust.
-
The first one: those exhortations
-
of our responsibility.
-
But what we're going
to look at this morning
-
is a parable of the Lord Jesus
-
where He emphasizes what's going on
-
behind the scenes.
-
And so let's turn to Mark 4.
-
And we'll read four verses.
-
Mark 4:26
-
"And He was saying,
-
'The Kingdom of God is like
-
a man who casts seed upon the ground.'"
-
Now, He's going to tell us something;
-
a fact about spiritual reality
-
of what the kingdom is like.
-
"'The kingdom of God is like a man
-
who casts seed upon the ground,
-
and goes to bed at night
-
and gets up by day and the seed
-
sprouts up and grows.
-
How he himself does not know.
-
The earth produces crops by itself.
-
First the blade, then the head,
-
then the mature grain in the head.
-
But when the crop permits,
-
he immediately puts in the sickle
-
because the harvest has come.'"
-
If you're a Christian here this morning,
-
you already realize
-
that the greatest Teacher who ever lived
-
was the Lord Jesus Christ.
-
His emphasis was never lopsided.
-
He never had a bump on the tire.
-
Everything that He said -
-
His manner, His methods
-
were always perfect.
-
It says in John 3 that
He whom God has sent
-
speaks the very words of God,
-
for He gives the Spirit
without measure unto Him.
-
So everything: perfect.
-
Every response.
-
Every emphasis.
-
Every manner. Every method.
-
And one of His favorite methods
-
was the parable.
-
There's a special beauty
-
and special wonder
-
about these parables, isn't there?
-
They're so earthy.
-
I mean, seeds and farmers
and what-have-you.
-
And they're so heavenly.
-
In four verses, the Lord Jesus
-
can say more than all the wise men
-
of the ages.
-
And He often opened His mouth in parables.
-
We read here a little later in v. 33-34,
-
"with many such parables, He was
-
speaking the Word to them as they were
-
able to hear it.
-
And He was not speaking to them
-
without parables.
-
He was explaining everything privately
-
to His own disciples."
-
And in Matthew, we're told
-
that one of the psalms alluded to this
-
about the Messiah.
-
It says, "I will open
my mouth in parables.
-
I will utter things hidden from
the foundation of the world."
-
And so the Lord Jesus Christ
-
was speaking in these parables
-
things that nobody had ever heard;
-
that had never been said
-
since the foundation of the world.
-
He said, "blessed are your ears,"
-
to hear such words as we've just read,
-
because many prophets and righteous men -
-
even kings - desired to hear the things
-
that you hear.
-
They didn't get to hear them.
-
What a privilege we have
-
to be able to even study this parable.
-
He's telling us some things
-
about the nature of the kingdom.
-
Very different than the ideas
-
that the Jews had at that time
-
about the nature of the kingdom.
-
And many of those
parables are of that sort.
-
But today, we want to look
at this parable in Mark 4.
-
And what a wonderful parable it is,
-
and how thankful we should be
-
for the truth that it contains.
-
Before we begin,
-
I just want to remind you again
-
that these parables are
-
speaking truth about invisible reality.
-
They're telling us something about
-
the nature of things in the kingdom.
-
And so the Lord Jesus said,
-
now there's a realm
here that you can't see;
-
that you can't understand.
-
But I want to tell you something about it.
-
This is what it's like -
-
the kingdom of God is like this.
-
It's like a man who casts
seed on the ground,
-
and goes to bed at night
-
and gets up by day.
-
Out of all the Gospels,
-
only found here in Mark.
-
It's kind of a buried treasure
-
you come upon; you stumble upon it
-
in the field as you're going through
-
the Gospel of Mark.
-
So the first question we should ask is
-
what is the theme or overall subject
-
of this parable?
-
Before we get to the details,
-
you say what's He talking about here?
-
And I think the answer is
-
He's talking about growth.
-
V. 27 "He goes to bed at night,
-
gets up by day, the seed
sprouts up and grows."
-
V. 28 "The earth produces crops by itself.
-
First the blade, then the head,
-
then the mature grain in the head."
-
So we know right off,
-
the Lord is unfolding to us
-
some of the mysteries about growth
-
in the kingdom;
-
growth of the kingdom of God as a whole
-
down through church history.
-
He said this is the way it's going to be.
-
And growth in our individual lives
-
and in the lives of other Christians.
-
This is the reality.
-
He says this is the way it happens.
-
So, with that in mind,
-
let's look at the details.
-
First of all, v. 26, He was saying,
-
"the kingdom of God is like a man
-
who casts seed upon the ground."
-
So the first thing is the
prerequisite of growth,
-
which is planting.
-
You can't have a crop;
-
you can't have growth without planting.
-
And that is a big emphasis, you remember,
-
in the parables.
-
It comes up again and again.
-
You have a man, a sower, sowing seed.
-
And you have that
picture; that illustration
-
where the seed is the Word of God.
-
And then you have this man who
-
plants good seed in the field.
-
And these plants come up.
-
It has to do with God Himself planting.
-
Ultimately, the man is God.
-
He represents God.
-
And God is the one that plants
-
the seed in the ground of the Christian.
-
You remember what Jesus said?
-
Every plant that My Heavenly Father
-
has not planted shall be rooted up.
-
Isn't this a wonderful thing to think
-
that God is in the business
-
of planting good seed that springs up
-
and becomes a wheat harvest?
-
God does that.
-
So the seeds are men sown by God;
-
converts.
-
But then if you go back a little further,
-
Jesus uses this matter of the seed
-
being the Word of God.
-
And you have that aspect of it
-
which has to do with, of course,
-
this is the way God does save people.
-
He plants people and saves people
-
through us sowing the seed
-
of the Word of God.
-
And so both of these, I think,
-
are involved here when He talks about
-
growth in the kingdom.
-
Remember, Paul in 1 Corinthians 3 says,
-
"I planted."
-
I planted.
-
So God uses men to plant
the seed of the Word.
-
And He uses that seed to save people
-
and plant true converts.
-
So do we see ourselves as sowers
-
planting seed?
-
We have seed.
-
We've been given the seed.
-
And isn't it something?
-
The seed looks so insignificant.
-
Vance Havner said when he was young -
-
I don't know; do they still do this?
-
You get your garden
seeds in a little package
-
and it has a beautiful picture on there?
-
And you know it's a
promise of what could be.
-
But you look inside -
-
I mean, lettuce is really the one,
-
when you look inside,
-
it looks like you're planting pepper
-
in the ground.
-
It's like how can this possibly
-
bring forth a crop?
-
Well, you think of Paul standing
-
on Mars Hill among the scoffers.
-
This is what we are.
-
We're in a heathen society
-
that hates the Word,
-
and it looks like those seeds are so small
-
and there's a step of
faith involved in that;
-
in just planting that seed.
-
The promise of what
can be is on the cover,
-
but it requires a step of faith.
-
The giant sunflowers, you know,
-
that is almost like a tree -
-
that starts out from one seed.
-
And so are we sowing?
-
Brother Kurt Daniel, a
pastor there in Illinois,
-
you call his number -
if you don't get him,
-
you get the answering machine,
-
and at the end he'll say,
-
"and remember the
words of the Lord Jesus,"
-
and then he quotes a verse of Scripture.
-
What's that? Planting a seed.
-
Well, that won't do any good.
-
Well, God says the opposite, doesn't He?
-
Ecclesiastes 11:4-6
-
"He who watches the wind will not sow,
-
and he who looks at the clouds
-
will not reap.
-
Just as you do not know
the path of the wind,
-
and how bones are formed in the womb
-
of a pregnant woman,
-
so you do not know the activity of God
-
who makes all things.
-
Sow your seed in the morning,
-
and do not be idle in the evening.
-
For you do not know whether morning
-
or evening sowing will succeed
-
or whether both of
them alike will be good."
-
Now, the devil tells you
the opposite, doesn't he?
-
You don't know.
-
Nothing will happen in the morning.
-
You don't even know,
-
maybe nothing will happen
in either one of them.
-
God says just the other way around.
-
He says sow in the morning;
-
sow it in the evening.
-
You don't know what I might do.
-
I might do something with both of them.
-
And it's happened, hasn't it,
-
again and again in the most unlikely cases
-
where God has taken some seed
-
through the instrumentality of man
-
planting some little insignificant seed;
-
God has planted a real, true Christian.
-
And lo and behold, they spring up
-
out of dry ground.
-
And they're sustained by God.
-
So the prerequisite of growth is planted.
-
And that has to be.
-
God has to plant the person
-
and He does it through the instrumentality
-
of us planting the seed.
-
Secondly, what else is true
-
about the kingdom of God?
-
Are you listening to this?
-
There is a time element involved.
-
There is a process involved.
-
He goes to bed at night;
-
he gets up by day.
-
He goes to bed at night;
-
he gets up by day.
-
What's Jesus saying?
-
He's saying there is a
time element involved
-
in this matter of growth.
-
One of the things that a farmer
has to have is patience.
-
And actually, as I see the weather
patterns and what-have-you,
-
I think well, you now,
-
I really don't want to be a farmer.
-
I mean, think of it.
-
James specifically brings this out.
-
"Be patient therefore, brethren,
-
until the coming of the Lord.
-
Behold the farmer waits
-
for the precious produce of the soil
-
being patient about it
-
until it gets the early and late rains.
-
You too be patient.
-
Strengthen your hearts
-
for the coming of the Lord is at hand."
-
We don't like to think in these terms.
-
But, the Lord is telling
us something here, isn't He?
-
You just picture a farmer
-
sitting dejectedly on this tractor
-
at the end of the day,
-
and you say, "what's wrong?"
-
And he says, "I don't have any crops."
-
"When did you plant?"
-
"This morning."
-
It's absurd isn't it?
-
That's exactly the way we are.
-
Instant.
-
I read my Bible every day this week
-
and I don't see any growth.
-
You know?
-
In the area of witnessing;
-
in the area of Bible study;
-
in the area of prayer,
-
this instant mentality.
-
Miles Stanford said, "when God
-
wants to make a squash,
-
He takes just a short time.
-
But when He wants to make an oak tree,
-
it might take a hundred years."
-
There's a time element involved.
-
Prime Minister Disraeli there in England
-
at one point, the story is
-
that he stood up and gave
an extemporaneous speech.
-
And later in the day,
-
they were having some kind of
-
state function,
-
and one of the ladies of state
-
came up to him and said,
-
"I want to tell you how much I enjoyed
-
that extemporaneous speech."
-
She said, "it's been on my mind all day."
-
He said, "Madam, that speech has
-
been on my mind for twenty years."
-
That's the time element.
-
You hear one of these brothers get up
-
and give an extemporaneous word.
-
That's been there a long time.
-
That doesn't just happen.
-
It takes time.
-
God works gradually.
-
There's a time element
involved with true growth.
-
Let me say it another way.
-
Growth is imperceptible.
-
That's another way of saying it.
-
Growth is imperceptible.
-
You think of corn plants.
-
Just sit; go out in the field.
-
I don't know - you all don't have
-
much corn down here.
-
But you go out and look at a corn plant.
-
Just stare at it really hard.
-
Keep an eye on it.
-
Watch it grow.
-
You won't see anything whatsoever.
-
You look at your own life really hard.
-
Stare at it really hard
-
to detect a trace of growth.
-
You're not going to see anything.
-
That's encouraging, isn't it?
-
I mean, you parents -
-
you know, this morning,
-
your kids walked into the room
-
and you said, "My, how you've grown
-
during the night."
-
No.
-
But somebody that hasn't
seen them for a while,
-
they come in - it's amazing.
-
And we forget.
-
And the quickest way to get discouraged
-
is to look inside all the time
-
and keep a real good eye on yourself
-
and see whether you're growing.
-
We forget how different people are now
-
from what they were ten years ago.
-
And growth is like that.
-
It's imperceptible.
-
It's slow.
-
It's mysteriously slow.
-
There's an apparent slowness about it.
-
What is does Jesus tell us?
-
Well, He talks about the
mystery of growth in v. 27.
-
"He goes to bed at night;
-
gets up by day."
-
There's this time element.
-
Time element.
-
My mother used to say that she thought
-
she could hear corn growing in the night.
-
I don't think so.
-
I think she could
hear the leaves rustling.
-
There's a time element.
-
But then He says,
-
"the seed sprouts up and grows.
-
How he himself does not know."
-
There's a mystery.
-
Now listen to this,
-
Jesus said this is the way
-
the kingdom of heaven is.
-
You do not know how growth takes place.
-
That's the way it is.
-
You don't know how it takes place.
-
That's what He's already said.
-
It's mysterious.
-
The Gospel takes root in your life,
-
and in other's life,
-
and you see things happen that
-
you cannot figure out.
-
It fills you with amazement and wonder.
-
And you're not going to
have the slightest idea how.
-
Jesus said the wind blows where it wishes.
-
You hear the sound of it.
-
You don't know where it comes from
-
or where it's going.
-
So is everyone who's born of the Spirit.
-
I've never understood growth in myself
-
or anyone else.
-
We know, like we've heard this morning,
-
we know it has to do with
-
spending time in the Word;
-
it has to do with prayer;
-
it has to do with fellowship.
-
All those things are the context.
-
So how many of you have just decided
-
I'm going to read my Bible
every day this week?
-
How'd you do on that?
-
See what I'm saying?
-
Underneath it all,
-
there's a mysterious working
-
of the power of God
-
underneath; sustaining everything.
-
Work out your salvation
with fear and trembling
-
for God is working inside of you
-
supernaturally, or you're
not going to make it.
-
You're not going to make it.
-
But He is working inside of you
-
if you're a Christian.
-
And you are going to make it.
-
See?
-
It's mysterious.
-
I've never understood growth in myself
-
or anybody else.
-
If it's something where you can say,
-
I did this, and I did
this, and I did this,
-
you've probably got some kind
-
of Pharisaical counterfeit.
-
That's what you've got.
-
I've never liked how-to's.
-
There's books out on that -
-
how to win souls;
-
how to have church growth.
-
The Lord Jesus said right
here there's no "how-to."
-
He said you don't know how.
-
That just did away with
a bunch of conferences.
-
You don't need to waste your time.
-
I've seen people taking notes on how-to.
-
They fill up 20 pages.
-
A year later, they're coming back
to the same conference;
-
filling up 20 more pages.
-
Nothing ever changes.
-
You've got to be cast upon God
-
like Brother Merle used to say.
-
The Bible's not a how-to book,
-
it's a what-to book.
-
A lot of the stuff Nathan
was saying to us today,
-
that's what-to, you know?
-
You be strong; you be stable.
-
How in the world am I going to do that?
-
Well, you've got to go to God.
-
Usually what happens in true growth
-
is you're crying out to God for change.
-
You've tried this. You've tried that.
-
You've gone to this conference.
-
You've gone to that conference.
-
You've tried squinting your eyes harder
-
when you repented.
-
And none of it worked.
-
And then, lo and behold,
-
you look back and it's:
God has changed me;
-
set me free from this.
-
He's working in my life.
-
Isn't it wonderful?
-
He says it happens -
-
it happens how? You don't know.
-
I don't know how this happened.
-
But I know, yes, I had to spend time
-
in the Word.
-
Yes, I had to cry out to God.
-
Yes, on all that,
-
but in the end you look back.
-
You know I used to think
-
that victory over sin would be -
-
I'd be standing there like these hunters
-
in Africa, you know,
-
with my rifle and my foot
on the head of the lion.
-
This is Charles with victory over sin.
-
It's more like you're shaking your head
-
saying I can't figure out how in the world
-
God ever set me free from that,
-
but it sure is good to be free from that.
-
And now I see how bad it was.
-
I couldn't even see how bad it was before.
-
Isn't that true?
-
It's mysterious.
-
The mistake that people make
-
is to take their own experiences
-
and try to get a formula that you can
-
give to everybody else,
-
and if they do that it'll work.
-
It won't.
-
God uses things in one person's life
-
and the next person reads
that same book or whatever
-
and they don't get a thing out of it.
-
You remember with the ark.
-
They said, well, take that,
-
it will work for us.
-
No, it won't.
-
Well, what else does He teach us?
-
Growth is miraculous - v. 28.
-
"The earth produces crops by itself."
-
Presto! They just pop out of it.
-
That's what Jesus said.
-
In other words, He's saying
-
there's something supernatural about this.
-
You can't explain this on your own.
-
"The earth produces crops by itself."
-
It's beyond man's power totally.
-
And it's incredible how it happens.
-
There's a power there outside of us.
-
And we don't know.
-
We're not the one that grows the seed.
-
God is the one that does that.
-
All we do is put the seed into the ground.
-
And so there's a miraculous
aspect about growth.
-
There's power and vitality
in the seed itself.
-
Peter talks about being born again,
-
not of corruptible seed,
but of incorruptible
-
by the Word of God
-
that lives and abides forever.
-
Romans 1:16 "I am not
ashamed of the Gospel.
-
It is the power of God unto salvation..."
-
1 Thessalonians 2:13
-
"The Word of God which performs its work
-
in you who believe."
-
And I like that where Paul says
-
in Acts 20 - he says I commend you to God.
-
We've done this often with people
-
leaving the church and going back
-
to China or wherever.
-
I commend you to God
-
and to the word of His grace
-
which is able to build you up
-
and give you an inheritance.
-
It's just wonderful, isn't it?
-
There's life in the seed itself.
-
The very idea of seed -
-
it's the Greek word semen.
-
1 John - "God's seed remains in him."
-
So there's something
miraculous about the seed,
-
but there's something miraculous also
-
about the earth.
-
The earth brings forth fruit of itself.
-
Isaiah 61 says this:
-
"I will rejoice greatly in the Lord.
-
My soul will exult in my God,
-
for He has clothed me with garments
-
of salvation;
-
He has wrapped me with
a robe of righteousness
-
as a bridegroom decks himself
-
with a garland,
-
and as a bride adorns
herself with her jewels.
-
For as the earth brings forth its sprouts,
-
and as a garden causes the things
-
sown in it to spring up,
-
so the Lord God..."
-
He's the Garden here, see?
-
The garden causes the things sown in it
-
to spring up.
-
"So the Lord God will cause
-
righteousness and praise to spring up
-
before all the nations."
-
Now that's what we're talking about here.
-
What Jesus is saying is
-
God is at work underneath the surface
-
to make things spring up supernaturally
-
that could not otherwise happen.
-
You remember in 1 Corinthians 3,
-
"What then is Apollos? What is Paul?
-
Servants through whom you believed
-
even as the Lord gave
opportunity to each one.
-
I planted. Apollos watered.
-
But God was causing the growth."
-
You know, if you think about it,
-
what are you really doing when you
put a seed in the ground?
-
You're not doing anything.
-
You put water on it.
-
God is the one making that
germinate and grow.
-
Are you listening to me?
-
God causes growth.
-
The only way you're ever going to grow
-
is if God causes you to grow.
-
That's the only way.
-
The only way you're ever going to change;
-
the only way you're ever going to be
-
more Christlike is if God causes you
-
to become more Christlike.
-
And that's what He's promised to do.
-
That's what He's promised to do in you.
-
What a glorious thing!
-
The only hope anybody has -
-
none of us will ever rise any higher
-
than God lifts us by His grace.
-
You're not going to do it.
-
But He will do it.
-
He will do it.
-
The Lord God will cause righteousness
-
and praise to spring up
-
before all nations.
-
That's the only hope we have.
-
God working in us to will and do
-
of His good pleasure;
-
causing growth.
-
He causes you to will.
-
He gives you that desire,
-
and then it's a long ways from the time
-
you start thinking I want to be more holy
-
in this or that;
-
it's a long ways before
you're actually there.
-
He works in you both to will and to work
-
for His good pleasure.
-
So if our Christianity can be explained
-
by human psychology
-
or turning over a new leaf
-
or trying to be better or so on;
-
there's no miracle,
-
there's no outside power,
-
then you're not a Christian.
-
What an encouragement this is God's work,
-
and He will accomplish what concerns us.
-
Alright, number five.
-
The progressiveness of growth.
-
You see it in v. 27, it sprouts up.
-
First of all, it has to sprout up
-
and it grows.
-
V. 28, "First the blade,
-
then the head,
-
then the mature grain in the head."
-
Progressive.
-
Now that's simple, isn't it?
-
This and then this and then this.
-
We don't want that.
-
What we want is:
-
go from here over to there.
-
You know, you could have
such-and-such experience.
-
That puts you clear over here.
-
You could enter into
entire sanctification.
-
Just have this happen.
-
Skip over all that stuff.
-
It's kind of hard going through
-
all that stuff anyway.
-
A lot of teaching is like that.
-
Anything that is held out to you
-
that makes you think:
-
if I could just have such-and-such,
-
I could skip over these stages.
-
That's a false teaching.
-
And you may have people say
-
that they've entered in and they have;
-
there's been some special thing
-
happen in their life where
-
they're in a different plane;
-
a higher plane than they were before.
-
That happens.
-
But beloved, I'll guarantee you this,
-
they're still going through the stages
-
just like you are.
-
First the blade, then the head,
-
then the mature grain.
-
That's always the way it is.
-
You see somebody that's
entirely sanctified,
-
you're looking at Jesus.
-
And He's the only one -
-
until heaven.
-
The holiest man in the world today
-
has so much sin, he'd be in hell.
-
(incomplete thought)
-
Can you imagine the way Jesus
-
handled a towel?
-
There's nobody in the world
-
that could hold a towel the way Jesus did
-
and wash somebody's feet.
-
You can't begin to be
like Him in that sense.
-
But we can walk in His steps.
-
Growth is progressive.
-
And you see here the utter stupidity
-
of the professing church in this.
-
There's some former football player
-
or singer or whatever;
-
they get converted and two weeks later,
-
they're speaking to a
crowd of 1,000 people.
-
Or 10,000. More like 20,000 people.
-
You take some little immature plant,
-
at best, and stick them out there.
-
That's not the way it is.
-
That's folly.
-
There's a process involved.
-
Hudson Taylor, before he became
-
the head of the China Inland Mission
-
had to spend years in obscurity
-
as a nobody learning things from God.
-
And I like that two volume set
-
on the life of Hudson Taylor.
-
Volume 1: The Growth of a Soul.
-
Volume 2: The Growth of a Work of God.
-
This tells my age,
-
but back when I was young,
-
we always talked about
-
the Empire State Building.
-
Boy, this is the tallest
building in the world.
-
Well, anyway, they said it took as long
-
to put that foundation in,
-
and there's as much in the foundation
-
as there is in the rest of the building.
-
Picture building some of these
-
massive things that they've got now
-
on a five-foot foundation.
-
How long would that last?
-
I think it's the Washington Cathedral
-
I saw years ago with my mother.
-
And in one way, it's impressive
-
looking at those top spires
-
and everything up there,
-
but to me, the most impressive thing
-
was when they took us
down into the basement.
-
And they said, now this rounded wall here
-
is part of one of the pillars
-
that supports this building.
-
And you could barely see the curve in it
-
it was so big.
-
Any life that is real
-
has as much underground
or more underground
-
as there is above the surface.
-
It's always that way.
-
(incomplete thought)
-
You're looking up there at those spires
-
of the building,
-
when God is driving foundation piling
-
in your life that is much harder -
-
hard stuff that you've got to learn.
-
I was talking about the
hymn the other night.
-
I like that hymn, I think Vance Havner
-
quoted it:
-
"Many a rapturous minstrel
-
among the sons of light
-
will say of his sweetest music
-
'I learned it in the night.'
-
And many a rolling anthem
-
that fills the Father's throne,
-
sobbed at his first rehearsal
-
in the shroud of a darkened room."
-
That's God putting the foundation
-
down under the building.
-
There is a slowness involved.
-
There is a process involved.
-
Don't let anybody trick you
-
into the idea that you can jump
-
from here to here.
-
You're not going to shortchange anything.
-
You might say, well, I'm going to
-
memorize the whole New Testament.
-
Well, that's great,
-
but it's not going to make you
-
a spiritual giant.
-
I mean, it's stages.
-
Well, the progressiveness of growth.
-
Then, the certainty of growth.
-
Now remember, the Lord is describing
-
the way things are in the kingdom.
-
It's like a man who plants
seed in the ground.
-
And he goes to bed at night.
-
This comes up. It grows.
-
It grows. It grows.
-
And then it dies and withers.
-
That's not what He says.
-
That's not the way it is when God
-
is involved in this.
-
It is going to make it.
-
It's certain.
-
It's going to grow.
-
When men plant things,
-
they often die.
-
Not so with God.
-
And you can look at that
-
in relation to church history as a whole.
-
That little seed that was planted
-
at the beginning,
-
it becomes a great tree.
-
And God's not going to fail.
-
The church is not going to fail.
-
He's advancing His kingdom.
-
He's going to do it. He will do it.
-
It will bring forth a crop.
-
It will grow.
-
It's a certainty.
-
Colossians - Paul talks about this.
-
He says "you previously heard
-
in the Word of truth - the Gospel
-
which has come to you,
-
just as in all the world also,
-
it's constantly bearing
fruit and increasing,
-
even as it has been doing in you also
-
since the day you heard of it
-
and understood the grace of God in truth."
-
So growth is certain.
-
The church isn't going to fail.
-
And growth is also certain
-
in the life of every true believer.
-
Why? Because it's not dependent upon man.
-
"Being confident of this very thing,
-
that He who began a good work in you" -
-
God did it.
-
"...Will perform it until the
day of Jesus Christ."
-
We're confident of that. He's the one.
-
He'll do it.
-
God says in the New Covenant
-
there in Ezekiel 36,
-
"I will cleanse you of all your filthiness
-
and all your idols.
-
I will put My Spirit in you and cause you
-
to walk in My statutes."
-
I'm so thankful.
-
He's saying I'm not going to quit on you.
-
You may fight this.
-
You either fight it or embrace it,
-
but if you fight it,
-
eventually you're going to embrace it
-
if you're a child of God.
-
I will cleanse you. I'll
cause you to walk...
-
It's a hard way though sometimes
-
if we resist what God's
doing in our lives.
-
Jesus said, "blessed is everyone who has;
-
to him more shall be given.
-
And he shall have an abundance."
-
And that's a wonderful thing.
-
If you have anything that's real,
-
it'd be better to be the weakest Christian
-
in the world today,
-
if you have just a
little grain that's real,
-
because you're going to get more.
-
And eventually, you're
going to have a lot.
-
Isn't that wonderful?
-
This little tiny thing
of grace in the life
-
of a true Christian;
-
He says blessed are you.
-
Now him that does not have,
-
even what he thinks he has
-
shall be taken away.
-
Better to be the weakest Christian
-
in the world, than the strongest looking
-
false professor.
-
Every branch in Me that bears fruit,
-
He purges it; He cleanses it
-
that it might bring forth more fruit.
-
(incomplete thought)
-
"Herein is My Father glorified,
-
that you bear much fruit
-
and so prove to be My disciples."
-
Some 100, some 60, some 30,
-
but all have fruit.
-
They're all growing.
-
They're all producing fruit.
-
Alright, last point.
-
Final outcome of growth is harvest time.
-
And He tells us that here.
-
V. 29 "When the crop permits,
-
he immediately puts in the sickle
-
because the harvest has come."
-
Why do you plant seed?
-
You plant them in order to get a harvest.
-
God is going to have a harvest, beloved.
-
He's going to have a harvest.
-
There's not going to be one missing.
-
Think of this.
-
Jesus says everyone that
the Father's given Me
-
will come to Me.
-
And He that comes to Me,
-
I will certainly not cast out.
-
Why not?
-
Why won't He cast us out?
-
Well, because He says, I came down
-
from Heaven to accomplish
a specific purpose.
-
I came down from Heaven
-
not to do My own will,
-
but the will of Him who sent Me.
-
And this is the will of Him who sent Me,
-
that of all that He has given Me,
-
I lose only a few and
then I raise up the rest
-
at the last day.
-
No, that's not what He said, is it?
-
That of all that He has given Me,
-
I lose not one!
-
Think of this.
-
Every plant that My Heavenly Father
-
has not planted, shall be rooted up;
-
but every plant that My
Heavenly Father plants
-
is going to make it all
the way to the harvest.
-
And there is a day coming -
-
I think of it whenever
we're together like this.
-
Do you realize the hilarious joy
-
we're going to have in seeing
-
one another in heaven?
-
What a day of rejoicing that will be!
-
Why? Because it's
the rejoicing of harvest.
-
The crop's in.
-
Up until that time,
-
you're kind of gritting your teeth.
-
I don't know if so-and-so's
going to make it or not.
-
I hope they're real.
-
And there they are!
-
You see them there -
-
they're shining like the sun
-
in the kingdom of their Father.
-
What a day of rejoicing that will be!
-
When the harvest is in.
-
And we'll look back
-
and it will be 10,000 times
-
more wonderful than we ever thought
-
as we see the providence of God
-
in keeping His people and so on.
-
There is a harvest coming.
-
And it's going to be a great ingathering
-
and a time of rejoicing.
-
Another angel came out of the temple
-
crying out with a loud voice
-
to Him who sat on the cloud.
-
Put in your sickel and reap
-
because the hour to reap has come,
-
because the harvest of the earth is ripe,
-
and He who sat on the cloud
-
(capital 'H' He) who sat on the cloud
-
swung His sickle over the earth
-
and the earth was reaped.
-
Jesus is telling us the nature
-
of the kingdom of God.
-
And He's taking us back
-
behind the scenes,
-
and showing us how growth takes place.
-
It takes place supernaturally
-
by the power of God.
-
And He will not have a crop failure.
-
But He's going to take every one of us
-
through all the stages necessary
-
to get there.
-
Amen.