Brother Gary Sunday Morning 7/13/14

Brother Gary Sunday Morning 7/13/14

Luk 8:1  And it came to pass afterward, that he went throughout every city and village, preaching and shewing the glad tidings of the kingdom of God: and the twelve were with him,

Jesus went into every village preaching the good news of the kingdom of God.  We thank God that we can know these glad tidings.

He was not alone when He went.  There were brothers and sisters with Him.

Luk 8:5  A sower went out to sow his seed: and as he sowed, some fell by the way side; and it was trodden down, and the fowls of the air devoured it.

Luk 8:6  And some fell upon a rock; and as soon as it was sprung up, it withered away, because it lacked moisture.

Luk 8:7  And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprang up with it, and choked it.

Luk 8:8  And other fell on good ground, and sprang up, and bare fruit an hundredfold. And when he had said these things, he cried, He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

Here Jesus spoke a statement that comes back to me over and over again.  “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.”

Luk 8:9  And his disciples asked him, saying, What might this parable be?

Luk 8:10  And he said, Unto you it is given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God: but to others in parables; that seeing they might not see, and hearing they might not understand.

Jesus gave this parable so that we could have an understanding.  We can identify with some things by there being a visual lesson with a spiritual meaning.

Jesus was the initial sower and it is passed down to everyone that receives the seed of the Word of God, understands it, and then gives out the good news so that others can know.

Of all that you can look to that would be helpful; there is nothing that will do what the Word of God can do.  There are some needs that will only be supplied by the Word of God.

The good soil sometimes brought forth 30, then 60 and then 100 fold.  In the beginning of the Word of God being sowed in our life whatever seed that we hear and grasp and it produces, sometimes it is only 30 fold.  As we walk with God and are perfected by the Word of God, the Word keeps being sowed and the production then may be 60 or 100 fold.

I believe that God wants to give us a song everyday and a scripture every day.  It is hard to pick out just one of the many scriptures in the 119^th psalm because they speak to us in our lives.

Luk 8:11  Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.

Luk 8:12  Those by the way side are they that hear; then cometh the devil, and taketh away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved.

Among the saddest conditions in the world is for an individual to hear the glad tidings of the Word of God and then for the devil to steal away the seed saying that they could never be happy, or saved, or forgiven.

We have this parable in the word of God to help us understand and to cause everyone of us to cry out to God, “Lord, allow me to never get hard or to allow any seed sown by God or the body of Christ to lay there without allowing it to grow in my life.” 

We don’t want to be wayside soil or let the seed of the Word of God be stolen away.

Luk 8:13  They on the rock are they, which, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, which for a while believe, and in time of temptation fall away.

We want to get the rocks out of our garden by tilling deep enough and digging to get all the rocks out so that we are confident that we are not planting on any rocks.

Someone last Sunday was praying, “Lord remove those empty rocks.”  There are some rocks that have no value to them.  If they are big enough to use as a border, or as an anchor they may have value, but for growing good fruit and seed in our life there is no value in a rock. 

The journey of life may leave people pretty crusty.  Sometimes we speak to individuals that we feel that under the crust there is some tenderness.  Sometimes under the soil there is some hardpan, that they don’t want broken up, that will hinder the good seed of the Word of God.

The stony ground hears, receives, and enjoys the Word of God but when difficulty comes they give up.  If you grow a garden, unless you are different than Karen and me, always prepare to replant.  Sometimes it is the rocks, the hardpan, sometimes I don’t know what it is but after being planted some things wither away.

If in your life you were all excited spiritually and things were going well and then something happened and the enthusiasm goes away.  Don’t give up.

When an individual gets burnt then sometimes it is “good bye with God and good bye with church”.  I am not sure that everyone in this building would meet me at the door and say that in grade school they had 12 teachers and they were all excellent.  

Most wouldn’t say that they had 98% perfect teachers.  I don’t think that Brother Jim would say that he had 100% perfect bosses, some of his bosses got fired or even ran over by a train. 

It is a part of life, it is a part of spiritual life, and it is part of being a family as much as family loves each other there are times when there are things that, “We are not getting very far with this, how come we can’t make ends meet or figure out this problem?”

Some say, I’m going to give up on school, my job, my marriage, or whatever.  This parable would say that you have a rock under your plant.  We cannot give up.  We have to grow.  We need to be saved.

I like to encourage young men to live moral.  They get red faced.  That tells me that they know right from wrong. 

The fact is this: every one of us that is saved is bearing 30, 60, or 100 fold whatever we are bearing.  We have to dig things out and keep growing.  Don’t let the injustices become a rock and you quit bearing.

Sometimes it takes more than a little hand shovel to dig out the rocks.  Sometimes you have to get a new handle because you break it. 

When we give up on Jesus, fall away, or give up on the Word of God and truth, what will be our foundation?  Without a foundation the house cannot stand.  Soon there is a pattern, a way of life and then an argument, “I failed here and there.”  That leads to failure.

Luk 8:14  And that which fell among thorns are they, which, when they have heard, go forth, and are choked with cares and riches and pleasures of this life, and bring no fruit to perfection.

Luk 8:15  But that on the good ground are they, which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience.

This scripture really spoke to me this last week.  An individual, in order to become good ground, has to have an honest and a good heart.  You may say or God might ask you “Tell me, what kind of soil you think you are?”

You might say, “God I am alarmed, I heard Word of God preached, it convicted me, and I left it laying there and it is gone.”  There is such a value of being honest with God. 

The honest and the good heart:  there is no question in my mind there are many hearts that desire God.  There was a gentleman in the rest-home that said, “I have never read the bible or gone to church but I believe that there is a God.”

We must take action.  “I am an eternal soul.  This body will go back to dust, but I am an eternal soul.”

The honest and the good heart hear the glad tidings and keep the Word.  You will all experience when you enter your 60’s that you need a notebook and a note pad; you need several of them.

I opened the bible and the song that Philip bliss wrote, p.105, ‘Wonderful Words of Life’:  “Sing them over again to me, wonderful words of life.  Let me more of their beauty see, wonderful words of life.”

I like to tell hymn stories, this man and his wife had given their life to spread the gospel by music.  They were traveling by train between two cities and the trestle gave out and the train wrecked.  Philip survived and then went back for his wife and his wife perished.

Won’t it be wonderful to get to heaven and say to Philip, “That song that God gave you was so good to me when I was worshipping.”  He may say, “Son, God gave me that song when I was worshipping too.”

Jesus taught us how to sow the seed of the good news.  He taught us to sow to all types of soil.  We are not to look at them and think, “You probably won’t take the gospel.”  That is like saying to me, “You probably don’t like fresh raspberry pie.”

I am wondering if there is something about the wayside soil, receiving the Word of God, hearing the Word of God and then losing it; they are wayside soil.  There is hope with God because with God all things are possible.

Jesus said, “Say to that mountain be thou removed.”  He said to the sycamore tree, “Be rooted up and cast into the sea.”  That is a miracle from God.  There is hope for wayside soil if you recognize, “God sent His Word, and the devil stole it away and left me without.”

You can be righteous today; you can have peace with the past and with the future. 

Isa 35:1  The wilderness and the solitary place shall be glad for them; and the desert shall rejoice, and blossom as the rose.

Isa 35:2  It shall blossom abundantly, and rejoice even with joy and singing: the glory of Lebanon shall be given unto it, the excellency of Carmel and Sharon, they shall see the glory of the LORD, and the excellency of our God.

The desert shall blossom as a rose.

Jesus gave us this parable so that we can have understanding of what kind of soil our soul is.  I did not start out as good soil.  There was much seed of the Word of God that was stolen away from me before I was saved.

One day the scene changed because of the love of God and my parents.  Jesus gave us a goal of 100 fold.  We can have this as our goal.  Isn’t that wonderful?

1Jn 1:9  If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.

Forgiveness brings forgiveness.  This is good news for all that are carrying the burden of sin.

Jesus taught us how to pray.  Luke 6

Our Father:  He didn’t say, “Pray to my father”, He said use the term, “Our Father.”

Then he said, pray “Thy will be done.”

It takes care of a lot of things when we reach that place, “Thy will be done in everything.”

Thy will be done in earth as it is in heaven.

Lead us not into temptation…

If we forgive men their trespasses our heavenly father will forgive us.

Matt 18 if you will be as this little child you can enter the kingdom of heaven.

Eph 4:11  And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers;

Eph 4:12  For the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Christ:

Eph 4:13  Till we all come in the unity of the faith, and of the knowledge of the Son of God, unto a perfect man, unto the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ:

Till we all come:  I am not making an insinuation that you are not bearing fruit this morning.  If you are bearing 100 fold then that is good.  But the God that I know has never left me unchallenged.  The design is to come, to come to the measure of Christ.

When I was a little boy, Jesus dealt with me as a little boy.  He still does that with little boys today.  These little children that are learning to pray, He deals with them as a teacher of little children.

When I was a child I spoke as a child, remember when you got saved and had a difficult temptation or a battle of accusation, maybe someone looked at you wrong.  You got up and testified, “I’m happy to be saved but I have gone through the hardest trial...  We look down the road and say, “I am so happy for the ground I gained.”

Not just to the young or affluent, He sows the seed on all types of soil. When an individual recognizes that “God is peaking to me, I won’t take the attitude that it is not important, God spoke it.  I’m going to take it and measure to it.”

If God says that you need to write this letter, make an apology, or maybe it is to get your roots down deep and bear fruit, or in all types of weather be the same.  “It is snowing in the Rockies but there is sunshine in my soul.”

Always measure yourself by the Word of God and never measure yourself by someone else.