Read: Luke 8:1-21

By: Pastor Jarren Rogers

How much do you have to hate somebody to believe that everlasting life is possible and not tell them that? – Penn Jillette

The Parable of the Sower. It is arguably one of Jesus’ most well-known parables. It is the one that is most memorable for people and may even be the one that you tend to gloss over when it comes up in your reading because you’ve seen it so many times.

The most common reaction to this parable is probably a question: What seed am I? Am I the seed that fell among thorns? Am I failing to mature because of life’s troubles? Am I the seed that fell on the rocky ground? Have I fallen away from my faith because of the testing I endured? Or am I the seed on the good soil? Do I hear the word and produce a crop?

I think that these are natural questions and they were probably the kind of questions that Jesus intended for His listeners to be asking themselves. But I want to propose a new question. I want to introduce a character in this parable who is too often overlooked.

“A farmer went out to sow his seed” (Luke 8:5).

Take a look at this farmer. He isn’t like any farmer I’ve ever heard of before. In this parable, this farmer is flinging his seed every which way. He is haphazardly hurling seed without rhyme or reason. He casts seed with abandon, not caring where it lands.

How many of us are like this farmer?

If the seed is the Gospel, how many of us are throwing the Gospel out to others with abandon? How many of us are casting the Gospel to the people around us not caring what people might think or how they will receive it?

How many of us see the field of our workplaces and fling seed around on a daily basis? How many of us see the field of our schools and toss the Gospel out to anyone who will listen? How many of us see the field that is our community and begin throwing seed this way and that with the hope that all would hear of the goodness of our God?

How many of us are like that farmer?

Ultimately, we each have to ask ourselves how we will receive the Gospel. We each have to ask ourselves which kind of seed we will be. But we also have to ask how we will share the Gospel.

Will we plant it only where we are sure it will grow? Will we keep it nice and neat and plant it where we know it will be accepted? Will we plant only in the right season, once or twice a year, when it is most convenient?

Or will we toss it out on a daily basis? Will we throw our seed out to anyone who will hear? Will we sow our seed with abandon and allow God to do the rest?