Commentaries:
The parable is clearly about the process of growth, comparing the development of a plant from sowing to harvest to the spiritual maturation of a citizen of the Kingdom of God, a Christian. What sets this parable apart from other similar parables is that its emphasis is on the invisible and miraculous nature of growth. The sower may put the seed in the ground and do some cultivating, but "he himself does not know how" actual development happens. God is behind the scenes, bringing His children to spiritual maturity in preparation for their harvest to eternal life.
Like its physical counterpart, spiritual growth happens slowly and incrementally. We should not expect a newly baptized Christian to be able to produce self-control as easily and to the same degree as one who has been in the church of God for several decades. In the parable, Jesus compares the Christian to a growing seed, and no one expects a sprout to produce ripe fruit immediately. This process takes time and steady progress through a series of stages of learning and experience.
This should be comforting, especially to those new to the faith. It should also set a goal or series of goals for each of us to strive toward. We do not want to remain a spiritual sprout like the wicked servant with one talent in the Parable of the Talents (Matthew 25:24-30). Fearful and lazy, he squandered all of his opportunities for growth by burying his talent while making excuses and blaming his master for his shortcomings. Instead, we should desire to fulfill by the end of our spiritual lives the awesome goal Christ Himself gave us, to "be perfect, just as your Father in heaven is perfect" (Matthew 5:48).
As we continue to develop under Christ, we must accept that we may not see much improvement at any given time. It is not as some Christian pollsters try to tell us, that spiritual growth is easily quantifiable, whether we read so many chapters of the Bible or pray for x hours each day. Because it is of a spiritual nature—by definition, something beyond our physical senses—Christian growth can be challenging to determine, discernible only when a person's godly speech and actions reveal a marked improvement. We may see growth somewhat crudely in certain stages, but most will occur unnoticed and unheralded.
The actual mechanics of spiritual growth are beyond understanding, like trying to fathom the infinite depths of the mind of God. As hymnist William Cowper wrote, "God moves in a mysterious way/His wonders to perform." We might as well ask how a kernel of grain becomes a fruitful stalk of wheat. All we really know is that God is faithful, continuing to work in His people to bring His crop of firstfruits to harvest (I Corinthians 1:4-9). He will ensure that every plant that He has chosen for His field has what it needs to grow, produce pleasing fruit, and enter into the fullness of His Kingdom.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Like a Growing Seed (Part Two)
This parable has obvious similarities to the Parable of the Sower, but it teaches a completely different principle. It is like the parables in Matthew 13 only in that it is a Kingdom parable and that it has a similar form. As a Kingdom parable, it is a metaphoric explanation by Christ about how God's Kingdom works. Jesus tells His disciples in a kind of spiritual code how they should expect the Kingdom of God to function.
We must understand that the Kingdom of God that He is speaking about is not what we normally think of as God's Kingdom, that is, the time after Christ returns in great power to the earth to set up His government. A future aspect certainly exists in the Kingdom parables, but in most of them, He specifically refers to the present reality of God's church and its future until the return of Christ. Recall that Paul writes in Colossians 1:13 that we have already been "conveyed into the kingdom of the Son of His love." Spiritually, then, we, as members of His church, are already under the dominion, reign, and rule of God. We have been called out of this world (I Peter 2:9) and given citizenship in God's realm (Philippians 3:20).
Kingdom parables show generally how the true church and true Christianity operate in this world. When He brings the Kingdom in its fullness in the Millennium, Christ will deal with matters much differently. His instructions in these parables, however, are to help us in our current, physical lives, not later, for how helpful would they be if they spoke only of things that will occur after the resurrection? As part of Christ's instruction to His disciples, these parables describe how God's Kingdom—in its present, spiritual manifestation—and its citizens function among men on the earth.
In this parable, therefore, Jesus uses the natural process of plant growth to explain how those whom God calls develop spiritually in this world. The process is quite simple, paralleling the growth of a seed into a full-grown, food-producing plant. Just like the growth of a plant, it happens invisibly and somewhat mysteriously, too.
The people of the first-century church would sow seed in their fields, the rains would come, and they would wait. In a few days, they would see sprouts coming up—a miracle! It was just as miraculous to think that the sprout would develop and not only produce another seed, but many other seeds, a great crop.
Jesus says that one becomes spiritually mature similarly; the spiritual process contains many parallels. For instance, He says that the sower sows the seed and goes his way, sleeping and rising, watching how things are going, but he really does not know how these things work. He knows that they happen, and he trusts that they will.
This reveals that the sower in this parable is not Christ but a human. Notice that He does not say, "The Sower goes out to scatter seed," but "A man goes out." In other places, especially Matthew 13, He is specific about who the Sower is, but here it is general, a man. If it were Christ, it could not be said that He does not know how they grow. No, this sower is a man God uses to sow the seed. He scatters the seed and then goes about his other tasks.
Soon, the seed sprouts due to the resources that God provides. At a certain time, He supplies the light, warmth, water, and nutrients, and the seed germinates. The sower does little more than cast the seed. All that the sower—a minister—does is speak a word, write an article, or preach a sermon. The recipient is attracted by it, but it is God who does the bulk of the work.
Ministers are unaware of all the ways God works behind the scenes to bring a person to the knowledge of the truth. They understand that He does it but not the mechanics of how He opens an individual's mind, turns him to the truth, and allows him to begin to accept His way of life. Ministers, like the sower, just go to bed at night and get up the next morning to continue to do His work. God does the rest, working invisibly. He is the Prime Mover, working unseen and mysteriously to bring forth a productive "plant."
His work goes far beyond just helping the plant to sprout, for He also wants to see, as Jesus says, ". . . the head, after that the full grain in the head" (Mark 4:28). He is looking forward to the fully developed plant, along with ripened, finished fruit—spiritual maturity.
A Christian develops spiritually in the same way as we see in this analogy. God will use whatever method He chooses to get a person's attention. It might be something insignificant that we might not think would catch anybody's eye, but in God's hand, it is sufficient to lead the individual to the truth.
That is just the beginning. God continues to work with him in ways that are beyond human discernment. A minister can be highly instrumental in feeding and cultivating the individual, but he cannot see the invisible, spiritual ways that God is developing that person for His Kingdom. He may have a long experience in the churches of God, but it is not necessarily the case that a minister will be able to see someone's spiritual growth in detail.
If a person inspects his plantings each day, he will see almost no growth from the day before, but if one waits a few days or weeks between inspections, it is amazing how much they have grown! Similarly, each Christian grows in stages and at a slow enough pace that it can seem like no growth at all. But God is working, and He is aware of the growth—and that should be very encouraging.
Richard T. Ritenbaugh
Like a Growing Seed (Part One)
When the gospel of the coming Kingdom of God is preached in all the world as a witness (Matthew 24:14), the ears that hear it are not always receptive of this priceless knowledge. In the Parable of the Sower (Matthew 13:3-8, 19-23; Mark 4:3-9, 14-26; Luke 8:4-8, 11-15), Jesus reveals why, using three component elements: the sower, the seed, and the soils.
This parable describes what happens after the seed is sown, the different types of soils on which it falls, and the resultant effects. The parable's focus is not on the sower as much as on the various soils. Nevertheless, the sower—Jesus Christ (Matthew 13:37)—is not incidental, for without Him there could be no sowing and thus no possibility of fruit being produced.
Martin G. Collins
Parable of the Sower
Other Forerunner Commentary entries containing Mark 4:26:
1 Corinthians 3:6-9
