Both St. Luke and St. Mark record the Parable of the Sower; and, unsurprisingly, in very similar terms since Luke borrowed freely from Mark.

Jesus begins addressing a large crowd with this parable and at the end Luke says he issues a caution that those with ears should hear or understand it.

Both versions have the disciples asking Jesus for an explanation afterwards.

The first question for us to ask is what is the purpose or application of this Parable and the second question is what are we to make of the reason Jesus gives for teaching in parables in general. As to the first question. Most bible scholars, the Prayer Book compilers included, believe that Jesus is encouraging his followers and his disciples to have faith in the proclamation of Jesus that ultimately, the good news of the Kingdom of God will prevail and produce multitudes of the faithful. Therefore, we should persevere in preaching and spreading the Word of God in the certainty of ultimate triumph.

Our Book of Common Prayer uses the passage from II Corinthians in our Epistle to compliment the idea of perseverance. Paul is lecturing the Corinthinans abou the hardships he has endured in his struggle to preach and spread the Word of the Kingdom of God. Although Paul is apparently responding to some critique of his ministry, he validates the idea that bringing about the Kingdom of God is not as simple as wishing it were so.

Perseverence for us, here at our small mission, has at least two dimensions. There is the perseverance common to all those who make the effort to attend Church regularly. To keep holy the Sabbath Day. And by that perseverance renew through the mystery of the Eucharist that ghostly strength that carries us through each day of the week. There is the perseverence of faith that relies upon God to give us those strengths, insights, and goodness with which to lead us step by step to eternal life with God.

We hear the Word each week, or even read it more often. In the case of Jesus' Jewish audience they would have had an immediate understanding of the symbolism of the parable. A sower in Jewish rabbinical tradition was a teacher. The teaching was represented by the seed being cast at the hearers. The reaction of the hearers to the Word is analogous to the type of ground upon which the seed has fallen. Accordingly, the thrust of the parable would not have been that difficult to fathom. At least in the understanding of the medium. The difficulty arises in the understanding and recognition of the forces that represent the unsuccessful rooting of the seed; as well as the nature of the human heart in which the Word takes root and produces fruit an hundredfold.

The disciples, we must remember, had a very different perspective of what had to happen upon the coming of the Messiah and the Kingdom of God. The Messiah was to be sent to the children of Israel who would be the ones who got the blessings. They were the ones who were to be saved and not the gentile world around them. In that regard, the Messiah had to have the unqualified allegiance of the Jewish people; not just handfulls here and there. And while it was true that large crowds followed them around, some to be sure to hear the Word and others more likely wanting to see something interesting like the healing of lepers, blind people and the like, true converts were not that numerous.

The disciples therefore want to know the meaning of this parable. By meaning they want the terms explained clearly. It is possible that they thought, given the nature of Jesus' answser, that if the parable were plain spoken it would have more resonance with the crowd.

As an aside, there is something of a parallel in our branch of the Church and it is not a coincidence that similar arguments have been advanced for reforming the language of the King James version and using language forms more familiar to modern society. It is somewhat true that Elizabethan English requires familiarization in order to be completely understandable; but further analogy fails because there is no revelation of theological concepts cloaked in the form of parables in the King James version or any other version. The analogy is, however, sustained in the literary sense where prose is employed to lend vitality to the naked Word. Parables are mini-stories that emphasize and embellish the idea with imagery. When that imagery is removed in order to make the language literal and thus flat one has removed the wheels from the vehicle.

Jesus understands the diciples' question about the parable and he knows that it is not about the literal meaning of it. Rather it is about the spiritual echo in the hearts of the hearers.

Therefore, Jesus prefaces his explanation by telling the diciples that they get the explained version because they have been selected to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of God. But those outside of this circle get the Word in parables that in seeing they might not see and in hearing they might not hear; lest in seeing and hearing the outsiders might be converted and and their sins forgiven.

If taken literally, this is a statement that is as stunning as it is incredible. That Jesus uses parables in his preaching to obscure the Word of God rather than the other way around with the objective of frustrating salvation. But that is not what Jesus means and he makes the clarification in the verses following the Prayer Book's truncation of this chapter of Luke.

The mysteries that are revealed to the diciples are truths that we could never discover on our own. Those whom Jesus has chosen were given particular revelation that others cannot take part in. Parables may obviously be taken at face value and received just for the enjoyment of the story without the effort of translating the imagery intospiritual principles. The careless hearer of the Word will receive judgment but the diligent who put into practice the Word will receive salvation.

Our understanding of what Jesus means if further enhanced by the imagery and meaning of the fate of the seed in the various soils into which it has fallen. Seed develops by growth. That is to say, it becomes something else after it takes root and begins to grow into the living thing it will become at the end of the cycle. In Jesus' Parable of the Sower there are three inhospitable growth environments; and only one ground that is favorable to the growth of the Word of God.

The first inhospitable soil is that of wilful unbelief. Those who hear the Word of God and do not believe it belong to Satan. Satan encourages unbelief just as he did in the Garden of Eden when he suborned Eve into unbelief about the effects of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. She ended up disbelieving the Word of God about the deadly effects of the Tree's fruit and then seduced Adam to the same unbelief. They both believed the lie of Satan and disavowed the truth of God.

It is no different today than it was at the beginning of mankind. There are those today who declare that they make the rules, not God. Than the reason of man is the measure of good and evil and not God. And so on.

The second inhospitable soil, the rocky ground, is somewhat more deceptive and therefore even more hazardous. Those who hear the Word of God with joy and apply it in superficial ways so that when temptation comes to their door they are swept away. The temptation of which Jesus speaks is not the indulgence of momentary passion that is sparked by sexual lust, anger or greed. Rather the temptation to toss their religion upon the altar of worldly gain; whether honors or recognition coupled with the trappings of status. These hearers are more likely to describe themselves as good persons who believe in God but not in the practice of religion by any rules other than their version of the Word translated.

The third inhospitable soil is described by Jesus as seed that has fallen among thorns identified as the cares, riches and pleasures of life. Jesus says the pre-occupation with these things chokes the growth of the seed so that it cannot develop. These hearers, although knowing, for example, that it is a right, good and proper thing to keep the Sabbath holy, not only because God commanded us to do so, but because there are spiritual benefits for so doing, prefer some recreation to Church

The hospitable ground is the hearer who keeps the word and in so doing grows the seed to full measure so that with patience it will bear fruit. The hospitable ground is a good and honest heart. It does not have to be an intellectual who may understand with all knowing and have the ability to enunciate the Word with crystal clarity. It is just a good and honest heart that believes in the Word of God and knows that all life and all being is dedicated to God and not the veneration of creation.

The television and print media this past week became almost hysterical in their celebration of the alleged cloning of cells from a human embryo in Japan. They re-printed and re-hashed the same tired list of all of the alleged benefits that will accrue once they figure out how to replace damaged human cells with those of cloned but unformed embryos. And they count this for good. This is the morality of those who do not fear God. The fear of God is belief and action that follows on that belief. And they know it well because they always make a derisive bow in the direction of those of us who agonize over this cannibalism.

The Parable of the Sower is about growth; as in a seed, as in the development of the spirit seeded by the Word of God. Goodness is a living, growing thing and therefore, goodness is the work of God and not of mankind. God will see to it that the seed grows in the good and honest heart and by the grace of God will that person see eternal life.

True good is not something that mankind can make in a test tube or in a petri dish, whether for himself or for others or in others. True good is the creation of God. It has always been so and will always be so forever and forever.