“And he said to them, “Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand all the parables? The sower sows the word.” (Mark 4:13-14)
Context matters. Context always matters.
We’re tempted to read this parable as some sort of spiritual taxonomy. We can look at different people and decide what sort of seed they were. Were they on the path and quickly scooped up? Were they in rocky ground and therefore they flourish and fail all within the same day? We are tempted to read this parable like Jesus laying out the familia, species, and genus of the spiritual life.
Yet, that’s not what it says. Not at all. The seeds are not people. The seeds are the word (of God). It is true that some people experience this word in different ways – not at all, with brief intensity and also fleeting interest, deeply and profoundly – but this has nothing to do with who the people are, merely how they receive the word. Hence, context matters.
I suspect for years, I misread this parable. I assumed that some people were just on the path and therefore they would never follow Jesus. I assumed that some people got excited for Jesus whenever they felt sad or had a bad break up, but then once they felt happy or had a new crush, they would move on. I thought this was all about people, not their experiences.
The reality is that this parable doesn’t describe whether someone is or isn’t a Christian, whether someone believes Jesus is Lord or not. No, this parable describes our daily experience of encountering God’s Word and wisdom. Some days, we hear it loud and clear. Other days, we’re too distracted, in too rocky of a place, and the word just misses us. Any given person can be in good or bad places to receive the word. Context matters.
The Good News is that if we ever find ourselves feeling as if God is no longer speaking to us, it is less likely that we are so reprobate that the Lord has thrown up His hands with an exasperated “Ugh!” and walked away forever, and much more likely that we need some sort of change of spiritual scenery. Maybe we need a different devotional, a new prayer habit, a different Bible study group, or even just changing the time of day we try to read the Bible. In switching up the context, we may just move ourselves off the well-trod paths and rocky places of life and into some lush soil where God’s word can put down some roots.
The hope in this parable is that Jesus’ questions to the disciples – “Do you not understand this parable? Then how will you understand all the parables?” – is not a harsh rebuke of His closest friends. Instead, it might just be an offer to change their head space, seek a new view of things, try changing their context. Amen.
