The Parable of the Sower

When I was reading this parable, I had questions about how I have always interpreted it. The idea of if you are not faithful enough you fall prey to the places that cause a seed not to grow. Simple explanation, all within the realm of my control based on the choices I make. If I do the things that supposedly keep me within this realm, then there is nothing to fear and I can be assured of my place. But something about this didn't seem right. Being a gardener, I know that if a seed falls in a place that it cannot grow, it is my responsibility as the gardener, not the seeds'. So what does this mean. I looked at the explanations later in the chapter of the story and it seemed pretty straight forward. Then I started wondering about the Hebrew words as opposed to the English ones that I was basing the meaning on. So I started looking up words and comparing them to the Hebrew word that the passage was derived from. A new theme began to emerge for me. So,first the idea of kingdom. (Matthew 13:19) Kingdom, the idea that struck me from my reading is that this is not a realm, or physical area and group of people under the rule of a monarch, but the idea is more subtle, implying dominion, or influence, thus removing the idea of specificity of declared allegiance, place and ideas, but instead more like a blanket of love being thrown out and we can bask in the warmth and comfort that is offered, but the implication about influence has less rigid patterning in order to be a part of this "kingdom". Secondly, same verse, the wicked one, based on my upbringing the image is very clear, but again something about that needed clarification for me. So I started searching and saw in reference to the Hebrew word connected to that, hostile to God. My mind went around and around trying not to superimpose an idea that wasn't actually there because someone else had said it before and left my feelings to dance freely in a space of openness. I started to think what is God? What would be hostile to God? The thought came that if we removed the physical,material idea of God and reduced him down to his most fundamental quality, we have love. Anything that leads us to love and its influence is of God, but anything that leads us from the influence of love is hostile to God. Anything! For my own purposes and experience, those things have been fear, anger, regret, sadness, sometimes physical things places and people have triggered those things in my life and although they can leave me hostile to God, they can also lead me to God, depending on how I hold them. So my state of mind in holding all things is what determines whether I am under that influence of either hostility to God or his dominion. The more I studied this the more I realized that the real message was that we move in and out of all of these places, meaning, the stony place, the wayside, the thorny spots, regularly in life. It is part of the process of finding God and experiencing his influence. We move from stony place, to thorny place, to falling by the wayside and back again, purposefully and individually designed. God knew we would. These teachings are about seeing the places we are in and recognizing that perhaps at this moment we are wilting and withering and knowing that the miracle of his love is the ability that it has to bring fresh life and nourishment when we are withering or feeling close to death. These are not meant to be permanent places, places that we see others in and point a finger recognizing their demise is forthcoming. These are meant to be illustrations of how God invites us back into his influence and his blessing??? Blessing….. Another word I had a great need to look up. Blessed, it has come to mean a state where if you do the right things you get a good result that is what is promised right? But doesn't that leave the possibility for this to oft times see things from a very comparative and prideful perspective? Like, if you are not where I am you are……… fill in the blank. BAck to Blessed, this is what I needed to understand about that word, it is about self contained happiness. It is holding with contentedness, our journey, based on the ability to see what is beyond the material,physical perspective and meaning and in (Vs 11) again, the ability to see is not because of something we have done, our works,or all the perceived service or devotion externally. That does not give us the ability to see. As Jesus points out, there were many prophets and righteous men that wanted to see and could not. So clearly the ability to see is based on something outside of our material, physical action. Jesus came to bring life and to bring it more abundantly. He didn't come to bring a longer to do list. That doesn't give us vision. In fact he gives but two simple commandments. They are about love, not an external, physically defined by action love, but a love defined by an inner content, not an outer representation. We can have outer representation with no inner content. That is perhaps the thing we should be most watchful of in our lives. As Thomas Barrfield in his book "Saving Appearances" defines: An idol is something that has an outer representation with no inner content. The inner content is love, desire, our soul's on definition of meaning. That is what Jesus came to bring. And to break down he came to break down things in antithesis of that, the rules, the externals, holding so dearly to those instead of love. He fought every tradition to bring everything back to love,the inner content. In my own life, the only reason I could not and sometimes till cannot, let go of the outer is that I wasn't and am not always fully convinced that holding on only to love would actually net the same things as all of the outer rules and ideas. I guess what I am saying is that I realized that I didn't really believe him when he said that all things hang on love. I thought that I had to put all of the other things first. Personally that is when I started to wilt in the sun, my root wasn't in his love it was in some outer form, lacking the inner content of love. After studying and trying deeply to let his love influence my ideas and thinking, Today I am just beginning to see that the most important thing ever is the influence of his love. And love, it does not know religion, it does not discriminate against sex, or race or beliefs. Sometimes I really want to discriminate and hold onto the things that put me in a light that I perceive will make me "loved", But really his love invites us in when we are wilting and when we want to know, not what someone else's idea about that are, but his he will tell us. Every day I am trying or let someone else provide them, of what I am trying to understand. Because really when Christ defines them who knows what may grow from the perceived wayside? It may be far greater than our minds and hearts could ever imagine. And who knows the heart of the master and his plan for us? Hearing his heart requires different eyes to see and different ears to hear. He said it himself that many righteous men and prophets could not. The question is Do we want to see his way, or ours????