September 8, 2024 • 34 mins
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What happens when the seed of God's word lands on different types of soil? Join us for a profound journey through Mark, Chapter 4, as we unravel the Parable of the Sower and explore the varied reactions to Jesus' ministry. We'll confront the hardened hearts of religious leaders who, gripped by fear and jealousy, accuse Jesus of demonic influences, and contrast that with the superficial excitement of the crowds and the sometimes misguided enthusiasm of the disciples. This episode sheds light on the deeper truths Jesus conveyed through His parables, emphasizing that while the seed is pure and powerful, the condition of our hearts determines its growth.
In our discussion of the types of soil, discover how rocky, shallow soil symbolizes hearts that can't sustain long-term spiritual growth. Drawing from my experiences in youth ministry, I share stories of temporary, emotion-driven conversions that, despite initial excitement, fail to take root and endure. We discuss the necessity of engaging both mind and heart in our faith journeys, and the importance of cultivating a deeply rooted faith capable of withstanding life's trials and tribulations. This episode is an honest conversation about the spiritual resilience needed to nurture lasting faith.
Finally, reflect with us on the beauty and challenge of genuine spiritual transformation. Inspired by Psalm 1, we liken true growth to a tree planted by rivers of water, flourishing and bearing fruit through deep roots in God's word. You'll hear personal accounts of overcoming loss and striving for a life that bears meaningful fruit, and join us in a heartfelt prayer for strength and spiritual depth. As we break through the hard ground of our hearts, we seek to trust God's guidance and emerge stronger, more fruitful, and fully anchored in our faith. Don't miss this rich and transformative discussion.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:11):
Here we are, mark, chapter 4, and we are taking it
really slow here now in chapter4, verse 1.
4, verse 1.
We've been seeing the ministryof Jesus.
We've been seeing, as is alwaysthe case, various receptions to
that ministry.
We've seen the religiousleaders.
(00:33):
We can, you know, boo and hissover, of course, but their
hearts are becoming hardened.
We've seen that as Jesusperforms miracles and teaches
and loves people, the religiousleaders, because he threatens
(00:54):
them, they criticize.
They say, well, he's doing allthese things by the power of
Beelzebub, the prince of demons.
So Jesus casts out a demon andthey say, well, he's casting out
demons by the prince of demons.
And every time Jesus doessomething, they say, well, a
demon, that's a demon, that's adevil, that ain't God, that's
the devil.
And their hearts are becominghard, a dangerous place to be.
(01:17):
We also see the crowds, right,the mobs that are coming to
Jesus, and they're seeing themiracles and they're seeing all
these things, and the crowds areexcited.
There's this electricity, butGod knows that their hearts are
rather superficial.
Jesus knows that they'refollowing him for all the wrong
(01:40):
reasons.
There's no depth we'll evenlook at today, and for them he's
a little bit of a passing fad,right, you know, he's kind of a
trend that they're following.
Then there's the disciples.
Now the disciples, we could oh,we could say they're the.
You know, they're in a goodplace and they are, but they're
(02:03):
somewhat oblivious to who Jesusis in reality.
They definitely don't have itall down.
They're unsure.
We seeing the whole picture, wego, you guys are missing it.
What are you getting wrong here?
But Jesus is working in theirlives and he's teaching.
Now in chapter 4, we see, see inparables for a time.
(02:25):
Parables Jesus is telling,giving earthly pictures of
heavenly truths, and the peoplewould hear him but they wouldn't
understand.
But his disciples would come tohim Clarification, jesus, what
is that all about?
Why are you telling this?
(02:46):
What is this about?
And Jesus actually tells them.
Now the parables are a littlebit daunting as we look at it,
because parables can be misused.
Parables can be kind of obscurein some ways and a little bit
uncertain.
Generally, just for reference,don't build theology on
(03:06):
parablesables, because you canuse them to prove and point to a
lot of things that just aren'tbiblical.
Be careful with parables.
But this first parable in Mark,chapter four, the first part
here, the parable of the sower,we're safe on.
We can use this all day longbecause Jesus explains it in
(03:28):
detail.
He tells us what each part ofthe parable is about, and so you
cannot really go wrong withthis parable, and that's why
we're taking it so slow, because, well, we might as well dig
everything we can out of it.
The parable of the sower, jesusspells out, and the sower, the
(03:50):
planter, we could say plants,seed, and this exciting,
thrilling story here the sowergoes out to throw seed out on
different soils.
You know, you can tell, asJesus is telling this story,
maybe the people are kind oflike they're getting closer for
the what's the punchline of thisand they're probably
(04:10):
disappointed.
It's about soil, about seeds.
Some plants grow, other plantsdon't.
Three bad soils, you could say,and one good, right Bad soils,
you could say, and one good,right Now.
Not a very exciting story, butthe meaning to it Jesus gives,
(04:32):
starting in verse 13.
And he said to them do you notunderstand this parable?
How will you understand all theparables the sower sees?
So sorry, right.
So Jesus starts us off in thisby giving us a huge part of it,
(04:57):
by saying the seed is God's word.
Now, I'm sure we've all heardthis before, but let's track as
best as you can.
The seed is God's word, thesoils we see in the next verse
in verse 15, is our heart.
(05:18):
Very simple the seed is God'sword, the soil is our hearts.
And the thing that we want tounderstand here is that there's
no other seed that can grow inour life than God's word.
That's something to look for inyour life.
The only thing that's going tobring real spiritual growth is
(05:47):
God's word, not books, notopinions, not politics or
philosophy or any of that.
The only thing that's going tobring fruit, real spiritual
fruit, in our life is God's word.
Look for it, find it, be in it.
But we see here, it's not theseed's fault that growth doesn't
happen.
The seed will grow if it's putin the right heart.
It's not the seed's fault, it'snot God's word that is weak.
(06:09):
It's our hearts that receive it.
Our hearts can be rather messedup.
In fact, three out of fourhearts seem to be messed up.
If you want to look at this instatistics, right, that's
probably even more than that.
All of our hearts are messed upand like planting, spiritual
planting of God's word involvespreparation of the soil, our
(06:40):
hearts, preparing our hearts.
And we saw last week, the firstheart that Jesus pictures is a
hard heart.
It's like hard ground, it'slike a hiking path, a trail.
It's packed down and we couldput this as pride, hardness of
heart, stubbornness.
We can all have a hard heart,and especially as God's word
(07:00):
right, as somebody goes sowingGod's word, as God goes sowing
God's word, as God goes sowinghis word in our hearts.
The more travel there is overour hearts and the resistance to
receive it, the harder ourhearts can get.
We just ignore God's word.
It doesn't mean anything to us.
And notice in the parable youmight have to go back and reread
the parable but the birds comeand eat that seed up on the hard
(07:24):
heart that doesn't receiveGod's word.
It just bounces off and thebirds representing the devil.
Here Jesus says the birds comeand gladly feed on God's word,
chew it up, take it away.
It doesn't produce anything.
We don't want to have a hardheart through resistance,
through pride, through justapathy, not even caring about
(07:47):
what we're hearing.
And it can be all of our hearts.
But I want to say in this story,the hard hearts are these
religious leaders who everysingle day Again, it can be all
of us, so apply it to your ownlife.
But the hard hearts of thesereligious leaders are not bad to
start with, necessarily.
But in resistance they justkeep saying that's the devil,
(08:09):
that's the devil, oh, that's thedemon.
He's not the devil, and beforelong it's just the instinct of
their response.
You know what I mean.
They say it without eventhinking it, and that's what a
hard heart is.
A hard heart is very and andthat's what a hard heart is A
hard heart is very, verydangerous.
But here is something I thinkwhen we look at somebody who
(08:30):
definitely had a hard heart,saul, who was breathing threats
against the church there in thebook of Acts, god busted him up
right through difficulty andjust knocked him to the ground,
you know, pricked his heartthere.
With Stephen's martyrdom, godhad his way of getting a hold of
(08:53):
that hard heart of Saul.
And God can, god can.
But it takes that breaking upof that heart.
Now here we are, breaking up ofthat heart.
Now here we are.
We're looking at the second one,the second soil, it's those
sown on the stony ground.
Let's go back to the beginningand let's read, let's just read
(09:14):
the parable.
We should have done that tobegin with.
Verse three, chapter fourListen, behold, check it out.
A sower went out to sow and ithappened as he sowed that some
seed fell by the wayside and thebirds of the air came and
devoured it.
Some fell on stony ground wherethey did not have much earth,
and immediately it sprang upbecause it had no depth of earth
(09:35):
.
But when the sun was up it wasscorched and because it had no
root it withered away.
So we're looking at this secondsoil here, the stony ground,
and we see some qualities aboutthis, just on the surface.
Here we see some qualities ofthis soil.
(10:00):
Notice in verse 5, immediatelyit's spraying up.
So in the stony ground,something we notice is there's
an immediate response.
That's one of Mark's favoritewords immediately, immediately,
it sprang up.
So it sprang up.
Notice Jesus' explanation of itin verse 16.
(10:25):
Let's look at the clear stuffhere.
These, likewise, are the onessown on the stony ground who
when they hear the wordimmediately, they receive it
with gladness.
So you can say about this soilthat they immediately receive it
with gladness.
Immediately it springs up.
That's a seemingly good qualityof this soil there's immediate
(10:47):
response, there's excitement, itsprings up.
Right.
But let's look at the negativequalities.
Back in verse four I'm sorry,verse five.
They did not have much earth.
They had no depth of earth inverse five.
(11:09):
And then when the sun was up,they're scorched because they
had no root.
So these are negative things nodepth of earth, no roots.
They didn't have much earth andand they're withered and they
died.
Now, this is not the kind ofplanting you want to do, right?
(11:32):
I think we said last time thesower's hope.
I guess if you could say thesower's desire, what you want
when you plant stuff is you wantit to grow, right.
That's why you do it.
You want it to bear fruit.
This is not the ending we'relooking for here withered and
died, right.
That's not the story we want.
(11:55):
So what does this look like?
Now?
Mark explains this, I think ina little different way than I've
always seen in Matthew, andit's interesting.
He says there's no depth,there's not much soil.
So picture it maybe a littledifferently than we presented it
before.
There's soil, but it's not verydeep, right.
(12:19):
It's just that it's top.
It's the top, we can see.
It's soil.
Below that there's still rocks.
We could say it's hard ground,right?
So you know, it's that kind ofthing when you're trying to dig
a hole for a post or somethingand you're like this is going to
be good, you know, and you're,you're, you're digging out soil
and then there comes that pointit happened especially, I think,
(12:41):
in California.
You would hit granite, you knowwhat I mean Decomposed granite
or whatever.
But you would hit like rock.
And you know people who want topool.
They get to that point it'slike no, bring out the dynamite,
let's see if we can do this.
You know, and that's thepicture we're getting here Not
enough soil, it's just a shallowthing.
So you look at it and go this ispretty good ground, I guess.
(13:04):
But right below the surfaceit's hard, it's rock, there's no
room for roots.
And so the seed hits that soiland it does grow.
Three of these four soils dogrow, but only one of them lasts
(13:26):
and produce fruit.
So there's growth very quickly,it springs up a lot of hope and
this temporary growth isfollowed by death.
That's not what you want, butthat's what's happening.
The problem is there's no death, it's superficial, and Jesus
says our hearts can be this way,can be superficial.
(13:47):
Now, I don't, I probably.
Well, let's just say it A lotof experience in youth ministry.
Love it.
I talk about it a lot, I know,but one of the things that used
to get me and you know, takethis how you want, because I
have become pretty cynical in mylife it's not a good place to
(14:10):
be, but every year we would havea revival here in town and and
people get saved.
People do get saved, but everyyear it almost started to drive
me a little nutty because everyyear kids would come to me and
go I got saved last night, yougot saved last night.
(14:30):
You know the night before that,you know you got saved last
year and I would get this packetof papers.
You know 200 people cameforward, 200 kids got saved.
And again, I know I'm cynical,I know I am, but I saw the big
picture of it Because I knew howit went.
I grew up in a situation likethat.
(14:51):
You know where the gospel isput out.
Now, when the gospel is put out, god can work and God will work
, and you know I don't want tobadmouth it in that sense.
But then it would be a fewstories and it would be some
emotional tugging of you know,and I knew a kid that you know
(15:11):
left a thing like this and wenton the road and they died.
You don't want to die tonight,do you?
What, if you died, would you goto heaven?
I mean that's logical, but theemotion would come, then the
music would go and then theywould have an altar call and
people would come forward andyou know again, god works in
that.
(15:31):
But it's the springing up andthen it was.
You know, 200 salvations, 300recommitments.
Look what we did.
And I go, wow, good jobeverybody.
You know I got cynical, whatcan I say?
But I hate to say it.
But this is the picture that weget here.
There's excitement and there'semotion, but there's no root.
(15:55):
Now check this out.
God has made us emotional beings.
Aren't you glad we're not justrobots?
You know what I mean.
You don't feel anything.
Aren't you glad that you know?
God gave us emotions to love himand love others.
It's great, but we can't justlive our life on emotions.
(16:16):
God wants more than that.
God wants us to love him withour heart.
And interesting in the ancientmind the heart.
We see this.
We go heart, we go the heart.
It's right here and I go loveGod with all your heart.
The ancients would have saidlove God with all your guts,
right.
Your stomach, your intestines,oh, I just love you with all my
(16:39):
intestines, because you know,when you feel in that feeling,
you go oh, I'm so in love, I'msick, I'm going to throw up, you
know, and they would say that.
But we get it right theemotions.
Love God with all your heart.
But Jesus extends it therelater on and Mark says love God
with all your heart, mind, souland strength.
(17:01):
Right, I don't even know whatall those things are, but your
mind too.
God wants you to love him withyour mind.
That brings us to the pointwhere we need to have some depth
, not just emotions.
We need to engage our brain,right, and as we look at this,
(17:21):
we understand that God's givenus a brain and God has given us
the ability to ask questionsabout life.
And and here's something Ithink we should all know God's
not afraid of questions.
There's a lot of questions wecan ask, but God is definitely
not afraid of questions becausein the end, he's always gonna
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come out to be true, right, he'snot afraid of them.
He wants us to study and askquestions and say well, why.
He wants us to see what hisword says about his nature and
qualities, about salvation andhow it goes down, what it's
about, what's faith, forgoodness sake?
And God wants us to dig deeper,not just loving him with our
(18:05):
heart, but loving him with ourmind.
And that really is what we seehere, that God Jesus says.
The problem with this soil isthat it's superficial, it's just
emotional.
Now then we see in this thatsomething horrible happens to
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this growth that's going on.
The problem here is the suncomes out.
In verse 17,.
I know I'm hopping around a lot, but this is the passages that
we're looking at.
Notice verse 17, jesus explainsthe Wendy's have no root in
themselves, so they endure for atime.
(18:58):
Afterward, when not if, whentribulation and persecution
arise for the word's sake,that's kind of important
immediately they stumble.
So Jesus paints this picture inthis shallow soil, the plant
starts to spring up through theground.
Yay, excitement for sure.
(19:20):
But then the sun comes out andscorches it and it dies.
Jesus defines these scorchingsas tribulations and persecutions
.
For the word's sake.
Now consider these words for asecond Tribulations that's one
of those high and lofty words.
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Tribulations right, we don'twant it.
Whatever it is, we don't likeit.
But tribulations the word meanssqueezings, pressure.
So picture a vice.
It's starting to come together,isn't it?
You know your picture of viceand there you are in this vice
and it's just squeezing.
(20:04):
It felt that way sometimes, Igotta be honest, these last few
weeks and you know, there'stimes like this in life.
For sure these last few weekswith death and sickness and
visiting people in the hospitaland Lila's dad, which we're
going to pray at the end for him, it's part of life, right.
(20:27):
But you know, when you feellike there's like a belt maybe I
have health problems myselfthere's like a belt around your
chest and it just keeps gettingtighter and tighter.
And I'm not, you know Lila'sprobably even, and I'm not, you
know leela's probably even more.
But you know that's how itfeels when tribulations and
difficulties come in.
It just squeezes.
(20:48):
A lot of different ways wecould look at it, but it
squeezes you and you just go,okay, okay, I can't breathe, you
know.
And then know this is kind ofinside to bring a little hope to
the situation.
Brayden and Libby came over acouple days ago and they brought
Gunner and isn't that goodmedicine For just a minute.
(21:08):
You know, I'm looking at thislittle guy and his little you
know blobbyness and justsquishiness and I just go, I can
breathe.
You know what I mean.
And yet tribulations are part oflife.
Persecutions we don'texperience too much of that.
But the picture here behindthis word persecutions, is
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somebody chasing you, right?
I mean?
I know we're all going to starthyperventilating here, but you
know you've got those nightmareswhere somebody is chasing you
and you're just.
But you know you've got thosenightmares where somebody is
chasing you and you're just, andyou know they're getting closer
and closer.
Right For us it's a nightmare.
(21:54):
For the early church it wouldhave been a daily thing, as
people like Saul chase them fromplace to place and persecuted
them and were gonna take awaytheir lives.
And Jesus knew for these guys,tribulations and persecutions
because of the word were gonnabe a part of their life.
But tribulations, squeezings inour life and chasings in our
life, they're part of life, andthe sun pictures that here,
(22:20):
right?
So the sun comes out and itjust beats down on these little
plants and they just shrivel upand die because they don't have
any root.
Now think about this for asecond, though.
The sun is not bad.
I don't know how else to say it.
The sun isn't bad.
The plant would not growwithout the sun.
(22:41):
We know that right, you've gotto have the sun.
In fact, with the rightcircumstances and nutrients and
water, a sunny day we see itright in our seasons here makes
the grass grow faster and thenwe have to mow it Right.
But you know, the sun isn't bad.
If you have roots, the sun isgood.
(23:06):
And then we hear our friendJames again in the back of our
head.
James, consider it all.
Joy, my brethren, when you fallinto various trials, knowing
that the testing of your faithproduces good things.
Come on, guys, be quiet.
James, I don't want it.
But the son, the trials, theyproduce real health in our life.
(23:30):
That's what God wants to bringout of it.
Good, but without roots,without depth, they don't.
We die, god.
Let me just one more time.
Yeah, god produces good thingsthrough trials.
(23:54):
Hebrews talks about thechastening of the Lord, the
training of the Lord, that hedoes it because he loves us, and
it's true.
But here, with no depth,there's only this superficial
response and they waste away.
That's not what we want.
(24:16):
We want to have some depth inour life, we want to have some
root.
We have to take time to getinto God's word.
Right, we have to take time torealize what God is really like.
You know.
(24:36):
I mean that takes some digging,that takes some work to see
that God is faithful, right,that God is just and he's
gracious, right, he judges sinbut he also forgives us because
of what Jesus did for us.
He's all those things, he's allpowerful and all present in our
(24:58):
life.
He's eternal, right.
And you look at this and you go,wow, this is God.
And when tribulations and stuffcome, we take all those things
we know about God and we, werest on Right, we rest on his
faithfulness.
God, I know you can't beanything but faithful, because
that's who you are, god.
I know you have all power.
You're not working right now,but God you're loving.
(25:20):
I have to trust that you'reloving in my life right now,
that your ultimate goal is forgood in my life and you trust in
those things.
Man, or else you wither and dieright.
So you gotta have this anchorof roots in your life.
I think another thing we seehere when we look at this plant,
(25:42):
this poor little plant, and welook at a good plant let's be
encouraged and look at a goodplant.
A good plant grows but it putsdown roots.
But check it out, the best workof the plant, the most
important work of the plant,happens below the surface, where
you can't see it.
(26:02):
It happens in private, right,and there's all the show and
that's all great.
You know what God's doing inyour life.
You know somebody comes up toyou and goes, wow, I've really
seen a change in your life, man.
I've really seen God growingyou and the way you love people.
Wow, it's just amazing.
You know, I see how you used tolose your cool and now, oh,
(26:23):
you're patient.
Wow, I see that.
But you know, there's that workthat God does below the surface
and that kind of hurts, doesn'tit?
But it's so real.
Right, it happens in suffering.
But here's where it happens forme.
I don't know if I can say thishappens for everybody, but it
happens in private.
It always happens with me whenI'm about ready to go to sleep
(26:49):
and there you are with thestresses of the day and you just
say, god, I don't know what todo.
You know you're trying to castall these things just so you can
get a little bit of peace andfall asleep or whatever.
You know, and it's you and God,you ever have those things
where everybody else is asleepor doing something else, and
it's you and God and you ask himthe hard questions like God.
I don't understand why this ishappening.
God, if you're here, how come Idon't see you?
(27:12):
God, this is really worrying memy kids, right.
This is really stressing me outwith sickness, worrying me, my
kids, right, this is reallystressing me out with sickness.
And it's you and God.
I look at Abraham and I relate alot to Abraham and I see the
work, you see the work from adistance that happened in
(27:33):
Abraham's heart and I understandit a little bit His desire,
sarah, probably even more sodesire to have children.
And I flop back to you know mypast not being able to have
children, big old deal in mylife, and how many times I went
to sleep going God, all I wantto do is have kids and he gave
(27:54):
me this heart.
I don't get it.
Why isn't this happening?
And you can put your own thingin there, right, everybody's got
their thing, everybody hastheir thing that they're going
through, and you go to sleep andyou go, god.
I just don't get it and I thinkabout Abraham and Sarah and I
just think about that was like adecade or more.
I think it was like 13 yearsmaybe.
I mean, don't quote me on that,but it was a long old time that
(28:16):
they had the promise of Isaacbut didn't see it, and I could
just imagine them, those quiettimes between you and God.
I think about Rachel, one ofAbraham's grandkids no, it
wasn't really related, anywaysinvolved in the family tree, and
Rachel says something verysimilar to her husband's.
(28:38):
She says if you don't give mechildren, I'm going to die and
you go, whoa, but I get it.
I get it Because you're likethis is the one thing I want to
see right now.
And you know she was saying itto Jacob, but I think she said
it to God plenty too.
I mean, that's where the realwork happens.
(29:00):
When we come to God with thosethings and we say this is where
I'm at, where the real workhappens.
When we come to God with thosethings and we say this is where
I'm at.
And you realize, in a healthyplant where God wants us to be,
the best work happens below thesurface, the place where nobody
else can see, the place whereit's just you and God and some
(29:27):
tears, and you're like I don'tthink I can do this anymore.
And you know I can't say that.
God always says well, here'sIsaac.
You know it happens at theright time or maybe it doesn't,
and God just sees you through it.
But you just go, god, I gotnothing else to hold on to.
I got no other roots in my life.
You're going to have to be myroots and that's where God
(29:50):
really wants us to be.
You know you read Psalm 1, andthat's kind of where we'll end.
Psalm 1, david says this youcan turn there.
Psalm 1.
It doesn't hurt to turn right.
We've got two and a halfminutes left, psalm 1,.
It doesn't hurt to turn right.
We've got two and a halfminutes left.
Psalm 1, verse 1.
We won't read the whole thing.
(30:14):
Blessed is the man or woman, ofcourse, who walks not in the
counsel of the ungodly, norstands in the path of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of thescornful.
That doesn't seem like a niceplace to be sitting in the seat
of the scornful.
That doesn't seem like a niceplace to be sitting in the seat
of the scornful.
You don't want to do that.
But his delight is in the lawof the Lord, god's word, and in
(30:34):
his law he meditates day andnight.
And he shall be like a treeplanted by the rivers of water
that bring forth its fruit inits season, whose leaf also does
not wither and whatever he does, prospers.
So here we see, the one who'sgot roots planted by living
(30:59):
waters God's word right, justtrusting God with everything,
like a tree, right, we've gotour sad little plant here in
shallow soil that's going towither away and die because of
the sun.
Then we got this tree that'slike, rooted and strong, and it
(31:20):
bears fruit in season andseasons come and season go, and
here's some fruit in your lifeand you go wow, god, that's
amazing fruit you bring in mylife.
And you just look at it andit's so refreshing, right.
I could sit in a place likethis and just sit by that tree
and go, rooted, grounded,getting water when it needs it,
(31:43):
healthy, strong, and everybodylooks and goes, wow, look at
that.
And you go that's what Godwants us.
And it's not easy.
A lot of that painful stuffhappens below the surface.
We may need to break up some ofthat hard ground in our hearts
still, but that's what God wantsus to be fruitful.
(32:04):
And when we get there in theend and I thought.
You know, with the passing ofEvelyn and the passing of Miss
Melody, I've been thinking a lotabout what I want that day to
look like for me.
But you know, I want to getthere and be like fruitful man.
(32:29):
God, look what you did in mylife, look at the people that
you affected, or love that youshowed God.
Look at these things and youdid it.
And you know, to God's glory,god steps back and goes, and
that's what I wanted, that'swhat I always wanted you to be.
It is fruitful, crazy fruitful.
God.
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I know that it's not positivethinking that's going to get us
there and it's not a pep rallythat's going to make that happen
in our life.
But, god, I know that you've tomake that happen in our life.
But, god, I know that you gottawork that in our hearts.
God, absolutely none of us wantthat deep work because it hurts
(33:15):
.
But god, whom you love, youtrain and chase and you take us
through it.
And God, you produce a crazydepth in our life that our life
can be more about just making it.
It can be about fruitfulness toyour glory.
So, god, whatever you I don'teven want to say it Whatever you
(33:40):
need to do in our lives tobring us deep.
I just pray you do it, god.
Help us to just find our anchorin you through the difficult
things.
Help us to hold on to you first, god.
You never let us down.
You're faithful, you're good,you're kind.
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God, make us something thatwe're not.
We pray all these things inJesus' name, amen.
Here we are, mark, chapter 4, and we are taking it
really slow here now in chapter4, verse 1.
4, verse 1.
We've been seeing the ministryof Jesus.
We've been seeing, as is alwaysthe case, various receptions to
that ministry.
We've seen the religiousleaders.
(00:33):
We can, you know, boo and hissover, of course, but their
hearts are becoming hardened.
We've seen that as Jesusperforms miracles and teaches
and loves people, the religiousleaders, because he threatens
(00:54):
them, they criticize.
They say, well, he's doing allthese things by the power of
Beelzebub, the prince of demons.
So Jesus casts out a demon andthey say, well, he's casting out
demons by the prince of demons.
And every time Jesus doessomething, they say, well, a
demon, that's a demon, that's adevil, that ain't God, that's
the devil.
And their hearts are becominghard, a dangerous place to be.
(01:17):
We also see the crowds, right,the mobs that are coming to
Jesus, and they're seeing themiracles and they're seeing all
these things, and the crowds areexcited.
There's this electricity, butGod knows that their hearts are
rather superficial.
Jesus knows that they'refollowing him for all the wrong
(01:40):
reasons.
There's no depth we'll evenlook at today, and for them he's
a little bit of a passing fad,right, you know, he's kind of a
trend that they're following.
Then there's the disciples.
Now the disciples, we could oh,we could say they're the.
You know, they're in a goodplace and they are, but they're
(02:03):
somewhat oblivious to who Jesusis in reality.
They definitely don't have itall down.
They're unsure.
We seeing the whole picture, wego, you guys are missing it.
What are you getting wrong here?
But Jesus is working in theirlives and he's teaching.
Now in chapter 4, we see, see inparables for a time.
(02:25):
Parables Jesus is telling,giving earthly pictures of
heavenly truths, and the peoplewould hear him but they wouldn't
understand.
But his disciples would come tohim Clarification, jesus, what
is that all about?
Why are you telling this?
(02:46):
What is this about?
And Jesus actually tells them.
Now the parables are a littlebit daunting as we look at it,
because parables can be misused.
Parables can be kind of obscurein some ways and a little bit
uncertain.
Generally, just for reference,don't build theology on
(03:06):
parablesables, because you canuse them to prove and point to a
lot of things that just aren'tbiblical.
Be careful with parables.
But this first parable in Mark,chapter four, the first part
here, the parable of the sower,we're safe on.
We can use this all day longbecause Jesus explains it in
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detail.
He tells us what each part ofthe parable is about, and so you
cannot really go wrong withthis parable, and that's why
we're taking it so slow, because, well, we might as well dig
everything we can out of it.
The parable of the sower, jesusspells out, and the sower, the
(03:50):
planter, we could say plants,seed, and this exciting,
thrilling story here the sowergoes out to throw seed out on
different soils.
You know, you can tell, asJesus is telling this story,
maybe the people are kind oflike they're getting closer for
the what's the punchline of thisand they're probably
(04:10):
disappointed.
It's about soil, about seeds.
Some plants grow, other plantsdon't.
Three bad soils, you could say,and one good, right Bad soils,
you could say, and one good,right Now.
Not a very exciting story, butthe meaning to it Jesus gives,
(04:32):
starting in verse 13.
And he said to them do you notunderstand this parable?
How will you understand all theparables the sower sees?
So sorry, right.
So Jesus starts us off in thisby giving us a huge part of it,
(04:57):
by saying the seed is God's word.
Now, I'm sure we've all heardthis before, but let's track as
best as you can.
The seed is God's word, thesoils we see in the next verse
in verse 15, is our heart.
(05:18):
Very simple the seed is God'sword, the soil is our hearts.
And the thing that we want tounderstand here is that there's
no other seed that can grow inour life than God's word.
That's something to look for inyour life.
The only thing that's going tobring real spiritual growth is
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God's word, not books, notopinions, not politics or
philosophy or any of that.
The only thing that's going tobring fruit, real spiritual
fruit, in our life is God's word.
Look for it, find it, be in it.
But we see here, it's not theseed's fault that growth doesn't
happen.
The seed will grow if it's putin the right heart.
It's not the seed's fault, it'snot God's word that is weak.
(06:09):
It's our hearts that receive it.
Our hearts can be rather messedup.
In fact, three out of fourhearts seem to be messed up.
If you want to look at this instatistics, right, that's
probably even more than that.
All of our hearts are messed upand like planting, spiritual
planting of God's word involvespreparation of the soil, our
(06:40):
hearts, preparing our hearts.
And we saw last week, the firstheart that Jesus pictures is a
hard heart.
It's like hard ground, it'slike a hiking path, a trail.
It's packed down and we couldput this as pride, hardness of
heart, stubbornness.
We can all have a hard heart,and especially as God's word
(07:00):
right, as somebody goes sowingGod's word, as God goes sowing
God's word, as God goes sowinghis word in our hearts.
The more travel there is overour hearts and the resistance to
receive it, the harder ourhearts can get.
We just ignore God's word.
It doesn't mean anything to us.
And notice in the parable youmight have to go back and reread
the parable but the birds comeand eat that seed up on the hard
(07:24):
heart that doesn't receiveGod's word.
It just bounces off and thebirds representing the devil.
Here Jesus says the birds comeand gladly feed on God's word,
chew it up, take it away.
It doesn't produce anything.
We don't want to have a hardheart through resistance,
through pride, through justapathy, not even caring about
(07:47):
what we're hearing.
And it can be all of our hearts.
But I want to say in this story,the hard hearts are these
religious leaders who everysingle day Again, it can be all
of us, so apply it to your ownlife.
But the hard hearts of thesereligious leaders are not bad to
start with, necessarily.
But in resistance they justkeep saying that's the devil,
(08:09):
that's the devil, oh, that's thedemon.
He's not the devil, and beforelong it's just the instinct of
their response.
You know what I mean.
They say it without eventhinking it, and that's what a
hard heart is.
A hard heart is very and andthat's what a hard heart is A
hard heart is very, verydangerous.
But here is something I thinkwhen we look at somebody who
(08:30):
definitely had a hard heart,saul, who was breathing threats
against the church there in thebook of Acts, god busted him up
right through difficulty andjust knocked him to the ground,
you know, pricked his heartthere.
With Stephen's martyrdom, godhad his way of getting a hold of
(08:53):
that hard heart of Saul.
And God can, god can.
But it takes that breaking upof that heart.
Now here we are, breaking up ofthat heart.
Now here we are.
We're looking at the second one,the second soil, it's those
sown on the stony ground.
Let's go back to the beginningand let's read, let's just read
(09:14):
the parable.
We should have done that tobegin with.
Verse three, chapter fourListen, behold, check it out.
A sower went out to sow and ithappened as he sowed that some
seed fell by the wayside and thebirds of the air came and
devoured it.
Some fell on stony ground wherethey did not have much earth,
and immediately it sprang upbecause it had no depth of earth
(09:35):
.
But when the sun was up it wasscorched and because it had no
root it withered away.
So we're looking at this secondsoil here, the stony ground,
and we see some qualities aboutthis, just on the surface.
Here we see some qualities ofthis soil.
(10:00):
Notice in verse 5, immediatelyit's spraying up.
So in the stony ground,something we notice is there's
an immediate response.
That's one of Mark's favoritewords immediately, immediately,
it sprang up.
So it sprang up.
Notice Jesus' explanation of itin verse 16.
(10:25):
Let's look at the clear stuffhere.
These, likewise, are the onessown on the stony ground who
when they hear the wordimmediately, they receive it
with gladness.
So you can say about this soilthat they immediately receive it
with gladness.
Immediately it springs up.
That's a seemingly good qualityof this soil there's immediate
(10:47):
response, there's excitement, itsprings up.
Right.
But let's look at the negativequalities.
Back in verse four I'm sorry,verse five.
They did not have much earth.
They had no depth of earth inverse five.
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And then when the sun was up,they're scorched because they
had no root.
So these are negative things nodepth of earth, no roots.
They didn't have much earth andand they're withered and they
died.
Now, this is not the kind ofplanting you want to do, right?
(11:32):
I think we said last time thesower's hope.
I guess if you could say thesower's desire, what you want
when you plant stuff is you wantit to grow, right.
That's why you do it.
You want it to bear fruit.
This is not the ending we'relooking for here withered and
died, right.
That's not the story we want.
(11:55):
So what does this look like?
Now?
Mark explains this, I think ina little different way than I've
always seen in Matthew, andit's interesting.
He says there's no depth,there's not much soil.
So picture it maybe a littledifferently than we presented it
before.
There's soil, but it's not verydeep, right.
(12:19):
It's just that it's top.
It's the top, we can see.
It's soil.
Below that there's still rocks.
We could say it's hard ground,right?
So you know, it's that kind ofthing when you're trying to dig
a hole for a post or somethingand you're like this is going to
be good, you know, and you're,you're, you're digging out soil
and then there comes that pointit happened especially, I think,
(12:41):
in California.
You would hit granite, you knowwhat I mean Decomposed granite
or whatever.
But you would hit like rock.
And you know people who want topool.
They get to that point it'slike no, bring out the dynamite,
let's see if we can do this.
You know, and that's thepicture we're getting here Not
enough soil, it's just a shallowthing.
So you look at it and go this ispretty good ground, I guess.
(13:04):
But right below the surfaceit's hard, it's rock, there's no
room for roots.
And so the seed hits that soiland it does grow.
Three of these four soils dogrow, but only one of them lasts
(13:26):
and produce fruit.
So there's growth very quickly,it springs up a lot of hope and
this temporary growth isfollowed by death.
That's not what you want, butthat's what's happening.
The problem is there's no death, it's superficial, and Jesus
says our hearts can be this way,can be superficial.
(13:47):
Now, I don't, I probably.
Well, let's just say it A lotof experience in youth ministry.
Love it.
I talk about it a lot, I know,but one of the things that used
to get me and you know, takethis how you want, because I
have become pretty cynical in mylife it's not a good place to
(14:10):
be, but every year we would havea revival here in town and and
people get saved.
People do get saved, but everyyear it almost started to drive
me a little nutty because everyyear kids would come to me and
go I got saved last night, yougot saved last night.
(14:30):
You know the night before that,you know you got saved last
year and I would get this packetof papers.
You know 200 people cameforward, 200 kids got saved.
And again, I know I'm cynical,I know I am, but I saw the big
picture of it Because I knew howit went.
I grew up in a situation likethat.
(14:51):
You know where the gospel isput out.
Now, when the gospel is put out, god can work and God will work
, and you know I don't want tobadmouth it in that sense.
But then it would be a fewstories and it would be some
emotional tugging of you know,and I knew a kid that you know
(15:11):
left a thing like this and wenton the road and they died.
You don't want to die tonight,do you?
What, if you died, would you goto heaven?
I mean that's logical, but theemotion would come, then the
music would go and then theywould have an altar call and
people would come forward andyou know again, god works in
that.
(15:31):
But it's the springing up andthen it was.
You know, 200 salvations, 300recommitments.
Look what we did.
And I go, wow, good jobeverybody.
You know I got cynical, whatcan I say?
But I hate to say it.
But this is the picture that weget here.
There's excitement and there'semotion, but there's no root.
(15:55):
Now check this out.
God has made us emotional beings.
Aren't you glad we're not justrobots?
You know what I mean.
You don't feel anything.
Aren't you glad that you know?
God gave us emotions to love himand love others.
It's great, but we can't justlive our life on emotions.
(16:16):
God wants more than that.
God wants us to love him withour heart.
And interesting in the ancientmind the heart.
We see this.
We go heart, we go the heart.
It's right here and I go loveGod with all your heart.
The ancients would have saidlove God with all your guts,
right.
Your stomach, your intestines,oh, I just love you with all my
(16:39):
intestines, because you know,when you feel in that feeling,
you go oh, I'm so in love, I'msick, I'm going to throw up, you
know, and they would say that.
But we get it right theemotions.
Love God with all your heart.
But Jesus extends it therelater on and Mark says love God
with all your heart, mind, souland strength.
(17:01):
Right, I don't even know whatall those things are, but your
mind too.
God wants you to love him withyour mind.
That brings us to the pointwhere we need to have some depth
, not just emotions.
We need to engage our brain,right, and as we look at this,
(17:21):
we understand that God's givenus a brain and God has given us
the ability to ask questionsabout life.
And and here's something Ithink we should all know God's
not afraid of questions.
There's a lot of questions wecan ask, but God is definitely
not afraid of questions becausein the end, he's always gonna
(17:41):
come out to be true, right, he'snot afraid of them.
He wants us to study and askquestions and say well, why.
He wants us to see what hisword says about his nature and
qualities, about salvation andhow it goes down, what it's
about, what's faith, forgoodness sake?
And God wants us to dig deeper,not just loving him with our
(18:05):
heart, but loving him with ourmind.
And that really is what we seehere, that God Jesus says.
The problem with this soil isthat it's superficial, it's just
emotional.
Now then we see in this thatsomething horrible happens to
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this growth that's going on.
The problem here is the suncomes out.
In verse 17,.
I know I'm hopping around a lot, but this is the passages that
we're looking at.
Notice verse 17, jesus explainsthe Wendy's have no root in
themselves, so they endure for atime.
(18:58):
Afterward, when not if, whentribulation and persecution
arise for the word's sake,that's kind of important
immediately they stumble.
So Jesus paints this picture inthis shallow soil, the plant
starts to spring up through theground.
Yay, excitement for sure.
(19:20):
But then the sun comes out andscorches it and it dies.
Jesus defines these scorchingsas tribulations and persecutions
.
For the word's sake.
Now consider these words for asecond Tribulations that's one
of those high and lofty words.
(19:42):
Tribulations right, we don'twant it.
Whatever it is, we don't likeit.
But tribulations the word meanssqueezings, pressure.
So picture a vice.
It's starting to come together,isn't it?
You know your picture of viceand there you are in this vice
and it's just squeezing.
(20:04):
It felt that way sometimes, Igotta be honest, these last few
weeks and you know, there'stimes like this in life.
For sure these last few weekswith death and sickness and
visiting people in the hospitaland Lila's dad, which we're
going to pray at the end for him, it's part of life, right.
(20:27):
But you know, when you feellike there's like a belt maybe I
have health problems myselfthere's like a belt around your
chest and it just keeps gettingtighter and tighter.
And I'm not, you know Lila'sprobably even, and I'm not, you
know leela's probably even more.
But you know that's how itfeels when tribulations and
difficulties come in.
It just squeezes.
(20:48):
A lot of different ways wecould look at it, but it
squeezes you and you just go,okay, okay, I can't breathe, you
know.
And then know this is kind ofinside to bring a little hope to
the situation.
Brayden and Libby came over acouple days ago and they brought
Gunner and isn't that goodmedicine For just a minute.
(21:08):
You know, I'm looking at thislittle guy and his little you
know blobbyness and justsquishiness and I just go, I can
breathe.
You know what I mean.
And yet tribulations are part oflife.
Persecutions we don'texperience too much of that.
But the picture here behindthis word persecutions, is
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somebody chasing you, right?
I mean?
I know we're all going to starthyperventilating here, but you
know you've got those nightmareswhere somebody is chasing you
and you're just.
But you know you've got thosenightmares where somebody is
chasing you and you're just, andyou know they're getting closer
and closer.
Right For us it's a nightmare.
(21:54):
For the early church it wouldhave been a daily thing, as
people like Saul chase them fromplace to place and persecuted
them and were gonna take awaytheir lives.
And Jesus knew for these guys,tribulations and persecutions
because of the word were gonnabe a part of their life.
But tribulations, squeezings inour life and chasings in our
life, they're part of life, andthe sun pictures that here,
(22:20):
right?
So the sun comes out and itjust beats down on these little
plants and they just shrivel upand die because they don't have
any root.
Now think about this for asecond, though.
The sun is not bad.
I don't know how else to say it.
The sun isn't bad.
The plant would not growwithout the sun.
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We know that right, you've gotto have the sun.
In fact, with the rightcircumstances and nutrients and
water, a sunny day we see itright in our seasons here makes
the grass grow faster and thenwe have to mow it Right.
But you know, the sun isn't bad.
If you have roots, the sun isgood.
(23:06):
And then we hear our friendJames again in the back of our
head.
James, consider it all.
Joy, my brethren, when you fallinto various trials, knowing
that the testing of your faithproduces good things.
Come on, guys, be quiet.
James, I don't want it.
But the son, the trials, theyproduce real health in our life.
(23:30):
That's what God wants to bringout of it.
Good, but without roots,without depth, they don't.
We die, god.
Let me just one more time.
Yeah, god produces good thingsthrough trials.
(23:54):
Hebrews talks about thechastening of the Lord, the
training of the Lord, that hedoes it because he loves us, and
it's true.
But here, with no depth,there's only this superficial
response and they waste away.
That's not what we want.
(24:16):
We want to have some depth inour life, we want to have some
root.
We have to take time to getinto God's word.
Right, we have to take time torealize what God is really like.
You know.
(24:36):
I mean that takes some digging,that takes some work to see
that God is faithful, right,that God is just and he's
gracious, right, he judges sinbut he also forgives us because
of what Jesus did for us.
He's all those things, he's allpowerful and all present in our
(24:58):
life.
He's eternal, right.
And you look at this and you go,wow, this is God.
And when tribulations and stuffcome, we take all those things
we know about God and we, werest on Right, we rest on his
faithfulness.
God, I know you can't beanything but faithful, because
that's who you are, god.
I know you have all power.
You're not working right now,but God you're loving.
(25:20):
I have to trust that you'reloving in my life right now,
that your ultimate goal is forgood in my life and you trust in
those things.
Man, or else you wither and dieright.
So you gotta have this anchorof roots in your life.
I think another thing we seehere when we look at this plant,
(25:42):
this poor little plant, and welook at a good plant let's be
encouraged and look at a goodplant.
A good plant grows but it putsdown roots.
But check it out, the best workof the plant, the most
important work of the plant,happens below the surface, where
you can't see it.
(26:02):
It happens in private, right,and there's all the show and
that's all great.
You know what God's doing inyour life.
You know somebody comes up toyou and goes, wow, I've really
seen a change in your life, man.
I've really seen God growingyou and the way you love people.
Wow, it's just amazing.
You know, I see how you used tolose your cool and now, oh,
(26:23):
you're patient.
Wow, I see that.
But you know, there's that workthat God does below the surface
and that kind of hurts, doesn'tit?
But it's so real.
Right, it happens in suffering.
But here's where it happens forme.
I don't know if I can say thishappens for everybody, but it
happens in private.
It always happens with me whenI'm about ready to go to sleep
(26:49):
and there you are with thestresses of the day and you just
say, god, I don't know what todo.
You know you're trying to castall these things just so you can
get a little bit of peace andfall asleep or whatever.
You know, and it's you and God,you ever have those things
where everybody else is asleepor doing something else, and
it's you and God and you ask himthe hard questions like God.
I don't understand why this ishappening.
God, if you're here, how come Idon't see you?
(27:12):
God, this is really worrying memy kids, right.
This is really stressing me outwith sickness, worrying me, my
kids, right, this is reallystressing me out with sickness.
And it's you and God.
I look at Abraham and I relate alot to Abraham and I see the
work, you see the work from adistance that happened in
(27:33):
Abraham's heart and I understandit a little bit His desire,
sarah, probably even more sodesire to have children.
And I flop back to you know mypast not being able to have
children, big old deal in mylife, and how many times I went
to sleep going God, all I wantto do is have kids and he gave
(27:54):
me this heart.
I don't get it.
Why isn't this happening?
And you can put your own thingin there, right, everybody's got
their thing, everybody hastheir thing that they're going
through, and you go to sleep andyou go, god.
I just don't get it and I thinkabout Abraham and Sarah and I
just think about that was like adecade or more.
I think it was like 13 yearsmaybe.
I mean, don't quote me on that,but it was a long old time that
(28:16):
they had the promise of Isaacbut didn't see it, and I could
just imagine them, those quiettimes between you and God.
I think about Rachel, one ofAbraham's grandkids no, it
wasn't really related, anywaysinvolved in the family tree, and
Rachel says something verysimilar to her husband's.
(28:38):
She says if you don't give mechildren, I'm going to die and
you go, whoa, but I get it.
I get it Because you're likethis is the one thing I want to
see right now.
And you know she was saying itto Jacob, but I think she said
it to God plenty too.
I mean, that's where the realwork happens.
(29:00):
When we come to God with thosethings and we say this is where
I'm at, where the real workhappens.
When we come to God with thosethings and we say this is where
I'm at.
And you realize, in a healthyplant where God wants us to be,
the best work happens below thesurface, the place where nobody
else can see, the place whereit's just you and God and some
(29:27):
tears, and you're like I don'tthink I can do this anymore.
And you know I can't say that.
God always says well, here'sIsaac.
You know it happens at theright time or maybe it doesn't,
and God just sees you through it.
But you just go, god, I gotnothing else to hold on to.
I got no other roots in my life.
You're going to have to be myroots and that's where God
(29:50):
really wants us to be.
You know you read Psalm 1, andthat's kind of where we'll end.
Psalm 1, david says this youcan turn there.
Psalm 1.
It doesn't hurt to turn right.
We've got two and a halfminutes left, psalm 1,.
It doesn't hurt to turn right.
We've got two and a halfminutes left.
Psalm 1, verse 1.
We won't read the whole thing.
(30:14):
Blessed is the man or woman, ofcourse, who walks not in the
counsel of the ungodly, norstands in the path of sinners,
nor sits in the seat of thescornful.
That doesn't seem like a niceplace to be sitting in the seat
of the scornful.
That doesn't seem like a niceplace to be sitting in the seat
of the scornful.
You don't want to do that.
But his delight is in the lawof the Lord, god's word, and in
(30:34):
his law he meditates day andnight.
And he shall be like a treeplanted by the rivers of water
that bring forth its fruit inits season, whose leaf also does
not wither and whatever he does, prospers.
So here we see, the one who'sgot roots planted by living
(30:59):
waters God's word right, justtrusting God with everything,
like a tree, right, we've gotour sad little plant here in
shallow soil that's going towither away and die because of
the sun.
Then we got this tree that'slike, rooted and strong, and it
(31:20):
bears fruit in season andseasons come and season go, and
here's some fruit in your lifeand you go wow, god, that's
amazing fruit you bring in mylife.
And you just look at it andit's so refreshing, right.
I could sit in a place likethis and just sit by that tree
and go, rooted, grounded,getting water when it needs it,
(31:43):
healthy, strong, and everybodylooks and goes, wow, look at
that.
And you go that's what Godwants us.
And it's not easy.
A lot of that painful stuffhappens below the surface.
We may need to break up some ofthat hard ground in our hearts
still, but that's what God wantsus to be fruitful.
(32:04):
And when we get there in theend and I thought.
You know, with the passing ofEvelyn and the passing of Miss
Melody, I've been thinking a lotabout what I want that day to
look like for me.
But you know, I want to getthere and be like fruitful man.
(32:29):
God, look what you did in mylife, look at the people that
you affected, or love that youshowed God.
Look at these things and youdid it.
And you know, to God's glory,god steps back and goes, and
that's what I wanted, that'swhat I always wanted you to be.
It is fruitful, crazy fruitful.
God.
(32:51):
I know that it's not positivethinking that's going to get us
there and it's not a pep rallythat's going to make that happen
in our life.
But, god, I know that you've tomake that happen in our life.
But, god, I know that you gottawork that in our hearts.
God, absolutely none of us wantthat deep work because it hurts
(33:15):
.
But god, whom you love, youtrain and chase and you take us
through it.
And God, you produce a crazydepth in our life that our life
can be more about just making it.
It can be about fruitfulness toyour glory.
So, god, whatever you I don'teven want to say it Whatever you
(33:40):
need to do in our lives tobring us deep.
I just pray you do it, god.
Help us to just find our anchorin you through the difficult
things.
Help us to hold on to you first, god.
You never let us down.
You're faithful, you're good,you're kind.
(34:02):
God, make us something thatwe're not.
We pray all these things inJesus' name, amen.
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