Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Hello everyone.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is Pastor Benjamin.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You're listening to Sermon Audio from New City Orlando.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: At New City, we long to see our Father answer the Lord's Prayer.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: For more resources, visit our website at Newcity Orlando.com.
Joshua Esquivel: Good morning.
Joshua Esquivel: Please join me in reading the Prayer of Illumination.
Joshua Esquivel: Living God, help us to hear your word with open hearts so that we may truly understand and believe, and believing that we may follow in faithfulness and obedience through Christ our Lord.
Joshua Esquivel: Amen.
Joshua Esquivel: Our scripture today comes from Luke 8.
Joshua Esquivel: And when a great crowd was gathering, and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable: A sower went out to sow his seed, and as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the air devoured it, and some fell on the rock, and as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture.
Joshua Esquivel: And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it, and some fell into good soil, and grew and yielded a hundredfold.
Joshua Esquivel: And as he said these things, he called he called out, He who has ears to hear, let him hear.
Joshua Esquivel: And when his disciples asked him what that what this parable meant, he said, To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.
Joshua Esquivel: Now the parable is this the seed is the word of God.
Joshua Esquivel: The ones along the path are those who have heard.
Joshua Esquivel: Then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved.
Joshua Esquivel: And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy.
Joshua Esquivel: But these have no root.
Joshua Esquivel: They believe for a while, and in time of testing fall away.
Joshua Esquivel: And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way, they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.
Joshua Esquivel: As for that, in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.
Joshua Esquivel: This is God's word.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Good morning.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: My name is Benjamin.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I'm a pastor here with New City.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And today through May, we will be in a series through Jesus' parables in the Gospel of Luke.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so buckle up, we're jumping in.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Luke actually has 28 parables, more than any other gospel writer.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now, what is a parable?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We see that word actually in verse 4 of our text.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If you have a Bible or a device or the worship guide, you can get the text in front of you here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 4 says, Jesus said in a parable.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: In a parable, simply the word means to throw alongside.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Parabole, to throw alongside.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So Jesus throws earthly stories alongside heavenly truths to help us see what we couldn't see before.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what a parable is.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If you look at verse 11, the seed is the word of God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see seeds and words side by side, similarities and differences, drawing out to open our eyes to see things we wouldn't see on our own.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now, why parables though?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Why not just speak plainly?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Says most readers who get struggled through the gospels, and you're like, what is Jesus getting after in this?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Well, Jesus answers that question in verse 10.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It says, Jesus said, To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, but for others they are in parables, so that seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, parables both reveal and conceal.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's the point of a parable.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's why he tells them.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus knew if he spoke too directly, people would twist his words into what they already believed.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: One commentator puts it like this: mention the word Messiah, and they would picture a king on a horseback, not a carpenter on a cross.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It would be like me trying to talk about God's heart for the immigrant or a nation's duty to protect their borders without someone categorizing me as left or right in our cultural moment.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus knew the temptation of the human heart to put what you say into mental models that are already existing, so he disrupted them through parables.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what he did.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He was disrupting this mental model of reality then and now.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But now who gets to know the secrets of the kingdom of God to use verse 10's language?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Well, parables conceal from the impatient and insincere, but they reveal to the sincere who persevere.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Let me say that again.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Parables conceal from the impatient and insincere, but parables reveal to the sincere who persevere.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We see that.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse 9.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It says the disciples themselves had to ask, Jesus, what does this parable mean?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So if you have to ask that question when you're reading the book, it's okay.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's actually expected.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's actually the response Jesus wants from you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because it's not for super saints.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Dr.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Pennington last week reminded us that God reveals things to little children.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And what do little children do, the little children do?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They ask incessantly.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so come like a little child this semester.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Ask Jesus, keep asking Jesus, what does this mean?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Help me, Lord.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And expect that He will reveal things to you supernaturally through the Spirit's illumination and in everyday, ordinary ways, like seeds and weeds growing in your backyard.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's speaking to you through these things.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so today we look at what Jesus calls the parable of the sower.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The parable of the sower.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And this is actually the gateway parable to all of the other parables.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It stands at the head.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You go through this gateway to get into the whole world of parables.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now I get that from Mark chapter 4, when Jesus tells this parable in the Gospel of Mark, and he says, This, do you not understand this parable?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: How then will you understand all the parables?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Okay, you hear that?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus is saying the parable of the sower is the most important parable to get if you're going to get the rest of the parables.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So we stand here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is a key, according to Jesus, that unlocks every other parable in the entire New Testament.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's important.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And it's important because it answers a question that maybe the question I wrestle with the most about Christianity, and I bet you do too.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now, I don't mean the inerrancy of scripture, I don't mean the historicity of the resurrection, I mean the simplicity of why doesn't God just change people?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Including, maybe starting especially with me.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Like, why does it take so long?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Why is there not what I would assume to be more fruit in my life born by the Word of God?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what this parable seeks to address.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because the same seed goes out everywhere, but the condition of the heart makes all the difference.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so I want to put this chart up behind me as we explore this parable together.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This will also be in the show notes on the podcast, so you can get a picture of it then.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But this chart comes from this book called Secrets of a Fruitful Heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I do this every now and again when uh I really want you to read a book, okay?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because leaders are readers and this is a little cheesy, but I'm willing to do it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Uh this book's fantastic.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's all about this one parable.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And uh I actually know Bob Sorge, he's a fantastic human being, and I recommend this book to you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I have this copy.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If somebody will come up to me, first come, first serve, and promise to read it in the next month, and then tell me what you think, it's yours.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I have a copy for you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Okay?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But this book essentially unpacks this parable for us in profound detail, and that's what this chart comes from.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But I've got one main point, and then I want to, sub-points are the four soils.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The main point I want to I want to speak to here is tend to the garden of your heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Tend to the garden of your heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And as we look at the text, I want to look at the four soils sequentially, starting with the first one, which is the trampled heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Look with me at verse five.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse five.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It says this A sower went out to sow his seed, and as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the air devoured it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now look down at verse 12.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The ones along the path are those who have heard.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, that's important, so that they may not believe and be saved.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Okay, verse 11 said that the seed is the word of God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 12 tells us that the soil is the human heart, right?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: All right, you got that?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's important for the whole parable.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The seed is the word, the soil is the human heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now, farmers had paths through their fields that were meant for people to walk along.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It prevented foot traffic from going across their fields.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Uh, instead, people would walk on these footpaths.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And the reality is that the path would become hardened over time by being trampled underfoot.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You can imagine this.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so the path is too hard for the seed to root, so it becomes nothing more than bird food.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now, the trampled heart is a hard heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Of all four soils, this is the only one that has no growth, no fruit, no even evidence that the seed took any kind of root whatsoever.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: A hard heart is the greatest travesty of a human's existence.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: There's nothing worse than that the condition of your heart would be hard towards God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And if that's true, I would want to ask and answer the question: well, what makes a heart hard?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: There's lots of reasons in scripture that the Bible gives, but let me just explore one.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Trampling.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I'm using that metaphorically to talk about any time somebody does something that causes offense to you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what it means to have your heart trampled.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so here's here's a little biblical psychology.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is how it goes.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Your heart feels trampled by someone in your life, maybe somebody close to you, maybe a stranger, maybe God, and that makes you angry.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now listen, anger can be a right response to reality.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The Bible calls that righteous anger.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But don't let the sun go down on your anger, even your righteous anger.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The reason why is because anger left in your heart ages like milk left in your car.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, anger sours the human heart and it turns it into bitterness, which leads to hardness.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I get this from Ephesians 4, verses 26 and 27.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Paul says this be angry and do not sin.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do not let the sun go down on your anger.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Why, Paul?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because you will give, you don't want to give any opportunity to the devil.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I like the NIV's version better.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It says, Do not give the devil a foothold.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because the devil will climb into your heart like Alex Honnold climbing Taipei 101.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: One foothold at a time.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what anger in the heart does.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It gives the devil a foothold.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And what is a foothold?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Undealt with anger.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, a hard heart closes itself off towards God and towards other people, but it is an open invitation to the evil one.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: C.S.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Lewis says it like this there is no neutral ground in the universe.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Every square inch, every split second is claimed by God and counterclaimed by Satan.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: There is no neutrality.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Your heart is the most important thing for you to guard with all vigilance.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, harbored anger turns into bitterness, which hardens your heart to God, but it invites demonic interference, which results in unbelief.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Look again at verse 12.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It says this the devil does his work so that they may not believe and be saved.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If you remember, the Garden of Eden had an enemy.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Well, listen, the Garden of your heart has an enemy.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And the question is, what do I do if I find that my heart has been trampled?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If I'm concerned I've got a hard heart, which let me just be clear, all four as all four of these soils apply to all of us all of the time.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This isn't just about the first time you hear the gospel and have faith and are converted, as we say.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's not just that.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's right here, right now, as you sit under the Word of God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Right now, your heart's gonna respond in one of these four soils.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: One of these heart conditions is gonna be true of you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so if you're here this morning going, I think I've got a trampled hard heart, what do I do?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Two things.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Grieve and forgive.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, some take the hyper-spiritual approach, which superficially forgives, but avoids entering into the depths of the pain that were caused by the trampling.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And for you, I would just say the tears of grief will water the hard soil of your heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But others of you take the cynical approach and you wallow in what has been done to you by others, but you never will release the debt through forgiveness.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I know forgiveness is hard.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: In fact, forgiveness will till up your hard heart like a sharp tool in the soil.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so listen, just switch the metaphor.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Grieve and forgive are like two petals of a bicycle to metabolize the pain of a trampled heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So Ephesians 4, that section I quoted about the devil having a foothold, ends like this: be kind to one another, tenderhearted, forgiving one another as God in Christ forgave you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So how do we get the motive to grieve and to forgive?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We look at the unshockable mercy of God in Christ towards us, and it begins to tenderize our heart toward those who trample us.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So that's the trampled heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Let's look at the shallow heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The shallow heart, verse six.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And some fell on the rock, and as it grew up, it withered away because it had no moisture.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 13.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy, but these have no root.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They believe for a while, and in time of testing, fall away.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now I am the son of a son of a farmer all the way back to Germany.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Okay?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I'm the first generation can't to not grow up on a farm.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So I wanted to do a little bit of research, which meant I had to call my dad and ask him some questions about how farming works, because all I've got is some raised beds with kale in it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I'm not bona fide enough to speak to this.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But listen, in Michigan where I'm from, this thing happens in a farmer's field.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: When the snow melts after winter, rocks have surfaced everywhere.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Rocks that were not there on the surface before winter.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, the free thaw of winter and spring pushes buried stones to the surface.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And farmers actually have rock-picking machines because they have to harvest the rocks before they can till the soil.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Otherwise, they'll damage their plows.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Listen, the stones are there all along, but they need to be revealed and removed.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Come on, somebody.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Anybody with me on this?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's right, thank you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Listen, remember the soil is your heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so, what are the rocks in your heart?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's the question.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Simply put, the rocks are whatever hinders a hidden life with God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Whatever hinders a hidden life with God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 13 says it like this: These have no root.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: No root.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The rocky ground lacks depth.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It doesn't allow a deep life with Christ, the kind of life that enables perseverance and endurance.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So the question is, what makes your faith shallow?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: What makes it superficial?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: What causes a lack of depth?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: For some, it's it's shallow cultural Christianity.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You show up here, but nobody would know you walk with Jesus the rest of your daily life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: For others, it's little pockets of compromise that nobody would really know about, but they're there.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Maybe little pet addictions that you know, but you don't do anything about.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: For some of you, it's actually a lack of theological depth.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Like you've got the emotions, but they're not rooted in truth.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's actually the thing that's talked about here, right?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They spring up with joy and then they wither away.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Theological depth really matters for perseverance in the faith.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So, what are the rocks that hinder your root development?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's the question.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I want to offer you both an encouragement and a challenge.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, every one of us has rocks in the garden of our hearts, even now, right now.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We don't know that they're there.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: There's these little pockets of sin, little pockets of compromise that we've yet to identify.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And Jesus knows this.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And Hebrews says he's not ashamed to call you his brother or sister.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But what he's gonna do is in his great kindness, he's gonna walk with you through seasons like winter and spring.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And as he walks with you through these seasons, he's taking you on a journey to reveal the rocks in your heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But here's the challenge.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: When we see them, we have an obligation to deal with them and to remove them.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We say things like, Yes, Lord, I see that stone.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I see it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I confess it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want it out.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I'm gonna tell my community, I'm gonna turn back to you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Listen, if you've been walking in the, if you've been in the faith for a while, you know that this is true.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You've recognized that there have been stones of compromise that have been surfaced in your life that have been revealed, and then you had to deal with them, and that doesn't stop as long as we live until we see Jesus face to face.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so I'm on an airplane last week preparing for this sermon, and I get to the stony heart, and I pause, and I just close my eyes, and I say, Lord, are there any rocks that are hindering depth in my hidden life with you?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And immediately my conscience speaks to me.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And it says, The way you use AI in your school.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I think, come on.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Like everybody does it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I actually even cite anthropic clawed AI in my bibliographies.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It can't be that big of a deal.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And the Lord was essentially like, hey, did you did you want it or no?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Like, did you want to know what the rock was?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because I'll tell you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so I did what is as good as writing it in stone.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I put it in my to-do list to send an email to my professors, including the chair of our department, and to confess and tell them.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I CC'd Mike Hison, a pastor in our denomination, for added accountability.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I sent that email because I knew there is something hindering the depth of the word of God bearing fruit in my life, and I want it gone.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want it gone.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I sent that email and I thought, Lord, I don't know what the cost of this is gonna be.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And then I thought, come what may, come what may, because I want depth, I want a hidden life in Christ, I want hundredfold fruitfulness, and I know that this is hindering that.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We couldn't handle the depth of the true motivations of our hearts.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The way I jokingly say it sometime is, yeah, my motives are mixed, but be glad they're mixed.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They used to be not mixed, they used to be all bad.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so listen, God's plan for your life is that you'd become like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season and its leaf does not wither.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you want that?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Oh, I want that.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want that for you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so God has only one way to provide that.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, trees that have in endured seasons of drought, they've shown have duper deeper root systems.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They put them down and down and down into the aquifer in order to draw life when there's drought above.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They have this underlying source of sustenance.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so that's what God does in times of testing, as this text says here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Here's the sequence rocks prevent depth.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The sun comes, which is testing or persecution or tribulation.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because you have no depth, that means there's no moisture.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And the plant withers.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And God, in his severe mercy, will allow times of testing into your life because testing is the great revealer.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you have roots or not?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And he loves you too much.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He loves you too much because he wants to expose the superficialities of your faith in light of the realities of this world.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because now is the time to deal with hidden compromises that enable you or disable you rather from putting your roots deep into Christ.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do it now before the testing comes.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The third soil is the neglected heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse 7.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 14.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way, they are choked.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Someone say choked.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want you to look at the genius of Jesus here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He lists three thorns cares, pleasures, riches.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now look at how these relate together.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Cares are what makes life hard.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Riches, or I'm sorry, pleasures are what make life easy.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Riches are what promises to cut your cares and give you plenty of pleasures.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you see how these three relate?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They're not bad in and of themselves, though.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Politics and sick kids and loneliness and the feeling that you're drowning in your list of obligations with zero margin.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Those are the cares of this life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The pleasures of this life are whatever helps you escape.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So some of you, that's a beach house, it's vacations, it's binge watching Netflix.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The pleasures of this life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And here's the both Matthew 13 and Mark 4 actually expand on the phrase from riches to use this phrase, the deceitfulness of riches.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That matters.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Riches are not bad, but they're also not neutral.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: They have a deceptive tendency.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so I texted one of our deaconesses and a guy in my circle, both of whom whom work in the marketplace, out in uh various workplaces, and I asked them this question.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I said, Hey, in your workplace, what do you think the lies of riches are?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And here's what they said.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Number one, money gives me autonomy.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If I have money, I don't need God for manna.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If I don't have to submit to my limitation, I can supply my own needs.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's one of the deceptive lies of riches.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Number two, money gives me status and identity.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If I have money, I don't need God's blessing of affirmation over my life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I can get that from man, which is wildly insufficient, but sometimes more tangible than the smile of an unseen God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Lie three, once you get enough money, then you will have freedom from the difficulty of life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Lie four, I feel secure when I have a little bit more in the bank.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Lie five, because I have this much money, I'm qualified as a man.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: These are some of the lies money speaks to you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So here's the question: what lies do you believe about money?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Because as we live these lies, it will strangle the fruitfulness out of your life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus is loving you here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's loving you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: These thorns are competing for your heart's attention and devotion.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: When we say tend to the garden of your heart, that root word tend is the same root word of attention.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Cares and pleasures and riches distract you so much, they pull on your attention that it chokes out the fruitfulness of your life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so again, these thorns aren't evil, but when we use them as distractions, they just we distract ourselves to death.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And Jesus is inviting us to slow down, to simplify our lives around deep-rooted abiding in Him, so that we can breathe and not be choked by the thorns of cares, riches, and pleasures.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Fourth and finally, the fruitful heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Look at verse 8 with me.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And some fell into good soil and grew and yielded a hundredfold.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 15 As for that, in the good soil, they are those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bear fruit with patience.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I said this earlier, but notice soil number one has no growth whatsoever.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I said before the hard heart is the greatest danger, the greatest risk a human could have.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But soils two and three actually have growth, but it doesn't last.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And this helps us because I think that it gives us a glimpse into Jesus' definition of fruitfulness.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: In John 15, where our call to worship was from, or I'm sorry, our words of assurance, Jesus said this, that your fruit should remain.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Fruit that remains is all that counts for Jesus.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, according to Jesus, endurance is key here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 15 says, Hold it fast, bear fruit with patience.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This endurance peace, that fruit would remain, is the thing that causes it to count.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So here's my shorthand definition for fruit in the Bible.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Fruit is anything God works in you or through you that lasts forever.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So it might be the fruit of the Spirit.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what God works in you, character formation.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It might be the fruit of ministry and ways in which you serve and love your neighbors.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That would be external fruit.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: God works that through you, but it has to last forever for it to count as real kingdom fruit.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Bob Sorgi put it like this.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: For it to be kingdom fruit, it has to have eternal implications.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And then he lists the kind of fruit that lasts.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is just some of it, it's not all of it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Friendship with Jesus, godly character, building up the church, leading people to Christ, financial generosity, obedience to Jesus, providing for your household, discipling your children, enduring persecution, praising God.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I would add a cup of cold water offered in Jesus' name.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Which I think is a subset of culture making, which we won't get into because it's a whole nother sermon.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But listen, the Spirit doesn't waste his breath.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If you look at the text, as the sower sowed, verse 5, some fell along the path, verse 6, some fell on the rock, verse 7, some fell among the thorns.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And verse 8, some fell into good soil.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see the difference?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The good soil is simply a receptive heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's all it is.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's a receptive heart, a receptive heart that's been cultivated by dealing with the birds, the rocks, and the thorns.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So Jesus is giving us helpfulness here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's saying, How do you become the fourth soil?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Deal with the first three problems in those soils, and your heart will be receptive.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, this is why a seed in soil wants to do what it does, bear fruit.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So it's actually less about doing something and more about removing certain things that are obstacles to the fruitfulness of the seed.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what Jesus is trying to get at here.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's why we say here at New City that communion with God is receiving and responding, because a receptive and a responsive heart before God is the greatest thing you could aspire towards.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so, this receptivity of the heart, if if the garden of your heart is cultivated properly, then you can have 30, 60, and 100fold fruitfulness in your life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I'm using Mark 4, verses 20, uh to describe what Jesus says elsewhere.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Here he just talks about a hundredfold.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Now, let me make that plain.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Bob Sorge, again, argues that these are not categories, but a spectrum.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I actually really like this.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: So some of us in this room are 12% fruitful.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And Jesus is like, you want to see what 13 would look like?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's that's the point of this parable.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's that 100%, hundredfold fruitfulness is on offer.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But what gets in the way are the birds, the rocks, and the thorns.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so some of you in this room are like, 73% fruitful.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And Jesus is like, hey, 75's amazing.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Wait till you get there.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Just deal with that thorn.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You've kind of learned to comfort too much in the pleasures of life.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And I'm just inviting you to say, hey, here you go, Jesus, you can have this.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want more fruitfulness.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want my life to matter beyond death.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I want fruit that remains.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so I hope you hear that as invitational, not as oppressive.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I hope you hear that as, hey, wherever you are, Jesus is just inviting you 1% more.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And it might take a lifetime.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And that's okay.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's patient.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Oh, he's abundantly patient.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He wouldn't commend patience in the fruitful good soil if he wasn't himself a patient sower.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Which brings us to that question: who is the sower?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, we've talked about how the sower scatters seed, which is the word of God, and it falls on four different types of ground, which is the condition of the human heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But almost all commentators, everybody that I read at least, agreed that the sower is Jesus.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And that Jesus is still sowing the seed of the kingdom wherever he goes.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's walking among us this morning and he's sowing the seed of the kingdom.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's doing it right now.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And in verse 8, you get the heart cry of Jesus.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is what he says.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: As Jesus said these things, he called out.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He called out he who has ears to hear, let him hear.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: When you read the Gospels, pay attention to what stirs up Jesus.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: There's a few things, but one of those things that stirs him up is ears to hear.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is quintessential Jesus.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is his trademark.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: This is one of his signature moves.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He says it seven times in the gospel, ears to hear.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And then he repeats it to the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Ears to hear.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That's what he's about.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: That means 14 times in the New Testament, Jesus is saying, I'm about ears that can hear.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: The four heart responses in the parable depend entirely upon how the word was heard.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If you look at verse 12, 13, 14, and 15, the word hear is in each of those verses.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Why is hearing such a big deal to Jesus?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Well, because Christianity is not primarily about what you do, but what's been done for you.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, Christianity is about this sower who was himself sown.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus was willing to be planted in the ground through his death on a cross, but then he rose again and bears 100x fruitfulness in resurrection power in his lives and in the lives of all who remain in him.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, he offers this fruitfulness to all who will simply receive and remain connected to him.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: What has the first importance in Christianity?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's not good advice, it's good news.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And how do you receive good news?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you earn it?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you deserve it?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you take hold of it?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Do you work for it?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: No, you simply hear it and believe it.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Those who have ears to hear.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so whether someone's heart is fruitful or not depends entirely upon the hearing of the word.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Everything in this parable comes down to helping you hear better.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Verse 12, it says that the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts so that they may not believe and be saved, because the devil knows the Bible.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He's read Romans 10, 17 that says, Faith comes by hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, you cannot tend to the garden of your heart unless God has given you a new heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus' heart was punctured on the cross in order to flow forth to you, giving you a new heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: There are only two people in the world, only two types of people, those who have a heart of stone and those who have a heart of flesh, a tender heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And the way you go from a heart of stone to a heart of flesh is divine heart transplant.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's not effort, it's not earning, it's God's initiative on your behalf.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: It's the only hope that we have.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You need God to sovereignly do a heart transplant, which I have good news for you, is the very promise of the new covenant.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Ezekiel 36 puts it like this: and I will give you a new heart, and a new spirit I will put within you, and I will remove the heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: You see, God expects a receptive heart and then he gives what he expects.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: He gives the very thing he expects.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And so this promise of the new covenant is that God himself will give you a tender, receptive, responsive heart before him.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And some of you need that this morning.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Some of you are here and you don't know Jesus.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Your heart has been hard towards God your entire life, and he's offering to you right now the promise of the new covenant.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Come to Jesus for a new heart.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But others of you, man, you've had that heart transplant, but it's been trampled, shallow, and neglected.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: And you failed to tend the garden of your heart, and so it has birds and rocks and thorns.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: But here's the good news: this sower was sown.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: If Jesus was buried like a seed and rose to bear resurrection life, if his heart was punctured to give you a new heart, he can and will make the trampled soil tender, the shallow soil deep, and the neglected soil fruitful once again.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Will you let him?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Let's pray.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Lord Jesus, we praise you, the great sower.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: We look to you with open eyes and open ears.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Holy Spirit, would you open our ears?
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Give us ears that can hear, that can receive.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I pray against the evil one in our midst.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I pray against the demonic interference whenever the word of the kingdom is proclaimed.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: In Jesus' name, I bind the evil one who would love to steal like a bird the seed from the hearts of the people in this room.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: I pray against the rocks and the thorns that choke out and hinder root development.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Jesus, would you give us honest hearts, open hearts, receptive hearts that bear fruit with patience over the long haul, so that we have that you appointed us that we might bear fruit and that that fruit should remain.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Help us, Lord Jesus, we pray.
Rev. Benjamin Kandt: Amen.