3305. A Clear Understanding

A Sermon Published On Thursday, June 6, 1912.

Jesus says to them, “Have you understood all these things?” {Mt 13:51}

1. This is a question which might often be asked of us when we have been reading the Scriptures, when we have been attending the public means of grace, or when we have been partaking of the Lord’s supper, “Have you understood all these things?” It would be good for someone to run up to us, as Philip did to the eunuch, who, on his return from Jerusalem was reading in his chariot, and say to us as Philip did to him, “Do you understand what you are reading?” Or the question might be asked of us, “Do you understand what you hear? Do you understand even what you say?” I fear there are hundreds of religionists in this country who never think of understanding what they attend to under the name of religion. They pass through the customary forms, listening to, and it may be joining in, the liturgy, until at length the service is finished, the day is over, and the thing is done. The language of devotion has slipped through the lips, without having leaped from the heart. Among ourselves, I fear there may be many who are content with listening to the sound of gracious words, who never pierce through the shell of the words into the kernel of the meaning; satisfied with the external, which is nothing, they miss the internal, which is everything.

2. “Do you understand these things?” then, is a question which may be asked, and should be asked often, of every worshipper, for it is only so far as we enter into religious worship, understanding what we are doing, and throwing our hearts into it, that it can be at all acceptable to God. The Lord’s prayer is quite as good said backwards as forwards if you do not say it from the heart; there is quite as much likelihood of a blessing in a number of words thrown out pell-mell, without any kind of order, as there would be in the best arranged sermon, if there is not an attentive ear and an understanding heart. Words that do not touch the understanding glide over us like oil over a slab of marble, without any effect. Men may perish with the gospel in their houses, they often do perish with the gospel ringing in their ears, for until they understand its importance it cannot became a soul-saving word to them.

3. Nor can it become a sanctifying word to any except so far as they receive it into the understanding. If we were to hear the gospel in Latin, after a fashion ever so orthodox, one might be no more edified by it than by listening to so much blasphemy, because it is not the thing heard, but the thing understood and received into the heart, which blesses the soul. Let me exhort all of you, who are in the habit of going up to the house of God, never to be content unless you feel that you have gotten a hold on the truth that is being taught. Oh you Christian people, I beseech you not to be satisfied with merely the terms of theology without getting into the pith and marrow of them! To realize in your own soul, by experience, the meaning of a doctrine, is the only way of knowing it. Those men never forget a truth who have had it burned into them as with a hot iron, by feeling the bitterness of their soul for the lack of it, and the preciousness of that truth to their soul when they receive it. He who does not receive the truth in the very power and force of it has only a name to live while he is dead.

4. I think these observations are warranted from the fact, that though our Lord preached the mystery of the kingdom of heaven in the plainest parables to the listening crowd, the very plainness of his speech, in using familiar metaphors to make spiritual truth common, became, through the hardness of their hearts, embarrassing to them; they stumbled at the mere outward metaphor, but never learned the inward meaning. It was to his own chosen twelve, his favoured and elect ones, he expanded the riddle, when he took them aside, and then afterwards enquired of them lest they should have missed the meaning of his exposition, “Have you understood all these things?” The outward testimony of the gospel may be addressed to the multitude, but its understanding is conveyed with transparent clarity to his own people. To hear it is a privilege, but such a privilege as may end without the salvation of your soul, and with the aggravation of your doom; but to understand it is the privilege which leads to eternal life, and happy are those who find the way to God’s right hand.

5. I. Let us first consider this searching question — “Have you understood all these things?” — as spoken to those who can humbly, but yet confidently, say, “YES, WE HAVE UNDERSTOOD THESE THINGS.”

6. I believe there are many of us here who, although we should not like to boast of what we know, and could only confess our ignorance before God, yet dare not be so false to our own experience as to deny that we do know the things which make for our eternal peace. We can say, with the man whose eyes were opened, “One thing I know; whereas I was blind, now I see.” We do understand, at least, as much as this, — that we are sinners, lost and ruined in ourselves, and that in Jesus all our help is found. We do understand that we were cast away in the first Adam, and that our rescue is found in the second Adam, to whom we look, and to whom we are now united by a union that never can be broken. We understand this, also, that on his advent into this world, on his holy life, his blessed death, his resurrection, his ascension, and the power which he now possesses at the right hand of the Father, — on him in all these respects we rest, and rest entirely. If we have not learned enough to understand all mysteries, and open up all prophesies, yet we know that Christ is precious to our soul, that he is the appointed Saviour, that he is our Saviour, and that we are saved through him. Yes, blessed be his name, we can say that we have understood, in our measure, all these things; not as we shall understand them, not as we shall know them eventually, when clouds and darkness shall all have disappeared, and we shall be in the clear light of the throne of God; but we have understood these things sufficiently to be led to cast ourselves on Jesus, and to be affected in our daily life and conversation by the truths which Jesus Christ has taught us.

7. If we have understood all these things, what then? Let us be thankful to God with all our hearts that we can say as much as this, — for this understanding of divine truth is not due to any natural intelligence that we possess. We were by nature blind as bats to the things of divine truth. Neither is it by searching that we have found God, for it was by his searching after us rather than by our searching after him. If we have received an understanding to know him, and the height and depth of his precious love, truly we have received it as a free-grace gift from the hand of our Lord. Had he withheld it, we would have never found the Saviour; but it is because he, out of his own good pleasure, irrespective of anything in us, was pleased to touch our eyes with eyesalve so that we should see, and to bring us out of darkness into his marvellous light; it was because of his rich, free, sovereign, distinguishing grace that we have been made what we are. Come, then, let us bless the name of God. Do we feel distressed with remaining sin? Yet let each one of us remember, “by the grace of God I am what am.” If I have very little grace, let me be thankful for that little; I might have had none at all. And if I am struggling with corruption, let me be thankful that I have grace to struggle with it, for there was a time when I should have enjoyed my corruptions instead of lamenting and deploring them. Whatever trial may depress my spirit, let me not rob my God of a song; but if, indeed, he has made me to understand the things which save my soul, let me praise him and extol him for his amazing grace towards such an undeserving one, the least deserving of all his family.

8. Further, brethren, if you have been led to understand these things, ought not this to encourage you to seek to understand more? The young beginner in grace should feel that it will not be impossible for him to grow to the stature of a perfect man in Christ Jesus, because grace has quickened him, and made him a babe. That is the greatest thing, to be made alive at all. When grace has gone so far as to give me life, and put me in the family of God, I know that grace will nurture that life and ultimately bring me to perfection. If I find myself growing in God’s garden, though I am the tiniest plant in all the bed, yet it is such a mercy to be in the garden at all, — I who was a wild rank weed out in the wilderness before, — that I know that he will water me when I need it, and that he will tend and care for me until I shall come to perfection. Never think, dear Christian friend, that you cannot master the gospel doctrine. Why, you have learned that Christ is yours; that is the secret of the Lord. All other doctrines, after this, are learnable and comparatively easy. Give yourself up to the teaching of the Divine Spirit. Wait on him in believing prayer, and he who has led you through the veil will not keep back the keys of any of the rooms of the temple that shall be profitable for you to enter. Having understood so much, it behoves you to hope to understand more, and it becomes you to seek to understand more as an intelligent believer in Christ.

9. And surely, if you have understood all these things, my dear Christian friend, you should not be backward to tell them to others. We are not sent in the divine school to be pupils merely for ourselves. We are to be in this world as pupil-teachers, — pupils always, but teachers too; pupils learning constantly at the Master’s feet, and at the same time teachers instructing others in the truths we know. Let it never be supposed that the office of teaching in the Christian Church can exclusively belong to one man, or to one class of men. It belongs to every Christian man, and to every Christian woman too. You cannot teach beyond what you have been taught by God, and it is in proportion as you are taught by God that your teaching takes a wider sphere. But you must teach what you know. You will seldom learn much to your own profit unless you are diligent in imparting knowledge and edifying each other, for it is in the distribution to the rest of the brotherhood of the good things which God has given you that you shall enjoy the blessing of the Lord which makes rich. If you will not share with the backsliding, with the desponding, and with the feeble the comforts which God gives you, you have reason to fear that, in your time of trouble, you may have those comforts withheld which you once stifled in your own heart, not knowing how to use them for the Church’s benefit. Never keep a truth to yourself, my brother. Have you found honey? There are other mouths that would gladly know its flavour, and there is enough in that Jonathan’s woods of the Scripture for all the hosts of Israel to eat; they cannot exhaust it. So I would have you tell to others what a dear Saviour you have found. Let other candles be lit from your candle, and your candle shall burn none the less brightly; but rather in this it may be said that, to enrich yourselves in all knowledge, you must enrich others with the knowledge that you have.

10. “Have you understood all these things?” There I will leave you, dear people of God. May your hearts glow and your thoughts be stirred in pondering this question of the text when you are alone!

11. II. But SOME WHO THINK THEY UNDERSTAND ALL THESE THINGS DO NOT UNDERSTAND THEM.

12. In all our congregations we have many who would say, as quickly as the question was heard, “Do you understand all these things?” “Indeed I do; I have been a hearer these thirty years; I tell you, sir, I know the difference between Calvinism and Arminianism; a man is not going to deceive me; as soon as I hear a sermon, I can tell at once whether it is sound or unsound.” Well then, dear friend, I am glad to hear that you have so much knowledge; but I want to ask you, — Is your life in accordance with what you know? Knowing the right from the wrong so well, is your life conformed to the image of Christ Jesus, or are you living for all the world as if you did not know anything about these things? Because, let me say to you, dear friends, it is a very, very solemn thing to have a kind of understanding of divine truth, but not to be affected by it so as to repent of sin, so as to live for God, so as to seek after holiness. All this religion of yours will be a painted pageantry for you to go to hell in; it will be nothing better than a millstone tied around your neck to sink you deeper and deeper. It would be better, very likely, for you that you never had known the way of salvation at all than that, having known it, you should have done despite to it, and have lived in opposition to its spirit and its precepts. You had better have been born in the interior of Africa, and never have listened to the missionary telling of the Crucified One, than to have been born in London, and fostered under an orthodox ministry, if you fool your soul with a name to live while you are dead; boasting about your knowledge, but never proving your holiness; talking about faith, but having a faith that is lifeless, producing no fruits, resulting in no works answerable to your profession. I charge you, knowing professor, to remember your solemn responsibility. I beseech you, as you love your own soul, not to make a downy bed out of your knowledge, for it shall be a thorn in your death pillow. I charge you, man, not to make hell hotter for yourself than it needs to be by taking all this knowledge in, and panting after more, while you forget that “to obey is better than sacrifice,” to trust is better than to boast, to love is better than to rival, and to serve out of simple affection is better than to prate, and to discuss, and to criticize, and to censure.

13. It would be good if everyone who understands the things of the gospel, or who thinks he does, would constantly examine himself about this business, especially those of us who are ministers. It is a very easy thing for us to be self-deceived, probably more easy for us than for any other people, because, having a sacred office for a secular vocation, we handle these things every day. Assuming it to be our duty to admonish others, we are prone to resent admonition ourselves. If we have not been converted, it is the least likely thing in all the world that we ever would be. I have made the remark myself, and I have heard it verified by others, that for ushers to be converted is a thing probably unheard of. They are busy here and there, until they are accustomed to forget their own obligation to worship. Unless they are converted before they take that office, — concerning which I think we should make strict enquiry, — in all likelihood they never will be, because they are so concerned about the pews, and about putting people in them, and I do not know what else besides, that it seems impossible for them to give their ears to hear, or their conscience to feel, or that the voice of truth should ever reach them. Next to them comes the preacher, who is always dealing with the shell of truth. When he sits down to read the Bible, he cannot help thinking whether this or that text would make a sermon. When he is praying, the temptation often is to glide into a kind of ministerial prayer, not the prayer of a poor sinner coming near to God.

14. Perhaps, after all, the least likely person to get a blessing is the knowing professor. I tell you that the drunkard and the prostitute are often rescued when such professors are not even reached with the thrilling message. The sermon which is made useful to a man who never heard the gospel before is of no use to the hard-headed critic, because he knows too much to get any good out of it. Oh! there are some people you cannot preach to properly. If the Holy Spirit himself were to speak, they would accuse him of being heterodox. If an angel from heaven were to deliver the truth fresh from the mouth of God, he would not satisfy them. They are always on the look out for a word amiss. They are always seeking, if they can, to pick holes, detect flaws, and find fault; this is their trade, their craft, the thing at which they are deft, to make the message of mercy a butt that they may fire at, a kind of target into which they may shoot their arrows. These men seldom, I might almost say never, get a blessing. I do not see how they can. The infinite mercy of God can do what it wishes, but seldom does God’s sovereignty light on these shallow professors who are eaten up with conceit. Oh, for a solemn searching, a sincere self-examination of our hearts! Perhaps we may find that our heads are growing and our hearts are shrivelling. Some children die early because they get rickets. {a} Their heads are too big, poor things; and there are many professors with big heads and small hearts. Alas, they do not have the life of God in them at all! May God save us from this temptation!

15. III. Are there not in every congregation SOME WHO WOULD HARDLY KNOW HOW TO ANSWER THIS QUESTION, “Have you understood all these things?”

16. They do understand them, yet they do not. They do up to a point theoretically comprehend them, but, spiritually and practically, they do not discern them. Fearing lest there might be in the present assembly such as really do not understand the very first principles of the truth of God, I would pointedly and earnestly address myself to their particular case. My dear friend, it would be a very dreadful thing for your soul to be lost for lack of knowledge, and to perish for lack of understanding. Solomon says that for the soul to be without knowledge is not good. You tell me that you do understand the gospel. Then I reply to you, why do you not accept it? You do know you are lost, you tell me; you do know that Jesus Christ is presented as the only Saviour; you do know that a simple trust in him will save you. How is it you can continue peaceful and happy while you are not a partaker of the grace of God? How is it you can remain satisfied when, knowing there is only one way of salvation, you have not yet entered into it, when, acknowledging Christ to be the Son of God, and to be the only way of salvation, you have lived up until now a despiser or a neglecter of him? I would gladly hope — for it would be the only excuse I could offer for you, — that perhaps, after all, you really do not understand these things which you think you do understand. Let me remind you now: you are an unsaved sinner, you are lost, your sin has condemned you, you fell in Adam, you have sinned personally and actually, and you are condemned to die. It is not that one day you will be condemned; you are condemned already. At this present moment you are spared, and allowed to go around this world, but you are like a criminal in a condemned cell. The sentence has gone out against you, and only God’s longsuffering stops that gleaming axe from falling and utterly destroying you. Do you understand that? Have you really gotten that thought into your mind? There you are, just like a man about to be beheaded, with your neck on the block, and the axe lifted up now, and it may fall. While I am yet speaking, the axe of death may fall, and you, soul and body, may be lost for ever before that clock ticks again. You know this, but do you understand it? Will you try to understand it? Will you try to make it real to your thoughts tonight? For, I think, if you would, there might be some hope that now you would escape from your present ruin, and lift up your heart to the great Father of mercies, and say, “Lord, save me, or I perish.”

17. You know another truth, and you say you understand it. Let me state it to you. Jesus Christ came into this world. He was God’s only-begotten Son, but he became man, and as man for man he suffered. God must punish sin, but he punished Jesus Christ for the sins of his people; and those who trust him are secure, because Jesus Christ was their Substitute, and they go free. Now, there is no other hope of redemption from the fiery wrath of God but by having a part and lot in the substitutionary work of Christ. You know that, but you do not have a part and lot in it, and you must be lost if you continue without that part or lot. How is it that you can be quiet? You sleep soundly at night; you eat and drink cheerfully, and you sometimes enjoy a merry ringing laugh. How can you revel in the pleasures of sense; how can you give sleep to your eyes or slumber to your eyelids until you get the one necessary thing, the one and only thing which can make eternity happy, that infinite future on which you are so soon to enter? If Jesus Christ, standing in heaven, is preached to you tonight, and you are told to believe in him, and you do not believe in him, then you do, as far as you can, crucify him afresh, and open his wounds again, and make them bleed. Do you intend to do that? Do you understand that this is what you are doing every day? Would you, dear friend, would you call God a liar? And yet the apostle John says that “he who does not believe God has made him a liar; because he does not believe the record that God gave of his Son.” Do you understand what this unbelief of yours really is? You doubt Christ; that is to say, you do not think Christ to be truthful, or good, or able, or strong. Oh! but you say, you know better than that. Then, if you do know better, why do you act as if you did not know better? If he is able to save, and willing to save, oh my dear hearer, why not come to him as you are, and cast yourself at his feet, and rest in him in whom your only rest can be found? “Have you understood all these things?” then, is a question which you cannot answer after all in the right way; but I beseech you never to rest until you can.

18. Should there be, my dear hearers, something which keeps you back from Christ arising, not so much from your lack of will as from your lack of knowledge, may God the Holy Spirit stir up your desire, and never let you rest until you know Christ, until you hear so that your soul shall live. How shall you know? He is the great Teacher, but in the use of the means he will teach you. Be constant in attending the house of God where Christ is most preached. Search the Scriptures, for in them you think you have eternal life, and these are what testify of him. Go to the Father of mercy, and plead with him before you sleep. Pray to him like this, “Father, if there is some sin, that I do not know to be a sin, that I am indulging in, and that keeps me from Christ, show it to me, and enable me to give it up; or if it is a sin which I do know, but seem to have struggled with in vain, my Father, strengthen me so that I may cut off the right arm, and pluck out the right eye, sooner than cherish those vain delights which bode my everlasting destruction.” Plead with him like this: “Oh my God, I want to know your Son; reveal your Son in me, for I read that you do so for your people; reveal your Son in me by the Holy Spirit! I am a poor, blind, ignorant sinner; but teach me, for have you not given the Spirit of God on purpose to be the Teacher of the ignorant, and the Instructor of the babes?” Plead with the Lord, and always plead with the knowledge that you cannot ask because you deserve, but you must ask because Christ deserves. Plead his wounds, his blood, his death, his infinite merits, and you shall before long, — I am certain of it, — you shall before long, in answer to your cries, receive light from the Word, and in that light you shall see light, and you shall understand the things which make for your peace.

19. I am deeply concerned for some of you, especially for such of you as often listen to my voice, that I may not for ever keep on talking into your ears, and never reach your hearts. What, am I to rock your cradle and send you to sleep, so that you may sleep yourselves into perdition? Is mine to be the voice that is really to increase your responsibility, and not to be the means of bringing you to Jesus? I pray God to avert so dreadful a result to all our ministry, but may you be led this very night, — for God’s people have been praying for you, — may you be led this very night to confess that you do not understand what you ought to understand, and go to the great and wise God to teach and instruct you; and as surely as his Word is truth, he will instruct you and teach you in the way that you should go, and bring you to himself. He who believes in the Lord Jesus Christ shall be saved. So his own Word says, “He who believes and is baptized shall be saved.” Trust, — that is the main matter. To believe is to trust, to rely on, to depend on; he who depends on Jesus, trusts him, believes in him, is saved. May we be of that blessed number, and his shall be the glory. Amen.

{a} Rickets: A disease caused by vitamin D deficiency, especially incident to children, characterized by softening of the bones, especially of the spine, and consequent distortion, bow-legs, and emaciation. OED.

Exposition By C. H. Spurgeon {Mt 13:1-23}

1, 2. The same day Jesus went out of the house, and sat by the seaside. And great multitudes were gathered together to him, so that he went into a boat, and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore.

I think I can see the little boat at a convenient distance from the shore so as to keep off the multitudes of people; in order that the Saviour might speak all the more freely, there he sits with a boat for a pulpit. There were no formalities about the Lord Jesus when he was on the earth, he was willing to speak to the people anywhere from any pulpit whatever.

3. And he spoke many things to them in parables, saying, “Behold, a sower went out to sow; {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2842, “The Sower” 2843}

It was probably at that season of the year when the sowers were going out to sow their seed, so Jesus pointed to them as to a living text. He was always alert to make use of everything that occurred all around him. “A sower went out to sow.” For why else should he go out? Yet some sowers whom I know of do not go out to sow, but to exhibit themselves, and to show how well they can do their work. This man aimed at sowing and nothing else. Oh, that all preachers did the same!

4. And when he sowed, some seeds feel by the wayside,

He could not help that; he was not sent to pick the soil, that would be too much responsibility for him. If we had to preach only to certain characters, we would be taking up all our time in picking out those characters, and probably we would make many mistakes while trying to do it. Our business is to scatter the good seed broadcast. We are not to dibble {b} in the Word, we are to throw it as far as we can, and to let it fall wherever God pleases. “Some seeds fell by the wayside,” — on ground trodden hard by the passers-by.

4. And the birds came and devoured them up:

Those birds are always ready to devour the good seed. Wherever there is a congregation met to hear the Word, there are always plenty of demons ready to do their evil work. “The birds came,” they did not have far to fly. The birds know a sower by the very look of him, so they hurry up, and come wherever the seed may be cast so that they may devour it. Oh Lord, keep the birds away; or, better still, break up the soil so that the seed may enter, and not lie on the surface!

5. Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth:

There was a pan of unbroken limestone an inch or two below the soil, but there was no depth of earth where the seeds could grow.

5. And immediately they sprung up, because they had no depth of earth:

They seemed to be converts, but they proved to be worthless. They were enthusiastic, carried away with excitement, but all was soon over with them, “because they had no depth of earth.” Everything was superficial, there was no depth of character, or feeling, or emotion.

6. And when the sun was up, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 2844, “The Seed On a Rock” 2845}

They seemed to be alive at the top, but they were really dead below. How many there are of that kind still; they make a bold profession, but it is only for a while, and then they wither away.

7, 8. And some fell among thorns; and the thorns sprang up, and choked them: but others fell into good ground, —

Thank God, we do not lose all our efforts. If one in four succeeds, it is a great deal for which we ought to praise the Lord. So, brother, sister, —

      Sow in the morn thy seed,

      At eve hold not thine hand;

   To doubt and fear give thou no heed,

      Broadcast it o’er the land.

8. And produced a harvest, some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.

There are degrees even in fruitfulness; Christians are not all alike. Oh, that we had a hundredfold return for our sowing everywhere! We do not get it, and can scarcely expect it; let us thank God if we have “some a hundredfold, some sixtyfold, some thirtyfold.”

9-12. Whoever has ears to hear, let him hear.” And the disciple came, and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?” He answered and said to them, “Because it is given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it is not given. For whoever has, to him shall be given, and he shall have more abundance: but whoever does not have, from him shall be taken away even what he has. {See Spurgeon_Sermons No. 1488, “More and More, or Less and Less” 1488}

It is so even in common things, the man of intelligence, who has a good education, picks up something everywhere, but the ignorant man learns nothing anywhere. He only finds out more and more of his own ignorance until even what he had is taken away from him. Oh, that the Lord would give us a good understanding of saving knowledge, so that we might go on learning more and more under the Holy Spirit’s teaching!

13-16. Therefore I speak to them in parables: because they seeing do not see, and hearing they do not hear, neither do they understand. And in them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah, which says, ‘By hearing you shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing you shall see, and shall not perceive: for this people’s heart is become gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and they have closed their eyes; lest at any time they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and should understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.’ But blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.

It is an awful thing when God gives men up to spiritual blindness and dullness and hardness, but it does happen. If you hear the Word, and refuse to receive it, you harden your heart to that extent; and if you continue to do so, you will by degrees lose the capacity for understanding the Word. Take heed what you hear. Oh my dear hearers, I am afraid that many of you are not aware of the solemn responsibility of hearing the gospel, and of the terrible peril of having your ears made dull and your heart made hard! I am responsible for preaching to you faithfully, but you are equally responsible for hearing what is preached. Let us not waste any opportunity that we have of hearing the Word, but use it wisely and well so that we may be able to give a good account of it before God in our fruitfulness.

Now, if the Saviour’s main intent, in the use of parables, had been that men should not understand him, he could have served that purpose better by not speaking at all. But see how mercy blends with justice, and gives them another opportunity of hearing the Word. They might have come to Jesus even as his disciples did, and asked him questions, and he would have explained the truth to them. If any of you today hear anything which you do not understand, go to the Lord about it in private prayer, and he will explain it to you. I tremble lest any of you should hear the Word, and not receive it, and yet be contented. That is the worst state of all for anyone to be in; may God save you from it! But as for you who know the Lord, “blessed are your eyes, for they see.” Those are blessed eyes that can really see; eyes that cannot see are a trial, but “blessed are your eyes, for they see: and your ears, for they hear.” It is only the grace of God that can make our ears spiritually hear. Only he who made the ear can make an open passage from the ear to the heart. If you have received this blessing, be very grateful for it, and bless the God of grace for giving it to you.

17. For truly I say to you, that many prophets and righteous men have desired to see those things which you see, and have not seen them; and to hear those things which you hear, and have not heard them.

To you Christian people, there is given a very full revelation of the truth of God. You live in the midday glory of the gospel, but the “prophets and righteous men” of old lived in the morning dawn. Be all the more grateful, and bless the Lord with all your hearts.

18, 19. Hear therefore the parable of the sower. When any one hears the word of the kingdom, and does not understand it, then comes the wicked one, and catches away what was sown in his heart. This is he who received the seed by the wayside.

There are many such hearers; they just hear the Word, and that is all. They are very like the countryman, who said that he liked the Sabbath for it was such an easy day, he had nothing to do but go to church, put up his legs, and think of nothing. There are far too many hearers of that kind who think of nothing, and therefore they get no good out of what they hear.

20, 21. But he who received the seed into stony places, the same is he who hears the word, and immediately with joy receives it; yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while: for when tribulation or persecution arises because of the word, eventually he is offended.

He soon ceases even to profess to be a Christian; he jumped into religion, and he jumps out again. Revival always produces a large quantity of such people, and yet, if there is one soul truly saved, the revival is a success so far as that one is concerned.

22, 23. He also who received seed among the thorns is he who hears the word, and the cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful. But he who received seed into the good ground is he who hears the word, and understands it; —

Knows what it means, thinks it over, takes it in as the good ground takes in the seed, and keeps it; —

23. Which also bears a harvest, and produces, some a hundredfold, come sixty, some thirty.

I say again, — Oh, that we had a hundredfold return for our sowing! Yet let us not forget to give God thanks if we have sixtyfold or even thirtyfold.

{b} Dibble: To make a hole in (the soil) with or as with a dibble; to sow or plant by this means. OED.

C. H. Spurgeon’s Useful Books at Reduced Prices.

The Salt-Cellars. Being a Collection of Proverbs, together with Homely Notes on them. By C. H. Spurgeon. “These three things go to the making of a proverb: Shortness, Sense, and Salt.” In 2 vols., cloth gilt, published at 3s. 6d. each, offered at 2s. 6d. each; Morocco, 7s. 6d. each.

“For many years I have published a Sheet Almanac, intended to be hung up in workshops and kitchens. This has been known as ‘John Ploughman’s Almanac,’ and has had a large sale. It has promoted temperance, thrift, kindness to animals, and a regard for religion, among working people. The placing of a proverb for every day for twenty years has cost me great labour, and I feel that I cannot afford to lose the large collection of sentences which I have brought together; yet lost they would be, if left to die with the ephermeral sheet. Hence these two volumes. They do not profess to be a complete collection of proverbs, but only a few out of many thousands.” — Extract from Preface.