Navigating An Ancient Faith Podcast

Parables of Jesus: The Coming Kingdom

• Navigating an Ancient Faith • Season 4 • Episode 2

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🎙️ We kick off Season 4 with a brand-new series exploring the Parables of Jesus, beginning in Matthew 13. In this episode, we dig into Jesus’ kingdom imagery—seeds, soil, wheat, weeds, mustard, and yeast—to uncover what the Kingdom of Heaven looks like as it takes root and grows. 🌿 We explore how these everyday images spoke powerfully to ancient audiences and how they continue to challenge and transform us today. ✨Along the way, we reflect on why parables resist quick answers, inviting us into ongoing reflection and deeper engagement. Join us as we begin this journey into the hidden wisdom of Jesus’ parables and learn to see divine truth woven into ordinary life. 🔍

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Hmm. Now that's a cool thought. Okay. Let's get, let's get back on track, man. All right. Um, actually. these things, can just take you so many places. This is why a good story, whether it's a fairytale or whether it's a parable, it can just, you can just kind of run with it, uh, once you really dig into the meaning behind it. And so, anyway, Yeah. Yeah. here. All right. So you ready to kick off season four? Uh, yeah, I'm looking forward to this parables. Yeah. was, I, I mean, we kind of introduced it last week, but I really got into it this week and I'm, I'm pumped. I'm pumped. There's a lot more there than I kind of thought maybe at the beginning, but yeah, we'll jump right into it. yeah. And, and so we will start off today by talking about the parables of the Coming Kingdom. We're gonna do a little bit of explanation here, probably about, why we're doing this series. But I wanted to start out with an important question. Get your feedback as we launch this series is, what did you think about the Stranger Things season finale? Uh, yeah. gotta get the important stuff. Yeah, I know. No, I thought it, I thought it was good. Uh, there was. It was a little mixed. I don't know. Most people generally liked it online. There's a little bit of a mixed, mixed review. uh, tell you what is interesting about Stranger Things is that because we're doing fairy tales and because we're doing this podcast and what we do, it really does change the way I, I watch shows like that, you know, kind of supernatural sci-fi. that's true. there's aspects of it that I'm thinking, oh, I don't know. And I, and I wish I could think of a example. I, wish it had it at hand, but, uh, there were just aspects of it that I remember thinking, understanding the mythical side of what they were trying to portray as opposed to just sit down and take the ride that they want to take you on, you know? Yeah, I found myself doing that as well. I, in the moment, it was hard.'cause you know, the last episode was what, like two and a half hours or something like that. yeah. There's a But I found myself, yeah, trying to think, okay, what does this represent? You know, what does, what does the wormhole represent? What does the crashing together of two worlds? Uh, I'd have to go back and watch it, but I don't know. My 2 cents on it was, I actually like season five. There was a season there I didn't really like, I, I didn't know what the point of it all was. yeah, I enjoyed season five. I thought the last. bit, Yeah. Where they were in California and I was just like, I, I don't even know what the point of all this is besides the milk. More episodes. Yeah. Yeah. The last 30, 45 minutes got a little long and drawn out, but understandable. You know, the whole show was wrapping up, so, Well, yeah.'cause, because when they actually defeated, uh, was it the Dagor or what was the big, uh, I forget the la the, the main guy's name. Vec Vena Vector. when they Yeah. Vector. I'm like, man, we're halfway through this episode. Where are we going with this Yeah. but That's it. It's a wrap. yeah, and that was it. But I appreciated the, the whole follow up and that they didn't just pull the plug on it and say, okay, you know, that's, that's, that the world's been saved. That they actually followed up with them months later and kind of gave their, are they doing now, type of scenes that we come to expect when we've been holding onto something for five seasons. And it wa it's more than five seasons. I mean, it's not, it's only five seasons, but it was, it's filmed over like seven years. Right. Because didn't they skip a year or Yeah, yeah, So I mean, all these kids have grown up and we got to see all of'em, all of 'em get so much older. And so a lot of the flashback scenes, that was fun. I thought it was pretty good as far as, uh, finales go. yeah, yeah. It wasn't bad. it was funny 'cause my wife and I were talking about it. Some of the actors were like 24, 25. Um, I can't remember the guy's name, but one of 'em is, he was like 34 years old right now. Oh The guy with the nice hair, you know what? Oh, I can't remember his name, but Yeah. Harrington. Yeah, he's like 34 years old, so, you know, and you're still supposed to believe that he's, you know, 19 years old, one year. One year removed outta high school or something like that. Anyway, yeah. Hollywood for you. Anyway, yeah, we hadn't talked about it, so I just wanted to get your take on that. So, alright, so let's start actually talking about the parables of Jesus now instead of stranger things. But we actually started thinking about this as kind of a continuation of our series on ancient stories, which is where we did fairy tales. And I don't know, I don't think we'll call it ancient stories, but it's along the same lines in that we wanna explore. These stories and parables certainly fall into that category, right? From that aspect of what's the deeper meaning, what's the symbolism embedded in all of these stories, Right, yeah. So that's what we're gonna do with this. We, of the challenges, I think I mentioned this in the opening episode, was I found myself thinking, well, they're pretty self-explanatory. You've heard all these taught in church before. There are some like we're gonna cover today, where Jesus actually says, Hey, here's what this parable means. right. And I found myself thinking, well, okay, what is there for us to talk about? But the more you and I batted some ideas around, man, there's a lot of depth in these parables. Yeah. There's, there's a lot there and, and we'll jump into it because. one of the things that surprised me, I had that same thought, uh, that you did is, well, you know, how many sermons have we heard about the sower and the seed? And, Yeah. what are we gonna bring that's new to the table? But really, that kind of mythical thinking that we've gotten accustomed to is really, really helpful, especially in this one. So I think there's actually a lot there that I've never really realized. Well, you brought up this idea of reading it symbolically. I, I read this, I forget where I read it, but I did write it down. But part of our, you know, we always talk about the rational, scientific reductionistic worldview that we all live in today for the most part. And one of the things that's done with stories is it looks at the moral of the story as the most important part, right? So once you get the moral of the story, you don't need the story anymore. You just have the principle right. and, and you can think a lot of ways where that's been the case. you read your kid a fairytale and say, here's the moral of the story. Once you got that down, you don't need to read fairytales anymore. Right? And we do this sometimes with parables, but to recapture this idea of a symbolic worldview or an ancient worldview, as we've talked about it, you can't throw the story away, right? Because there's so much more embedded in it than that simple moral truth that's important. Sorry, I've got a little bit of a cold. It's important, but But you can't throw the story away, right? right. Once you reduce the story to the lesson or the moral, you've, you've lost half of its power. Right. And. Yeah. place to start is kind of just remember that this is a world where illiteracy was the norm. And not because people were unintelligent or anything, but there was no easy way to distribute written information. This is long before printing presses or Mm-hmm. texts of any type, right? And so ideas didn't spread on paper. They spread through voice, right? And that's why you had a town crier running through villages announcing the news, you know? And so in a world like that, if you wanted idea to spread, if you wanted it to go viral, right? It had to be packaged in a way that was memorable or portable or easy to retell from one town to the next. And so that's kind of the, the very, the, I dunno, the, the bottom layer of why, why use parables. And we'll get in and find out that there's a lot more to unpack when, when, why Jesus told stories. With parables. We'll, we'll get into that in here in a second, but just on the very surface level, that's why it was, it was so necessary to package these stories in the oral tradition. So it could go from town to town. But once you boil it down to a lesson, then man, you've lost, you, you've lost the power of the story to communicate the lesson. You may have the lesson, but it doesn't have the communication power that it originally had Yeah, attached to the story. and you've also boiled a story down to one lesson as opposed to many, many lessons, which I hope we bring out in this series. So We're gonna be in Matthew chapter 13 today. Do you have anything else to add? yeah, just let me add that, that it really is, uh, you know, we really are trying to think about the way the ancients viewed these things because modern minds, they, they want to, like you said, they wanna boil down and pull out the moral of the story so they can move on away from, from the fairytale part of it or the parable part of it. But it's just really important to understand how, how modern minds, we want conclusions and ancient minds wanted patterns. You know what I'm saying? The modern mind kind of wants to boil Yeah. a propositional truth, a scientific truth, or something like that. Right. And, and that's fine, but you just have to understand that propositional truth tells you what is true. While parables train you to recognize what is true. Do you see the difference? Yeah. And, and so anyway, so I just kinda wanna point that out as we get started, that, that, obviously parables are a different way of te of communicating truth, but it's, it's more like, it's what's embedded in, it's how to recognize the pattern of truth as opposed to simply saying, you know, the 10 commandments, thou shalt not do this, thou shalt not do that. Right. And so it's Yeah, it is trying to help you understand patterns. yeah, yeah. That makes sense. That makes sense. Alright, like, like I said, we're gonna be in Matthew chapter 13 today, I think for all of these. It's interesting that in the middle of Matthew chapter 13 we're talking about, well, why are we talking about parables? Well, Jesus was asked this question directly. So the disciples came to him in Matthew chapter 13, verse sin, and they said, why do you speak to them in parables? Which tells you that it wasn't just the norm back then, you know? they kind'cause the disciples were even, Yeah. yeah. Why are you doing this? And so Jesus answers to you has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven. But to them it has not been given. This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see and hearing, they do not hear, nor do they understand. So you kind of see that, that duality and why Jesus says, here's why I talk in parables. Because to those who are open to his disciples, to those who are paying attention, right? He says, you will understand what I'm saying. But to those who don't want to hear it. Who aren't tracking with me, who aren't open. Right. It's just going to confuse them. And you were right before we hit record, you were talking about this idea of parables have a way of, attacking something, but kind of in this vague form where the people he's attacking or the institutions that are being attacked, they're kind of like, um, was that directed at me? Like was, you know. Yeah. Like if, if, with that. But, but the moments pass them by, you know, it's almost like he's not being direct with it and yeah. Yeah. It takes him while to catch up, right? Yeah. Yeah. So I just thought that was interesting that even in the middle of all this, his disciples say, well, Jesus, why are you telling these stories? You know, why can't you just lay out the law? Right. Give Or something like that. and they probably thought he was like talking in riddles, but you have to think about the religious environment that Jesus was in The Pharisees didn't really speak in parables or stories. They spoke in legalistic verbiage that stemmed from Levitical law. Right. Which is Mm-hmm. what happens when is chiseled stone. Right? So parables. Yeah. Parables don't really bypass reason. They bypass the defensiveness that that is built up when you have this legalistic structure. And that's what made Jesus's way of speaking so disruptive is that he command, he, he, He communicated ideas in a form that was less likely to get hijacked into rigid ideology. And that's why I Yeah, yeah, structure yeah. Just as you said that, I'm thinking he's actually elevating. All the legal codes that were being taught right. to more of a virtuous way of living, to understanding the world, knowing that if you did all those things, you probably were gonna keep all of these legal codes, but more importantly, you understood the reason why they were there and the principle they were trying to communicate. And so if you understood the parable, I think you became a good citizen of Israel, almost defacto, right? Instead of towing the line of, am I breaking the law here? Am I breaking the law here? And look, that's what Jesus does. A lot of times. He, he goes around and says, look, I don't care what the law says. I'm telling you to live this way. Right? right. And so parables are a way to do that. And, and it's, it's just kind of the, the spirit of the law as opposed to the law itself. Because in this day and time, uh, the Pharisees had taken the law and extrapolated it out to where. What you don't pick heads of wheat on Sunday. And you know, I mean like these real strict interpretations of the Levitical law and I just think it's interesting that they were so rigid in the way they saw the law that, uh, that was handed down to them the only way it can grow and adapt is to become more and more strict. Do you know what I'm saying? I mean, you're not gonna go back to the original Mosaic law and say, well that was then, and this is now. And we don't really have to, uh, apply such a Yeah. to that. Really all it can do is get more and more restrictive and strict as as time moves on and. Therefore, you know, well, if you're supposed to honor the Sabbath, then that means that nobody does any work. And that means you can't saddle up your horse or your donkey, and that means that, you know what I mean? It just kept getting more and more layered until it became this such a restrictive structure. And Jesus talked about that. The what it was, the weight of the law that they're putting on people, or was that Paul No. Jesus talked about that too. Yeah. The, burdens that you're putting on people. on the people. And that's the only way that it can really progress if you have the law written chiseled in stone. And so the parables kind of circumvented that a lot. Yeah. Yeah. Alright, so let's jump in. we're gonna talk about several parables today. Like I said, they're all in Matthew chapter 13, but we've kind of grouped these as the inbreaking of God's kingdom, and we talked about this on. An episode a while ago where we kept running into the phrase the kingdom of heaven is like, Right, right, so and so this is an opportunity to maybe revisit, alright, what was he saying when he says the Kingdom of Heaven is like this and like that, right? Because he's trying to describe something that they really don't have a good experience of. So we're going to talk about these today, Matthew chapter 13. We're gonna start with, I'm sure, a familiar one, the Parable of the Sower, and I guess we'll start by just letting people listen to it and then you, and I'll come back and start picking it apart. Yeah, that sounds good. okay. So I guess we'll start just like, we always start our fairy tales and our myths and is, you know, what does, we have a sower, we have seed, we have different types of ground. Let's start that. Let's start off with the easy stuff. What does a sower represent? Uh, what is the seed? Where are you gonna take this? Well, one thing that I'll start out with by, because I asked the question, who is the sower? And it talks about the seed is the gospel, so we'll get to that. But it occurred to me that Jesus is being a bit self-referential here. Because ultimately in the beginning, Jesus is the one sowing the seed. Right? right. And I guess I never, I don't know, you can jump in. I never really thought of it that way before, that Jesus is actually talking about himself, launching this ministry where he's gonna go around talking about repent for the kingdom of heaven is near which, Yeah. It's a little veiled, uh, to the listeners at the time who were listening to it in real time, we obviously look back and that conclusion, but do you think that the listeners at the time would have all picked up on that? well, it's the nature of parables again. I think there would've been some who would have saying, okay, he's talking about a random guy sowing seeds. He's talking about the kingdom of heaven. But I think others would've said, wait, I think he's actually talking about himself. And to, why it's interesting to me is because he talks about how some seed fell on, uh, rocky soil, right? We have the types of soil on the path and rocky soil and all that. And I don't know. In a way Jesus is, he's kind of, his message isn't gonna land on everyone there's actually gonna be very few that get it. And it's one thing for me to say, well, I've gotta be faithful and sow the seeds. I don't know. That was just my first thought. It's another thing to see that Jesus actually was referring to himself ultimately about, yeah, some people are gonna reject it, others aren't. I have to be faithful sowing the seeds. This message of the kingdom of heaven, right? Yeah. it's also interesting kind of the detachment of the sower. I mean, it kind of presents this image of a guy just wandering through the countryside, Yeah. Johnny Appleseed, you know, tossing seeds up in the air. And some of it's gonna land on the path. Some of it's gonna land on rocky soil, which is interesting because I'm sure farmers at the time are probably thinking, well, why in the world are you throwing seeds on a road? You know what I mean? Right. it's You, let's cultivate the ground first. Let's be a little bit more efficient with what? With our process here. You know, it's probably driving some farmers crazy. yeah. You don't, you obviously don't know how to play a field, if that's what you're saying, but that's kinda the picture I had of this, you know, is just the, like you said, Johnny Appleseed just going around scattering seeds. Right. And some of it just falls where it will, but no, I, I think Jesus is being intentional about, as he goes along, he's sowing the seeds and we're to do the same. And it's not about planting a field, so to speak. It's about talking about the kingdom of God wherever you go. And you don't always have the choice of what kind of soil. You're putting the seeds in, if that makes sense. Right. this plays into the idea of the parable itself. It's gonna go out to a group of people, are instances where Jesus sat down one-on-one and communicated with somebody a lot more directly because. this is a, a, one-on-one situation, but when you're talking to groups of people, the very nature of that is that we're scattering seed. we're putting bits of information about reality embedded in the story. Some of you're gonna hear it, some of you aren't. And so the very nature of the story itself is just to toss, you know, it's like a bucket of water. Just toss it out there. Some people are gonna get soaked and some people, the water's not gonna hit. But it's sort of the random nature of the spoken word to begin with, as opposed to, to go back, I'm gonna keep going back to this, as opposed to the rigid chiseled law that had created the religious culture of the time. Yeah. So I think even as Jesus is telling the story, that's what he's doing. He is actually becoming the sower. Right. And the ground is everyone listening. Some are gonna get it, some aren't. Right. I. he understood that as he was teaching. I dunno. I just thought that was neat. So that's the sower. Um, and obviously the next thing is the seed. Now you and I, we can talk a lot about this, but, but we had a lot of conversations earlier yesterday. I think we talked on the phone about this idea of a seed. What a huge metaphor that is. Yeah. It's such a great image of the gospel because it's not a fully formed concept, right? It's, it's, it's an idea that's meant to grow and evolve, and it's another image that kind of pushes back at the rigid absolutism of the religious system of his day. And honestly, you know, if it, it's, it's a warning to the modern church, uh, that if we become too inflexible, can cut ourselves off from growth, right? things don't grow well in rigid containers. And so, Mm. you know, I, I think he's kind of, that, that image of the seed really resonated with me on a deeper level. This time that I read it, because I'm really trying to figure out, well, what's the difference between y you know, a seed y, you know, it's like a seed is this thing, unlike a diamond or uh, a bar of gold, right? That has a fixed value within the thing itself, like it's static. You know what I mean? Mm-hmm. is more like potential unrealized value, something like that, but it has to be properly integrated into fertile soil in order to bear the potential. Right. Yeah. Yeah. The seed is only the potential, but it contains all the potential that's needed, Yeah, right? And so it comes in this little, and we're going to do this throughout, but it starts to tie into some other parables we're gonna look at. You know, it's this little, it's insignificant thing, but that thing contains all the potential, in this case, for the kingdom of heaven to grow and to flourish, right? Yeah. The other thing I think that's interesting is when you talk about the seed, you know, being organic, in the ancient times, and even sometimes today, but not many of us go plow a field today. But what you would do, especially in the Middle East, is you had to clear the field of rocks, right? And so the seed is that living thing as opposed to the rock, but there's also the clearing of the field, and then the rocks often become the boundary. Oh, Right. And you see this everywhere. You see it in Greece and you see it in the Middle East and, Right. and so I don't know. There's something I don't quite know what to do with that, but we'll talk about the rocky soil here. I'm getting ahead of myself maybe, but I just wanted to point out that, you know, the seed is that organic living thing as opposed to the rock, which is fixed and it actually acts as a boundary sometimes. yeah. that's not the thing. That's not the point of the field. Well, the rock is, is it provides a foundation. It's rigid, right? rigidity creates stability, but it kills growth, Seeds need a living soil. so up until this point, we've got this rigidity, we've got this solid foundation that we can point to, Jesus is coming along and saying, okay, the kingdom of heaven's close, but it's gonna be more like a seed and less like the rigid I. rock that provides stability, Yeah. And you could even see it where some thought Jesus was gonna be like a military leader and overthrow Rome and set up his kingdom. Not that you would pick up on this, but if you were truly listening, you might think, no, that's not what a seed does. Right. He's just, he's just planting the potential and it's gonna take time to develop and it's not gonna be a giant overthrow of Rome. I, and I'd have to think about your, your concept about you take the rocks and build the boundary. I like that. I think there's something there. I don't know. We'll have to, we'll let the listeners run with that one because there is something, there is something to that.'cause you're exactly right. As you plow up, you kind come across these field stones and you don't just throw it in the river. You, you take those field stones, it's like, well, you know, I'll build my wall with that. So there is something about walling in a fertile soil, but you still need, you need both things. You need the boundary, Yeah, need, you need it laid out, you know, in black and white, you know, here's the boundary, but in the middle you've got this more organic, uh, taking place for that enables growth. well, you can think of, the law as the boundary, right? All those rocks piled, I. forming a boundary, forming a safe space where people can thrive basically, right? Right. if you just build the boundary and say, okay, here's an empty patch of dirt. Go thrive. Right? What's it missing? It's missing the life. It's missing the seed and, and so I think, you know, to really get deep into this, I think maybe Jesus is actually comparing the law to kind of the rocks. Form the boundary, but what's missing is the seed. It's the life, right? It's the organic thing that you have to nurture and step back and just watch what it does. But you don't just clear a field and then pile rocks up and say, there we go. There's life. Yeah, yeah. You're right. So it's something like that. I don't know. Well, I mean, I go to the, to him telling Peter that on, on, on the, calling him the rock and saying, on your foundation, I'm gonna build the church. So it is, there's some kind of recognition about we need foundations in our culture, we need our foundations in life, but at the same time. It's in those, in those rigid foundations, you're not gonna have organic growth. And I Hmm. I kind of really, really think that that's what one of the aspects of this parable that it communicated to me this particular time that I read it as we kind of dug in that way. I was like, yeah, I think he's pushing back at the rigid religious structure of the time you know, because again, if you know the details of a story matter, we say that every time we go through these, why wouldn't it be like a diamond that you found in the ground? Why wouldn't it be like, you know, it's, uh, the gospel, the kingdom of God is valuable, like a bar of gold or a a, a big chunk of gold. And I think that the fact that he used the seed metaphor pushes against that idea of we have this diamond of, priceless worth. And it's like saying, no, that's not what I'm, coming to do. I'm coming to plant seeds. I'm coming to start something that is gonna organically grow and spread. And that's the metaphor he is fostering right now, as opposed to the Yeah. rock. I don't know. Yeah. Yeah. I think that's definitely there. We got a bit ahead of ourselves. But so the idea is the sower goes around sowing seeds, and then we have these four types of soil, right? right. So we have some fell on the path, where it says the seeds were simply snatched up. The evil one snatches the seeds up rocky ground and thorns, and then good soil. So let's talk about these soils. The first one is the path. And I had the same thought you had earlier, which is why the heck would you throw seeds on a path, right? But if you, if you realize that this is what Jesus is doing, he is the sower, right? He's not planting a field per se. He's casting the seeds out, and some are just gonna fall where they will. But what did you take of the meaning of this idea, of the path? It's obviously the well-worn path. That's hard. Nothing's gonna grow there. Yeah. It's more than just, well, it's packed dirt, and you can't, can't take root. There's something, I think there's something to it because a path is what you travel on. Right. And it's something more akin to. you're unlikely to embrace a transformative idea when you're fixated on where everyone else is traveling. Yeah. Yeah, where everybody's going, right? Crowds are great for efficiency, but they're terrible for transformation, and right. is described as a narrow path, right? You, you can't really discover something if everybody is already pointing to it. Right? That's not a discovery. And so there's something about the gospel idea that says, you need to leave the beaten path. You need to look where no one is looking and be willing to walk a different direction. It's something like that, Yeah. We talk about how transformation takes place in the wilderness, right? Not the well worn path. Yeah, exactly. One of the things that occurred to me when we were talking about, when we were thinking about the path is I thought the path is social media. Right? It, it's, looking at, it's what everyone's looking at. It's what everyone's yelling at each other, right? Everyone's disagreeing. We say we're having a conversation, but we're not, we're just arguing back and forth. Right. that's not fertile soil for transformation to take place. Yeah. And I was gonna say, the thorns are social media. the thorns. Okay. I could see that too, we can go either but it did said, media is definitely in here, though. We're gonna, we're gonna bang on that a little bit. I'm sticking with the path that's social media, but. No, there is something, there is something interesting about where everybody's at, where, you know, because this is where you get your likes and where you get reinforced by everybody that says, Hey, Yeah. And you know what I mean? That, so you're always searching for that. And so there's something neat about that idea of the well worn, beaten down path that everybody's at. You're just not gonna find transformation there. That's pretty good. Well, and then he says that what happens is, you know, the seeds just lay there. They can't actually embed in the soil. So it says the birds just come along and eat it. And to me that describes social media too, is there's no real conversations being to be had. It's just onto the next thing. yeah. you go any depth about the birds? No, I can't say that I did. Although the, here again, this is one of those parables where later, and we're gonna get to this. The disciples say, what does this parable mean? Right? So Jesus actually explains a little bit of this, and so he says the evil one, I think he says later, the evil one comes in and snatches up the seed. So maybe the birds have something to do with like the evil one. Yeah. In the fairytales, if you have a bird, you have something that's, that's of heaven coming down and snatching. So it, does have yeah, image of something, something from above coming and snatching up the seed that can't take any root. that's true. there is a little bit of a dual meaning, meaning that obviously the path is where every, where I see everybody going, and so I'm just gonna. Be part of the herd and you can't really, there's no, there's no transformation in that. Yeah. that aspect of something from above snatching the gospel idea, I don't know. I'd have to dig into that a little bit more, but I, but I think there's something to that. Yeah, I think that's right and I, I think that's why he maybe says the evil one comes and snatches it all away. When in the parable it was the birds. Right? Yeah. It's that something that lives in the air that comes to the ground and won't let anything take root. Yeah. I think might be something there. Well, I like your social media analogy because there is something about try to say something transformative on TikTok and then just look at the comments. I mean, all the top comments are gonna say, you're a moron, and. Yeah. Your ears are huge, and what's the deal with what you're wearing? You know what I mean? There's, they're all gonna be snarky and it's just, it does have this nice image of birds just picking away, the Alfred Hitchcock movie. You know, Yeah. your eyes out, peck by peck right there. There does seem to be something like that Yeah. social media. All right. So the next soil that seeds fall on is some fell on the rocky places where there would, it did not have much soil. It spr up quickly because the soil was shallow, but when the sun came up, the plants were scorched. So there's basically no depth of soil. Right, because, and, and we talked about this idea a little bit already, of that idea of the soil containing rock, that if you actually tended a field, that's one of the first things you do is you go pull all the rocks out. Yeah, A seed requires an organic medium and rocks don't have any nutrients that foster growth. So when you have too many, it's something like, when you have too many rigid absolutes in your thinking, then new ideas don't have any space to take root. yeah, that's true. I mean that, you know, and It goes, what does, what do the rocks represent? Maybe so it goes back to that idea then that the rocks could represent something like the legal code, right? Yeah. Like if your mind is full of the, the rules, there's just a bunch of rocks, there's no soil that's actually going to grow something new and transformative. Right. And there again, I, there, there is something there about those idea of the rock serving as the boundary. But if you leave 'em in the field, then nothing's really gonna grow. It's gonna come up fast and then it's just gonna die because there, there's no soil there. It, it's the soil is too filled with all of the rules and the laws, and there's no real space for transformation. It's gonna be something like that. yeah. All the rigid things that don't provide any nutrition. It's great for stability, but it doesn't provide nutrition to, for a seed to grow. Yeah. Alright, so we can come back to that if we want. The next one is the thorns. And so here again, um, other seed fell among the thorns, which they grew up and choked the plants and doesn't say much more about that, so, okay, so we talked a lot about thorns in the fairytales too, Right, right. The thorns. for thorns. Yeah, me too. So the thorns are the lowest, In terms of what grows organically. Thorns are the last thing you want, the thorns are the lowest things like fruit trees would be the highest. Form of vegetation or something like that, so, Yeah. so yeah. It's interesting that this idea of thorns, then the thorns will choke out any kind of new growth that's happening. Yeah, but to contrast it with the birds, the birds come from above and the thorns come from below. That's right. Yeah. yeah, so it's, so it's kind of this, you know, you, you can get taken by either extreme know, I like that word. I like the idea that it says, it says that it chokes it out, because I think I've mentioned this in another podcast, but the word worry is, comes from, stems from a Germanic word that means to choke. That's the, that's, that's what that word literally means. And you Hmm. to thinking about worries in her life or when you're anxious about something. It is that choking feeling it doesn't allow, again, these transformative ideas to take root, because you're always worried about all the little thorns in life. Right. And he, I think when he explains this parable, he actually says, um, you know, the thorns are all the concerns of life, you can think of a time where, you know, my wife works a lot of weekends, so sometimes it's like, man, I'm gonna spend Saturday reading and writing and working on navigating ancient faith stuff. But then I start mowing the lawn and you know, a couple things I need to do around the house, pay a couple bills, and you know, I had good intentions Right, really nurturing my soul. Yep. then it's just like all the thorns. And in that case, you wanna minimize the thorns, but some are necessary, right? yeah. It's almost like you can't ignore them completely because I, I don't know. I mean, they're, they're a reality of, of this world, so it's not that we completely ignore it, but it's just we don't give them an elevated place. Keep them where they're supposed to be lowest. Right. You know, Yeah, it on the down low. no, I, I'm sitting there thinking, I'm like, okay, the thorns belong outside of the, the rock boundary of the field. Like, there's gonna be thorns out there, right? And so, yeah, you know, you've gotta go deal with 'em every now and then, but they shouldn't inhabit what the space of growth, yeah. Your heart, your mind, right? There are things you have to take care of. So, I don't know, it's, there's something about that idea of the tended field. The rocks have formed the boundary, the thorns are outside. That's the key to a well nurtured soul or something like that. Yeah, I'd say, I'd say that's probably right. also a aspect of thorns that maybe I'll use the word weeds. Because it's hard to tell if you've got weeds or if you, I'm, I'm not a gardener, so I have planted a few things and I'll see something pop up and think, oh, here we go. You know, got something, got some growth. And it turns out it's a weed, Yeah. uh, yeah. So it's hard to tell the difference between new growth and a weed. Now, obviously after time and it takes root and you got a nice Rose Bush or something there, then you can distinguish the difference. But initially it's hard to tell the difference between the thorn and the actual new growth itself. And so there's some kind of, I don't know, I, I, I was thinking there's something about distinguishing, substance from the noise, and that's kind of what the thorns represent. And I don't, you know, I don't wanna get off on a tangent about the anxiety generation, but we just finished. know, 2025 and all the recaps of the news headlines of the year, you know, at the end of the year, they're always say, here are the big stories. You know, Yeah. a couple of those stories about the recap of 2025 and most of the top stories were either divisive or just grim. Right. And there's just this a symptom of, like I said, noise rather than substance. And, and when I was watching that, I'm sitting there thinking, I didn't think of it at the time. I'm thinking it now. Yeah. That was all thorns. It was all just thorns. Yeah. how do you, and there's something to separating the thorns from or the, or the weeds from the grass or something like that. We'll, we'll get into this more about the wheat and the tears, Yeah. there is something about thorn's look appropriate. initially until established growth is coming along. And then you can tell 'em apart, easy. But at at, at the beginning, it's hard to, it's hard to separate the noise and sustenance. Yeah. And you're right, that's gonna get to the whole next parable here. But you know, so the other thing about thorns, as we're talking thorns can also be a protective hedge. So in Snow White, the thorns actually protect snow White and the castle from outsiders, Right, right? So there again, it's it's almost like the rocks. It's like these, these things have their place, right? You have to live your life. You have to pay your bills. Yeah. But do they occupy the central space or can they form a boundary? And so it, it allows what's good and nurturing in, and it keeps harmful things out. yeah. If you pay your bills harmful bill collectors aren't gonna come knocking on your door. Right? Yeah, Right. So there, there's something about that idea Right. No, I, I think you're right it. It's easy to read this parable and say, well, thorns are bad, rocks are bad. And that's not what it's saying. Thorns and rocks have their place in the natural world. It's, Right? has, your attention? What is it that you're focused on? Are you focused on the rocks? Are you focused on the thorns? Because that's not gonna be a nurturing en environment. And this is Yeah. are so concerned over the constant battle for our attention. Right? And the fact that we don't create any space for thinking about, I don't know, just deeper ideas. taking a shower I think is about the only waking time that we have that we're not captured by headphones or a screen. You know what I'm saying? Yeah, It's yeah, need to create that space, you know? And here we are on a podcast with our headphones on, looking at our screens. But, uh, yeah. I, I think it is something in that message that's saying you need to create a space, a quiet space where ideas can nurture and in this attention grabbing culture that we're in right now, it's tough to find that. yeah. It's a lot of work. And look, you know, maybe that's just the point is, you know, to have a, a healthy producing field, it's not an easy thing. You have to be very intentional about it, right? The elements have to serve their purpose and be in their place. The rocks, the thorns, But if you don't have any organization or structure around that, it's just gonna be a field of rocks and weeds. That's all it's gonna be. Yeah. When you jumble it all up, it's like, figure out where these things go and Yeah. and then, and that, that creates nurturing soil. Yeah. All right. So then we get to the good soil and Jesus says, you know, this is the person who hears and understands. Now, it's also interesting because he said where it produces a crop 160, 30 times, what was sown? And I don't know, I started out this year reading some stoic classics again, uh, Epictetus and Marcus Aurelius, just to kind of go, well, that's probably a good way to start. And I was just reminded about how you can't control the outcomes. You can only control. what you produce, you can only control what you put into it. Use the example of you can shoot the arrow, you can, do all this training about shooting an arrow, but ultimately, you can't control whether the wind changes or something hits it. Whether it hits the target. So that's a very stoic idea, and I just thought it was interesting that at the end Jesus is saying it produces a hundred or 60 or 30 fold. I think what he's saying there is something similar, like ultimately you can't control what is produced. Yeah. I think you, I Does that make sense? Yeah. You can control the rocks, the thorns you put them in their place, some fields are gonna produce whatever tenfold and some are gonna produce a hundred fold. so, it's almost like he's saying don't try to attach a. A rigid formula to this, you know what I mean? You can only control Yeah. control, you know? Yeah. Do your part. Nurture your part, but don't attach a lot of value to, it's the nature of the seed too, right? don't attach a lot of value to results, and especially I think, getting into the comparison of your results with other people. Yeah, I think you're right. I think you're right. this is, I, don't know, this is just such a great parable 'cause it really can apply to so many other arenas of our understanding. that what this story's asking us is, are you the type of person that's open to hearing new ideas or is your thinking rigid and absolute in a way that doesn't allow any real development outside of your calcified opinions? Right. and this is, this is the grumpy old man problem. You know, there are areas of my thinking, you know what I mean? That, that, that are susceptible, this type of roadblock. And, what this story helped me see is that, know, I've gotta be open to new ideas and not have such rigid opinions or else transformation, can't take root. And all of us have kind of experienced maybe transformational moments or periods in our lives, but it's hard to sustain that. and I think what this parable is saying is, if you want sustained transformation, you have to constantly be getting rid of the rocks, getting rid of the thorns. And it's Yeah. it's, it's a constant thing. And that's what you said a minute ago about being intentional. It's a very intentional act that is. I don't know. It's gonna take a lot of energy on our part, but it's also, to your point about the, the stoic thinking is, is do your part and then let the growth happen Organically happen naturally. yeah, yeah. I think that's right. And if you're not seeing any kind of, uh, transformation, if you're not seeing kind of the kingdom of God developing around you, so to speak, then it's time to take a look at the field that you're tending to. Is it a mess? Right. And chances are it is Chance it are. You know, it's, it's full of distraction, it's full of noise, it's full of social media and yeah, it's, no, I'm gonna harp on social media, but yeah, it's no wonder that, you don't see any of that growth taking place. Right. it kind of teaches me that the kingdom of God is clearly more organic and complex than what is often presented, right? That the gospel is looking for an Yeah. our thinking to be able to grow over time and take root in our lives. And it kind of goes against that idea that there's a, quote unquote, there's a moment that you gave your life to Christ, right? That we kind of, we were raised to kind of believe. it points more toward the ongoing need for your heart and mind to be open and fertile and for slow, continual depth of understanding to take place. Yeah, yeah, we have a little raised garden and I'm gonna try to resist continually bringing it up because I've actually learned a lot from tending to that little raised garden, trying to grow tomatoes and basil and jalapeno peppers, things like that. But for the first year, we couldn't grow anything, you know, put soil in there, we planted seeds, nothing. And the second year we didn't get much. But I, I've continued to, you know, pull the little weeds. I continue to throw sometimes my coffee grounds in there, eggshells sometimes if I had a banana, I'll throw the banana peel in there and, And lo and behold, like last year, some of the tomatoes, we didn't even plant anything, but some of the tomatoes that had fallen off from the previous season Okay. Yeah. growing. I mean, we had like three huge tomato plants Oh, that's and, and yeah. Yeah. And they just came back. Yeah. From previous season. And they just came back now. I mean, I have, uh, two tomato plants and this one has big clusters. They're still green, you know, but I didn't plant them. Yeah. And, and I, I don't know, I think about that I idea of, you know, you have to nurture your environment. You have to nurture your soul. And the kingdom of heaven is there as a seed containing all this potential, but you don't know when it's gonna start sprouting, but you have to keep nurturing it, and you can't control the harvest. Yep. now you can do your part, but you can't control what it's all gonna produce. Because actually that's another nature of the seed is, you know, this is gonna yield tomatoes, but you don't know how many, Yeah. I and so, that, that we would try to apply this formulaic idea to the gospel and this parable pushes back on that type of thinking. Yeah. Well, we can keep, we can move on, but you and I have talked about how somebody will come up with a really neat, transformative idea in the church. And the first thing we want to do is write a book and create a small group series and package it Right. Package it, reproduce it, and send it out. and I think you're right. I think. I think when we do that, there's nothing wrong with, with some of that, but at the same time it's just, maybe we, we'd get frustrated that we don't have the same transformative effects of, the original project, so to speak. Right. yeah, yeah. Alright, so. One of the cool things that I think we'll see in this series is how some of these start to play into each other. So we already hit on this a little bit, but the next one, if you're looking continuing on in Matthew chapter 13 is in Matthew 13, 24 through 30 is the weeds among the wheat, and that's a little bit longer to, so I guess we'll let people listen to it and then we can come back and talk about it. Okay. So this was a little bit different. have that same kind of metaphor where we got and seeds and things like that, but in this case, we've got growing amongst the tears. Depending on your translation, the right? in the wheat, And, they're gonna have to coexist. This is kind of a strange one. They're gonna Yeah. until the judgment day of which, you know, and he talks about cutting it down and the wheat gets thrown in the, the good pile and the TA get burned up, right? Yeah. yeah. So this is kind of an interesting one because it's clearly letting us know that if you're looking for some sort of cosmic justice in this earthly life, then you're bound to be frustrated and angry about all the injustices that are never ending, right? And so this kind of, this kind of addresses this problem. There's a lot going on in this one. again, to, not to jump to the, what I took from this, but yeah, I think there's that going on. I think it dismisses this idea of being an isolationist, right? If, if we could just all retreat, if we can just, uh, barrier ourself out from the outside world, if we could all retreat from, um, I was just watching this thing about if we could have a Christian commune, you know, everything would be perfect. The answer's no, it wouldn't, right? But it kind of pushes back against that idea because Jesus is clearly saying that again, the kingdom of heaven for a while is going to have to coexist along. well, evil, I, I think he actually says that when he explains this one too. Okay. Well I think when Jesus actually explains this one, or maybe he says it, um, well, he talks about the evil one, sowing weeds among the wheat, right. Um, just a couple things that's going on there. First of all, I think especially today, we don't do ourselves much good about thinking of categorizing people as evil or good. I think it's probably better to think about. Ideas and movements and ideologies. So that's kind of where I went with this one. And one of the things that we talked about earlier that you brought up is this idea that initially these things grow side by side and you can't tell the difference, right? That's the nature of this idea of a tear is it looks like wheat until it's time for the wheat to come to fruition. And there's that root word of fruit, right? Mm-hmm. when the wheat starts to fruit and these things growing alongside, it don't ever fruit. They don't produce anything. Yeah. That's interesting. And I'm glad you said that. You clarified that it's easy to say, well, this is the saved and the unsaved. But I think it, it may be better to see this as, ideas, you know, like you said, because yeah, there, there's something about, letting an idea take root, then it doesn't go anywhere and, and. I mean, I think we all deal with this, you know, we're in the world of information there, there's constantly new ideas and interesting conspiracies. I love all this stuff, right? So there's these cool conspiracies coming at you and you're like, oh man, I wonder if there's something to that, you know? But after a while, it's almost like you, you have to say, I don't know. I don't know what you know about this or that conspiracy, but there, because there's no fruit coming from it. It, uh, there's nothing I can do about it if it's true. And, you know, you just gotta move on from it. And I think you're right. I think there's some, I think that's, that's the way you tell the distinction between, a healthy idea and a bad idea is what does it produce? Does it produce Yeah. value? Yeah. And I think, I think we see that a lot on, with protests and with, with some of the things we're seeing in the headlines, uh, of the past, you know, 10 years or so. That initially it's like, oh, this is interesting. there's this protest going on, you know, no Kings. There's a no Kings protest, and there's a lot of noise around it. But then at the end of it, and, and not to get polit, we try to stay politically neutral, but Political. Yeah. of, that's a, that's a particular one where at the end of it, it's like, okay, no kings let's, we don't have a king. And I, I guess we're clarifying that we don't want one, kind of reminds me of every once in a while you'll see somebody do something gimmicky. Like, um, like they'll walk across the entire United States, or they'll swim some real long body of water. And when the news gets ahold of it and they interview the person, they're like, Hey, why are you doing this? And they'll say something like, well, I'm trying to raise awareness for breast cancer, or I'm trying to raise awareness for, uh, about mental illness. and I always hear those, like when I hear that word awareness, I'm thinking, yeah, we were aware. I, I kind of knew that breast cancer was a thing. And, and so I, I mean, I guess, I guess it's trying to, and attach an honorable thing to your, your little thing of eating this many hot dogs or something, whatever, whatever the gimmick is. Right. Yeah. I, what I'm trying to say is that's an example of one of those things that you're like, oh, that sounds interesting, and Oh, that's cool. They're trying to raise awareness for this. But at the end of the day, you're like, okay, I guess that was it. there's really nothing to be done with it. There's no fruit at the end of it. Yeah. that make any sense? Yeah, because Jesus, look, he taught a lot about, and not even in parables, but he said, you know, you'll know people by the fruit they bear, good trees produce good fruit. I mean, he says that several places. Right? And, Right. and so when you tie it back to this idea then of the parable that here is a, I guess wheat isn't technically a fruit plant, but you know, here's something that's meant to bear fruit, and then there's all this stuff that looks like it. That doesn't, to me, that's what he's talking about. okay, so here's where I went with this too, is, in the recent years, there's been a lot of things that look like good ideas, and everyone jumps on board. Right. Uh, they go viral Mm-hmm. Yeah. and a lot of people start virtue signaling about, Hey, I'm gonna do this. I'm gonna put this background on my profile, and things like that. But they don't produce any fruit. And I just, to me, what this actually did was it, it told me to pay more attention to what is bearing fruit and what isn't, and don't just jump on every bandwagon. you know, that's the outrage of the moment and is it producing any fruit? And also, where did it originate? know, 'cause I, I've seen again, people of faith follow terrible ideas from awful people because it had this kind of brief, you know, correspondence with something Jesus might have said, you know, if you take it this one way. And, and I just go, man, are you kidding me? Yeah. But there again, it, I, I think this idea of like the evil one is sowing ideas that look good, but they don't produce fruit and we have to be more aware of that. Okay, so what does it mean to produce fruit then? Because that's easy to say, but what is like, like in our of this, what does, what does fruit mean? Okay. So, well that make sense? it does. And if you look at the other teachings of Jesus, you know, teach, uh, well it's nourishing, Um, a lot of times fruit is compared to like the fruit of the spirit. Apostle Paul talks about that virtue. Alright. So it's actually like a movement that's producing fruit is actually producing virtuous people among its followers. Yeah. in the case of wheat, wheat actually is producing more seed, so, okay, so that gets to this idea then that something that is fruitful is actually producing more potential and more fruit. Something that is not, and we've talked about this, uh, uh, previously. Uh, the nature of evil is it's not productive. Right. only consumes, right? all it can do, right? That's all it can do. Yeah. And so I think that plays into this as well. I don't know, that's a long answer to your question, but. no, I th I I think that's, that's what I was getting at. It's like, well, it's easy to say does it pro produce fruit, but what does, what does that even mean? You know? And, and I know we kind of have these ideas of what that means, but, know, when you talked about the fruits of the spirit, I, uh, one thing I have thought about before when it comes to the fruits of the spirit is that, the fruit is not actually a benefit to the tree. Do you, do you know what I'm saying? Like, you can have a tree that. Yeah, any fruit, and it's a perfectly healthy tree. Right? And, so in that context, you know that you're producing fruit when other people are coming to that tree to pick the fruit there. Other people find value in it. And so, and yeah, yeah, thing. Yes. I, I, I like the idea, the fact that it's reproducible and you'll, you're gonna see this reproduce, uh, in an organic way, like a seed. But there's also, there's going to be, you're going to have people outside of you coming to, coming to you, or your church or your group or whatever, and they're going to be nourished from the actions that you're perpetuating. yeah, yeah. It's reproducible. So, uh, the fruit contains more seed. right? It's something that's just going to keep producing virtuous people, good people, good ideas, good results. But tying it back to the other one, it's like we don't always control the harvest of it, right? 160, 30, but it's producing something. And I don't know, it's just something that evil doesn't do that. And I, I becoming more aware of that in recent months is evil. Doesn't do that. Evil or bad ideas, let's not even just say evil, but bad ideas don't produce anything. They sound good, but in the end it's just, it's the same old, same old. So one of the difficulties of talking about these parables is once you start, and we saw this in fairytales as well, right? a thorn in one fairytale represents a thorn in another fairytale, right? The forest always represents the same thing. And so one of the things that when you understand that with parables is that it's hard to talk about these in isolation. I'm finding, and I think that's some of, you know, 'cause it's, it's hard to talk about one and then say, okay, that links to the one we just talked about. That links to an one we're gonna talk about in a minute. Because this idea, the seed always means the same thing. Usually always means the same thing. So I don't know. Um, we can move on, but it, that's just occurred to me that that's some of the, the good and the bad of trying to talk about these is there's a lot more in, in these single parable once you realize that I think Jesus told 40 parables. Right. and the image that he chooses is, not the same image, but it's when you, you're right, when you reuse some of these different images, they usually mean the same thing, Right. you know? So, so the, the, the next parable that we go onto is the mustard seed. And I just said to you before the podcast, uh, saying, uh, maybe we probably should have started with this one, right?'cause we really could have unpacked this idea of the seed by itself, because. Jesus ends with it. And, and it really does get into this idea that small things, you know, the, the, the packaged potential idea. so, I don't know what is, what's your thought about, uh, the mustard seed that we kind of haven't already, talked about? Let me read it real quick. Uh, he told him another parable. The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it's the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree becomes a tree so that the birds come and perch on its branches. Okay, so that's pretty simple, right? yeah, yeah. it would've been a good place to start because it's the same idea that all the potential is contained in this little seed. And he's probably, he's, I haven't planted mustard, so I can't say I know, but apparently it's a very small seed seed. Yeah, that's and grows into a very huge, yeah. Grows into a very huge plant, which I just realized. He talks about the birds, so there's that idea of the birds coming perch in it. I don't know what to do with that, but Oh, talked about that earlier. a cool concept. Yeah. I wanna run with that. Yeah. The heavenly ideas have a place to land. Yeah. That they have this place to land on this, on this, you know, growing potential or something like that. I don't know. well, obviously I think one of the things he's saying is Kingdom of Heaven initially appears as almost this insignificant thing, right. Over the course of, the last 2000 years, it's grown to support, you know, a huge amount. Millions and millions probably, if not billions of the population. Right. Right. So, I, I don't know. It's something, it's something like that. But where do you think he's going with this idea of a mustard seed? no, I think you said it right. It's just that you're right, it starts out small, but again, over time, slowly it turns into something. It turns, it, it, the potential is almost endless because it's reproducible, because it's recruitable, you know? So there's, Yeah. I just think it's interesting that all three of these are about are about the seed. There's, there's the seed aspect of it, I just like that he's kind of, he has this thread through all three of these parables. it's pointing to potential that om uh, that can just ne uh, be never ending, essentially is, and, you know, so I don't know. I, I, it's, We'd say exponential growth or something like that. yeah, yeah. There's, yeah, there's an exponential aspect to it and to your point that this obviously started 2000 years ago and, and is now this worldwide phenomenon doesn't seem like the right word, but you, Yeah. I'm saying, right. Yeah. This, yeah. thing, right. That, that has changed so many people and transformed so many people's lives. and yeah, it's, it's like, yeah, it started out from such a simple idea he's, he's basically saying that if your own life. Is open to new ideas that those types of things, the kingdom of God can be manifest if you allow your own heart to be fertile and to, and to let things grow and to not be so rigid and this amazing thing can come out of that. You know, the other thing that just occurred to me as I was reading that again is, you know, he says, A man tended his field, right? a man took and planted in his field, and so here's a person who's actually doing the right thing. He's tending his field, right? And so it's almost like he can take the most insignificant of seed and he's going to grow this big plant. And now instead of the birds snatching the seed off the off the path, the birds come and perch in these. Beautiful plants that he's got growing because it's almost like the full picture of someone who's doing this the right way. yeah. No, I, I think you're right. And I think there's something about the image of virtue doesn't just pop up in some people. You know, it, it has to be nurtured Okay, so here's a rabbit trail. Do you think that the curse of Adam having to work the ground until it bring forth a harvest. Is tied to this idea in some way. Is it, it a way of saying that before the fall that all creation was sort of self-evident in its justice and goodness? Right. And we didn't have to dig and struggle to make sense of the world? Is is there In the garden. Yeah. You know, because before the fall creation appears to be pretty intelligible, right? It's, goodness and its order in a sense are obvious, right? Adam names the animals, not as an act of dominion, but as an act of recognition. You know what I'm saying? it's like meaning is close at hand, right? He just has to name it. You don't have to, to excavate to find out what's true. It just presents itself before the fall and after the fall, that. Clarity fractures. Right. And now meaning has to be extracted. has to be worked for. Is that going anywhere with you? I, I No, it, no, it actually, my head. it actually is because once you say it like that, and there's a lot of references in here to the Garden of Eden versus the fallen world after sin was introduced. And so I think you might be onto something that you could listen to all these parables, especially back to back to back, right? right. go, wow. He's describing the contrast between the Garden of Eden, where you might say virtue did just kind of spring up naturally. And the fallen world we live in, that the kingdom of heaven is going to have to break through. And you have all of these things, right? So you're gonna have to nurture virtue now, right? You're gonna have to, till the ground with your hands. To get anything to produce. And even the idea of thorns, right? Thorns grew outside of Eden, the ground is gonna produce thorns. And so Jesus is bringing these elements of the thorns.'cause like this is, we live in the non edenic world, right? yeah. I, I do think, yeah, I do think these are subtle references back to, maybe it's just the reminder that hey, we, we don't live in Eden and the kingdom of God is coming. But you have to be aware, we live in a fallen world. And if you're paying attention, maybe you do see that correlation back to creation and the fall and the resulting world that we now live in, right? And have to get buy-in. No, I thi this is interesting. I think this is going somewhere. because we always, take a real literal reading of the Genesis account, you and I have kind of said, well, maybe, the earth wasn't made in 24 hour days. You know what I mean? That type of thing. But when we get to the garden and, and what Adam's job was, we suddenly go back to this literal reading of, yeah, it was just fruit trees just popped up everywhere and just fell in his hand. And he, he ate it. And, and now it's not gonna be that way anymore. It's gonna be more difficult. But I think, I think, I almost think that there's something to that, that, that it's more like, uh. Meaning was obvious. Truth was obvious. and now it has to be worked for. yeah. Okay. So again, you know, Jesus is talking to the, to the Pharisees and they had this, this rigid ideology that had emerged from the law. Right. And, and Paul talks about, I, I'm sorry, Jesus talks about I haven't come to abolish the law. I haven't come to get rid of it. I have come to fulfill it, to kind of present it in a different way. Maybe you could look at it. And so in that sense, these rigid absolutes can be seen. Going back to our Adam conversation as sort of a coping mechanism, right? There are attempts to turn living soil into stable, predictable unmoving stones, right? But the problem is that the stone doesn't grow anything. it had its time because we had to have that stability and that rigidity, you had to have that boundary that you talk about, but can't turn living soil into, into, into an unmovable stone and get anything, get anything from it. And so that's where I'm starting to see this transformation from the law to Jesus is, is preaching. And this is why it's so, it was so dangerous. And so like the Pharisees just lost their mind over this stuff because the more they understood, the more he spoke in these, in these parables. And the more the Pharisees went back and discussed it in the temple and said, here's what he's saying. You realize what he's saying. Man, it was scandalous. It was a big deal. and, and, and I really can start to see this now, even in these early parables. what the Pharisees think that he's undermining, but he's really just trying to complete, did that go any, does that, did that go anywhere? Does that make sense? Yeah, well a lot of these, we'll see this more in, um. Some of the other upcoming episodes, but a lot of these references are actually subtle references to Old Testament imagery. So the field, you know, uh, Jesus says the field is the world, right? Israelites would see the field as Israel. And Jesus is basically saying, Hold up. yeah, it it's not being very productive. It's full of rocks. It's full of thorns. And it's that idea of trying to trying to nurture the Garden of Eden as much as you can, but you're going to have to deal with the curse of the thorns and the weeds and the birds, right? The fallen, Right. the fallen coming down, you know, which again, you could talk about the Nephilim and all that stuff. So, I mean, yeah, I actually think some of that imagery is there. but there are definitely cases where people would see the field as Israel and the law is the boundary, Yeah. right? And Jesus is saying, that's not enough. Right? The fence needs to be repaired, but you're preparing the field to grow something new, something better, yeah. right? yeah. I think the religious impulse after the fall, it says something like, if we just define things clearly enough, we can fix the world. And what Jesus is seeming to say is the world is healed by something alive and patiently from within. Right. And that's, that's Yeah. so, that's why he had that counter-cultural basically. Yeah, so that whole idea of uh, confronting the Pharisees and a small thing working its way through kind of leads to the last one that we're gonna talk about today is, um, Matthew 1333, where he says, one more, he told them still another parable. The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about 60 pounds of flour, which huge amount until it worked all through the dough. And like that's the parable. Right. Yeah. This is, this is a cool one because it seems to take a really, a left hand turn. You're like, what? Uh, you know, I thought we were talking about harvest, and, but if you think about it, this really does fit perfectly with our soil framework. That yeast doesn't set on top of the dough. It's not, you know, it's, Yeah. it disappears, right? It just mixes in. But once it's properly integrated, let's say it quietly transforms. Everything from the inside out. Right. I think that's how it ties in a little bit to our soil framework. Yeah. In some ways you could say that yeast is just another variation of the seed, right. but it's more, it's truly more organic. we don't work with yeast that much. I know in COVID everyone had their, uh, sourdough starters, but Yeah. My that's, all into it, yeah. But we don't generally have like yeast sitting around, you know, starting making bread. Some people might, right? But yeah, I, I think it's actually, isn't it like an organism? Yeah. Yeah. It's a, it's a living organism Yeah. So it's a living thing. it, yeah. I'm just gonna, I'm gonna make a fool of myself, but I think as it consumes something like starch, that it, that it out gases something and that's what makes Sugars or something. Yeah. something like that. Anyway, But anyway, the, yeah, the nature of yeast is that, you know, once it's worked into a dough, I like that word integrated, because you can't pick the yeast out, you know, you can't give it to your kid, and your kid says, Hey, I don't like yeast. Well, you pick it out, right? right? like, well, you're eating this or nothing. Right? Because the yeast is there yeah. And it transforms everything. I mean, and, and, yeah. everything about it, right? I mean, yeah, so maybe this is kind of one upping the imagery of the seed. It's like, okay, if you're blown away with this seed, like. The Kingdom of Heaven is like yeast and it's going to just go through everything and transform everything. It's almost like he's saying, are my bakers in the house? I've thrown the knowledge to the farmers. Now where are my bakers? Here we go. Let's, Silas, I, this make a mean sourdough. This one's for you, right? This was for you, dude. Yeah. That's great. Yeah, it is. But it is kind of, it is neat'cause it really does hold onto that framework, even though it feels like it deviates from the original, first three parables there, you know, Yeah. but it, it actually just kind of extends the idea on a little bit deeper level maybe. Yeah. And one thing that's interesting about yeast is normally in a lot of Jesus's teaching yeast is actually portrayed as a negative thing. and this goes back to the whole Old Testament where. They had to make unleavened bread. Right? Because when they were traveling through the Exodus, they didn't have yeast so their bread was unleavened. Okay. So in a lot of the festivals, yeast was, I don't wanna say discouraged or outlawed. Yeast wasn't allowed. You had to bake unloved bread. Right, So, like they did in the wilderness. yeah. And so yeast in a lot of cases has this negative connotation to it, right? And in fact, elsewhere Jesus says, be on your guard against the yeast of the Sadducees and the Pharisees because, but there's still that principle there so one way to think about it is a bad idea can be just as invasive as a good idea. That's why you have to be careful about what you are nurturing. Yeah. So it goes back to that idea, the, the idea of ideas again, you know? No, that's a cool thought. So what he's saying is the mechanism is neutral, right? And what matters is what you introduce into the system. Right in that Yeah, yeah, and evil spread the same way. That's cool. Yeah, I like that. That's neat. yeah. Any other thoughts on that idea of yeast and this really simple parable? Well, I like that you pointed out that it it's typically spoken in a negative context, but he's, he's sort of just saying again, this is how ideas spread. And so obviously if you allow the weeds to grow up in, in your garden then that's what's gonna come out of it. That's you, you know, are bad ideas and I think that actually helps, it helps point out.'cause there is a, there is a tendency to, to read, to go back to the, the wheat and the TAs to sort of read that as the saved and the unsaved. And I'm not saying that it's not about that at all, but I am saying the yeast kind of helps clarify that, that maybe it is more about the growth of bad ideas or good, good and bad ideas. You know what I'm saying? Like, like they Yeah, same way, I think is what he's saying, as opposed to trying to point out, you know, the sheep from the goats, let's say. Right. we yeah, tend to wanna do who's on the inside, who's on the outside. He's not talking about me, man. He's talking about you. You know, yeah. the TAs. I'm not a tear, you're a tear. Right. You know, it's like, but, but if you, if you take this to the level of ideas, I don't know, I, I just think it takes on an a little bit different meaning And how we started is we so wanna reduce this. You know, that reductionistic idea of we wanna reduce this to. well, didn't Jesus say that's what that means? Well, yes he did. But when you understand the story that he's telling, it means so much more than that. And that's why you have to hang onto the story because if you just say, okay, the wheat and the tace, it's the saved and the unsaved. I'm saved so I'm good. So I got it. And it's like, no, you're just scratching the surface, right? Yeah. Yeah. Exactly. No, that's, that's, that's interesting. Yeah. Okay. So we covered a lot today. We're just in Matthew 13, but I don't know, any last thoughts about what this is getting at with the A, the nature of the kingdom of God, what Jesus is trying to convey to people. Yeah, I'll tell you what, this, this is one of those episodes that I'm gonna be thinking about for several days after we recorded, obviously, but yeah. Maybe one last thing I I wanna point out, and I hope it's kind of been evident in this opening episode, is that you don't master a parable. You, you kind of, you sit under it, right? You, you, you chew on it and let it sink in. And so. don't wanna get in the mindset of saying, you know, ah, this is exactly what this story means and move on. Right? So we encourage our listeners to read these parables for themselves and to let them do the work that great stories do. Right? That, that is, let it attach to your particular way of thinking and your individual experience, because these stories are very layered and can be incredibly personal if you let them be. Right? And Yeah. what we're trying to do, you know, again, is, I don't wanna, I just don't wanna give the impression that Yeah, we, we wrap that up. We, we, we said exactly what that means. You know, one of the things that I, I pulled from this episode is it's a very individual, it's your individual heart, the way it receives it. And so your heart may receive a parable differently than my heart and. It doesn't mean that you can translate it any old way you want, but it does mean that there is gonna be an individual aspect to that. And so, yeah, I, I just encourage people not to, after this podcast, read some of these parables and just chew on it all day long. You know, think about it all day because that's when, that's when that, when that transformation actually takes place. And not being distracted by all the things of the world and just reading it, moving on, because it's a verse of the day type thing. Right. You know, Yeah. onto it and see what it does and let it do its transformation inside you. Well, and my final thought is kind of along those same lines that I would say is these parables, you know, this is what people did back at that time. They made bread, they tended fields, they harvested, right? Yeah. And so I think Jesus is one of the things he's saying is the kingdom of God, if you're paying attention, will be seen among the ordinary things in your life if you'll elevate it and give them meaning. And so in the same way, it's like read these parables and I don't know, think about when you're making dinner, what. How is the kingdom of God like making dinner, right? How is the kingdom of God? And that may sound silly, but look, it's no different from what Jesus is doing, right? Yeah, is the, kingdom of God? Like, you know, raising your toddlers, right? How is the kingdom of God? Like, you know, whatever you do right? Sitting, on your commute to work. How is the kingdom of God like that? I, and I think that's what Jesus is trying to do. He's trying to connect the potential of the kingdom of God so that people could see it and recognize it in all that they did, right. right? It's, again, it's not Jesus giving answers. It's, it's him shaping how we see I don't know, giving, giving us, uh, you know, glasses on how to view the world. And you're, to your point, you can see it in all the little things that you do day in and day out if you are open and not distracted, and if you have a heart that is, is to seek out these things. Well that was just the first episode, so man, dude. Well, we, yeah, I didn't mean to get off. I got off on a few tangents on that one, but this was a really, really good one. And it just kind of, I don't know, it lit a spark in me Okay, so next episode. Where are we? Where are we taking this parable thing? I, So there's a, a whole bunch of parables that Jesus talks about. The kingdom of heaven is this very hidden thing. So we're gonna talk about parables that kind of reveal hidden knowledge and why it's hidden and secretive in the first place. ah, So Lucas. Yeah. Okay. yeah, a little bit different take. That'll be fun. Alright, sounds good. Yeah. And the last thing I would say is, one of the easiest ways to get ahold of us is there is a link on the show notes. The very first thing you see is you can just text us real quick, shoot us a message. the warning with that is that we can't respond to it. So if you wanna reach us. There's also email address in the show notes, but I was just reminded of that because someone actually, texted us this week. We got an email, a really kind, a really cool comment. They really enjoyed one of the, episodes that we had done and they really liked the podcast. So love to hear from people. Encourage you to use that link, but if you do use that link, we can't respond directly back to you. So if you wanna response email Okay. Yeah, that sounds good. So we'll pick this up next episode. Alright, we'll see you in next episode.

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David Gwartney

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J.R. Gwartney

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