Passage
[Matthew 13: 3-9]
“And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, “Behold, the sower went out to sow; [4] and as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up. [5] “Others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil. [6] “But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. [7] “Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out. [8] “And others fell on the good soil and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. [9] “He who has ears, let him hear.”
Introduction
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ,
When you sow seeds in the ground and care for them, they will sprout, grow up, and bear the fruit.
As the water, sunshine, temperature, and nourishments are controlled, they will bud, grow up, and bear the fruit.
How amazing it is that seemingly dead seeds can bud, and it grows up to the full measure to bear the fruit!
This is the law of the nature that God created.
But even though we sow the same seeds and provide them with the same care, in some fields they bear abundant fruits while in other fields they bear less fruit.
Why this difference? It’s because the soil of each field is different.
Some fields are fertile and can produce much while other fields are infertile and can produce little.
The same difference is present among the spiritual fields, too.
Here, ‘field’ refers to the heart of men. ‘Seeds’ refer to the word of God.
God the Father constantly sows the seeds of His word in the hearts of His children.
When the word is sown in men’s heart, they can bear the fruit spiritually and materially.
They can bear the spiritual fruits such as the Beatitudes, the fruits of the Holy Spirit, and fruits of light, and physical fruits of financial blessings and blessing of heath.
But is there anyone of you who thinks your fruit is ripening too slowly or that you are bearing little fruit?
Or is there anyone who does not even see any fruit ripening?
If this is the case even though you diligently listen to the word and try hard, what a pitiful situation it would be!
If you can associate yourself with either of these cases, I want you to check your field, namely the field of your heart.
Manmin has been in the 3rd stage of take-off since the 27th anniversary last year. It is the time to reap.
Now as church-wise and at individual levels of the church members, we will reap so many fruits that it will be incomparable with anything in the past.
But the amount of harvest will be different according to what kind of hearts you have.
Therefore, I would like you to check the condition of your heart-field, as you are checking your measure of faith in this new year, 2010.
Whatever the kind of field, if you cultivate it into good soil then it can produce a good harvest.
I urge all the Manmin members to cultivate your heart-field into good soil so that you can get abundant harvest in this new year.
Also, I pray in the name of the Lord that you will at least go into the third kingdom of heaven.
[Main]
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, Jesus spoke in parables with the examples of things on earth so we could understand the spiritual things more easily.
One of them is the parable of the sower, namely the parable of the field, found in today’s passage Matthew 13:3-9.
It says, “And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, “Behold, the sower went out to sow; [4] and as he sowed, some seeds fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up. [5] “Others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil. [6] “But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. [7] “Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out. [8] “And others fell on the good soil and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. [9] “He who has ears, let him hear.”
In the passage reading, Jesus spoke of four kinds of soils: roadside, rocky places, thorny place, and good soil.
He also explained the results after sowing the seeds in these four kinds of soils.
I will refer these four kinds of soils to ‘fields’ to make it easier.
Field refers to, as I already mentioned, the heart of men.
Just as there are various fields, men’s hearts also vary. Men’s hearts are all as different as their faces are different.
So, they have different personalities, ways of thinking and behavior. Even in the same situation, they react differently.
For example, some people are stubborn. Even when other people teach them something good, they don’t change their opinion easily.
On the other hand, some people accept other people’s opinions very well.
Some have rough hearts, so their words and actions are also rough.
Some people have gentle minds, language, and behavior.
All these differences come from the heart. But this heart is not visible to the eyes.
So, Jesus likened this ‘heart’ with the field which is seen with the eyes.
He explained the four major kinds of hearts.
The difference in the hearts will bring about differences in each one’s life. Especially, it affects our Christian life very much.
For example, the speed of going into spirit can be very different according to the kind of heart-field.
Therefore, it is necessary to understand what kind of heart you have and make it better.
But why did Jesus compare our heart with ‘fields’ among so many things?
What did God make men with?
Genesis 2:7 says, “Then the LORD God formed man of dust from the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living being.” As said, He made us with the dust of the ground.
That is why Jesus likened men’s heart with ‘field’ which is the soil, the dust of the ground.
The characters of the soil will become different according to what you add to the soil.
If you put in something good, it will become good soil; if you put something bad, it will be bad soil.
For example, if you bury a lot of trash or pour a lot of polluted water into good soil, it will soon become infertile field.
On the contrary, if you take away bad elements and fertilize a bad field, it will become a good field.
It’s the same with men’s hearts.
If you put something good in the heart, it will become a good heart; if you put in something evil, it will become a more evil heart.
When God made the first man Adam, he had a heart that was a heart of good soil.
It was a gentle and beautiful heart filled with nothing but the truth and had no evilness in it.
In the Garden of Eden provided by God, Adam and Eve lived in peace, obeying God’s will.
But this heart of good soil changed into infertile field.
From the moment he disobeyed God by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, Adam’s heart began to become infertile.
Namely by committing a sin, his spirit died and his spiritual communication with God was disconnected.
Now, he began to hear the voice of the enemy devil and Satan.
The enemy devil and Satan began to plant in Adam’s heart such untruths as hatred, envy, jealousy, anger, judging and condemnation, etc.
As a result, the good field of Adam became infertile and barren land that had many weeds, for it was not cultivated for a long time.
Namely, it became a hard and rough field. It was no longer a soft and good field.
Since the Fall of Adam, all his descendants are born with this infertile and barren heart-field.
Of course, not all men are born like that.
Though very rare, there are some people who are born with heart of good soil.
Men receive the life-force of their parents and ancestors, so they inherit the outward appearances, temperament, and even the characters of their parents.
According to what kinds of life-force they receive from their parents, their heart-fields are formed differently.
But even though they are born with the heart-field of good soil, that heart-field can become barren as they grow up, if they do not take care of it.
According to the kind of environment in which they are raised and the teachings they receive, their heart-field can be changed.
Of course, even though they are not born with good soil, if they keep on putting the truth, goodness, and love into it, namely if they cultivate the heart, the heart can become good soil.
But unfortunately, today’s world is so full of sins, and when children are born, most of them see, hear, and plant evil in their heart as they grow up.
For example, they are affected by the mass-media such as TV from early age and are stained by the trend of the world.
Most children sing popular songs of the world and dance to them from a very young age.
When the parents see their children do that, they praise them with clapping. So the children are even more excited to do it more.
They also always see others hating and fighting with one another, and such untruthful elements are planted in their hearts.
Of course, some children form heart-fields with relatively good soil for they are educated well from a young age.
Their parents raise them with the truth, and their heart is close to good soil.
For some other children, they are taught with the manners of the world very well and they have relatively good heart-field.
Those who have formed good heart-field in the world will find it relatively easier to cultivate their heart into good soil when they come into the truth.
Of course, even though they formed their heart-field with good education, they will find out many things that they have to change.
Also, when people are born, they inherit the heart-field from their parents, which contain the sinful natures.
For this reason, everyone without exception has to go through the process of cultivating their heart-field into good soil when they accept the Lord.
To cultivate into good soil, simply speaking, is to pull out the untruths and sinful natures from the heart.
We can bear a lot of fruits only when we sow the seeds after cultivating our heart-field.
Here, what does the ‘seed’ refer to? It refers to the word of God.
The word of God is the will of God and the heart of God.
When the word of God is sown in the hearts of men, that word will sprout, grow up, and bear the fruit.
It’s because God’s word has life.
But if the heart-field is a roadside, a rocky place, or a thorny field, it is difficult for the word of God to be born as complete fruit.
It may not even bud, or even if it does, it is dried up. Or even if it bears fruit, it is not a good fruit.
But if the word of God is sown in good soil, it will produce fruit 30, 60, or 100 times. This is absolutely true.
The latter part of Galatians 6:7 says, “…whatever a man sows, this he will also reap.”
As written, it is the law of the spiritual realm that we reap what we sow.
Then, what kinds of fruits will be born? The spiritual fruits such as fruits of light, and fruits of the Holy Spirit will be born.
They will bear the hearts of the true children of God who resemble Him.
Also, as their souls prosper, all things will prosper and they will be healthy. Namely, they will bear fruits of material blessings.
The rules in sowing and reaping are being explained in the Sunday evening services.
In the morning services, I am delivering messages to let you analyze your heart-field, cultivate it, and make it good soil.
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, as we accept the Lord and become God’s children, we begin the process of cultivating our heart-field, which has been infertile since the Fall of Adam.
So, it means our old, infertile field cannot have good soil immediately after we accept the Lord.
As we begin to attend church and listen to the word of God, we come to find out what kinds of untruths we have in our heart.
Just as we pull out the weeds one by one, if we pull out these untruths one by one, our heart is cultivated and changed into good soil.
It will become a gentle and mild heart having no evil, a heart that obeys the word of God, and a heart of truth.
Of course, there will be toils and efforts to cultivate our heart.
Also, according to the conditions of each one’s heart, some can cultivate it more quickly than others.
But the important thing is that God’s power can change any kind of field into good soil.
Also, the toil in cultivating is nothing compared with the joy of abundant harvest.
But to my regret, some believers attend church for a long time, but they still have the same kind of heart-field that they used to have before they met the Lord.
Also, they cultivate it to some extent but stopped in the mid-way. The weeds begin to grow again and rocks go deeper into the field.
Some just cut off the top growth of the thorns but leave the roots, so they do not bear abundant fruits.
Or, they get rid of all rocks or thorns, but they do not diligently sow the seeds. So, considering the fertility of the soil, they produce little fruit.
The seeds will at least sprout and take root in any kind of field except the roadside.
These fields will bear the fruit to some extent.
Or, even though the soil is not very good, if you put a lot of fertilizer it can produce relatively more fruits considering the actual fertility of the soil.
The word of life, the works of God’s power, and the overflowing grace of God in this church are acting like fertilizers for you.
As above, they haven’t cultivated a good soil in heart, but they just stay at one point being at ease and do not cultivate their heart any more. How pitiful this is!
I urge you to tighten up your belt and diligently cultivate your heart-field.
In order for you to be able to check your heart-field, I will explain to you about four different kinds of heart-field in detail beginning with the next session.
[Conclusion]
Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, Genesis 3:23 says, “…therefore the LORD God sent him out from the Garden of Eden, to cultivate the ground from which he was taken.”
God the Father sent Adam and Eve down to this earth from the Garden of Eden when they committed sin.
God made them cultivate the ground to eat.
Here, making them cultivate the ground from which they were taken means that in spirit He lets us cultivate our hearts.
Therefore, God’s children must cultivate their hearts diligently into good soil during their life on earth.
And we have to diligently sow the seeds.
But when we cultivate our heart-field, the field may bloom such beautiful and splendid flowers.
Namely, we may fulfill the will of God and give glory to Him greatly.
For example, we Manmin have been accomplishing world evangelism greatly.
You have been giving glory to God in your respective places.
But the ultimate purpose of cultivation is not to get the flowers to bloom. It is to bear abundant fruit!
We have to bear the fruit of the Grand Sanctuary, the fruit of world evangelism, but above all, we have to bear the spiritual fruits abundantly.
For this reason we must not stop cultivating the field of our hearts.
We must recover the good soil that God gave us in the beginning.
As we make our heart-field into good soil, we can reap abundant fruits according to what we have sown.
Then, we will be able to fulfill the providence of God more quickly and more greatly.
I urge you not to be lazy in cultivating your heart when you see the providences of God being fulfilled.
I hope you will make it a beautiful and good soil so that you can bear abundant fruit in all things and give joy to God.
I pray in the name of the Lord that you will all save many souls and make them prosperous.
[Amen]
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