Matthew 13 / The Seedy Gospel
Well, it’s good to be with you. We have work to do today. If you have your Bibles, turn to Matthew chapter 13. We are in a summer of parables, so I thought it fitting to start with the first parable Jesus talked about.
I have the privilege here at The Well to teach occasionally in our residency program—committed folks who give nine months of their life, 6:00 AM to 7:30 AM, August through May, four days a week. They come, they get taught, they dive into the Word of God, and they work through real issues in their lives. I had the privilege this last year to teach through Matthew with them. When it came time for the teachers to look through the parables, I called dibs on this one. This is the one I wanted, particularly because it’s the one Jesus explicitly explains. He says, “Here’s what it means.” So if you have a problem with this one, your problem is with Jesus, and my work is relatively done!
The Pivot Point in Matthew
Before we see verse 1 in action, it’s critical to know what’s going on in the broader story of Matthew. Matthew is a gospel written to the Jewish people. Matthew himself was a Jewish tax collector. The theme running through this entire gospel in your New Testament is that Jesus is the King of the Jews. That means there is a kingdom—which we’ll talk about—and Matthew wants his readers to understand that reality.
Jesus came onto the scene in chapter 1. His public ministry launched out in the open with John the Baptist in chapter 3, and this kingdom has been breaking forth all the way up to this chapter. Chapter 12 is pivotal; it is the climax of the narrative in Matthew where everything turns downhill. That’s where Jesus has very strong words for the Jewish religious leaders, the Pharisees. In fact, Matthew tells us that the Jewish leaders set their minds to destroy him and get rid of Jesus.
Matthew 12:14 (NASB)
But the Pharisees went out and conspired against Him, [as to] how they might destroy Him.
You see from this point forward that the religious leaders are actively trying to kill Jesus because of what he is saying to them. Jesus understands this in his spirit, so he begins a new strategy in chapter 13. He has just illustrated to these leaders that a tree is known by its fruit, pointing out poignantly that they have no fruit in their lives, which makes them furious.
So he leaves.
Matthew 13:1-2 (NASB)
That day Jesus went out of the house and was sitting by the sea. And large crowds gathered to Him, so He got into a boat and sat down, and the whole crowd was standing on the beach.
That phrase “out of the house” carries the idea that he was severing his relationship with those religious leaders and moving on to something new. For the first twelve chapters, when Jesus comes onto the scene at age thirty, he works right within the multitudes and crowds. But here in chapter 13, he distances himself and gets into a boat. He becomes the mouthpiece instructing the crowds and preparing his disciples for what is to come.
From here in chapter 13, he is going to teach seven parables—seven truths about the kingdom. This kingdom is a mystery to some. It is an “already, not yet” concept: it already exists right now when you place your faith in Christ—you are a new creation, you have hope in him, your life is transformed—yet it is also a physical kingdom that will fully arrive one day. That is our hope in Revelation, waiting for the return of our King. The kingdom is far more about the King than it is about the physical boundaries of a castle; it is about subjecting ourselves to the authority of Christ.
After this, Jesus leaves Galilee, goes down to Jerusalem, and dies. These words to his home region in chapter 13 are vital.
The Sower and the Seed
As you remember from Brad last week, a parable literally means to “throw alongside” a truth. There is a practical picture thrown alongside a bigger spiritual reality that we need to understand.
Matthew 13:3-4 (NASB)
And He spoke many things to them in parables, saying, ’Behold, the sower went out to sow; and as he sowed, some [seeds] fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up.
Literally, the text says the sower went out to sow. Jesus is making a point: the Sower is God.
There are four types of soils in this agricultural parable. Jesus explains them later in the chapter, and we are going to look at each soil alongside Jesus’ own explanation. The people listening would have understood this instantly because they lived in an agrarian culture; they farmed to survive. A sower would carry a bag of wheat seed, walking along the terraced hills or valleys of Galilee, taking handfuls of seed and broadcasting it—throwing it broadly across the field.
What is the seed? The seed is very clearly the gospel—the truth of who Christ is, why he came, why he died, why he rose from the dead, and the transforming impact that message has on human lives for eternity.
Soil 1: The Hardened Path
First, we see the seed that falls along the path.
Matthew 13:4 (NASB)
and as he sowed, some [seeds] fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up.
Jesus explains this plainly just a few verses later.
Matthew 13:19 (NASB)
’When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil [one] comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is the one on whom seed was sown beside the road.
On those terraced hills, there were paths continuously trampled by feet. Over time, that ground became so compressed, compacted, and hard that nothing could grow there. When the seed of the gospel hits that hard, calloused path, it has zero opportunity to germinate, take root, and draw nutrients.
Jesus says that when the gospel hits a calloused, hardened heart, the Evil One comes and snatches it away just like a bird devouring a seed off the pavement. It never has a chance. That doesn’t diminish the power of the seed; the life within the seed is still potent and true. But it finds no cultivated soil, no margin, no room to take root. These are people who say, “I’m too busy, I don’t need God, I’m fine on my own.”
Sometimes when you prepare a sermon, you wonder who it’s for. God often confirms it through real life. This week, a friend from our Clovis campus who is an educator called me. She was walking through her final days at school before summer because she had received a pink slip earlier in the year. She had invested thousands of hours into her coworkers and students, and she sent me an email full of hurt and sadness. She wrote, “I see these people, and when I offer truth and kindness and try to live so they see Christ, they just reject it. It breaks my heart.”
One coworker had told her, “I don’t need an outdated mythological book of fairy tales. I’m just an unimportant piece of carbon that has no meaning and no purpose.”
Can you feel the hardness there? Can you feel that compacted life calloused to the gospel? You probably know people in that exact place. When the seed lands, there is no depth for it to hold onto, and the enemy snatches it away.
Soil 2: The Shallow, Rocky Ground
Next, Jesus describes the rocky ground.
Matthew 13:5-6 (NASB)
’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. ’But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away.
And here is his explanation:
Matthew 13:20-21 (NASB)
’The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no [firm] root in himself, but is [only] temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away.
As a former youth pastor, this resonates deeply with me. So many times, students would go to summer camp or a beach trip, get completely fired up, and say, “My life is changed forever! I’m living for Jesus!” Two weeks later, they were back in my office with the exact same sin struggles, totally stuck.
That represents the shallow heart. It hears the truth of God’s Word, feels an immediate emotional high—because the gospel is good news that brings joy—but never meditates on it. It never lets the truth penetrate the dark corners of the soul.
When the scorching sun comes up—when trials, suffering, and persecution hit—the shallow soil has no deep reservoir of moisture or nutrients. It withers immediately. You can always tell what a person’s faith is made of when trials arrive. Trial reveals depth. It is easy to make excuses and blame our past, our parents, or our circumstances. While those hurts are real, we must take personal responsibility for our walk with God because we alone will give an account for our lives.
James wrote to the church: don’t just be hearers of the Word, be doers.
James 1:22 (NASB)
But prove yourselves doers of the word, and not merely hearers who delude themselves.
Truth must move from your head to your heart, and down to your hands and feet.
In this shallow soil, we see the weakness of our own flesh. When we try to sustain ourselves in our own strength, trial quickly crushes us. I think of Judas in scripture—someone who walked closely with Jesus and initially looked all-in, but when the pressure and temptation mounted, there was no root, and he walked away.
Soil 3: The Thorny Soil
Then Jesus speaks of the third soil.
Matthew 13:7 (NASB)
’Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out.
He explains what the thorns represent:
Matthew 13:22 (NASB)
’And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.
I was talking to a local farmer this week. Here in the Central Valley, we know a thing or two about agriculture. He explained to me what he calls “idle areas” of a field—the corners where tractors and equipment can’t fully turn around. Because those areas can’t be actively cultivated or treated, weeds, thorns, and thistles take over. He called it an area of “plant competition.”
A single grain of wheat will produce a few stalks and heads of grain, but a single weed can release millions of airborne seeds that spread aggressively. You pull weeds on Saturday, and by next weekend they’re back with a vengeance. In those uncultivated areas, plant competition chokes out the good crop.
Jesus identifies those choking thorns as the cares of this world and the deceitfulness of wealth. Materialism is subtle and deadly. Scripture tells us that the earth and everything in it belongs to the Lord.
Psalms 24:1 (NASB)
A Psalm of David. The earth is the LORD’S, and all it contains, The world, and those who dwell in it.
We are simply stewards of God’s time, talent, and treasure. But greed whispers a word my five-year-old son Cooper loves to use: “Mine!”
I’ll ask him, “Cooper, whose is that?” He’ll say, “Mine!” I ask, “Whose is it really?” His shoulders drop, he cuts his eyes at me, and says, “God’s.” I tell him, “That’s right. It’s His stuff.”
We laugh when kids do it, but adults do the exact same thing. We fall for the lie: If I just had this much in savings, or if my retirement hit that number, then I’d be secure. I have met people living below the poverty line living paycheck to paycheck, and I have met people making six figures living paycheck to paycheck—and both say, “If I just had a little more.”
Materialism chokes out generosity and godliness until we are spiritually suffocated. In an unstable economy where nothing in the world feels secure, what a crucial time to remember that our hope is not in the dollar, but in the King who owns it all.
Soil 4: The Good, Fruitful Soil
Finally, Jesus describes the good soil.
Matthew 13:8-9 (NASB)
’And others fell on the good soil and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. ‘He who has ears, let him hear.’
When Jesus says, “He who has ears, let him hear,” it’s like saying, “Listen up! Lean in—you cannot afford to miss this.”
Matthew 13:23 (NASB)
‘And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.’
Good soil does not happen by accident; it takes deliberate cultivation. You have to break up the fallow ground, till it, fertilize it, and prepare it during the off-season. Wheat is sown in the fall, settles in over winter, germinates in spring, and is harvested in summer. It is seasonal.
We often want instant evangelism. We want to walk across the room, drop a quick tract or a clever apologetic, have someone check the salvation box, and say, “Done!” But spiritual life is seasonal. Sowing seed and reaping a harvest takes patience, prayer, and time.
For me, coming to Christ was a progress of belief. There was a defining moment at age thirteen when I sat on my bedroom floor, read through the Gospel of John, and prayed, “Lord, if this is true—if your death, burial, and resurrection really happened—I give my life to you.” But leading up to that night, there were coaches and Fellowship of Christian Athletes leaders who patiently loved on a punk athlete with a dirty mouth and no respect for authority. They kept sowing seeds month after month, season after season.
Notice that the good soil yields varying returns: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. In our culture, we constantly fall for the lie that bigger is always better, and we think, I want to be the hundredfold person. But a farmer was grateful for whatever harvest God provided through the rain and soil.
If God has called you to love your spouse faithfully, honor Him at your workplace, raise godly children, and share your faith with your neighbors, that is a fruitful harvest. We don’t all have to be Billy Graham to be faithful. Be satisfied with the portion God has entrusted to you, because it is God who gives the growth.
Living organisms grow and reproduce. If we say we belong to Jesus but have never shared our faith or discipled another soul, we have missed the heart of the mission. The gospel is not merely a fire insurance ticket to heaven; it is reconciliation with the Living God right now, overflowing into a fruitful life.
Becoming the Sowers
Most of the time when we read this parable, we ask: What kind of soil am I? That is a healthy question. But for those of us who follow Jesus, there is a second question: What kind of sowers are we?
Jesus has commissioned the church to carry the seed of the gospel into the world.
Matthew 28:19-20 (NASB)
‘Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.’
We are the message carriers. That means we need discernment to understand the soils around us where we live, work, and play.
I was able to encourage that teacher this week by reminding her: “Your coworker’s heart is a calloused path right now. It is not your fault that the seed didn’t take root today. You did what a faithful sower does—you scattered the seed. Hold your head high.”
As parents, our job is to till and cultivate the soil of our children’s hearts so the gospel can take deep root. As believers, our job is to scatter seed everywhere—not just where we think the ground looks promising. The sower threw seed across the whole field, trusting God with the outcome.
What does a farmer love about farming? He loves getting his hands dirty in the soil. He loves the hard work. He loves walking out into the field in the spring and seeing green shoots breaking through the dirt. And he loves the harvest when the fruit is gathered in.
Church, we need to be farmers. We have to love getting into the dirt of people’s messy lives, sowing the gospel with patience, and watching God bring dead hearts to life.
Let’s pray.
Father, thank you for this Word. Thank you for Jesus, the master teacher, who speaks straight to the core of our hearts. God, the soil of our hearts matters deeply. I pray that your gospel would penetrate our souls, take deep root, and produce a thirty, sixty, and hundredfold harvest for your glory. Soften the calloused paths. Pull up the choking thorns of materialism and worry. Give us the patience and courage to be faithful sowers where we live, work, and play. We ask all these things in the name of Christ. Amen.