Dear Friends,

Listen! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seeds fell on the path, and the birds came and ate them up… Hear then the parable of the sower. When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what is sown in the heart; this is what was sown on the path (Matt 13:3-4,18-19).

What makes a path?

A path is often a shortcut, finding the route of least resistance around obstacles. People or animals going the same direction at the same time make a path. Feet, hooves, or tires traverse over the same ground again and again, packing the earth. The tender plants are broken and ground underfoot. When the soil is compressed and hard, the fragile shoots cannot make their way through. Eventually, the path becomes a rut.

What would make our hearts like a stony, rutted path?

Might it be too many people allowed into our lives, walking through, asking us to come with them, demanding less resistance and more compliance with their ideas and wishes, insisting that we take the same route of thought and action?

Perhaps they hike through our hearts when we want to please them and can’t bring ourselves to say “no” whenever they want to enter our time, our hopes, our rest. Do we just open the gate and let them trample through even though we quietly resent them, daydream ways to thwart them, and relive their impositions and insults until bitterness glazes over the worn-smooth places in our hearts with the hardness of cement?

Perhaps the pedestrians crowd in at our invitation, in our egotistical endeavors to take care of everyone and everything. Over-exposure to the heat of the day can bake a crust over our souls hard enough to bruise those who stumble upon it.

Truth be told, we allow a lot of people inside because they agree with us, or us with them. “Group-think” can make us feel righteous, filling our capacity to receive the Spirit with complacent pride until the seeds of inspiration have no opportunity to take root and yield their green, tender shoots of renewal. Instead, those seeds of truth and love are no more than pigeon food, gone in the same hour they are sown.

Do we complain about the lack of rain as if its God’s fault that we are in this hard, rutted condition that would repel the drops even should they fall. In the end, is our only value to be useful walkways for those on their way to somewhere else?

Instead of our hearts being a quiet, verdant place suitable for an exploratory ramble in the woods and fields with God are they paved over like a fenced-off interstate with a long way to go before we can reach an exit to pull off or turn around? How many people are traveling through anyway? Let every one of us examine our heart and test our own actions in these matters (Gal 6:4).

What can we do? Jesus said it with the first word of the Parable of the Sower — “Listen!”

If we want to return our hardened paths to their natural condition so grass and flowers and trees can grow, they have to be plowed up, the soil aerated, new seeds planted and the rain and the sun allowed to do their work without force or interference. That’s what listening to the word of God does for hearts trampled down by the back-and-forth of busyness and that are hardened by the heat of over-exposure.

So why not listen? “Who has the time?” is the excuse I usually get from the same men and women who turn down the Master’s dinner invitation because of their business concerns, property management, and family time (Luke 14:15-24). Yes, I said it, even family. If any of those things get between God and us, we are in real trouble. We are in worse trouble if any of those things become God to us.

A wise friend told me years ago, “Take care of the King’s business, and he’ll take care of your business.” It takes true faith, but if everything we have is from the Lord, can we not trust him to lead and provide for us in business, property, and family matters?

The commands to “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your minds; and your neighbor as yourself” are inextricably linked, one flowing over into another. We cannot claim that God is our life in Christ Jesus if he is denied access to portions of the hardened paths worn across our hearts by our commitments to everyone but him.

The Apostle John instructs us that our belief in and love for Jesus will determine the quality of love in our human relationships. He writes: “Everyone who believes that Jesus is the Christ has been born of God, and everyone who loves the parent loves the child. By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments. And his commandments are not burdensome for whoever is born of God conquers the world” (1 John 5:1-4). I can say from experience that I did not become a husband, a father, boss or friend worthy of those roles until God took over my life.

We must let God take over if the hard surface of our heart is to be broken up and restored to the goodness and honesty suitable to grow God’s life in us. That means repentance — a change of direction, a clearing of schedules and an unconditional surrender of all that we are and all that we have to the Lord. There can be no half-measures in this. As Abraham laid Isaac on the altar in faithfulness, so we have to lay at the foot of the Cross everything we hold dear in life and love and trust God for what happens next (Gen 22; Heb 11:17-19).

Jesus said prostitutes and tax-collectors understand the need for repentance far better than those caught in the rut of performance (Matt 21:28-32). We church-going, right-living, tax-paying types tend to think of repentance as a good thing for those enmeshed in sex, drugs, alcohol, gambling and rock & roll. But is the highway to hell of flamboyant sinners any worse than our rutted, hard-packed path of activity where the evil one keeps snatching the words God sows there for us because we are too busy to listen to them so they take root in our heart and bear fruit in our conduct?

Repentance and listening to God are also not things that can be put off for vacation or retirement. Jesus’ invitation to “Come and to me, all you that are weary and are carrying heavy burdens, and I will give you rest” is meant those carrying those burdens right now (Matt 11:28-29). Praying, “Lord, just let me get this accomplished or that done and then I will come to you,” won’t cut it. If you continue to carry those burdens it will just compress the soil in the path of your heart and make it harder. The Letter to the Hebrew’s calls us to rest in God the Creator by repeating David’s warning, “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts as in the rebellion” (Heb 3:15).

Men, in particular tend to blow off Jesus’ invitation to “Come to me and rest,” as something reserved for needlepoint samplers and bumper stickers. “Real men work and don’t shirk their responsibilities for Bible study” is a popular conception. I might buy that if I hadn’t had a Grandfather and a Dad, carpenter-contractors,  who worked dawn to dusk, often six days a week, to feed, clothe and pay church school tuition. Yet they found time to faithfully read their Bible, never missed family worship, and were in the pew with us every week, as a matter of joy in the Lord, not of obligation.

I have that same joy in my heart and so does my son working full time and completing his master’s degree. It’s a matter of choice for us. We’ve chosen God who represents life and love for us across the generations. It’s not that we are special or perfect. Each of us has allowed people and activity to pound paths across our hearts at times, but we know by the impulse of love to return to the presence of the Lord for times of refreshing (Acts 3:20).

It is possible and practical to put God first in every aspect of our lives, but it will never happen if we put it off until we cease the activity and curb the traffic through our hearts. Repentance is not one more project. It is a complete and permanent change of direction.

Busy believers tend to plan their agendas and ask God to bless them. Obedience literally means to listen to God and do what he says to do. Those who would have the hard-surfaced paths of their hearts transformed to a good and honest place where God’s Word lives and grows, need to receive the new life he offers them and live it out in obedient faith in his Word and by the empowerment of grace (Tit 2:11-13).

A simple prayer will begin the change of heart from hard path to garden: “Lord, I give in to you. Take over. Make your life and my life one in holiness.” This is a prayer that I know for a fact that he will answer.

“O taste and see that the Lord is good. Happy are those who take refuge in him” (Ps 34:8).

Under the mercy of Christ,

Kent

 

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