Series: Grow Strong
Sermon: Growing Whom?
Speaker and Writer: Jessyka Albert
Refresh: Start with a prayer. Ask for the Holy Spirit to open your heart to new understanding and for God’s character to be revealed.
Read: Matthew 13:1-43 (NLT). Note 1–3 insights or questions.
Reflect: To those who asked “why?” Jesus unpacks the parable, putting it simply:
The seed = the word of the kingdom
The soil = our hearts
Makes sense agriculturally. Makes sense figuratively.
When I was five years old, my family moved from the California Bay Area to the countryside of Washington state. My dad dove full force into developing the best possible garden. He worked tirelessly, digging up hundreds of rocks, tilling the soil, and adding fertilizer. What was once dry and rocky ground became an overflowing green garden. This didn’t happen overnight, or even over one season. It took years before that soil qualified as “good.”
Reading this parable, it’s easy to just believe that the good soil was just there. Our culture has primed us to think that good things just show up. Nice houses are just built. Delicious meals are just prepared. Interesting books are just written. Memorable movies are just made. Thriving cities are just developed. The new iPhone just appeared.
As you picture your heart as being like soil, ask what you are doing every day to till it. To remove rocks? To nourish it? A relationship with Jesus is truly a Daily Walk. I think my dad was often ready to give up on his dream of a garden. There were too many rocks and the ground was too hard, but he kept going, making small improvements that over time amounted to large improvements. Our hearts might contain some rocks that seem too big to move or ground that’s too hard to till. It will take time, it will take blood, sweat, and tears, and it will take dedication, but our hearts aren’t something to take lightly. It’s not good enough to settle on an occasional walk with Jesus. We must allow Him to remove sharp rocks and to soften our hearts every day.
The habits of older people, whether at home or at church, are passed along to children and younger people who are forming their own rhythm of life. When we take kids along on the journey of bringing both our joys and struggles to God—no matter how small—we provide an example that they will follow through their journey into adulthood. They will learn to take the rocks from their hearts and lay them at Jesus’ feet.
Recalibrate: Which kind of soil does your heart feel like lately? How have you been living the past few months and how does that correlate with how your heart feels?
Respond: Pray for a desire to have a closer relationship with Jesus. Ask for help in removing the big rocks stuck in your heart.
Research: Read Peter Scazzero’s “The Emotionally Healthy Church.”
Wonder: Get out some Play-Doh or improvise with something else (applesauce in a Ziploc bag works great) and something hard like a piece of Lego. Talk about how Jesus wants us to have soft hearts and not hard hearts. Pray for Jesus to keep our hearts growing in Him.
Adventure: Help your child find a rock and decorate it (bonus points if you make one too). Designate this rock as your child's “prayer rock.” Whenever a tough time comes up or their hearts are feeling hard, take a moment to bring out the rock and pray with them that Jesus will soften and work on their hearts.
Purpose: What are some things that have happened in your life that have caused you to put up some walls or develop a tough shell? It’s scary to ask Jesus for a soft heart. Journal or draw a picture of what these walls look like. What would be the hardest part if these walls came down?