Saturday in the 24th Week of Ordinary Time, September 23, 2023

Luke 8, 4-15

When a large crowd gathered, with people from one town after another journeying to Jesus, he spoke in a parable. “A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path and was trampled, and the birds of the sky ate it up. Some seed fell on rocky ground, and when it grew, it withered for lack of moisture. Some seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew with it and choked it. And some seed fell on good soil, and when it grew, it produced fruit a hundredfold.” After saying this, he called out, “Whoever has ears to hear ought to hear.”  Then his disciples asked him what the meaning of this parable might be. He answered, “Knowledge of the mysteries of the Kingdom of God has been granted to you; but to the rest, they are made known through parables so that they may look but not see, and hear but not understand.  This is the meaning of the parable. The seed is the word of God. Those on the path are the ones who have heard, but the Devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts that they may not believe and be saved. Those on rocky ground are the ones who, when they hear, receive the word with joy, but they have no root; they believe only for a time and fall away in time of temptation. As for the seed that fell among thorns, they are the ones who have heard, but as they go along, they are choked by the anxieties and riches and pleasures of life, and they fail to produce mature fruit. But as for the seed that fell on rich soil, they are the ones who, when they have heard the word, embrace it with a generous and good heart, and bear fruit through perseverance.”

St. Luke’s account of the Parable of the Sower runs twelve verses and St. Matthew’s (Matthew 13, 3-23) runs twenty-one.  This occurs largely because Matthew includes dialogue between theLord and his Apostles that Luke either did not hear about from his sources or that he did not think necessary for the Parable’s elucidation.  He may also have not included it in his account because it makes the Parable seem more about why the Jews, particularly, failed to believe in him, whereas Luke, writing for Gentile Christians, saw the lesson as applying to the Gentiles as well.  The question of why the whole world did not leap up at the coming of its Savior and be quick to believe in him puzzled those who did welcome him, and Saints Matthew, Mark, and Luke include the Parable in their Gospels because in it the Lord explains the reasons very clearly.  

The Lord reveals the “seed” in his Parable as “the word of God”, which means the content of the Lord’s preaching.  The “sower” is to be understood as the Church, through which the word of God is preached and taught throughout the world by the Lord Jesus.  Alternatively, we can understand the sower as the Lord himself.  The word of God is “sown” in all places, whether likely to produce fruit or not.  Everyone in some way is given the opportunity to accept or reject the word of God.  Some reject his word out of hand because they have chosen to walk on the path of wickedness.  Others receive it at first when it is easy for them to do so but in the rockiness of life they give it up rather than allow it to sustain them.  Some receive it and try to make it fit in with other priorities.  These pick and choose which of Christ’s doctrines they will believe and practice.  They may produce fruit of a kind, but it is immature and amounts to the same worth as if they had not.  It is evident to the believer who these folks are because their works or lack thereof identifies them.  And it is necessary for the faithful to recognize these in order to do whatever is possible to bolster their faith.  These faithful are those who “have heard the word, embrace it with a generous and good heart, and bear fruit through perseverance.”  They are fertile soil in that they desire to live virtuous lives and are open to God’s word.  They bear fruit through perseveringly striving to bolster the faith of the weak, teaching it to children as well as adults, and by praying for the conversion of the world.

“Knowledge of the mysteries of the Kingdom of God has been granted to you; but to the rest, they are made known through parables so that they may look but not see, and hear but not understand.”  The Lord uses a figure of speech here: “the knowledge of the mysteries of the Kingdom of God” is revealed to the Apostles because they are so zealous for these mysteries that they have left everything behind in order to learn them.  “The rest”, that is, those who are not (yet) committed to the Lord and do not have the capacity for understanding the mysteries.  These, indeed, hear the parables but they do not ask the Lord what they mean: “they may look but not see, and hear but not understand”.  They ponder the parables for a time and then forget them as they go about their daily lives.

To those who are faithful, the Lord Jesus has revealed the mysteries of the Kingdom of God.  We marvel at them, meditate upon them, and hope one day to come face to face with the One who is at the heart of them.