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‘But that on the good ground are they, which in an honest and good heart, having heard the word, keep it, and bring forth fruit with patience.’
Luk_8:15
I. There is a certain condition of the man that appreciates and that advances to welcome the Word of God when submitted to it. What is that condition? The honesty and goodness are not the fruit of the Word, seeing that they are the attitude in which they are to receive the Word. And yet just as there is a kind of soil fitted to receive and promote the seed of the sower which falls upon it, so there must be a cognate condition of heart. The ‘honest and good’ is a well-known combination of Greek words, a familiar coupling of epithets which have acquired an almost technical meaning; and when applied to men it meant a man of noble, kind, and generous race, worthy of one’s descent, true to the primal birth and endowments. I think that that word ‘generous,’ seeing that we ourselves have long been accustomed to apply it to inanimate things, would really be a very adequate rendering of the two Greek words here in combination. We know what we mean when we speak of the soil as a generous soil; it is a metaphor, no doubt, but it is one that we all accept. And even that further use of ‘generous’ in the sense of giving is not out of harmony with it.
II. A generous soil is a soil that gives as well as receives; it gives something of its own to meet half-way the boon conferred upon it; and so they both co-operate to the blessed end of bringing forth fruit. So the heart that hears the Word with gladness, it too is prepared to give as well as take.
III. Those who accepted the Word.—When we think of the various personages in the Bible history whose acceptance of the Word to rich and blessed ends is brought under our notice, it is abundantly clear that this description does not mean that the Word of God is not accepted by those who only come to it with a spotless record of past lives. We know, and it is the one hope and consolation of our lives to know, that it was not the spotlessly clean ecclesiastics of our Lord’s day who appreciated and accepted the message that He brought, but it was the sin-stained, those who approached Christ with no antecedent qualities for honesty and goodness; not the respectable but the unrespectable class for the most part supplied the hearts in whose soil the Word found its most fertilising acceptance. The man who was only too well aware of his unbelief, not the man who prided himself on his orthodoxy; the woman who had been a sinner, not the highly born lady who would have spurned her from her presence; not the Scribe who came into court with the cleanest of clean hands in such matters. Such were the subjects on which the Word tried its power with the most wondrous success. And therefore it must have been all such who came under the rule laid down by our text. The ‘honest and good’ heart describes these outcasts, these downright sinners at that moment when the Word found them and was welcomed and began its beneficent work.
Rev. Canon Ainger.
Illustration‘Paradoxical as it may seem, it was not the strangeness or difficulty of our Lord’s first parable that was a stumbling-block to many who heard it, it was rather their familiarity and their simplicity. The defect in the listener who was offended by them was not that of mental acuteness, they were not so dull as that they failed to understand a simple metaphor; it was that they were so accustomed to receive a religious teaching of a different kind, that this new sort seemed as it first fell on their ear trivial. If the Pharisees and doctors of the law were asked to deliver a religious homily it would have been something altogether different, something in fact quite over the heads of the unlearned; and therefore when this new Rabbi proceeded to unfold His religious message, and began to tell simple fables of the ploughman and sower, and all the homely details of the life around them, it seemed to the anxious listener a mockery, an evasion of a sacred duty. It was not because the analogy was too hard for them to understand, but because it was too easy, that they were first offended.’
‘And bring forth fruit with patience.’
Luk_8:15
I. In ordinary business affairs.—Impatience is the cause of probably the greatest number of business disasters. Too great a hurry to get rich entails unwise ventures, and very frequently failures. If a business is to be one that is built up on sound, firm lines, it must be of slow growth, there must be patience. We get an exact illustration of this in nature. That plant-life which, in the world of nature, grows with great rapidity, dies with equal rapidity; but that which is permanent, is the slow-growing, hard wood.
II. In religious life.—In things appertaining to the spiritual side of man’s nature, this patience is essential. To some extent, I think, this is recognised; but I want to show you that patience occupies, or should occupy, a much larger space in our religious life than most of us think.
(a) If we want to cure a bad habit, to conquer, by God’s help, a besetting sin, it is necessary to have patience. Any disease of long standing takes a long time to get rid of, and we have the requisite patience for the healing of the disease of the body.
(b) In working for others patience is needed. People so soon despair because they are not able to see results. That is because they have not learned the necessary lesson that there must be patience to let good work grow. How foolish our despair is, when we call ourselves by the name of Christians, when we profess to draw our inspiration from Jesus, and to regard Him as our Teacher and Leader.
(c) In praying for others. We do not see any result, we do not see any improvement. And many people give up praying because they have not found any result to their prayers. They know it must be God’s will to grant such prayers, and it becomes a trial to their faith when they are not answered. Patience, to let God’s things grow, that is the reply. You may never even live to see the fruit, but you may be perfectly sure that such prayers are answered, and produce their results.
III. In matters of faith.—People do not always realise that patience is needed in matters of faith. All my hearers are probably in the habit of saying the Apostles’ Creed. You begin, ‘I believe,’ and I expect, if you are thinkers, from time to time the thought flashes across your minds, ‘Here am I saying “I believe.” What do I mean? Do I really believe at all? Do I believe in such a sense that it has no effect upon my life?’ And then, if we are patient, if we understand that faith, as everything else that is valuable in this world, must be a plant of slow growth, we shall study, read, think, pray. But if we are not patient, we shall do what a good many people do when they start thinking, and probably for the first time in their life think about matters of faith, realise that what they imagined they believed they only accepted because they had never considered it, and then they say, ‘I do not believe.’ That is impatience. How can we imagine that if it takes so much time to learn the things of this world, it should not take any time to learn the things of God?
—
Rev. H. G. Hills.
Illustrations(1) ‘To learn to wait is, perhaps, the hardest thing we can be set to do. We are naturally disposed to do just the reverse. We would wish to get rid of temptations and troubles at once. We would wish to realise blessings and enjoyments now. We do not bear our trials patiently. We fret under them, and often think at the bottom of our hearts that we are unkindly treated in having so many. Now this isn’t being Christ-like; and we should all wish to be like Jesus Christ. We must bring forth fruit “in patience,” or we shall, perhaps, bring forth none at all.’
(2)
A golden promise fair and great
In precept-mould is cast.
Soon shall the morning gild
The dark horizon-rim,
Thy heart’s desire shall be fulfilled:
Wait patiently for Him.’