4
“He Began to Tell Them Many, Many Things in Parables”
1 Jesus+ began teaching beside the lake once again, and such a large crowd gathered near him that he got into a boat and sat in it out on the lake, while the whole crowd remained here: At the water’s edge on the shore.
2 Then he began to teach them many, many things in parables. As he was teaching them, he said:+
“A sower went out to sow his seed”
3 “Listen! Pay close attention: A sower went out to sow his seed.
4 While he was sowing, some seed fell along the path, and so the birds came and ate it up.
5 Other seed fell on the hard bedrock, where it had only a thin layer of soil,+ and it sprouted quickly because the soil was not deep enough.
6 When the sun came up, it was scorched, and because it didn’t have sufficient root,+ it dried up.
7 Other seed fell among plants with thorns, and the plants with thorns grew up and choked the life out of it, so that it produced no crop.
8 Other seeds fell on good ground and were producing a crop as they sprang up and grew, and they went on to yield a harvest—one thirty times, and one sixty times, and one a hundred times what was sown.”
9 Then he added, “If you have ears to hear, then listen carefully and pay close attention!”+
10 When Jesus+ was away from the crowd, the Twelve and the others around him began asking him about the parables.
11 “To ᵖyou,” he replied, “has been entrusted the mystery concerning the Kingdom of God.+ To those on the outside, however, everything takes place in parables,
12 so that
“ ‘they may look closely, but not perceive,
and may listen intently, but not understand.
Otherwise, they might return,
in which case their sins+ would be forgiven them.’+”
13 Then he said to them, “Do ᵖyou not understand this parable? How in the world will you understand, then, any of the parables?
14 As for the sower, it is the message+ that he is sowing.
15 The seed that+ fell along the path, where the message is sown, represents these people: When they hear, immediately Satan comes and takes away the message that was sown in them.
16 The seed sown here—on the hard bedrock—represents these people: When they hear the message, they immediately receive it with joy.
17 In these people the message doesn’t take deep enough root,+ however, and they endure only a short time. Later on, when affliction or persecution occurs because of the message, they quickly stumble with offense.+
18 The seed sown here—among the plants with thorns—represents still other people. These are the ones who hear the message,
19 but then something keeps coming in and choking the life out of the message: The worries of this age and the deceitfulness of riches and the desire for other things. And so what does it become? Unfruitful.
20 But the seed sown here—on the good ground—represents these people: They hear the message and welcome it and bear fruit—one thirty times, and one sixty times, and one a hundred times what was sown.”
“Nothing is hidden except for the purpose of being disclosed”
21 Jesus+ also said to them, “A lamp isn’t brought in to be placed under the measuring basket, is it, or under the bed? Of course not. The lampstand is where it is to be placed, is it not?
22 Nothing is hidden except for the purpose of being disclosed,+ you see, and nothing is concealed except for the purpose of eventually coming out into the open.++
23 If you have ears to hear, then listen carefully and pay close attention!+”
24 He also said to them, “Make sure that ᵖyou give careful thought and attention to what ᵖyou are hearing.+ The more ᵖyou do so, the more understanding you will be given, and then still more will be provided to ᵖyou.+
25 If someone is responsive and attentive and trustworthy with little, you see, further understanding will be entrusted to him.++ If someone is dull and stubborn and unwilling to listen, however, then even the little understanding he does have+ will be taken away from him.+”
“This is what the Kingdom of God is like: As when a man scatters seed on the ground”
26 He also said, “This is what the Kingdom of God is like: As when a man scatters seed on the ground,
27 and then sleeps night after night and gets up day after day+ while the seed goes on sprouting and getting taller, though he himself doesn’t understand how it happens.
28 The ground produces a harvest all on its own—first the blade, then the head, and then the full grain on the head.
29 As soon as the crop+ is ripe,+ he sends in the sickle, because the time for harvest has come.”+
“It is like a mustard seed”
30 He also said, “To what can we compare the Kingdom of God? What parable is it that we can use+ to explain+ it?
31 It is like a mustard seed; although this seed,+ when sown in the ground, is of all the different kinds of seeds in the ground the smallest,
32 after it has been sown it comes up and becomes the largest of all the garden plants and produces such large branches that ‘under its shade the wild birds+ are able to nest.’+”+
“He wouldn’t say anything to them, in fact, without using a parable”
33 It was with many parables such as these that Jesus+ kept proclaiming the message+ to them, as they were able to listen.+
34 He wouldn’t say anything to them, in fact, without using a parable. Privately, however, he was explaining everything to his own disciples.
“Even the Winds and the Waves Obey Him!”
35 That day, when it was evening, he said to his disciples,+ “Let’s cross over to the other side of the lake.”
36 So after leaving the crowd, they took him with them, since he was already in the boat.+ There accompanied+ him, too, other boats.
37 Suddenly+ a fierce windstorm developed, and so many waves were breaking into the boat that it was quickly filling up with water.+
38 Jesus,+ meanwhile, was in the back part of the boat with his head on a cushion+ asleep. The disciples+ woke him up and said to him, “Teacher! Surely you care that we’re about to die, don’t you?”
39 Then Jesus+ got up and issued a stern command to the wind and said to the waves,+ “Silence! Be still!”+ At that the wind died down and things became completely calm.
40 Then he said to the disciples,+ “Why are ᵖyou so cowardly? Do ᵖyou still not have any faith?”
41 The disciples+ were struck with great fear. “ Who then is this man?” they kept saying to one another. “Even the wind and the waves+ obey him!”+