Matthew 13:1-23

Introduction (13:1–9)

1 That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat beside the sea. 2 And great crowds gathered about him, so that he got into a boat and sat down. And the whole crowd stood on the beach. 3 And he told them many things in parables…

3 …saying: “A sower went out to sow. 4 And as he sowed, some seeds fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured them. 5 Other seeds fell on rocky ground, where they did not have much soil, and immediately they sprang up, since they had no depth of soil, 6 but when the sun rose they were scorched. And since they had no root, they withered away. 7 Other seeds fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked them. 8 Other seeds fell on good soil and produced grain, some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty. 9 He who has ears, let him hear.”

Context: a new family.

• Example: How a husband hears his wife is much different than how he consumes content on his phone—one must be active, engaged, and demanding, while the other can be passive, mindless, and easy. But the husband who hears and listens well is helping to develop a flourishing marriage.
• Jesus has just pointed to his disciples and redefined his family.
  • “For whoever does the will of my Father in heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” (Matt. 12:50)
    • Does: Jesus’ family doesn’t just listen; they hear, which means they obey.
• This raises the issue of hearing. Some will hear about him and his kingdom and receive him. Others will hear and reject him. So Jesus will tell a series of parables about that division, and the first one has to do with those who hear and those who don’t.

The parable.

• On the same day when he redefined family as those who hear him and do the will of his Father, Jesus began teaching in parables (1; 3; Matt. 12:50; Mark 3:34).
  • Some don’t hear him, instead rejecting him. Why?
• Setting: Jesus sits in a boat; the crowd stands on the beach—a natural amphitheater (1–2)
• A sower went out to sow: Farmers sow seed. Here the sower practices broadcast sowing: scattering seed everywhere, then plowing it under.
• Four soils

1. The path: the birds devour it (4)
2. Rocky ground: it springs up fast, then scorches (5–6)
3. Thorns: it gets choked (7)
4. Good soil: a hundredfold, sixty, thirty (8)

• Jesus: He who has ears, let him hear (9).

The Question: How do we best hear Jesus?

• The emphasis is on hearing, mentioned fifteen times in the passage.
  • How are you hearing?
  • How are you listening?
  • How can you keep your focus on the kingdom in this chaotic, noisy world?
• Transition: before Jesus explains the parable, his disciples ask why he speaks in parables at all (Matthew 13:10)

1. Hear with gratitude and prayer (13:10–17)

10 Then the disciples came and said to him, “Why do you speak to them in parables?”

Question: Why are you teaching the crowds with riddle-like parables?

11 And he answered them, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. 12 For to the one who has, more will be given, and he will have an abundance, but from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

Answer: God has not given them the secrets of the kingdom of heaven (11).

• Paragraph of Privilege. Jesus responds. The disciples, and others like them, are privileged to have been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven (11). But the crowds had not been given that privilege (11).
• Something about this reality caused Jesus to speak to the crowds in parables—and we’re about to find out why.

What are the secrets of the kingdom of heaven?

• Secrets (Greek mystēria): truth that can’t be reached by human insight, only revealed.
• The secret is that the kingdom has come differently than expected: hidden, seed-like, in Jesus himself.
  • He had come.
  • He was establishing his reign.
  • His reign wouldn’t look like they expected, or quite like the world would demand.
  • There would be nothing explosively dramatic about the kingdom. Like a seed, it would grow and grow.
• …the mystery hidden for ages and generations but now revealed to his saints…which is Christ in you, the hope of glory. (Col. 1:26–27)

13 This is why I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. 14 Indeed, in their case the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled that says:

‘You will indeed hear but never understand,
and you will indeed see but never perceive.”
15 For this people’s heart has grown dull,
and with their ears they can barely hear,
and their eyes they have closed,
lest they should see with their eyes
and hear with their ears
and understand with their heart
and turn, and I would heal them.’

Answer: Because their minds are darkened, but they think they are enlightened, I speak to them in parables (13).

• They think they are seeing, but they do not see (13). They think they are hearing, but they do not hear, nor do they understand (13).

Jesus stepped into Isaiah’s experience.

• Isaiah’s commission: preach to a people who would not hear (Isaiah 6:9–10).
• Jesus had (and has) a ministry like Isaiah’s—he always speaks to those who hear, but do not hear.

The parables were teaching instruments of some kind.

• An illustration. York Minster—three towers, each around 200 feet tall, visible across the city; centuries to complete. From inside, the stained glass blazes with Bible scenes. From outside, the same windows look dark and dingy; the details disappear.
  • Jesus’ parables work the same way.
    • For those inside, treasures they’ll cherish forever.
    • For those outside, confusing and dark.
    • But you should want to go inside!
• Remember: Jesus came as an extension of the love of God for the whole world (John 3:16).
  • Jesus came to seek and save the lost. His whole mission embodied the desire of God that people know him. The problem with the crowds was their tendency to think they knew him when they didn’t. The parables would help them pause to consider their beliefs.

16 But blessed are your eyes, for they see, and your ears, for they hear. 17 For truly, I say to you, many prophets and righteous people longed to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.

How should we who have been given to know the secrets of the kingdom respond? With gratitude and prayer.

Gratitude: thank you for letting me see and hear you, O Lord.

• All the saints—prophets and righteous people—had been longing to see and hear what the disciples saw and heard (17). We are so blessed to see and hear Jesus!
• “The hearing ear and the seeing eye, the LORD has made them both” (Prov. 20:12)

Prayer: please let those around me see and hear you, O Lord.

• Pray for the Spirit to give hearing ears: “Pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest” (Matt. 9:38).
• Pray for your own ears as well: “To the one who has, more will be given” (12).
  • More will be given (12): Like a muscle, hearing grows stronger with use and wastes away with neglect.

2. Hear above the noise (13:18–19)

18 “Hear then the parable of the sower: 19 When anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown along the path.

Ground 1. The seed has no opportunity here because it falls not on good soil but on a hardened pathway.

• The birds represent the evil one who snatches away the word sown in someone’s heart (19).
• They have that opportunity because the path is so compacted there is nowhere for the seed to go.
  • The path: where people walk.
    • The loudest voices—popular viewpoints that contradict Jesus’ kingdom. To many, if enough people are saying it, it must be what God is saying, but this isn’t true.

Eliminate the loudest voices.

• A footpath’s “main task is not receiving seed but receiving feet… it receives the activity of people and not the activity of the Sower as its main occupation.” (Bruner)
• We would be well served by an eye and ear audit.
  • Example: Ninety minutes of feed and five minutes of Scripture produce footpath ears.
  • Example: The ever-decreasing attention span.
  • Some areas to consider: your feeds; the apps that suck you in; the sites that numb you to the world; the rage bait that beckons you.

3. Hear the whole message (13:20–21)

20 As for what was sown on rocky ground, this is the one who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy, 21 yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while, and when tribulation or persecution arises on account of the word, immediately he falls away.

Ground 2. The seed has no opportunity here because it falls not on good soil but on shallow, rocky ground.

• Rocky ground: a thin layer of soil over limestone (20).
• Immediately…with joy: A real, glad reception, not a fake one (20).
• No root in himself: Joy without understanding and commitment can’t last (21).
• What causes this seed to fall away? (21)
  • Tribulation or persecution that arises on account of the word (21).

Accept the entire message.

• Jesus suffered, so will we.
• Rocky soil hearers embrace the emotional benefits, joy, and forgiveness of Jesus, but reject his ethical demands, cross, and trials.
• Discipleship (the entire message) is root work.

4. Hear with an undivided heart (13:22)

22 As for what was sown among thorns, this is the one who hears the word, but the cares of the world and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and it proves unfruitful.

Ground 3. The seed has no opportunity here because it falls not on good soil but on ground filled with thorny weeds.

• Two thorns
  • The cares of the world (22).
    • Literally: the anxiety of the age.
    • Not only personal worry but the anxious air of our time—the toxic, existential dread and catastrophic thinking of the surrounding culture.
  • The deceitfulness of riches (22).
    • Deception, but in later Greek it could also mean delight/pleasure.
    • Wealth deceives by feeling like delight—it feels like comfort and security rather than danger.
    • For Demas, in love with this present world, has deserted me… (2 Timothy 4:10)

Guard against competing cares.

• Anxiety: political fear, tribalism, doom-scrolling at 2 a.m.
• Riches: comfortable coastal wealth, where leisure, real estate, and taste are assumed.
• Image maintenance: curating a life for others to see.
• Uproot, don’t just trim: deal with the root of the anxiety and the love of money, not only the symptoms.
  • Antidote attitude: I am content with Jesus alone (secret of contentment, Phil. 4:11–13).

5. Hear and understand (13:23)

23 As for what was sown on good soil, this is the one who hears the word and understands it. He indeed bears fruit and yields, in one case a hundredfold, in another sixty, and in another thirty.”

Ground 4. The seed grew well on this good soil.

• The shortest description of the four: “being a fruitful Christian is not complicated” (Bruner).
  • No ten steps, no special techniques; the soil’s one job is to give the seed room.
• Step 1. Hear the word of the kingdom.
• Step 2. Understand the word of the kingdom.
• Step 3. The natural byproduct will be fruit.
  • Understand/Receive the word of the kingdom→Obedience, transformed life, character, broadcasting the seed

Conclusion

• We go back to the house for a time of examination.
  • Jesus gathered with his disciples—they heard and did the will of the Father.
  • Ongoing question: Am I hearing Jesus well? Am I listening like a good husband would listen to his wife?
• Hope: the Son did hear and do the will of the Father for us—and now he dispenses grace upon grace to us.
  • For from his fullness we have all received, grace upon grace. (John 1:16, ESV)

Study Questions

Head (Knowledge, Facts, Understanding)

1. Jesus tells the parable of the sower on “that same day” he redefined his family as “whoever does the will of my Father in heaven” (Matt. 12:50; 13:1). How does that context shape what Jesus means by hearing, and why does the sermon say his family doesn’t just listen but hears—which means they obey?
2. Jesus says the disciples have been given “to know the secrets of the kingdom of heaven,” while the crowds have not (Matt. 13:11), and he ties his parables to Isaiah’s commission (Matt. 13:14–15; Isa. 6:9–10). What is the secret the sermon describes, and how do the parables work like the York Minster windows—brilliant from inside, dark from outside?

Heart (Feelings, Impressions, Desires)

1. The sermon opens and closes with a husband who truly hears his wife, and asks, “Am I hearing Jesus well?” Honestly, is your hearing of Jesus more like attentive listening or like passive scrolling? What does it stir in you that the Son has already heard and done the Father’s will for you, giving “grace upon grace” (John 1:16)?
2. Jesus names two thorns: the cares of the world—the anxiety of the age—and the deceitfulness of riches, which feels like delight rather than danger (Matt. 13:22). Which one feels closer to home right now, and what are you afraid of losing if you uprooted it rather than just trimmed it?

Hands (Actions, Commitments, Decisions, Beliefs)

1. The sermon calls for an eye and ear audit: “Ninety minutes of feed and five minutes of Scripture produce footpath ears.” Looking at your feeds, apps, and the rage bait that beckons you, what one concrete change will you make this week to quiet the loudest voices and give the word room?
2. Rocky-ground hearers embrace the joy and forgiveness of Jesus but reject his ethical demands, cross, and trials (Matt. 13:20–21). Where do you need to accept the entire message? And who will you commit to pray for, asking the Lord of the harvest to give them hearing ears (Matt. 9:38)?

Sources Used

• Frederick Dale Bruner, Matthew: A Commentary, Volume 2—The Churchbook, Matthew 13–28
• D. A. Carson, Matthew
• R. T. France, The Gospel of Matthew
• Craig L. Blomberg, Matthew
• Craig S. Keener, A Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew
• Michael J. Wilkins, Matthew