TITLE: The Parables- Stories of the Realm TEXT: Matthew 13:1-23, Luke 8:1ff. THEME: The more open...

TITLE: The Parables- Stories of the Realm

TEXT: Matthew 13:1-23, Luke 8:1ff.

THEME: The more open you are to God’s truth the more truth He will reveal to you.

Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes

Basis for

“The Man from La Mancha”

with the theme song

“To Dream the Impossible Dream”

The story illustrates the power of deception and perception- both

can shape our view of reality and delude us into seeing what is not

in reality there.

It is clear both views cannot be true and it is equally clear that

either one or the other is right or even that both are wrong.

I. Jesus began speaking in parables only after He was rejected

by Jewish leaders. (Matt 12)

Matthew 12:22-32

22 Then they brought him a demon-possessed man who was blind and mute, and Jesus healed him, so that he could both talk and see. 23 All the people were astonished and said, “Could this be the Son of David?” 24 But when the Pharisees heard this, they said, “It is only by Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that this fellow drives out demons.”

Matthew 12:22-32

25 “Jesus knew their thoughts and said to them, “Every kingdom divided against itself will be ruined, and every city or household divided against itself will not stand. 26 If Satan drives out Satan, he is divided against himself. How then can his kingdom stand? 27 And if I drive out demons by Beelzebul, by whom do your people drive them out? So then, they will be your judges.”

Matthew 12:22-32

28 “But if it is by the Spirit of God that I drive out demons, then the kingdom of God has come upon you. 29 “Or again, how can anyone enter a strong man’s house and carry off his possessions unless he first ties up the strong man? Then he can plunder his house.”

Matthew 12:22-32

30 “Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters. 31 And so I tell you, every kind of sin and slander can be forgiven, but blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. 32 Anyone who speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but anyone who speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come.”

I. Jesus began speaking in parables only after He was rejected by Jewish

leaders. (Matt 12)

A. The Jewish leaders had just condemned a miraculous exorcism done by Jesus as a work of Satan.

.


leaders. (Matt 12)


B. Jesus describes this an unforgiveable sin in that it is blasphemy against the Holy Spirit.


leaders. (Matt 12)



C. The unforgiveable sin is attributing something done by the H.S. through Jesus as the work of Satan through Jesus.


leaders. (Matt 12)A. The Jewish leaders had just condemned a miraculous exorcism done by Jesus as a work of Satan.


C. The unforgiveable sin is attributing something done by the H.S. through Jesus as the work of Satan through Jesus.

D. The unpardonable sin is no longer possible because Jesus is no longer on earth.

II. The first parable of Jesus came as a surprise to his disciples. (1-10)

Matthew 13:1-10

“1 That same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the lake. 2 Such large crowds gathered around him that he got into a boat and sat in it, while all the people stood on the shore. 3 Then he told them many things in parables, saying: “A farmer went out to sow his seed. 4 As he was scattering the seed, some fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.”

Matthew 13:1-10

“5 Some fell on rocky places, where it did not have much soil. It sprang up quickly, because the soil was shallow. 6 But when the sun came up, the plants were scorched, and they withered because they had no root. 7 Other seed fell among thorns, which grew up and choked the plants. 8 Still other seed fell on good soil, where it produced a crop—a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown. 9 Whoever has ears, let them hear.”

Matthew 13:1-10

“10 The disciples came to him and asked, “Why do you speak to the people in parables?”


A. The rejection of Jesus by Jewish leaders leads Him to teach in parables.


A. The rejection of Jesus by Jewish leaders leads Him to teach in parables

B. Parables are designed to be confusing to the ones who hears them.


A. The rejection of Jesus by Jewish leaders leads Him to teach in parables

B. Parables are designed to be confusing to the ones who hears them.

C. Parables require that Jesus interpret their meaning.

Slave girl bought from slavery

Her new owner said, “You are free to go.”

Slave girl bought from slavery

Her new owner said, “You are free to go.”

She looked at him intently and replied, "Then I will go with you."

III. Jesus speaks in parables to provide exclusive truth to His

followers (11-16)

Matthew 13:11-16

11 He replied, “Because the knowledge of the secrets of the kingdom of heaven has been given to you, but not to them. 12 Whoever has will be given more, and they will have an abundance. Whoever does not have, even what they have will be taken from them. 13 This is why I speak to them in parables:

“Though seeing, they do not see;

though hearing, they do not hear or understand.

longed to see what you see but did not see it, and to hear what you hear but did not hear it.

Matthew 13:11-16

14 In them is fulfilled the prophecy of Isaiah:

“‘You will be ever hearing but never understanding;

you will be ever seeing but never perceiving.

15 For this people’s heart has become calloused;

they hardly hear with their ears,

and they have closed their eyes.

Otherwise they might see with their eyes,

hear with their ears,

understand with their hearts

and turn, and I would heal them.’

Matthew 13:11-16

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


followers (11-16)A. Kingdom secrets are revealed only to those who accept the truth of Jesus.



1. More truth is given to those who are open and accept.



1. More truth is given to those who are open and accept.

2. Less truth is given to those who are closed and reject.



B. Your openness to Jesus determines how much God will reveal to you.

James 4:14

“Come near to God and He will come near to you.”



B. Your openness to Jesus determines how much God will reveal to you.

C. As citizens of the realm we are granted insights about God’s Kingdom that are not granted to others.

CS Lewis, “Meditations in a Toolshed”

“I was standing today in the dark toolshed. The sun was shining outside and through the crack at the top of the door there came a sunbeam. From where I stood that beam of light, with the specks of dust floating in it, was the most striking thing in the place. Everything else was almost pitch-black. I was seeing the beam, not seeing things by it.


“Then I moved, so that the beam fell on my eyes. Instantly the whole previous picture vanished. I saw no toolshed, and (above all) no beam. Instead I saw, framed in the irregular cranny at the top of the door, green leaves moving on the branches of a tree outside and beyond that, 90 odd million miles away, the sun. Looking along the beam, and looking at the beam are very different experiences.


But this is only a very simple example of the difference between looking at and looking along. A young man meets a girl. The whole world looks different when he sees her. Her voice reminds him of something he has been trying to remember all his life, and ten minutes casual chat with her is more precious than all the favours that all other women in the world could grant. He is, as they say, “in love”. Now comes a scientist and describes this young man's experience from the outside. For him it is all an affair of the young man's genes and a recognised biological stimulus.


That is the difference between looking along the sexual impulse and looking at it. When you have got into the habit of making this distinction you will find examples of it all day long. The mathematician sits thinking, and to him it seems that he is contemplating timeless and space less truths about quantity. But the cerebral physiologist, if he could look inside the mathematician's head, would find nothing timeless…


As soon as you have grasped this simple distinction, it raises a question. You get one experience of a thing when you look along it and another when you look at it. Which is the “true” or “valid” experience? Which tells you most about the thing? And you can hardly ask that question without noticing that for the last fifty years or so everyone has been taking the answer for granted.


It has been assumed without discussion that if you want the true account of religion you must go, not to religious people, but to anthropologists; that if you want the true account of sexual love you must go, not to lovers, but to psychologists; that if you want to understand some “ideology” (such as medieval chivalry or the nineteenth-century idea of a “gentleman”), you must listen not to those who lived inside it, but to sociologists.

APPLICATION

1. All of us are prone to be being deceived and our view of things can be shaped by lies and distortions. The word “Satan” itself means “The Deceiver.” Perception shapes how we view reality.

APPLICATION

2. How you view Jesus and His Word will determine how much you will be able to understand about God and His Kingdom.

APPLICATION

3. The more open you are to Jesus and His Kingdom the more He will reveal to you.

APPLICATION

4. Do not be surprised that some will reject Jesus’s claims and His accounts of the Kingdom. Jesus not only says this will happen but He purposely holds truth from them because of the unwillingness to be open to Him.

APPLICATION

5. The modern secularist worldview argues that matter is all there is and that natural laws and behaviors can account for everything. But, as a result, they miss out on the greatest and most important truth of all. They miss the point for which we and everything has been made.

John Lennox, Oxford Professor, Mathematician, Christian Apolgist

You can study a letter from two approaches. • The one approach is that you can analyze

the composition of the ink and paper of a letter.




• The other approach is that you can read it and find the purpose of the letter.




• The other approach is that you can read it and find the purpose of the letter.

• The real purpose of the letter is found in the message that the words communicate.

Conclusion

Many would have us believe that the paper and ink of life is all that matters. Yet God has this profound and important message in His creation that tells us why He created us and the universe and what our role is to be in it.

TITLE: The Parables- Stories of the Realm TEXT: Matthew 13:1-23, Luke 8:1ff. THEME: The more open...

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