What's Choking Out Your Faith? | Mark 4

Regardless of the soil, the sower is still throwing seed. He's faithful to throw seed. He's faithful to still invite us into his word. The sower is consistent even if the soil is not. Man, thank God the sower is consistent. Thank God that when I was shallow or rocky or thorny and distracted, the sower continued to sow seed. (upbeat music) This is the Crossroads Daily. No experts, no perfect people. Just honest conversations about what happens when the Bible shows up in real life. (upbeat music) Hey everybody, I'm Chuck. I'm Mish, I'm Caleb. - And I'm Kirsten. - So, Mark chapter four, quick recap. Mark is the shortest of the biographies of Jesus' life and it is action-packed. We're moving to the part where there's a lot of Jesus' key teachings. And one of his maybe most famous teachings is in this chapter. It's the parable of the sower, right? Planning seed and these four different kinds of soil and Jesus is kind of using that to connect it to how we receive God's word. So, as you think about this parable, which part of the parable feels like, man, that tracks with my spiritual life?

I'll go first 'cause one of the things I often think about is how many times I have been shallow soil for something. I get really excited about something and it doesn't take root. And I see that for me has been in the places in my life where I'm immature. So, for me, I look at that shallow soil as there are some places in my life where I've had immaturity and in those places, the thing that I might know to be true hasn't taken root. And so, the question is, and essentially you think about the difference between that soil and the soil that sticks is it has to get soft. You know, I've had to be softened by suffering. I've had to be softened by difficulty in my life to actually be able to receive that soil and it take root. So, that's one of the things that I would say tracks to lots of areas in my spiritual life. I think that's true about my relationship with money. That's been true about my relationship to fear and trust. Not that I'm over any of the, not that I'm perfect. I'm just saying like those are places where the suffering and the softening that's come from it have helped me get to a place where it's like, oh, I actually do think I can lean on the fact when Jesus says seek the kingdom and everything else will be added to you. I think I've been through enough difficulty to see him come through that I trust that a little bit more now.

So, that's one of the places where I try to be bearable. - Yeah, one of the soils is the seed falls there and it's among thorns. And it kind of stops the crop from growing 'cause the thorns are already established and it chokes out the crop. This one stuck out to me and I mean, real talk. I'm not good at finances and they suck. And it stresses me out and I don't know the last time you bought gas, but like-- - That stresses me out. - It's expensive and groceries for a family of five. It's stupid expensive and I was feeling good yesterday 'cause it was a day before payday and I was like, oh, there's still money in our account, like crazy. And then I got a bill that took all the money on my account that I didn't know was coming, right? And I went home like low-key like, I don't think I've ever had a panic attack. And it was not that, so don't let me oversell it. But like I was real stressed. And then I read this and it was like the Jesus later, he explains it to the disciples. And one of the things he says is the deceitfulness of wealth is one of the things and I was like, well, dang, you talking to me today? - That's one of the most convicting lines, man. - It's freaking me, right? And so I don't have a bow on it except that I don't want

anything to choke out what God is doing in my life and least of all money, right? And so I guess what it's doing to soften me if I can mix the soil metaphors is it's forcing me to recognize that I can't do it on my own. I'm not the provider, God is, right? And so it's easy to pray for like problems in the world or pray for my grandma or the sick or whatever. Like I'm looking at God like, hey, can you help me make it to the next payday? Hey, can you help me find some side gigs? Hey, can you help me, whatever? - Yep. - And he is. And I'm gonna keep pressing in on it. - So he loves talking to you like that. He loves hearing that. - Thank you, no thank you. - Yes, he does, you're right. - The thorn on was the one that came to mind for me and yeah, I feel like he's the only one that can kind of, you know, break the thorns and make and make the space and do the pruning, right? This is a heavenly parable. But the thorns for me are like, they pre-existed the pride. It's the things where I, I'll be really good at saying my, my husband's lost his job in the past. He's lost his job twice in the past couple years. And the first time it was really easy to be like, oh, I surrender, ha ha ha, God.

What a funny way to learn how to be obedient. And then the second time was not as joyful. (laughing) It was much more like, okay, well, like, but we have things to pay for. We have dreams, things are not gonna be easy anymore. Just 'cause it was easy after he lost his job the first time, like God was just super faithful and through freelance and stuff. And the second time it was like, but can God do that again? Like the fear and the thorns of just like, my expectations on God, my pride, then I started doing math of like, okay, well, what can I do? What can I do to control the situation and fix the situation? And instead of just like letting God grow the seed that he already started, like man, the joy from the first time still like, could exist the second time. But yeah, I let these thorns that were there just kind of like choke out what could have been such a beautiful growth in my faith. And I think we got there. We totally like, my husband and I grew so much to that. And there was definitely redemption, but that's, yeah, that's real. - That's real. - That's real.

Real talk for me, I think I relate often to the pathway, like the seed along the path where the word is sown. And as soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes the word away. I get distracted often. I get distracted from I think from like the point. And you said the word pride, I have a pride in an ego where I know because I am nice as someone or I do a good thing that I like lift myself up, like this is good. There's a book by this guy C.S. Lewis who wrote Lion Wishing Wardrobe in our new series, right? And he has a book called Screw Tape Letters. And one of the things that I really related in that book is this demon is telling another demon, a lesser demon that like, hey, use their pride against them. If they do something good, use that against them. Of course God wants to do good things. He wants us to lift each other up off the sidewalk if we're heard or help each other and stuff like that. And Satan will use that, yes. Satan has used that with me, that I'm a good person and therefore, I'm a godly person and therefore, you know, I'll get distracted. He uses that all the time, honestly. - There's a business book by a guy named Jim Collins and he talks about why giants fall or something like that why companies fail. And one of the things he talks about is the hubris born of success. - That was a big word.

- It is a big word. - What was it? - Hubris born of success. Hubris is a process. - Great, thank you. - And basically what he's saying is what the Bible says in Proverbs, which is pride comes before a fall, right? Like we are at our most susceptible when we are at our most proud. And that's been true for me. - So real. - It's the time when I think I'm so spiritual that I wind up falling the hardest, you know, into sin, into deception. It's been like, oh, but I was on the mountain top. And it's like, yeah, that's a dangerous place to be. That's a really dangerous place to be. So let me ask this question about the soils. How do you become good soil? How do we become good soil? - Well, honestly, I don't think there's like a formula approach. I can't, I think it has to be contextualized depending on the person in their situation. But the biggest one for me is my community. And it's like, it's a mix because there's a community of people who I can be with, like a core group of people who I can be with who challenged me, who give me their best, who let me give them their best to shoulder, second crown, et cetera.

All the things that you can think of, these are people who you can go to no matter what. And I feel like God has also very uniquely called me to be in a space that are not just Christians and believers and a community of people who I would not say are the ones I should be going to all the time. So that makes that community part even more and necessary to have good soil. - Yeah, man. Plus one net for sure, community. - Yeah, I was thinking, this is back a chapter before, but when Jesus heals the man with the paralyzed hand that we talked about, he tells him, stretch out your hand. He doesn't just like zap him with the same. He's like, there's an action. Like, you gotta meet me in the thing. So even as I'm talking about finances, you know. God can and will break in. And there are things I need to do. Caleb, tighten up your budget. Caleb, you should be shopping at Aldi, not a Kroger or whatever. You know what I'm saying? It's not just sitting and waiting for the blessing to rain down on it. - That's right. - And that turns us, that turns the soil at least. - That's right, that's right. - That finds some good stuff underneath.

- Yeah. - Faith, right? - That's it. - That's your hand is an act of faith. - That's right. - It's gotta, yeah. - What would you say? I don't know if I have a good one for this one. - Man, I mean, I think you guys are hitting on a lot of it is for me, it's been about community. And I would say, again, I feel like I keep coming back to this, but it's true. Suffering softens our soil. - Yeah. I don't know, maybe it's 'cause I'm 50 now and I just had to live through, I'm old. (laughing) Old guy speaking here, but I just, I see now the places in my life that have helped me get to places of trusting Jesus that had everything to do with the crappy thing I went through and didn't want to go through. And it's like, but that was the way I understood that lesson. That was how I understood this. And so I think that suffering also softens our soil. - Do you think we're supposed to go through all these soils to get to good soil? Or do you feel like this is just, yeah, is this just part of life that we have to grow in? Or is this something that we can avoid right now?

- That's a great question. I feel like this is one of those parables that Jesus is literally just holding up a mirror. It's like, here you go, here's a mirror. Where are you? And the beautiful thing, if there's anything in the, and this is, look for this clue in lots of Jesus' parables. What is the one constant in this parable? Regardless of the soil, the sower is still throwing seed. He's faithful to throw seed. He's faithful to still invite us into his word. The sower is consistent even if the soil is not. And so I think that's the thing that we can look and take away from this is like, man, thank God the sower is consistent. Thank God that when I was shallow, or rocky, or thorny, and distracted, the sower continued to sow seed. That's the good news of Jesus. - It's so good. - Come on. (upbeat music) (upbeat music) (upbeat music)