Focus

As you quiet yourself for this brief time, be willing to be open to God in whatever way that may take place.

Read

Luke 8:4-10 New Revised Standard Version (NRSV)

When a great crowd gathered and people from town after town came to him, he said in a parable: “A sower went out to sow his seed; and as he sowed, some fell on the path and was trampled on, and the birds of the air ate it up. Some fell on the rock; and as it grew up, it withered for lack of moisture. Some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew with it and choked it. Some fell into good soil, and when it grew, it produced a hundredfold.” As he said this, he called out, “Let anyone with ears to hear listen!”

Then his disciples asked him what this parable meant. He said, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God; but to others I speak in parables, so that

‘looking they may not perceive,
and listening they may not understand.’

Reflect

Ah-h-h, spring! The days are longer, the sun warmer, flowers bloom, birds sing – the sap rises!
It’s time to break up a garden and plant seeds. As a child, every opportunity afforded me, I would sneak away from my parents, fling off my shoes, and run barefoot across the cool, damp, freshly plowed garden dirt. My mother would scold and predict my eminent death by pneumonia if I didn’t keep my socks and shoes on. Obediently I would put them back on, not because I believed I would take pneumonia, but because I loved my mother and knew how much she loved me.

As a parent and grandparent, I find myself using many of the same phrases my mother used. She planted seeds in my life that continue to bear fruit today because they were seeds of unconditional love based in God’s Word.

Luke 8 records the parable of the sower in which Jesus uses familiar physical things to teach spiritual truths. His words teach more about the condition of the ground while the seed is implied to be of great value and quality due to the harvest when planted in the best soil. Reading Luke 8 should cause reflection on the soil of our hearts. Is it hard; choked with weeds and unprepared for the precious seeds of God’s Word to develop strong deep roots?

Pray

Dear Lord, Abba Father,
Thank you for your love, mercy and grace. Look within my heart today, Father God, and see if there by anything that stands between me and Thee. Show me, by Your Holy Spirit, the things that I should remove from my life that are unpleasing to You and forgive me wherein I’ve sinned. Create within me a desire for Your Word so that I may serve You humbly and completely all the days of my life. In the name of Jesus, my Savior. Amen

Go with God!