Dear First Pres,

   This past Sunday I preached on Mark 4:1-20. I hope you’ll take a few moments today to reflect on these verses.

   I’m not sure I was as clear as I needed to be about the three sections of this passage and their three points. Let me break it down here.

  1. Even though there will be strong resistance to the message, the Kingdom of God is coming and it will multiply until absolutely victorious (verses 1-9).
  2. The parables are used to keep those who aren’t genuinely listening from truly understanding. But those who are genuinely listening know the mystery of the Kingdom - that it is coming in the person and work of Jesus (verses 10-12).
  3. Those who are continually hearing and receiving the message of the Kingdom put themselves in a position for God to produce a Kingdom crop through them. That’s what it means to be “good soil” (verses 13-20).

   So, the main thing I asked you to do this week was to pray that FPC would be “good soil.” Have you remembered to do that? If not, please make it a priority over the next few days. I believe this is a prayer that the Lord loves to answer. Ask God to show us the ways in which our hearts are hard. Ask God to show us where our soil is shallow and full of rocks. Ask God to reveal the thorns in our lives that are choking out His Word. Ask God to help us to continually hear and receive His Word so that He might multiply His Kingdom through us.
   And as I think about that prayer request, I can’t help but think about something Francis Chan wrote in his book Crazy Love: Overwhelmed by a Relentless God. He said, “My caution to you is this: Do not assume you are good soil” (p. 67). He goes on to argue that when we assume we are the good soil, we are prone to miss the thorns that are choking out God’s Word in our lives. Chan writes, “A relationship with God simply cannot grow when money, sins, activities, favorite sports teams, addictions, or commitments are piled on top of it” (p. 67). All of these “thorns” are a real challenge for me, so I imagine they are for you as well.
   All the more reason to beseech our gracious God to make us a congregation of good soil people. How awesome is He to invite us into His redeeming transformation!

Blessings,
Jeremy Vaccaro