The Good Ground Hearer, Part 2

Driving home: But now notice carefully what is being taught. It is a matter of degrees and not of kind.

Martin uses the analogy of a farmer harvesting grain (wheat, barley, or oats) that yields thirty, sixty, or a hundredfold. He explains that while the quantity differs, the harvested grain is identical in kind, illustrating that all true believers bear real fruit, though in varying degrees.

Now let me illustrate it from the parable itself. In the time of harvest, when the sower went forth, not with his seed bag to sow his seed, but with his scythe or with his sickle to reap his harvest, and he went out to the field where there was good soil, and some of the stalks had yielded thirty, and some of the stalks had yielded thirty, and some of the stalks had yielded some sixty, some a hundred, some of the areas, thirty, sixty, a hundred. When he used his scythe and gathered the sheaves into his arm, and came back to the place where he would store his grain until it was thrashed, that w...

13:58 - 15:26 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin shows how the principle of varying fruitfulness is consistent with other Scriptures (babes, young men, full-grown men; those who follow the Lord more fully) and with…

He compares believers to babes, young men, and full-grown men, all of whom are human and have life, but differ in their developmental stages, illustrating varying degrees of spiritual maturity and fruitfulness.

Now the common denominator is they're all human beings and they have life. They're not robots, merely fabricated in the shop of religious concoctions and somehow wound up with a couple of batteries of religious forms stuck in them to go about and to look. No, they're real, live human beings. Babies, young men, and grown men.

18:58 - 19:24 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin shows how the principle of varying fruitfulness is consistent with other Scriptures (babes, young men, full-grown men; those who follow the Lord more fully) and with…

Joshua and Caleb are given as examples of Old Testament figures who 'wholly followed the Lord,' demonstrating a higher degree of devotion and fruitfulness.

This they have in common, they have life, but varying degrees in the development of that life. Furthermore, the Word of God describes in the Old and the New Testaments those who follow the Lord more fully than others, whose love for Christ is more intense than others. Jesus, Joshua, and Caleb are marked out as those who wholly followed the Lord. And you see John Bunyan as one who knew his Bible well and observed people well.

19:24 - 19:58 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: Martin shows how the principle of varying fruitfulness is consistent with other Scriptures (babes, young men, full-grown men; those who follow the Lord more fully) and with…

Martin references John Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress' and its characters like Faithful, Valiant-for-Truth, and Mr. Great-Heart alongside Mr. Fearing, Mr. Feeble-Mind, and Mr. Ready-to-Halt. This illustrates that all are on the path to the Celestial City, but with varying degrees of courage and strength, consistent with the sermon's theme of differing fruitfulness.

He captured all of that in his Pilgrim's Progress, didn't he? He has in that immortal work such characters as faithful, valiant for truth, Mr. Great Heart, on their way to the celestial city. But they're not.

19:58 - 20:14 Read in full sermon

Driving home: Well, any attempt to answer that question brings us down into that mysterious land where the streams of divine purpose and sovereign design coalesce, confluence, coalesce, mingle, flow together with the streams of human …

Martin uses the metaphor of two streams (divine purpose and human responsibility) coalescing. He explains that just as it's impossible to sort out individual cups of water from the mingled streams, it's difficult to fully separate divine sovereignty and human effort in fruitfulness, but both are present.

Why then 30, 60, and 100-fold? Well, any attempt to answer that question brings us down into that mysterious land where the streams of divine purpose and sovereign design coalesce, confluence, coalesce, mingle, flow together with the streams of human responsibility and human effort. Now, if you want to have some fun, try to go to a place where two streams meet and sort out which one is which. With a cup of water, a cup in one hand and a cup in the other, say, oh, that's the stream coming in.

28:53 - 29:30 Read in full sermon

In this part of the sermon: From another perspective, Martin explains that varying fruitfulness is due to human responsibility and spiritual cultivation. He cites 2 Peter 1:5-8 and Paul's prayer in…

He compares spiritual growth to cultivating plants, where diligence in 'weeding time,' 'cultivating time,' and 'fertilizing time' leads to greater harvest (sixty or a hundredfold) than neglect, which results in only thirtyfold.

You must give all diligence to nurture them. And so from the human standpoint, the difference between a thirty and a sixty and a hundredfold bearer of fruit is often the degree to which someone has his priorities straight and the spiritual disciplines in hand and is continually cultivating the graces which God has implanted by the Holy Spirit. Whereas others allow themselves to get busy that weeding time is passed over for a week, and then another week cultivating time is passed over, and another week fertilizing time is passed over, so in harvest there's only thirty when there could have been...

33:56 - 34:40 Read in full sermon

The point: Pray to be as holy as it is possible for a redeemed sinner to be this side of heaven.

Martin quotes Robert Murray McShane's prayer, 'Oh God, make me as holy as it is possible for a redeemed sinner to be this side of heaven,' as an example of the kind of desire for maximum fruitfulness believers should have.

You've heard it. It bears repetition. Oh God, McShane prayed, make me as holy as it is possible for a redeemed sinner to be this side of heaven. Is that your desire?

42:50 - 43:06 Read in full sermon

The point: Mourn over your sinfulness, turn from self-salvation, and throw yourself in faith upon Christ as offered in the gospel.

Martin uses the example of drunken office parties and base appetites during Christmas as a stark contrast to the true meaning of Christ's birth, highlighting the world's perversion of the season and the need for the gospel.

What you do with the message that was announced by those first angels unto you is born this day in the city of Israel. In the city of David, what? A figure who will be the occasion of drunken office parties? That's all Christmas is to some of you.

46:07 - 46:24 Read in full sermon