SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/18/2022 10:26 AM
My Worship Time Focus:
“The Plan: To Speak in Parables”
Bible Reading & Meditation Reference: Matthew
13:3a
Message of the verse: “And He spoke many things to them in parables,”
It was on this occasion and on most future occasions that
Jesus spoke many things to the, that is the multitudes, v-2, in parables, and
only in parables as seen in verse 34 “All these
things Jesus spoke to the multitudes in parables, and He did not speak to them
without a parable.” Jesus did not
explain their meaning to the multitudes but He only explained it to the
disciples as we will see when we get to verses 10-11, 18, 36; and also it can
be seen in Mark 4:34 “and He did not speak to them without a parable; but He
was explaining everything privately to His own disciples.”
John MacArthur writes “Parabole (parable) is a compound word made up of a form of the verb
ballo (to throw; lay or place) and
the prefix para (meaning alongside
of). The idea is that of placing, or
laying, something alongside of something else for the purpose of
comparison. A spiritual or moral truth
would often be expressed by laying it alongside, so to speak, a physical example
that could be more easily understood. A
common, observable object or practice was used to illustrate a subjective truth
or principle. That which was well known
was laid alongside that which was not known or understood in order to explain
it. The known elucidated unknown. The parable was a common form of Jewish
teaching, and the term is found some forty-five times in the Septuagint, the
Greek Old Testament.”
In our Lord’s earlier teaching, He
used many graphic analogies to illustrate divine truth. He had spoken of believers as being salt and
light in the world as seen in Matt. 5:13-16, and of their following the example
of the birds and lilies in not being anxious about the necessities of life as
seen in 6:26-30, and then of building their lives on the solid rock of God’s
Word rather than the insecure sand of what was man’s philosophy as seen in
Matthew 7:24-27. We could say that these
were what we could call embryonic parables, but their meaning was clear in the
context of Jesus teaching which is unlike the parables we will see in this 13th
chapter of Matthew.
MacArthur writes “Teaching through
parables and other figurative means is effective because it helps make abstract
truth more concrete, more interesting, easier to remember, and easier to apply
to life. When a truth is externalized in
the figures of a parable, the internalizing of moral and spiritual meaning is
much easier.”
Here is what we will be looking at
as we look at a series of parables in chapter 13, and that is that Jesus uses
such familiar figures as soil, seed, birds, thorns, rocks, sun, wheat, tares,
mustard seed, leaven, hidden treasure, and even a pearl to bring about
spiritual truth once they are explained to His disciples so that they and also
us can understand them. However in these
particular parables the truth is not made clear because the basic story tells
nothing but the literal account, without presenting moral or spiritual truth as
MacArthur writes. “It was only to His
disciples that Jesus explained what the soil, the seed, the thorns, and other
figures represent. And an unexplained parable was nothing but an
impossible riddle, whose meaning could only be guessed at.”
Spiritual
meaning for my life today: I am
looking forward to better understand these parables which are actually
prophetic stories about the church age, which is also called the mysterious
age. In the Bible the word mystery means
something that has not been known but now is explained, which is what the
church age is, despite what some detonations believe. There is nothing spoken of about the church
age in the Old Testament as far as prophesying that it would happen.
My Steps of Faith for Today: I trust that
the Lord will be with my wife and I in a special way as it is her birthday
today.
3/18/2022 10:54
AM
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