Weeding With The Word
with Bruce Pringle
intro. by DAG :
There's a well-known parable of Jesus in the gospel of Luke (8:4-15) about a farmer sowing seeds. Some were eaten by birds; some seeds sprouted but soon withered in the dry, rocky ground where they had fallen. Other sprouts fell among weeds and were choked out. But some seed fell on good soil, came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown.
Jesus then explained the story to His disciples. The seed is the Word of God. Some people hear it, but the devil snatches the Word from their hearts to keep them from belief and salvation. Others hear and receive the Word with joy, but they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of temptation they fall away. Others are choked with cares, riches and pleasures of this life, and they do not mature. But the seed on good soil are they with a good and honest heart, who hear the Word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.
This Bible passage introduced an interesting illustration in September's "Rockcliffe Fellowship Bulletin", produced each month by a friend south of Ottawa. Bruce Pringle had spent some hours hoeing and weeding, taking care to get the weeds out by the root to prevent their return. "Obviously, a little weeding every day would have made the job of cultivating much easier and the resulting crop of higher quality and much more plentiful", he wrote.
If we regard the garden as the world around us, Bruce says, we recognize that "unless weeding is done on an ongoing, daily basis and the hearts of people are fed on God's holy Word, [we] become engulfed by a variety of pernicious weeds which, once they have been allowed to set their roots in the fertile soil of the human soul, are discouragingly difficult to remove." And weeds are quick to return among young, tender shoots, robbing them of nutrients, moisture, and sunlight.
This applies especially to a Christian education for our children. Bruce repeated the story of Coleridge the poet, "who had listened to a visitor's vehement argument against religious instruction of the young. His guest had concluded with a statement of his personal determination not to 'prejudice' his children in favour of any form of religion, but to allow them, at maturity, to choose for themselves.
"Coleridge made no immediate comment, but shortly afterwards asked his visitor if he would like to see his garden. The invitation was accepted with enthusiasm and he quickly led his guest to a strip of lawn overgrown with weeds. 'Why, this is no garden. It is nothing but a weed patch', said the visitor. 'Oh' replied Coleridge, 'that's because it has not come to its age of discretion and choice. The weeds you see have taken the opportunity to grow and I thought it unfair of me to prejudice the soil toward roses and strawberries'."
The worship of the god of "freedom of choice", especially for young impressionable children, is a cop-out. Even some sincere church people seem to ignore scriptures such as Proverbs 22:6 ("Train up a child in the way he should go..."), perhaps because of the false idea (as Bruce identifies) that "God is love and only love."
Some churches "carry on endlessly about a 'servant' God whose only attribute is LOVE of the world and its people (regardless of their iniquitous behaviour). ...In so doing they strip the Almighty of His authority in the area of Justice and Judgment, declaring that all men will be saved... The notion of justice and judgment derives from 'negative' thinking we are told - this is the day of the 'positive' ministry of love and tolerance of everything, and peace and prosperity for all peoples of the earth."
Bruce observes that "the weeds of this 'new gospel' have spread like purple loosestrife until the true gospel of Christ has been all but choked out in the modern church. ...Few seem to be concerned these days with God's Truth as revealed in his holy Word. So the weeds of modernist theology have not only been allowed to proliferate, but have actually been nurtured in many instances by those whose duty it is to root them out."
Bruce concluded this article with two other parables about weeds and harvest time: Matt.13:24-30, 36-43, and 21:33-41.
intro. by DAG :
There's a well-known parable of Jesus in the gospel of Luke (8:4-15) about a farmer sowing seeds. Some were eaten by birds; some seeds sprouted but soon withered in the dry, rocky ground where they had fallen. Other sprouts fell among weeds and were choked out. But some seed fell on good soil, came up and yielded a crop, a hundred times more than was sown.
Jesus then explained the story to His disciples. The seed is the Word of God. Some people hear it, but the devil snatches the Word from their hearts to keep them from belief and salvation. Others hear and receive the Word with joy, but they have no root. They believe for a while, but in the time of temptation they fall away. Others are choked with cares, riches and pleasures of this life, and they do not mature. But the seed on good soil are they with a good and honest heart, who hear the Word, retain it, and by persevering produce a crop.
This Bible passage introduced an interesting illustration in September's "Rockcliffe Fellowship Bulletin", produced each month by a friend south of Ottawa. Bruce Pringle had spent some hours hoeing and weeding, taking care to get the weeds out by the root to prevent their return. "Obviously, a little weeding every day would have made the job of cultivating much easier and the resulting crop of higher quality and much more plentiful", he wrote.
If we regard the garden as the world around us, Bruce says, we recognize that "unless weeding is done on an ongoing, daily basis and the hearts of people are fed on God's holy Word, [we] become engulfed by a variety of pernicious weeds which, once they have been allowed to set their roots in the fertile soil of the human soul, are discouragingly difficult to remove." And weeds are quick to return among young, tender shoots, robbing them of nutrients, moisture, and sunlight.
This applies especially to a Christian education for our children. Bruce repeated the story of Coleridge the poet, "who had listened to a visitor's vehement argument against religious instruction of the young. His guest had concluded with a statement of his personal determination not to 'prejudice' his children in favour of any form of religion, but to allow them, at maturity, to choose for themselves.
"Coleridge made no immediate comment, but shortly afterwards asked his visitor if he would like to see his garden. The invitation was accepted with enthusiasm and he quickly led his guest to a strip of lawn overgrown with weeds. 'Why, this is no garden. It is nothing but a weed patch', said the visitor. 'Oh' replied Coleridge, 'that's because it has not come to its age of discretion and choice. The weeds you see have taken the opportunity to grow and I thought it unfair of me to prejudice the soil toward roses and strawberries'."
The worship of the god of "freedom of choice", especially for young impressionable children, is a cop-out. Even some sincere church people seem to ignore scriptures such as Proverbs 22:6 ("Train up a child in the way he should go..."), perhaps because of the false idea (as Bruce identifies) that "God is love and only love."
Some churches "carry on endlessly about a 'servant' God whose only attribute is LOVE of the world and its people (regardless of their iniquitous behaviour). ...In so doing they strip the Almighty of His authority in the area of Justice and Judgment, declaring that all men will be saved... The notion of justice and judgment derives from 'negative' thinking we are told - this is the day of the 'positive' ministry of love and tolerance of everything, and peace and prosperity for all peoples of the earth."
Bruce observes that "the weeds of this 'new gospel' have spread like purple loosestrife until the true gospel of Christ has been all but choked out in the modern church. ...Few seem to be concerned these days with God's Truth as revealed in his holy Word. So the weeds of modernist theology have not only been allowed to proliferate, but have actually been nurtured in many instances by those whose duty it is to root them out."
Bruce concluded this article with two other parables about weeds and harvest time: Matt.13:24-30, 36-43, and 21:33-41.