“These have no root” (Luke 8:13)

Examine yourself this morning by the light of this Scripture. You’ve received the Word with joy; your feelings have been stirred and you know it’s true; but to receive the Word in the ear is one thing, to receive Jesus as Lord and Savior is quite another. Superficial feelings often come from unregenerate hearts that agree with truth without obeying it. 

 In the parable, the seed fell upon rocky ground covered with a thin layer of dirt. When the seed began to take root, its downward growth was hindered by hard stone and so it spent all its strength pushing its green shoot as high as it could, but having no root nourishment, it withered away. Is this my case? Have I been making a fair show in the flesh without having a corresponding inner life? If you’re saved, good growth takes place upwards and downwards at the same time. Christ warned, “He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing” (John 15:5). 

 Is my heart a rock, unable to receive grace? The good seed may germinate for a season, but it will eventually wither when it can’t find soil in a hard heart. Let me not be like Jonah's gourd; let me count the cost of being a follower of Jesus, above all let me feel the energy of His Holy Spirit, and then I’ll be able to grow an abiding and enduring seed in my soul. Oh God, if necessary, plough me under, so I will be good ground for Your seed, and “having heard the Word with a noble and good heart, keep it and bear fruit with patience” (Luke 8:13).