Mark 4:26-28 commentary: what you don't know

26 And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; 27 And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. 28 For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear.

God gives the increase. God gives blessings. We all know someone who is real tough that breaks under God’s word and someone who seems really nice and reasonable whose heart remains hard as a rock. It often makes no sense.

Here is another verse that underscores how man does not know why, or really know how.

Ecclesiastes 11:6 In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good.

Science, it can be admitted, is a very important way of understanding the world around us and predicting the way things will work. But, the truth is, that mankind reads his conclusions back into the data to come up with a comprehensible explanation of why things happen. There is a philosophical ignorance that even the most intelligent people have.

Don’t assume you know what God is going to do. Don’t assume you know what is going on in a person’s heart. In our modern world we want precision and are slaves to a clock but there are things we simply can’t know. We witness, we pray, and yet it is God who gives the increase.

You plant the seed, you water, and you pray and wait on the Holy Spirit to work, knowing that you might not witness the results on this earth. There are humanistic seminars given on soul winning, on how to manipulate people into a “decision for Christ.” These remove the fact that there is a loving God working on a heart willing to believe and a soul winner sent by God to that person. It is not a sales job, a psych job, an emotional manipulation or magic. If you reduce it to a humanistic approach it is not of God.

We have to get past a world of owner’s manuals, step-by-step instruction booklets, sales seminars, and time clocks and open ourselves back up into a world where a living God engages willing hearts and sends out ministers to minister. And just accept the fact that you don’t know what’s going to happen when you measure out the word. You just know that God will get the glory.

Isaiah 55:11 So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.