Jesus Taught in Parables
Matthew 13:1-17
Today as we begin Matthew 13, I thought it would be good to remind ourselves of what a profound thing it is to hear the word of God. In the Bible, we have the word of the living God, inspired by the Holy Spirit, written by the Lord’s apostles and prophets, preserved by His providence, and translated into our language for our spiritual benefit.[1] Do we take it seriously? Think about it! In Matthew 13 we have the very words that the Lord Jesus Christ spoke. It is the third of five extended sections of Jesus’ teaching that we have in the Gospel of Matthew. Can there be any greater privilege than to hear the Son of God teach us?
Not only is it a great privilege to hear God’s word, but it also carries with it a great obligation. When we hear the word of God, we are responsible for what we hear. How will you respond to the Lord and His word today?
Some will hear God’s words with humble reverence and a sincere desire to understand and obey what He says. They will hear His word with genuine trust in Jesus Christ—coming to Him for the words of life. I hope this is you today. Because if you desire to listen and obey God’s word, God will give you what you desire. If we hear and receive His truth, He will graciously respond by giving us more of His truth. He will allow us to truly hear it, understand it, be saved by it, and transformed by it.
Some, on the other hand, will hear the word of God and ignore it, critique it, sit in judgment of it, or altogether reject it. They will harden their hearts to God’s revealed truth. I hope that is not you today. Because the danger of turning away from God’s truth is that God, in judgment, may respond by giving you what you want. If you do not want to hear and understand what God says, then His judgment may be to keep you from hearing or understanding His word. The same word that brings salvation to some brings condemnation to others.
It is never a trivial thing to hear God’s word! And when we hear it, nothing is more important than how we respond to what we hear. In the Gospel of Matthew, we have seen that the multitudes in Galilee had the great privilege to hear the word of God from the very lips of the Lord Jesus Christ, God’s Son. They heard the Messiah King teach about the Kingdom of God. They were eyewitnesses of many of His miracles. They saw how He acted in the power of God and spoke with the authority of God.
Yet, in the last few chapters, we also saw the opposition to Jesus and His message of the kingdom of God mounting. Some rejected Jesus with cold apathy, and some rejected Him with fiery hostility. Jesus saw their unbelief and warned them of the danger they were in if they did not repent. Jesus has been proven to be the Messiah King. But many have rejected Him. He has pronounced judgment on them. And yet, He offered His gracious invitation to whoever will do the will of the Father and believe in Him.
Now, as we come to Matthew 13, Matthew points out a change in the Lord’s teaching ministry. The theme of His teaching is the same—the Kingdom of God—but the manner of His teaching is different. Matthew 13:3 says, “Then He spoke many things to them in parables …”
In Matthew 13, Jesus teaches using a number of parables. The word “parable” is the Greek word parabolē (παραβολή) from para meaning “beside” and ballo meaning “to throw.” Thus, the word literally means something “thrown beside” or something “cast alongside another thing.” When something is cast beside another thing, we can see the comparison or apply the illustration. A parable is a story from real life or a real-life situation from which a moral or spiritual truth is drawn.[2] They are earthly stories with heavenly meanings.[3] Behind it stands the Hebrew word māšāl, a word used in the Old Testament to refer to proverbs, similes, allegories, comparisons, riddles, or stories embodying some truth.[4]
Already in Mathew’s Gospel we have seen Jesus use many graphic analogies to illustrate divine truth. He said believers are salt and light in the world (Matt. 5:13–16). He spoke of following the example of the birds and lilies in not worrying about the necessities of life (Matt. 6:26–30) and of building our lives on the solid rock of God’s Word rather than the insecure sand of man’s ways (Matt. 7:24–27). Although those and other teachings were in the vein of parables, so far in the context of Jesus’ teaching, when He used a parable, He also made their meaning clear. The difference now is that Jesus will teach using parables, but He will not explain them to the crowds, only His disciples.
Jesus using parables in this manner was a significant change. Matthew indicates this change in three ways.[5] First, as he introduces the first parable, Matthew wants us to notice the change, when he wrote, “Then He spoke many things to them in parables…” (Matt. 13:3). If this was the same as what Jesus had always done, Matthew would not have needed to tell us this. Second, Matthew points out that Jesus’ disciples noticed the difference in His teaching. In Matthew 13:10, they ask Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” Third, in Matthew 13:34 he writes, “All these things Jesus spoke to the multitude in parables; and without a parable He did not speak to them.” We will see the reason for this change to parables in Matthew 13:11-17 as Jesus answers the disciple’s question. We will look at this in a few moments.
But first, I want us to see an overview of the chapter. Matthew 13 contains seven or eight parables. They are meant to illustrate to us, as it says in Matthew 13:11, “the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.” They all have the same theme—the Kingdom of Heaven or Kingdom of God. The word “mystery”, as it’s used by Jesus, refers to a divine truth that was hidden in times past but is now revealed by God.[6] It can only be known as God chooses to reveal it. Jesus is the King who has come to this earth to establish His kingdom. These parables teach truths about His kingdom that we would never know by mere research or investigation.
Jesus reveals the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven—the fullness of the gospel message and the coming of the church age. Both were hinted at in various places in the Old Testament but, for the most part, they were not understood. In Christ, these mysteries of the kingdom are unveiled. Paul writes a doxology to the Romans about the mystery of the gospel saying…
25 Now to Him who is able to establish you according to my gospel and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery kept secret since the world began 26 but now made manifest, and by the prophetic Scriptures made known to all nations, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, for obedience to the faith– 27 to God, alone wise, be glory through Jesus Christ forever. Amen. (Rom 16:25-27).
God has now made manifest the mystery of the kingdom and its full meaning through the preaching of the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is the truth that Jesus is proclaiming. As we will see, Jesus’ parables explain the initiation of the kingdom and why some enter it and some don’t. They explain the kingdom’s nature, how it grows and where it is headed. They tell the value of the kingdom and the cost of being part of the kingdom. And they tell the ultimate victory of the kingdom and its purification at the end of the age. They tell of salvation for those in the kingdom and judgment for those who refuse it.
The first four (the parables of the soils, the wheat and the tares, the mustard seed, and the yeast) Jesus spoke before the multitudes. The next three (the parables of the hidden treasure, the fine pearl, and the dragnet) Jesus spoke before the disciples only.[7] Then Jesus closed by speaking one last parable to His disciples—the parable of the master of the household (Matt. 13:52). The central focus of this section signals judgment. Even Jesus’ use of parables was a judgment on those unwilling to hear.
With that introduction, let’s look at Matthew 13:1-17 under three headings: 1) the popularity of Jesus; 2) the parable He told; and 3) the purpose of parables.[8]
First, I want you to see…
1. The Popularity of Jesus (Matt. 13:1-2)
1 On the same day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the sea. 2 And great multitudes were gathered together to Him, so that He got into a boat and sat; and the whole multitude stood on the shore. (Matt. 13:1-2)
Notice this—when Jesus shifted to teaching in parables, it was not because people were losing interest. Matthew says that there were “great multitudes” flocking to Jesus on this day. It is a striking scene. Jesus left the house where He had been teaching disciples and He sat down on the beach by the Sea of Galilee. Everywhere Jesus went, people thronged to Him. They were constantly seeking Him. This day is no different. In fact, the crowd is so large on this day that in order for Jesus to be able to teach without interference from the needy crowd, He got into a boat, pushed back from the shore, and sat down to teach from the boat. The shores along the Sea of Galilee slope upward creating an amphitheater effect, and so the people may have been standing or sitting along the banks listening to Jesus as He taught.
So, we see that Jesus didn’t start teaching in parables in order to draw a crowd. The multitudes were already there. Why did they come? Some may have come out of curiosity—no one else did the works Jesus did or spoke in the way He spoke. Some may be there to get something from Jesus—healing, deliverance, food. Jesus will describe these people in Matthew 13:13 saying, “… seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.” These people have hearts that are dull, ears that are deaf, and eyes that are blind. Most could care less about the truth. They only wanted to be entertained and gratified.
Therefore, Jesus tells them…
2. The Parable of the Soils (Matt. 13:3-8)
The parable starts in Matthew 13:3 where Jesus said, “Behold, a sower went out to sow.” He described a sight that they would have been very familiar with in their day—that of a farmer walking along, sowing seed for a crop. Next time, we will examine Jesus’ interpretation of this parable in Matthew 13:18-23. But let’s not get ahead of ourselves. I know that most of us have been taught the meaning of this parable many times. However, today I want you to think about what it was like to hear this story for the first time without an explanation. Listen to it:
… “Behold, a sower went out to sow. 4 “And as he sowed, some seed fell by the wayside; and the birds came and devoured them. 5 Some fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth; and they immediately sprang up because they had no depth of earth. 6 But when the sun was up they were scorched, and because they had no root they withered away. 7 And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them. 8 But others fell on good ground and yielded a crop: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.” (Matt. 13:3-8).
It’s a farming story—one that everyone in that agrarian culture would be very familiar with. The sower probably carried a bag of seed slung over his shoulder and reached into it, grabbed a handful of seeds, and scattered them across the field.
The seed fell on four different types of soil. First, some “fell by the wayside” or the walking path where the soil was trampled down. The seed just sat on top of the hardened dirt so “the birds came and devoured them.” It bore no fruit.
Second, some seed “fell on stony places, where they did not have much earth.” Picture a shelf of limestone rock covered by a thin layer of topsoil. The seed germinates and “immediately sprang up” in that warm shallow soil. But because it could not put down deep roots, “when the sun was up they were scorched.” It also bore no fruit.
Third, some seed “fell among thorns.” It also sprouted, but its growth was hindered by the weeds, bushes, and thickets around it—”the thorns sprang up and choked them.” It could not bear fruit either.
Finally, other seed “fell on good ground.” It produced what the farmer was looking for—it “yielded a crop: some a hundredfold, some sixty, some thirty.” That’s very good soil! The seed produced either thirty, sixty or a hundredfold what was sown.
End of story. And I am sure that everyone listening to this story on that day understood those truths about sowing seeds. They knew the woes of farming. Birds, rocks, the scorching heat, and thorns were perpetual problems for growing crops in that part of the world. They got it. The problem is that for most of the crowd, that is all they got, because Matthew makes it clear that Jesus did not explain the parable to them. All they got was a story about farming.
We know that Jesus meant more by that story—not only because He later explained it to His disciples, but because after the story He exclaims, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear!” (Matt. 13:9). Obviously, everyone who heard those words had ‘ears’. But not everyone had ‘ears to hear’. Only those with listening ears could really hear the spiritual point that Jesus was making. Not everyone can hear God’s word and take it to heart.
Jesus’ disciples knew there was more to it than just a farming story. Mark and Luke both record that the disciples came and asked Jesus to explain the meaning of the parable (Mark 4:10; Luke 8:9). They knew that Jesus was teaching something significant. Maybe they didn’t yet understand all the details, but they wanted to learn more. They had ears to hear. But did the crowd understand this? Did they have ears to hear? Probably not most of them.
That is the parable. Next, Jesus’ disciples ask Him about…
3. The Purpose of Parables (Matt. 13:10-17)
And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” (Matt. 13:10).
Matthew inserts the disciples’ question here in the middle of Jesus’ speaking to the crowds, even though it probably occurred later in private. He does so because, as we will see next time, this first parable will illustrate what Jesus says to His disciples about why He teaches in parables.
Imagine the disciples watching the faces of the people in the crowd. I am sure, as Jesus taught this parable, they saw some perplexed looks on many faces. Jesus is not speaking in a plain, straight-forward way, but rather in parables. As we said, most probably did not get the meaning. Even the disciples weren’t entirely sure they understood His parable either (Marl 4:13; Luke 8:9). But before asking about the meaning of the parable, they ask “Why do You speak to them in parables?” They are wondering, “Why doesn’t He speak to them plainly? Why the parable?” And so, when His teaching was over, they went to Him privately and asked Him about it.
Jesus answers their question in Matthew 13:11-17. And His answer has two parts. The reason Jesus spoke to the people in parables Is to conceal and to reveal.
A. To Conceal (Matt. 13:11-13)
Look at Jesus’ answer:
11 He answered and said to them, “Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. (Matt. 13:11)
Here’s the shocking thing about Jesus’ answer—He actually didn’t intend to be plain in His teaching. He didn’t intend for everyone to hear and understand it. He spoke these mysteries in parables so that they would be revealed only to certain people while remaining mysteries to others! Jesus says, “it has been given to you,”—that is, His disciples who believed in Him—“to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven.” But, He says, “to them,” meaning the crowds who did not believe, “it has not been given.”
Now, I don’t believe this means that our Lord was refusing to reveal the truth to some who truly wanted the truth. He is not hiding the kingdom of heaven from those who are truly seeking the kingdom. Remember how Jesus said, “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you” (Matt. 7:7). I believe Jesus gladly reveals the truth of His kingdom to whoever genuinely believes in Him and sincerely desires to understand. In the Gospel of John, when Pilate asked Jesus if He was a king, Jesus replied, “For this cause I was born, and for this cause I have come into the world, that I should bear witness to the truth. Everyone who is of the truth hears My voice.” It is the Lord’s mission to reveal the truth of the kingdom. That, in fact, is why He has commanded us to preach the gospel of the kingdom in His name to the world. He wants people to come to the truth, believe the gospel, and enter the kingdom.
It’s never a matter of whether or not the Lord is willing to reveal the truths of His kingdom to those who sincerely want to hear. Rather, it’s always a matter of whether or not people are willing to hear. Jesus goes on to say in Matthew 13:12,
12 “For whoever has, to him more will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has will be taken away from him.
It almost doesn’t sound fair, does it? Those who have get more, and those who don’t have get less! What is Jesus saying here? I like the way Rory Mosley illustrated it.[9] When our children were young and we had a fellowship meal at church, we would fix their plates for them as they went through the line with us. When a child asked for more of something than we had given them, we would say, “Eat what you have, and then I’ll give you more.” Why? Because kids’ eyes are often bigger than their stomachs, and we didn’t want to waste food.
Jesus is saying something similar. These crowds of people had truth incarnate right in front of them, speaking to them. He had revealed the truth about who He was both by His words and His works. They had a plate full of truth. But until they digested the truth they had, they weren’t getting any more. He says, “For whoever has”—whoever has accepted the truth they’ve been shown—”to him more will be given.” But “whoever does not have”—whoever has not accepted the truth they’ve been shown—”even what he has will be taken away from him.” Jesus didn’t grant them to understand more truth because they hadn’t done anything with the truth they had.
This multitude looked like they were hungry for the truth, but Jesus knew otherwise. And so, He concealed the truth in a farming story about seed and soils. Jesus says in Matthew 13:13, “Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they do not see, and hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.” They saw the truth but paid no attention to it. They heard the truth but did not listen to it to understand it. Jesus conceals the truth—not because He doesn’t want to reveal it, but because they don’t want to receive it.
This is an act of judgment. Because they will not hear with understanding, Jesus will now speak words that they can’t understand. He confirms them in their stubbornness and hard-heartedness. Jesus speaks in parables to conceal.
Jesus also speaks in parables …
B. To Reveal (Matt. 14-17)
In Matthew 13:14-15, Jesus says,
14 “And in them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says: ‘Hearing you will hear and shall not understand, And seeing you will see and not perceive; 15 For the hearts of this people have grown dull. Their ears are hard of hearing, And their eyes they have closed, Lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears, Lest they should understand with their hearts and turn, So that I should heal them.’ (Matt. 13:14-15).
This was no surprise that they rejected Jesus and His message of the kingdom. They were fulfilling the prophecy of Isaiah 6:9-10 which Jesus quotes here.
If you remember the context of Isaiah 6, the prophet saw a remarkable vision of the Lord sitting on His heavenly throne, “high and lifted up” (Isa. 6:1-4). It was at this time that the Lord humbled Isaiah, purified his lips, and atoned for his sin. Then Isaiah heard the voice of the Lord saying, “Whom shall I send, And who will go for Us?” (Isa. 6:8). The prophet answered, “Here am I! Send me.” Isaiah was compelled to go on God’s mission and proclaim God’s message.
Then, the Lord revealed to Isaiah what a difficult mission and unwelcome message it would be. God would send Isaiah to deliver a message that the people did not want to receive—a message that would, in fact, result in judgment on the people who heard it. God told him,
Go, and tell this people:
‘Keep on hearing, but do not understand;
Keep on seeing, but do not perceive.’
Make the heart of this people dull,
And their ears heavy,
And shut their eyes;
Lest they see with their eyes,
And hear with their ears,
And understand with their heart,
And return and be healed. (Isaiah 6:9-10).
God told Isaiah that his prophetic ministry would result in the people of Israel hearing the truth, but not understanding it or perceiving it. It would only result in them becoming more spiritually dull, deaf, and blind. Isaiah would proclaim God’s message to them until, at last, God’s judgment would finally fall upon them (Isa. 6:11-12). Isaiah’s preaching would condemn the people when they rejected it. It would reveal how blind they were. It would reveal their unhearing ears and their hard hearts. It would render them without excuse.
Now, with the coming of Jesus and the proclamation of the gospel of the kingdom, this prophecy is also fulfilled in His generation. Jesus spoke the message of the Kingdom of God. And when the people heard it, their souls grew calloused and dull. They became hard of hearing. They shut their eyes. They hardened their hearts.
In the Gospel of John, after Jesus gives sight to the man born blind, He says, “For judgment I have come into this world, that those who do not see may see, and that those who see may be made blind.” (John 9:39). This statement troubled the Pharisees who opposed Jesus. So, John writes, “Then some of the Pharisees who were with Him heard these words, and said to Him, “Are we blind also?” Jesus said to them, “If you were blind, you would have no sin; but now you say, ‘We see.’ Therefore your sin remains.”” (John 9:39-41). Jesus spoke in parables not only to conceal more truth from them but to reveal their blindness.
If they were not blind in their sin, they would see the truth about Jesus. If they had ears to hear, they would understand. This is why Jesus’ disciples did understand. Even though these parables mean nothing to many in the crowd, they meant a great deal to the disciples. They knew that the parable was about more than just farming. They wanted to hear more. They may not have initially understood it all, but they understood there was more. And they wanted more. That is why they came and asked Jesus to explain the parable to them.
So, Jesus says to them, “But blessed are your eyes for they see, and your ears for they hear …” (Matt. 13:16). Jesus’ parables not only reveal the blindness of those who reject Him, but it also reveals the spiritual sight of those who receive Him. After Jesus teaches the parables of the kingdom in this chapter He asks His disciples, “Have you understood all these things?” And they answered Him, “Yes, Lord” (Matt. 13:51).
What they saw in Jesus was such a great blessing that He says, “for assuredly, I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see it, and to hear what you hear, and did not hear it.” (Matt. 13:17). These humble disciples saw the Messiah-King that others—even the prophets and righteous men in past generations—had longed to see.
Peter later wrote to his believing Jewish brothers and sisters…
Of this salvation the prophets have inquired and searched carefully, who prophesied of the grace that would come to you, searching what, or what manner of time, the Spirit of Christ who was in them was indicating when He testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ and the glories that would follow. To them it was revealed that, not to themselves, but to us they were ministering the things which now have been reported to you through those who have preached the gospel to you by the Holy Spirit sent from heaven—things which angels desire to look into (1 Peter 1:10-12).
What a blessing—to have been given such spiritual sight!
How did they get such spiritual sight? Where did they get ears to hear? How did they understand when others did not? It’s certainly not that the disciples were any mentally smarter or morally better than others. These “ignorant” men could understand the truth that the “educated” religious leaders could not grasp! What was the difference?
They saw because they believed. God was showing them grace. As John Newton wrote in his great hymn,
Amazing grace, how sweet the sound,
That saved a wretch like me!
I once was lost, but now am found,
Was blind, but now I see.
The Spirit of God reveals the truth of God by grace to those who believe. The disciples had repented of their sin and believed on the Lord Jesus Christ, so it was granted to them to understand the mysteries of the kingdom. They saw that Jesus was the Savior, the promised Messiah-King. And because they believed, God allowed them the blessing of seeing more. To them, Jesus explained the parables so they could understand the kingdom of God.
What they did with Jesus determined everything else. Jesus is the Light of the World. When He shines His light on you, it either reveals more truth to you, or it reveals that you are blind. What have you done with Jesus? Have you believed He is the Son of God who was sent by God the Father? Have you believed He died for your sin so that you could be redeemed? Have you believed He has risen from the grave and is alive today?
It is a serious thing to hear the word of God. Hear the truth today–“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and you will be saved” (Acts 16:31). Will you receive it, repent and believe it, and be saved?
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[1] Greg Allen, A Blessed Grasp of the Truth, https://www.bethanybible.org/archive/2006/100106.htm accessed 05/02/2024. I adapted this introduction from Allen.
[2] James Montgomery Boice, The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2001), 230.
[3] Hal M. Haller Jr., “The Gospel according to Matthew,” in The Grace New Testament Commentary, ed. Robert N. Wilkin (Denton, TX: Grace Evangelical Society, 2010), 61.
[4] D. A. Carson, “Matthew,” in The Expositor’s Bible Commentary: Matthew, Mark, Luke, ed. Frank E. Gaebelein, vol. 8 (Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan Publishing House, 1984), 302–303. Carson points out that twenty-eight of thirty-three instances of māšāl in the OT are rendered parabolē [parable] in the LXX (Num 23:7, 18; 1 Sam 10:12; 24:13; Job 27:1; Pss 49:4; 78:2; Prov 1:6; Eccl 12:9; Isa 14:4; Ezek 12:2; 17:2; 24:3; 13; Mic 2:4; Hab 2:6).
[5] Richard Caldwell, God’s Judgment on Stubborn Unbelief | Matthew 13:1-17, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ark40YgWGDI.
[6] Greg Allen, ibid.
[7] James Montgomery Boice, The Gospel of Matthew (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2001), 231.
[8] Rory Mosley, The Purpose of Parables (Matthew 13:1-17), https://fbcspur.org/purpose-parables-matthew-131-17/. I adapted Mosley’s outline for this sermon.
[9] Mosley, ibid.
