The Secret of Thorns

1 Corinthians 3:9  (ESV)

...You are God's field...

When God speaks, He creates. 

It's more than just communication.

God's Word must be digested. 

Matthew 4:4 (ESV)

...“‘Man shall not live by bread alone,

    but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.’”

If God's Word remains in you long enough, it will manifest.  

Luke 8:4-8  (ESV)

4 And when a great crowd was gathering and people from town after town came to him, he (Jesus) said in a parable, 

5 “A sower went out to sow his seed. 

And as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the air devoured it.

 

6 And some fell on the rock, and as it grew up, it withered away, because it had no moisture.

7 And some fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up with it and choked it.

 

8 And some fell into good soil and grew and yielded a hundredfold.” 

As he said these things, he called out, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear.”

The ears are connected to the heart.  

A willing heart hears them. 

Hosea 4:6 (ESV)

⁶ My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge;

    because you have rejected knowledge,

If people deny the existence of God, they don't have to obey Him. 

There are 4 types of ground, which represent 4 types of people. 

Pathway, stony, thorny, and good.  

75% of the people get nothing from hearing the Word of God.  

Seed on the pathway ground was trampled down because of lack of respect.   

Proverbs 1:7  (ESV)

⁷ The fear (respect) of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge;

    fools despise wisdom and instruction.

Respect gives you an ear to hear.

Let's talk about the 3rd type of ground today.  

It's thorny ground.   

Luke 8 (ESV)

9 And when his disciples asked him (Jesus) what this parable meant,

 

10 he said, “To you it has been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of God, 

but for others they are in parables, so that ‘seeing they may not see, and hearing they may not understand.’

 

11 Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God.

12 The ones along the path are those who have heard; 

then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not believe and be saved. 

13 And the ones on the rock (a layer of rock below the surface) are those who, when they hear the word, receive it with joy. 

But these have no root; they believe for a while, and in time of testing fall away.

This is the stony ground.  

The word came with pressure from Satan to separate God's word from shallow people to prevent results.  

Luke 8:14  (ESV)

And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.

Thorns choked the word of God out of their lives. 

Genesis 3:17-18  (ESV)

¹⁷ And to Adam he (God) said,

“Because you have listened to the voice of your wife

    and have eaten of the tree
of which I commanded you,

    ‘You shall not eat of it,’
cursed is the ground because of you;

    in pain you shall eat of it all the days of your life;

¹⁸ thorns and thistles it shall bring forth for you;

    and you shall eat the plants of the field.

Thorns are a part of the fall of mankind.  They did not exist in the beginning.  

We, also, see thorns in redemption.

Matthew 27:29  (ESV)

29 and twisting together a crown of thorns, 

they put it on his (Jesus's) head and put a reed in his right hand. 

And kneeling before him, they mocked him, saying, “Hail, King of the Jews!”

You see a progression from pathway ground to thorny ground.  

It has the depth and the moisture.  

They hear it and understand it.  

They were pressured by Satan, but they stayed.  

What's left for Satan to do?   He uses distraction.

  

A big thorn in your flesh really gets your attention.  

Satan wants you to water his thorns.

Satan wants to keep your attention on your problem and not on God's word.

  

The thorns choke God's word with worry, things, and pleasure.

  

Luke 21 (ESV)

33 Heaven and earth will pass away, but my (Jesus's) words will not pass away.

When you study God's word, they will stay with you forever.  

34 “But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation (burdened) and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap.

The thorns overburden your heart. 

They get all the life out of your heart soil and use you up.

  

Satan has convinced most people that worry equals love. 

We worry about our loved ones.  

Worry is actually a thorn of Satan.

The care will come at you a thousand times a day, but you must speak the word of God to it.  

Doing that will water that word of God that's in you.  

We must prevent the cares of this world from choking the word of God in us. 

Worry and fear will suck the life out of you.  

You have the responsibility of your own heart.  

1 Peter 5:7  (ESV)

 (You) casting all your anxieties on him (Jesus), because he cares for you.

Luke 8:14  (ESV)

14 And as for what fell among the thorns, they are those who hear, but as they go on their way they are choked by the cares and riches (the love of it) and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.

We are producing a crop all the time good or bad.  

Something is growing within us.  

Good seed produces a good harvest.  Bad seed produces a bad harvest.  

It's a matter of priority.  

We must not be preoccupied with home life.  

We must train our families to put God first. 

If your family is first, God is not first.  

If your business is first, God is not first. 

We must not allow stuff to choke out God's word.  

If you put God stuff first, He'll take care of your stuff later (Matthew 6:33). 

Keith Moore, Faith Life Church
https://flcmedia.nyc3.digitaloceanspaces.com/productvideo/1214-GodsIncorruptibleWordSeed-09-ThornyGround-HD.mp4