Seed fell among the thorns (세속적인 마음)

By Pastor Young Joon Park

May 24, 2009

Mark 4:7, 14, 18-19

The field is our heart.

We have 4 different kinds of hearts according to Jesus’ teaching.

Four different Hearts

1. Beside road field: Hardened Heart

2. Rock ground: Stony Heart

3. Among the thorns: Thorny Heart

4. Good soil: Good heart

I. The Thorns’ Heart: Carnal Mind

     세속적인 마음

1. The parable   비유

^{MK 4:7} “Other seed fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked it, and it yielded no crop.

  1) The seed fell among the thorns

  2) The thorns came up

  3) The thorns choked it

  4) It yield no crop

2. Meaning   의미

  1) The sower sows the Word of God.

^{MK 4:14} “The sower sows the word.

The seed is God’s Word.

The seed is sowed into your heart means that every word of God is released to your life as the prophetic word for your destiny from the Lord.

In every Service and every Cell Group Meeting, God releases His Word to your life with His Prophetic Word for your destiny.

He releases the prophetic word during the worship, announcement, offering, testimony, prayer, the sermon, ministry and the fellowship time.

The seed is God’s Word.

The seed is sowed into your heart means that every word of God is released to your life as the prophetic word for your destiny from the Lord.

I would like to challenge you.

Why do you come to church every Sunday and the Cell Group Fellowship?

What is your purpose of doing it?

What do you expect from the Sunday Service and the Cell Group Fellowship?

If you do not have any answer from these questions, then you need to realign your heart with the Lord from now on.

In every Service and every Cell Group Meeting, God releases His Word to your life with His Prophetic Word for your destiny.

He releases the prophetic word during the worship, announcement, offering, testimony, prayer, the sermon, ministry and the fellowship time.

Here is my suggestion:

When you come to Sunday Service and the Cell Group Fellowship, expect that God will release the prophetic word to your life, and get ready to receive it.

God releases the prophetic word through the sermon, because God speaks to me to whenever I prepare the sermon, and which also is true for other preachers.

2) Among the Thorns – Carnal mind & Double minded

    가시떨기 밭 – 세속적이며 이중적인 마음

^{MK 4:18} “And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns; these are the ones who have heard the word,

    (1) a soil in the wrong place.

This type of heart receives the word of God with joy and grows continually, and at the same time their heart starts getting influenced by the worldly things from outside the church. They hear the word of God and face the challenges. This means that they grow until they are faced with the temptations from the worldly matter.

It is not possible to avoid the worldly temptation throughout the entire life, with no exception.

a) The thorns were built up in the dwelling place

Lot’s family was living in the Sodom and Gomorrah where the place was full of sins and worldly temptations. Lot did not realize that God had a plan to judge these sinful cities until the angels ordered him and his family to leave the place as quickly as possible. They should have left this place long times ago, however, they stayed in and lived among the sinful and worldly minded people.

When you enter into a stingy smelly place, you can smell the stingy smell right away, however, after being there for at least 1 minute, you start not smelling the stingy smell any more, because you become numb to the smell within a minute.

One day I was so shocked at myself on how much I was influenced by California’s suing culture. I heard about someone’s unfair situation, I immediately responded by saying, “Sue them.” As you know California is known as the most suing state, which is why we have so many lawyers in California. My mind was so polluted by the suing in California without being aware of it.

Some people would say that they would not be influenced by the environment wherever they go. I would like to say to them, “Don’t be so sure!” I saw many times I found their hearts were influenced by the environment deeply without their recognition.

b) The thorns are built up by the materialism

Someone might say, “It will not hurt if just a little bit of taste even if the Lord warned about it, and I will not going to get myself involved with it at all, but I want to taste just a little bit.”

In the middle of the judgment of the Lord, the mid of Lot’s wife was hanging around the worldly things, so she broke the warning of the angel’s and turned her eyes to look  back and she was to become one part of the Lord’s judgment. She did not go back to the city, but she did only turn her eyes back toward to the city where her real heart was in. Immediately the judgment of the Lord came upon her, and she was perished.

Hebrews 2:2-3

² For if the message spoken by angels was binding, and every violation and disobedience received its just punishment,

³ how shall we escape if we ignore such a great salvation? This salvation, which was first announced by the Lord, was confirmed to us by those who heard him.

c. The thorns are built up by experience of learning

Lot’s two daughters did not have the moral standard since they grew up in the sinful environment. They wanted to carry on their father’s descendant, but they could not find any men for them. So they slept with their father and had children to carry on Lot’s descendents, because Lot’s daughters did not have a moral standard. They knew that their father would not allow them naturally. They had to resort using the method that they learned from the sinful society, and got into the unthinkable with their father.

You would not feel any different when you come out from the stingy and smelly place, however, people will avoid you because of the stingy smell from your cloth and your physical body. One problem is that they could not see themselves and recognize their own smell.

I grew up in very good environment in school, because we had a good moral standard nation wide. I realized that my school life is totally different than that of today’s school environment.

We had a very strict discipline rules in school when I was young.

Most of the things that were considered as problems were like chewing gum, talking back to teachers, disordering in class, or not finishing the homework assignments, but today’s school problems are totally different than that of when I was young.

Today’s problems are drugs, pregnancies, violence, or guns… after USA government prohibited prayers in public schools. The demonic forces work all over the places right now.

I really have a compassion heart for today’s students. They are gong through tremendous amount of the stress and the depression from the early age because of the demonic environment in school today even among the teachers.

One of the prophetic words to us, One Glory Church from the Lord is about the revival among the young people’s today. God is going to send lot of young people, white, black and yellow, to this church. Many of them are the drug abuse, broken and dysfunctional family even young prostitutes.

Matthew 9:12

But when Jesus heard this, He said, “It is not those who are healthy who need a physician, but those who are sick.”

One thing I know is that the Lord will bring the healing among this young people by the Lord’s Hand and will free them from the captures. God is going to raise the army of the Lord from these young people. 

And you are the major part for this prophetic word for coming months and years for the Kingdom of the Lord. We need to get ourselves prepared for this vision.

Do you want to see that these young peoples among us are raised by the Lord?

If you do, raise your hand.

Please stand on your feet if God called you for the young people ministry for the drug abusers, brokenhearted young people because of their dysfunctional family, street young people in various reasons, prisoners and criminal young people.

God is going to raise many of this kind of young people to make the world upside down.

They are the ones who do not have any fear for the Lord and follow the Lord with just one simple mind in following the Lord.

Let’s gather together around these people to commit your life to the Lord for this vision.

This is not only for the young people, but the people who are in these categories as well. One Glory Church ministry will focus not only on young people, but all generation also, because God is going to pour His Spirit in this time to all mankind.

Joel 2:28-29

²⁸ “It will come about after this, that I will pour out My Spirit on all mankind;

And your sons and daughters will prophesy, Your old men will dream dreams,

Your young men will see visions.

²⁹ “Even on the male and female servants I will pour out My Spirit in those days.

So I encourage you to be faithful as One Glory Church ministers for the Kingdom of God.

I encourage you to get on board One Glory Church and work together with one heart.

I want to see how many people want to do it and commit no matter what happens.

    (2) Closed space – Very limited place with thorns

^{MK 4:18} “And others are the ones on whom seed was sown among the thorns

Controlled by the oppression

Our time is the most stressful time than ever.

There are so many rules and regulations around us.

One example)

The gated community

There are so many regulations to live there. It feels as though that they control life in this community under their own man made regulations such as a uniform.

You cannot plant your own way, you cannot display what you want to, you cannot do whatever you want, but you have to follow what they want you to do.

I know that the purposes of the rules are for the clean and good environment of the community, but the rules that I have an experience on are more than just that purpose.

The association controls the residence according to their desires instead living freely in the community.

This is just a tiny tip of the ice burg matter of the world.

Other countries, there is not much freedom to live like a communist country, or dictatorship such as the one that Jews were under during the World War II.

There are so many activities among young children. Everyday parents are kept very busy and hard working to be able support activities of their children, and children are busy getting involved in these activities. The parents and children are busy to keep up with all kinds of activities and studies. The society as a whole changes the culture in that direction, because there are so many people doing them

Many parents and children are busy for their future, and there are not many people who seem to have any time to value their eternal spiritual matter.

When I came to USA from Korea, I started attending at American Baptist Church.

I did not find watching the football game interesting, and still I don’t. I found that the football game was the big event to many Americans. I also found that the big event games are usually on Sunday.

One day the pastor had a plan to finish Sunday service earlier than usual, and everyone seemed so happy, and I did not understand why. They finished the service earlier, so they can watch the football game.

I do not know about you, but to me some Christians are following the world, and the world does not see those Christians as their example. No wonder why this America is going to fall into the deep immorality situation and many other areas, too if Church cannot speak against the unrighteousness to the public freely.

I do accept the people who committed sin, but I do not accept the sin.

I do accept the people who are involved with wrong things, but I do not accept the wrong matter like as adultery, homosexual, or any kinds of violent actions…

In Canada, there is a legal stipulation that church cannot be against the homosexuals. Sooner or later our country will follow this kind of rules if our Christians do not wake up.

I get shocked, almost constantly, to learn that their priority was not the Lord, but the world and compromised with them constantly from Christians whom I thought that they were mature in Christ.

We should go head to head against the opposite spirits of the world.

They bring the spirit of hate, but we have to bring the Love of God against it.

They bring the spirit of sin, but we have to bring the Salvation of the Lord against it.

I pray that our Christians should not be busy in going against each other, bringing the division inside the church, nor following the world, but we should keep ourselves busy going against the worldly carnal matter.

We are going to be trapped in the worldly mind sooner or later if we do continue to be kept busy following the worldly matters and stay in the slumber situation.

Our position in the Lord is to influence the world, but not to be influenced by the world.

I had a good report and the testimony from Ruby last March. Her business place, people come to her to receive prayer, and some people came into her place and they felt sudden joy in their heart with no particular reason. One lady just came into her place and gave Ruby a big hug for a long time because of the joy in her heart without any reason, but she knew where this joy came from. The spiritual environment was changed because of her presence in her business place.

We, Christians, should be an example and an influence to the world, and let them follow Jesus through us. They cannot see Jesus Christ, but they can see Jesus who abides in us daily. So the world will reject Jesus if we have unstable life and the division in church.

Everyone is busy with so many different matters.

The real main problem in our time is that people are not making time for the Lord and follow Him because of their own many different kinds of busy schedules.

The Word of God for their life destiny is diminished by it and is choked to die in spirit because of the people’s busy life.

Influence by the loving world

And also, there are so many kinds of worldly things around us in our society. We all want to have the best and luxury materials. You can find these things so easily without searching hard.

We have GPS system in our car. I did not know how it works, but I realize it was an amazing tool once I’ve gotten to know how to use it. I want to buy these kind of things for the future too.

So our mind wonders around looking for these kinds of materials. It’s so easy to get caught up those materialism and fall in love with the worldly things.

I am not saying the material is wrong, but I am talking about the danger of falling into the materialism. And we have to use it for the Kingdom of the Lord, but not for the flesh desire.

I heard about the gambler’s mind set.

They want to win back what they lost. That is why they go back to gamble time after time.

We are going to get far away from the Lord when you start getting involved with the worldly things, because the worldly things will choke the Word of God that is your destiny. As a result, you’ll end up putting more value on the worldly matter than the Word of God.

Many times people make a decision to go some place instead of the fellowship with Christians. And I noticed that their hearts slowly starts drifting away from the group and the Lord.

    (3) 3 different kinds of thorns

^{MK 4:19} but the worries of the world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and the desires for other things enter in and choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.

The thorns:

a) The worries of the world

b) The deceitfulness of riches

c) The desires for other things

      a) The Thorn of Worries of the world

We can easily be worrying a lot of things in our life if we focus on the worldly things.

Matthew 6:25-34

²⁵ “ For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing?

²⁶ “ Look at the birds of the air, that they do not sow, nor reap nor gather into barns, and yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are you not worth much more than they?

²⁷ “And who of you by being worried can add a single hour to his life?

²⁸ “And why are you worried about clothing? Observe how the lilies of the field grow; they do not toil nor do they spin,

²⁹ yet I say to you that not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these.

³⁰ “But if God so clothes the grass of the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, will He not much more clothe you? You of little faith!

³¹ “Do not worry then, saying, ‘What will we eat?’ or ‘What will we drink?’ or ‘What will we wear for clothing?’

³² “For the Gentiles eagerly seek all these things; for your heavenly Father knows that you need all these things.

³³ “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

³⁴ “So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

1 Peter 5:7

Casting all your anxiety (cares) on Him, because He cares for you.

The worry chokes your life and paralyzes you

Whatever kinds of our anxiety we have right now, nothing is too small for the Lord, and nothing is too big for the Lord, nothing at all.

He not only does not mind taking care of your worries, but He actually loves to take care of you, because He is crazy about you, and He loves you to death.

Didn’t He die for you already? He died for you, because He loved you to death, literally.

      b) The Thorn of the Deceitfulness of riches

I always have a compassion and pitiful heart for them whenever I hear about the news on the life styles of celebrities’ and their richness. They believe that they are on the top of their business, but they do not see about their real eternal future. It really is a pity that there are lots of people who desire that kind of life and pursue it continually.

Hard worker’s income – $10,000 – $200,000 in a year,

The celebrities’ income like entrainment industry – several million $ in a year

God speaks to us about the vainness of the richness through Ecclesiastes.

What Jesus said

Luke 12:16-21

¹⁶ And He told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop.

¹⁷ He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’

¹⁸ “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods.

¹⁹ And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.” ’

²⁰ “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’

²¹ “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.”

James 4:13-14 

¹³ Now listen, you who say, “Today or tomorrow we will go to this or that city, spend a year there, carry on business and make money.”

¹⁴ Why, you do not even know what will happen tomorrow. What is your life? You are a mist that appears for a little while and then vanishes.

James 5:1-6

¹ Now listen, you rich people, weep and wail because of the misery that is coming upon you.

² Your wealth has rotted, and moths have eaten your clothes.

³ Your gold and silver are corroded. Their corrosion will testify against you and eat your flesh like fire. You have hoarded wealth in the last days.

⁴ Look! The wages you failed to pay the workmen who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty.

⁵ You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence. You have fattened yourselves in the day of slaughter.

⁶ You have condemned and murdered innocent men, who were not opposing you.

1 Timothy 6:9-10

⁹ But those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a snare and many foolish and harmful desires which plunge men into ruin and destruction.

¹⁰ For the love of money is a root of all sorts of evil, and some by longing for it have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many griefs.

The right heart for the richness

The richness comes from the Lord, not by you

I Chronicles 29:12

Both riches and honor come from You, and You rule over all, and in Your hand is power and might; and it lies in Your hand to make great and to strengthen everyone.

James 4:15-17 

¹⁵ Instead, you ought to say, “If it is the Lord’s will, we will live and do this or that.”

¹⁶ As it is, you boast and brag. All such boasting is evil.

¹⁷ Anyone, then, who knows the good he ought to do and doesn’t do it, sins.

How to use it.

I Timothy 6:17-19

¹⁷ Instruct those who are rich in this present world not to be conceited or to fix their hope on the uncertainty of riches, but on God, who richly supplies us with all things to enjoy.

¹⁸ Instruct them to do good, to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share,

¹⁹ storing up for themselves the treasure of a good foundation for the future, so that they may take hold of that which is life indeed.

The money issue is very critical from the ancient times. Everyone is slaved by this materialism.

Especially in our current time God is shaking the economy throughout the world now as all of you feel and see right now. So many people are going through the tough times continually. Our Country is in the big economy trouble, but God is going to open the big doors for the Christians among this economic crisis. Joseph will be sent to us or will be raised among us by the Lord. Who is to say that that you are not one of Josephs?

The 3^rd country ministers want to connect with American churches because of the issues with funds. Yes, we really need to help other brothers and sisters who are in dire needs throughout the world. But I am not talking about it. I am talking about the people’s mind set which is so worldly way. I am talking about the source they are looking for.

If you are in difficult time, then remember that this is the time you really need to walk by faith in Him and trust Him alone, and come out your mind that relied on other sources than God.

So do not be deceived about the richness by satan.

1 Peter 1:24-25

²⁴ For, “All men are like grass, and all their glory is like the flowers of the field;

the grass withers and the flowers fall,

²⁵ but the word of the Lord stands forever.”

We have to have the right vision and purpose to be rich, business and all kinds of financial areas.

I had a good testimony from Carol. She runs a pre-school business, and her purpose is for the Lord, also her students are influenced by her life.

      c) The Thorn of the Desires for other things

1 John 2:15-17

¹⁵ Do not love the world nor the things in the world. If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him.

¹⁶ For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh and the lust of the eyes and the boastful pride of life, is not from the Father, but is from the world.

¹⁷ The world is passing away, and also its lusts; but the one who does the will of God lives forever.

Compromise place – Many Christians are falling into this pit.

People love the world and wreck their faith life.

I Timothy 1:18-19

¹⁸ Timothy, my son, I give you this instruction in keeping with the prophecies once made about you, so that by following them you may fight the good fight,

¹⁹ holding on to faith and a good conscience. Some have rejected these and so have shipwrecked their faith.

So the flesh desire to love the world is totally opposite against the Desire of the Holy Spirit. This heart is always against God’s Will and Purpose even they want to follow, so there is no way to be producing the fruits in the Purpose and the Destiny of their life from the Lord.

Galatians 5:17

For the flesh sets its desire against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh; for these are in opposition to one another, so that you may not do the things that you please.

They can make a decision for the strong commitment by mouth, but they cannot fulfill it, because their desire is getting stronger for the worldly matters, but getting weaker all the time when the temptations come.

They easily compromise with the worldly things and make a decision to choose the worldly things than the Lord.  

    (4) The function of the thorns

a) They enter into the heart

b) They choke the Word

c) It makes the word unfruitful

The worldly mind comes into our heart and chokes the word of God. And the result is that the word of God will be unfruitful. Every Word of God has a purpose for each person, but the purpose of the Word of God could not produce the right fruit in their life at all because of the stress of the worries and the worldly values than God’s.

Choke means causing unable to breath by squeezing their throat, or crushing the source of life. 

The thorns are the evil spirits of the devil who control the worldly matter. These spirits know our weak areas and attack us, choke the Word of God in our life and destroy our destiny so that we cannot bear the fruits for the purpose of our life in Him.

This is the heart who loves the worldly matter more than God, and who has double minded.

They do not trust the Lord at all because of mind set full of the worldly matter.

James 1:8

⁸ being a double-minded man, unstable in all his ways.

On several occasions, I saw some people who made compromises about making offerings to the Lord. They do not hesitate to reduce the offering or stop offering to the Lord when their business slows down. And then they hesitate to start giving the offering even when their business picks up. Our heart is easily choked by the spirit of the mammon.

Jesus said,

“for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” Matthew 6:21

James warned us that we can be an enemy of God if we love the world than the Lord.

James 4:4

You adulteresses, do you not know that friendship with the world is hostility toward God? Therefore whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.

3. Encouragement

This field is the worldly heart, carnal mind heart and the double minded heart.

They want to love the Lord and to love the worldly matter at the same time.

The worldly matter means about all of the ungodly matters that are against the will of the Lord.

Matthew 6:24

No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.

When we have this thorny heart, we cannot bear fruit at all no matter what we try.

1) The Holy Spirit has to change our heart, we have to yield ourselves to the Holy Spirit at the same time

Romans 12:1-2

¹ Therefore I urge you, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living and holy sacrifice, acceptable to God, which is your spiritual service of worship.

² And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, so that you may prove what the will of God is, that which is good and acceptable and perfect.

It has to start to renew our heart that is our heart field.

No matter what we do, the main key is our heart.

Psalm 51:10

Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me.

2) Our priority

Matthew 6:33-34

³³ “But seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.

³⁴ “So do not worry about tomorrow; for tomorrow will care for itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own.

2 Corinthians 6:17-18

¹⁷ “Therefore, come out from their midst and be separate,” says the Lord. “And do not touch what is unclean; and I will welcome you.

¹⁸ “And I will be a father to you, and you shall be sons and daughters to Me,” says the Lord Almighty.

Invitation

Matthew 11:28

Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest.

Closing illustration)

2 young men on the way to drink and to hang around with wrong people:

Passing a Church – one of them entered the church the rest kept on going to hang around with the wrong group – many years later – one prisoner as a murderer – tears down to hear the news of the inauguration of the president – the president: Grover Cleveland who served two terms of US President for 22^nd and 24^th the President was this murderer’s friend whom he never had seen again since they had been separated one night long time ago.