Ready for Impact (10 minutes)
Catch up on how things have been since the last time your Impact Group met. Allow anyone new to introduce themselves. Then ask group members:
- Talk about the best listener you know. What makes them such a great listener?
Ask for a volunteer to read Matthew 13:1-23 to the group, praying a short prayer that – however much they’ve come to know Jesus, they’d know him better as a result of your time together.
Watch
If you’re not gathered in person, the leader should project the video for the group through sharing their screen. If you’re using Zoom, make sure you have optimized your screen share for video.
Impacted by the Word (15 minutes)
Suggested questions to help your discussion.
Note to leaders: don’t feel you need to spend ages on the first few questions. They’re just making sure everyone in the group understands the main point of the parable.
- In Jesus’ parable (verses 3-9), what makes the difference in how the seeds grow?
- Jesus’ disciples ask what the parable means, and he gives them the key (verses 16-23). What does Jesus say the seed represents?
- What do each of the four soils represent?
- In each of the first three soils, what prevents the seed from bearing fruit? (Try and put your answers in your own words).
- What might the ‘fruit’ produced by the seed in good soil refer to?
- How might this parable have helped the disciples respond to the varied responses they later saw people making to Jesus?
- Jesus closes his parable with the words, “Whoever has ears, let them hear” (verse 9). What might Jesus mean by this?
Your discussion may run into difficulty as you talk about “the evil one” (verse 19), who comes and snatches away what was sown. How are we to understand this?
Jesus says that this group is best signified by a path – land which is hard. Some responded to Jesus’ teaching in his own day with hardness of heart. The more Jesus spoke, the more he healed, the more he taught, the harder their hearts got. Essentially these people were uninterested in hearing Jesus and therefore unable to hear him. What happens to this kind of heart? When they hear, says Jesus, the evil one immediately comes and takes the word away.
The Bible is clear throughout that there are malevolent spiritual forces, which wage war against Jesus and his people. Their normal pattern of work is to take something evil and to amplify it many times over. Here, people are already disinclined to listen to Jesus, and the evil one turns this into outright disregard for him.
C.S. Lewis picks up on this theme in his great fictional book The Screwtape Letters. It’s a series of letters from one senior demon, Screwtape, to a junior demon, Wormwood. Wormwood has been assigned a man to keep from coming to faith in Jesus. In one letter, Screwtape says, “It is funny how mortals always picture us as putting things into their minds: in reality our best work is done by keeping things out.”
We might most instinctively associate evil powers with the occult, but the evil one has a million methods of drawing us away from Jesus. Perhaps one of the key methods in our day is simply through distracting us.
- For more, check out the episode Soft Power, Dirty War and Russian YouTube Videos from the This Cultural Moment podcast.
Impacting Our Hearts (10 minutes)
Take time to allow group members to take in what they’ve heard. You might find these further questions helpful:
- Why do you think Jesus told this parable?
- How do you think Jesus hoped people would respond?
- How do you think Jesus might hope that you personally might respond to his parable?
You might also like to share any requests for personal prayer at this point, and for those who’d like to lead the group in prayer.
Impacting the University (15 minutes)
Central to Jesus’ parable is the idea of listening. We honour people through paying them attention. This sort of listening can transform us.
It’s not only listening to Jesus that is important. Listening is how we go deeper in relationships and beyond superficial conversation. You might enjoy watching this somewhat cheesy video to explore more.
Discuss together:
- How easy do you find it to take a real interest in others and to listen with this attitude?
- How can listening help us as we aim to discuss the things that matter most in life?
- In the week ahead, what one change could you make to be a better listener?
Come ready next week to talk about what you’ve learned about listening.
Wrap-up
You may have people in your Impact Group who are less familiar with Jesus and his teaching.
- Let them know how much you’ve enjoyed having them, and encourage them to keep coming to your Impact Group!
- Invite them to explore Uncover, a set of sessions in John’s Gospel, allowing them to investigate Jesus for themselves. Make it easy for those who are keen to opt in. (You can find hints on using Uncover online here).
- Next week we will be looking at Jesus’ story of a tree that just wouldn’t stop growing! Who else could you invite to join you? These friends don’t need to be followers of Jesus and may really appreciate being invited.
- Find out who’s in your university city this week. Who’d be up for going for a walk together?
Confirm the time that you’ll meet next week, and ask someone to close your time together in prayer.
Taking it further – links you might like to share with your Impact Group
- London pastor Liam Thatcher considers the question of whether Jesus’ parables conceal or reveal in this short blog
- Go into more detail on why Jesus told parables with Don Carson (56 minutes).
- Read this inspiring story of how the parable of the sower is being used by CU students in Albania.
- The Bible Project has a 3-minute video on what ‘hearing’ means in the Bible.
- Karen Maeyen’s TED talk isn’t explicitly Christian but is themed on the importance of asking questions and listening well.