Collateral Points

Luke 8 is one of the places where we find the sower parable, but it is also found in Matthew. I have already covered this parable – see the study entitled 'As a man thinks' – so here in Luke, I will focus on collateral points.

What do I mean by collateral points? We all too often concern ourselves with only the core topic of a study. We look through our personal telescopes and count off the planets but disregard the moons. We hurry to reach the end of the labor, willing to relegate all minor points to the category of trivia. These are the collateral points, the things we hurry past without giving due credit. If we were to look through our personal telescope at the earth, an appraisal of its moon would render truths about the tides and how they help drive the weather of an entire world.

Let us look at the little things. Let us seek meaning and strive for definition. Luke 8 begins with Jesus traveling through the towns and cities of a region. You may well ask, 'what region?' In Luke 7, Jesus had last been seen in the city of Nain. Let us find out where that was. A quick internet search gives us this information: less than ten miles south of Nazareth and near Mount Tabor, Nain is located in lower Galilee. Jesus traveled through the region of Galilee visiting “every” town and city. The unmentioned time frame for these events would have been between weeks and months.

The account tells us that all of the twelve disciples traveled with him. For them, it was more than a learning experience. They served the mission needs in multiple stations: seating agents, ushers, security – just to name three. Women also traveled with him, and certain facts are given. Here, I would like us to linger over the collateral points.

Only three of the women are named, but it is said that beside these, many other women traveled in his company. These women are said to have “ministered unto him” and it is assumed that it was put this way for a reason. Jesus managed the entire troop, as well as all public speaking engagements, from a singular position. Such daily rigors will take a toll on any man. Many women, each with a job to do, each volunteering to use their own “substance.”

What did they own? Did they have food? Did they share fabric for clothing? Who among them had currency to spend? I am no expert on the status of women in those times, but it is clear these women had possessions over which they had the final say and gladly used them to attend the needs of Jesus.

Of what kind or type were these women? There are the “certain women” which are described in part, and there are the “many others” who are only mentioned in passing. It may be that the certain women are representative, at least in part, of the many others. It might well have taken a chapter or two to list and describe all the women with their infirmities. So it is that through the certain women we get a sense of them all. Susanna is named but not described. Joanna was known as the wife of Herod's steward, Chuza. This woman, at least, gives us an idea of how a woman might have acquired substance, being a woman with connections.

The most explicit description is of Mary, who was as often as not, simply called Magdalene. It was as if her fame or notoriety lay in her association to the city of Magdala. She may have been recognized as typical, through her looks or appearance, as one from that city. Be that as it may, she was also the most recognized among the healed as the one from whom seven devils were driven out.

She may have been a wild one. Such women were put away or stoned. Yet, she may have been hidden – I am thinking of blood ties to important people. Some scholars think Joanna may have been the granddaughter of the high priest Theophilus, a 'person of eminent quality.' If so, could not Mary have been of similar standing? If she had a connection to high station, that would more readily explain her access to substance.

When Jesus spoke to the gathered people in verse 4, it was in the open countryside between the cities. It may have been more practical, considering the size of his troop and the number of people who came to hear him, to make camp outside city limits. It was in such a setting that Jesus delivered the sower parable.

All of us know this parable and most of us understand it. Many of us feel a connection to it for we are the physical field in which a spiritual God has planted a spiritual seed. We feel a certainty that what develops in our spirits – that is, who and what we are becoming – is the harvest that God expects.

What is especially interesting about this parable is how Jesus explains it to his disciples later. Even though he had delivered the same parable to both the people and his disciples, there was a certain dynamic at work that separated the disciples from the common crowd. That same dynamic works today to divide the believer from the non-believer.

The best way I can explain it is with an illustration of biceps. Think of the believer as the bicep on the right arm and the non-believer as the bicep on the left arm. The believer is exercised where the non-believer goes unused. The same dynamic that sees the exercised muscle grow sees the unexercised muscle shrivel away.

Mark 4:25 says, “For he that hath, to him shall be given: and he that hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he hath.” That is the dynamic, and every time I think of it I am reminded of how exercised muscles get bigger while ignored muscles get smaller.

Just like physical muscles, our spiritual attributes may either be exercised or ignored. If you do either, even in secret, the proof of it will be evident. That same dynamic is applied through Jesus' statement that a tree is known by its fruit. There are basically the two directions: being more or being less.

The more you are, the more you become. The more effort you put into something, the more you will get out of it.

Jesus confirmed this with his own words. The same disciples who had just heard his explanation of the sower parable, who had been made aware of a truth that was withheld from the majority, were present when it was told Jesus that his mother and siblings wanted to see him but could not reach him for the overwhelming number of people.

And this is how Jesus responded in verse 21: “My mother and my brethren are these which hear the word of God and do it.” My friends, that is 'do' as in seek, as in strive. That is 'do' as in exercise. Anyone who seeks to be more of himself can ill afford to ignore the word of God. Anyone who seeks truth must give credence to his spiritual qualities. He must not only seek, but grasp, and most importantly, he must exercise.