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In form and imagery this parable is exquisitely simple; in principle and meaning it is very profound. To be able to put great truths in simple language is a note of true power. Christ was a master of this art. His disciples do not seem to have ever attempted it. The parable was too Divine a thing for them to touch. The idea in this parable is distinct and beautiful. The seed once sown, grows according to its own nature; it has life in itself; and when once fairly deposited in congenial soil, and subjected to the quickening influences of heavenly sunshine and shower, it silently and mysteriously develops the life that is in it, according to the ordinary principles of growth. It has an inherent vitality, a growth power, which springs up "we know not how;" we only see that it grows. The brown clod of the field is first tinged with virgin green; then covered as with a carpet; then waves, in yielding beauty to the wind, like a summer sea, and rustles in ripening music, like a forest. So is the kingdom of God; the field of the heart, the field of the world, are thus covered with gracious fruit.

I. THIS GREAT LAW OF SPIRITUAL GROWTH IS NOT ALWAYS RECOGNIZED, NOR ARE MEN ALWAYS CONTENTED WITH IT. We are eager for quick results; we have not the patience to wait for the slow development from seed to fruit.

II. BUT THIS IS GOD'S PLAN IN ALL THINGS. He produces nothing by great leaps and transitions; all His great works are quiet processes. Light and darkness melt into each other; the seasons change by gradual transition; all life, vegetable and animal, grows from a germ; and the higher and nobler the type of life, the slower and more gradual is the process of growth. The oak attains to maturity more slowly than the flower; man than the lower animals; the mind than the body; the soul than the mind.

III. APPLICATION TO THE CHARACTER AND COURSE OF THE CHRISTIAN LIFE.

1. Its beginning. Only a blade, hardly to be discerned above the soil, or distinguished from common grass. We may often confound the real beginnings of religion with ordinary human virtues.

2. Its progress. We look for the formation of the ear, and for the full corn in the ear. A child of God, always a babe, is a deformity.

3. Its consummation. How fruitful and beautiful it should be, not with the verdant beauty of the blade, but with the golden beauty of the ripe corn.

(Henry Allon.)

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KJV: And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground;

WEB: He said, "The Kingdom of God is as if a man should cast seed on the earth,