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Date: December 30, 2018 Title: The Instruction of the Messiah (Pt 1a His Parables) Passage: Matthew 13:1-23 Speaker: Bob Corbin Sermon Note Sheet (PDF) Download Audio

* Focusing on the Messiah in the book of Matthew. Matthew was a Jewish man writing to a Jewish audience and giving testimony regarding the life and ministry of the Messiah who had been foretold by many of the Jewish prophets. * As the Scribes and Pharisees begin to plot how they might destroy Jesus, He begins the new phase of His ministry - preparing His disciples for His departure. * Matthew now transitions his account of the life and ministry of the Messiah to the instructional phase by sharing several of the parables which Jesus taught. However, before we can adequately study this chapter, we must first understand the concept of Parables * I. PARABLES ARE TO BE ORATORICALLY GIVEN (They are oratorical in nature) - A parable was not meant to be read but to be heard - They were not spoken to be studied at length and leisure but to produce an immediate impression and reaction. - Therefore what we must look for in a parable is a situation in which one great idea leaps out and shines like a flash of lightning. - It teaches something new by putting the truth alongside something familiar (a word picture). * II. PARABLES ARE TO BE EXEGETICALLY INTERPRETED ... EXEGESIS v. EISOGESIS - Be careful of reading too much into a parable! - Exegesis means taking knowledge out of and Eisogesis means reading knowledge into * III. PARABLES ARE TO BE SPIRITUALLY DISCERNED (v. 9-17) - As you carefully consider the picture, it becomes a mirror in which you see yourself, and many people do not like to see themselves * For this first parable - the Sower and the Seed, or the four soils - Jesus gives us the illustration AND the interpretation. However, we are still left to determine the impact ... the application!