In Mark 4:26-29 we have the parable of the seed. Verse 26 says, “And He said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed on the earth.” The kingdom of God is the reality of the church brought forth by the resurrection life of Christ through the gospel (1 Cor. 4:15). Regeneration is its entrance (John 3:5), and the growth of the divine life within the believers is its development (2 Pet. 1:3-11).
The man in Mark 4:26 is the Slave-Savior as the Sower. The man in verse 26 is the sower in verse 3. This sower is the Slave-Savior, who was the Son of God coming to sow Himself as the seed of life in His word (v. 14) into men’s hearts so that He might grow and live in them and be expressed from within them.
The seed in verse 26 is the seed of the divine life (1 John 3:9; 1 Pet. 1:23) sown into the believers of the Slave-Savior. The casting of the seed here indicates that the kingdom of God, which is the issue and goal of the Slave-Savior’s gospel, and of the church in this age (Rom. 14:17), are a matter of life, the life of God, which sprouts, grows, bears fruit, matures, and produces a harvest. They are not a matter of lifeless organization through man’s wisdom and ability. The apostles’ words in 1 Corinthians 3:6-9 and Revelation 14:4, 15-16 confirm this.
Mark 4:27 goes on to say, “And sleep and rise night and day, and the seed sprouts and lengthens—how, he does not know.” The words “sleep and rise night and day” and “how, he does not know,” should not be applied to the Slave-Savior. This verse illustrates the spontaneity of the growth of the seed (v. 28). The word “lengthens” here indicates growth.
Verse 28 says, “The earth bears fruit by itself: first the blade, then an ear, then full grain in the ear.” The earth here is the good earth (v. 8) and signifies the good heart created by God (Gen. 1:31) for His divine life to grow in man. Such a good heart works together with the seed of the divine life sown into us to grow and bear fruit spontaneously for the expression of God. The word here enables us to have faith in this spontaneity. Thus, tares are not mentioned here, on the negative side, as in Matthew 13:24-30. The words “by itself” mean that the growth is spontaneous.
Verse 29 concludes, “But when the fruit permits, immediately he sends forth the sickle, because the harvest has come.” The sickle signifies the angels sent by the Lord to reap the harvest (Rev. 14:16; Matt. 13:39).
In 4:30-34 we have the parable of the mustard seed. In verses 30 through 32 the Lord says, “How shall we liken the kingdom of God, or in what parable shall we put it? It is as a grain of mustard, which when it is sown on the earth is smaller than all the seeds on the earth, and when it is sown, it comes up and becomes greater than all the herbs, and produces great branches, so that the birds of heaven can roost under its shade.” The significance of the seed in verses 3 and 26 and the lamp in verse 21 is that it discloses the nature and inward reality of the kingdom of God. However, the significance of the mustard seed becoming great not after its kind, and the birds roosting under its shade, is that they speak of the corruption and outward appearance of the kingdom of God.
In Matthew 13:31 and 32 we see that the grain of mustard seed not only becomes greater than all the herbs, but eventually becomes a tree. The church, which is the embodiment of the kingdom, should be like an herb to produce food. But it became a tree, a lodge for birds, having its nature and function changed. (This is against the law of God’s creation that every plant must be after its kind—Gen. 1:11-12.) This happened when Constantine the Great mixed the church with the world in the first part of the fourth century. He brought thousands of false believers into Christianity, making it Christendom, no longer the church. Hence, the parable of the mustard seed corresponds to the third of the seven churches in Revelation 2 and 3, the church in Pergamos (Rev. 2:12-17). The mustard is an annual herb, whereas the tree lives on year after year. The church, according to its heavenly and spiritual nature, should be like the mustard, sojourning on the earth. But with its nature changed, the church became deeply rooted and settled in the earth as a tree, flourishing with its enterprises as the branches to lodge many evil persons and things. This has formed the outward organization of the outward appearance of the kingdom of God.
In the parable of the sower, “the birds came and devoured” the seed that fell beside the way (Mark 4:4). According to verse 15, this indicates that Satan comes and takes away the word which has been sown into certain ones. Since the birds in this parable signify the evil one, Satan, the “birds of heaven” in the parable of the mustard seed must refer to Satan’s evil spirits with the evil persons and things motivated by them. They lodge in the branches of the great tree, that is, in the enterprises of Christendom.
In 4:33 and 34 we have the conclusion of this section in the Gospel of Mark on the parables of the kingdom of God: “And in many such parables He spoke the word to them, as they were able to hear; and without a parable He did not speak to them, but privately to His own disciples He explained all things.” These parables displayed the Slave-Savior’s divine wisdom and knowledge (Matt. 13:34-35).