Matthew 13:20-21

Some fell upon stony places, where they had not much earth.

Stony places

I. The nature of the ground.

1. Stony ground wants breaking up. These persons enter into a profession of religion before their hearts are thoroughly broken in the sense of sin.

2. Stony ground is cold; what colder than a stone? These persons are without spiritual warmth.

3. Their hearts may be compared to stony ground from the heaviness or lumpishness of their spirits. These hearts are heavy and not soon removed out of their evil course.

4. Stony ground doth not drink in the rain that falls from heaven.

5. All the hearts of men are naturally hard.

6. Stony ground seems to be the fruit of the curse for man’s sin. So these persons seem still to be under the curse.

7. Stony ground by reason of the little earth that is found there, never brings forth fruit to perfection. So these persons only bring forth the externals of religion.

8. Stony ground, when the sun rises high and begins to shine hot upon it, the scorching beams thereof soon causes the blade to wither away.

II. The success of the seed. Stony or hard hearted hearers may go a great way in the profession of religion.

1. They may hear the Word of God with diligence.

2. They may be zealous hearers.

3. They may receive the Word into their hearts.

4. They receive it with joy.

5. They believe for a while.

6. They may yield obedience to all external duties.

7. They may become members of a visible church.

8. They may leave all gross acts of sin.

9. They may have some inward joy as to the hopes they have of heaven.

Why they go so far?

1. From the common illuminations of God’s Word and Spirit.

2. Because a temporary faith is not wholly without product.

3. It may arise from regard for some ministers.

4. Self-respect and honour may cause them to go so far.

5. It may be self-profit.

6. It may arise from that seeming sweetness and satisfaction they meet with from within themselves whilst they continue in the profession of religion.

7. It may be from a natural desire of being saved.

8. It may be from the shame and reproach which are attached to open wickedness.

From whence it arises that these hearers go no further:

1. It may arise from the great ignorance that is in them.

2. It ariseth from the unsoundness of their hearts, the ground is not good.

3. It ariseth from the deceitfulness of their hearts.

4. They go no further because of their pride.

5. Because they had no vital but artificial principle ill them.

6. Because there is some secret sin hid in their hearts. (B. Keach.)

Withering is the fearful fate of all stony-ground hearers

I. As to the evil of the cause that produces such evil effects.

1. The principal cause is the stoniness of their hearts.

2. Privative cause.

(1) Want of moisture.

(2) Want of earth.

(3) Want of taking root.

II. The badness of those effects that proceed from such evil causes.

1. Barrenness.

2. Another effect that attends these professors is earthliness.

3. Lukewarmness in religious duties.

4. Pride.

5. Uncharitableness.

6. Contention.

7. Inconstancy.

8. Apostacy.

(1) In judgment.

(2) In affection.

(3) In practice.

(4) In respect of means.

III. The danger and fearful condition of such that wither

1. They disappoint God of His expectation.

2. These persons are hateful to God, as they seem to declare to all the world that there is not that good to be found in God which the Word and ministers do affirm.

3. They bring scandal upon the Church.

4. In respect of the world these men’s sin and danger is also aggravated.

5. In respect to the sin itself, none is more odious and dangerous. Relapse more dangerous than the disease.

6. This sin of withering is generally punished with other sins,

(1) with blindness of mind;

(2) with judicial hardness of heart;

(3) with a seared conscience;

(4) with final impenitence.

7. How may it be known that a man is withering?

1. Self-confidence.

2. When he cannot bear a searching doctrine.

3. When his conscience is not so tender as it was.

4. When a man’s prayers are short.

5. When he cannot stand in the hour of temptation.

6. Deadness of spirit. (B. Keach.)

The temporary Christian

This man’s faith has five stages:

1. He knows the Word.

2. He assents to it.

3. He professes it.

4. He rejoices inwardly in it.

5. He brings forth some kind of fruit; and yet for all this, hath no more fruit in him than a faith that will fail in the end; because he wants the effectual application of the promise of the gospel, and is without all manner of sound conversation.

This faith is like corn on the housetop, which grows for a while; but, when the heat of summer comes, it withers. (W. Perkins)

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An easily-moved susceptibility

There is deep knowledge of human nature and exquisite fidelity to truth in the single touch by which the impression of religion on them is described. The seed sprang up quickly; and then withered away as quickly, because it had no depth of root. There is a quick, easily-moved susceptibility, that rapidly exhibits the slightest breath of those emotions which play upon the surface of the soul, and then as rapidly passes off. In such persons words are ever at command-voluble and impassioned words. Tears flow readily. The expressive features exhibit every passing shade of thought. Every thought and every feeling plays upon the surface-everything that is sown springs up at once with vehement vegetation. But slightness and inconstancy go together with violence. “Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh.” True; but also out of the emptiness of the heart the mouth can speak even more volubly. He who can always find the word which is appropriate and adequate to his emotion,, is not the man whose emotions are deepest’; warmth of feeling is one thing-permanence is another. (F. W. Robertson.)

Shallow soil like superficial character

You meet with such persons in life. There is nothing deep about them-all they do and all they have is on the surface. The superficial servant’s work is done: but lazily, partially-not thoroughly. The superficial workman’s labour will not bear looking into-but it bears a showy outside. The very dress of such persons betrays the slatternly, incomplete character of their minds. When religion comes in contact with persons of this stamp, it shares the fate of everything else. (F. W. Robertson.)

The superficial character connected with the hard heart

Beneath the light thin surface of easily stirred dust lies the bed of rock. The shallow ground was stony ground. And it is among the children of light enjoyment and unsettled life that we must look for stony heartlessness-not in the world of business-not among the poor, crushed to the earth by privation and suffering. These harden the character, but often leave the heart soft. If you wish to know what hollowness and heartlessness are, you must seek for them in the world of light, elegant, superficial Fashion-where frivolity has turned the heart into a rockbed of selfishness. Say what men will of the heartlessness of Trade, it is nothing compared with the heartlessness of Fashion. Say what they will of the atheism of Science, it is nothing to the atheism of that round of pleasure in which many a heart lives: dead while it lives. (F. W. Robertson)

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Warm affections easily moved

Among the affections, when they are warm and newly stirred, the seed speedily springs. (W. Arnot.)

Christ not to be on the surface

Do not keep Christ on the surface; let Him possess the centre, and thence direct all the circumference of your life. (W. Arnot.)

Hasty, but not lasting

The marked antithesis between the immediate reception and the immediate rejection is to be carefully observed. That which is hasty is not lasting. Grace, in almost every case, is slow and progressive; for, in the human heart, it has much to contend against; and God treats us as free agents, putting no force on any man’s will, (J. Ford,)