The Thursday after the Seventh Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on August 7, 2025 by under
Scripture: St. Mark 4:26-29 (NKJV)
4:26 And He said, “The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground, 27 and should sleep by night and rise by day, and the seed should sprout and grow, he himself does not know how. 28 For the earth yields crops by itself: first the blade, then the head, after that the full grain in the head. 29 But when the grain ripens, immediately she puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”
Devotion
The fruitfulness of the Word is not subject to human technique; the Word of the Lord makes that very clear. “So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how.” It does not matter how much we learn about agriculture; the point of comparison here is that the fruitfulness of the seed is not dependent on knowledge, but upon the vitality which the Lord has granted to it.
The parable sets forth the pattern: “For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear.” When the seed has been sown, the Lord declares, then that which is according to that which the Lord has established comes to pass. The sower may be awake, or he may sleep, but that does not alter this fruitfulness.
The moment for the action of the sower comes again in the day of harvest: “But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.” The seed is sown, the fruit harvested. As St. Paul wrote in 1 Corinthians 3: “Who then is Paul, and who is Apollos, but ministers by whom ye believed, even as the Lord gave to every man? I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase. So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.”
Collect: O God, Whose never-failing Providence ordereth all things both in heaven and earth: We humbly beseech Thee to put away from us all hurtful things, and to give us those things which be profitable for us; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
