Sunday, July 12, 2026

¹⁰For as the rain comes down and the snow from the sky, and doesn't return there, but waters the earth, and makes it grow and bud, and gives seed to the sower and bread to the eater;

¹¹so is my word that goes out of my mouth: it will not return to me void, but it will accomplish that which I please, and it will prosper in the thing I sent it to do.

¹⁰You visit the earth, and water it. You greatly enrich it. The river of God is full of water. You provide them grain, for so you have ordained it.

¹¹You drench its furrows. You level its ridges. You soften it with showers. You bless it with a crop.

¹²You crown the year with your bounty. Your carts overflow with abundance.

¹³The wilderness grasslands overflow. The hills are clothed with gladness.

¹⁴The pastures are covered with flocks. The valleys also are clothed with grain. They shout for joy! They also sing.

¹⁸For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which will be revealed toward us.

¹⁹For the creation waits with eager expectation for the children of God to be revealed.

²⁰For the creation was subjected to vanity, not of its own will, but because of him who subjected it, in hope

²¹that the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of decay into the liberty of the glory of the children of God.

²²For we know that the whole creation groans and travails in pain together until now.

²³Not only so, but ourselves also, who have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, waiting for adoption, the redemption of our body.

¹On that day Jesus went out of the house and sat by the seaside.

²Great multitudes gathered to him, so that he entered into a boat and sat; and all the multitude stood on the beach.

³He spoke to them many things in parables, saying, "Behold, a farmer went out to sow.

⁴As he sowed, some seeds fell by the roadside, and the birds came and devoured them.

⁵Others fell on rocky ground, where they didn't have much soil, and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of earth.

⁶When the sun had risen, they were scorched. Because they had no root, they withered away.

⁷Others fell among thorns. The thorns grew up and choked them.

⁸Others fell on good soil and yielded fruit: some one hundred times as much, some sixty, and some thirty.

⁹He who has ears to hear, let him hear."

¹⁰The disciples came, and said to him, "Why do you speak to them in parables?"

¹¹He answered them, "To you it is given to know the mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven, but it is not given to them.

¹²For whoever has, to him will be given, and he will have abundance; but whoever doesn't have, from him will be taken away even that which he has.

¹³Therefore I speak to them in parables, because seeing they don't see, and hearing, they don't hear, neither do they understand.

¹⁴In them the prophecy of Isaiah is fulfilled, which says, 'By hearing you will hear, and will in no way understand; Seeing you will see, and will in no way perceive;

¹⁵for this people's heart has grown callous, their ears are dull of hearing, and they have closed their eyes; or else perhaps they might perceive with their eyes, hear with their ears, understand with their heart, and would turn again, and I would heal them.'

¹⁶"But blessed are your eyes, for they see; and your ears, for they hear.

¹⁷For most certainly I tell you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see the things which you see, and didn't see them; and to hear the things which you hear, and didn't hear them.

¹⁸"Hear, then, the parable of the farmer.

¹⁹When anyone hears the word of the Kingdom and doesn't understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away that which has been sown in his heart. This is what was sown by the roadside.

²⁰What was sown on the rocky places, this is he who hears the word and immediately with joy receives it;

²¹yet he has no root in himself, but endures for a while. When oppression or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he stumbles.

²²What was sown among the thorns, this is he who hears the word, but the cares of this age and the deceitfulness of riches choke the word, and he becomes unfruitful.

²³What was sown on the good ground, this is he who hears the word and understands it, who most certainly bears fruit and produces, some one hundred times as much, some sixty, and some thirty."