Why does God speak in parables?

Why does God speak in parables?

In our Gospel today (Matthew 13:1-23), Jesus, the storyteller, invites the vast expectant crowd to consider the parable of the sower. His disciples later approach him and ask, “Why do you speak to them in parables?”

There are many possible answers to this question, each containing a nugget of truth: Parables urge us to think, and Jesus wants us to figure things out—not just follow blindly. God gave us our intellects, and if we are to love him “with all our minds” (Matthew 22:37), we must use this gift. And when we do, the very act of trying to understand becomes a gift we return to him.

We can also connect this to what Jesus said in our Gospel last week: “I give praise to you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to little ones” (Matthew 11:25). If Jesus were to repeat these lines to us today, he would probably use air quotes with the words “the wise and the learned.” Why? Because they weren’t wise or learned at all—they only thought they were. And this was also the main reason why things remained hidden from them.

Maybe Jesus spoke in parables to separate (and here’s a preview of our Gospel next week) the weeds from the wheat, “the wise and the learned” who cannot see from “the little ones” who humbly accept they still have much growing to do.

The poet Alexander Pope warns us, “A little learning is a dangerous thing.” Knowing just a tiny bit can tempt people into believing they are already experts. Psychologists today even have a name for this: the Dunning-Kruger effect. People with limited competence overestimate themselves because they also lack the self-awareness to recognize their deficiencies.

Have you ever done an Internet search on a symptom you were experiencing? Then, emboldened by a factoid or two from Dr. Google, you suggest an alternative diagnosis to the one an actual physician provides. Or worse, you self-medicate and end up writing a prescription for trouble.

We don’t have to look any farther than our Gospel today for another example of the Dunning-Kruger effect. Jesus’ disciples asked him, “Why do you speak in parables to them?” They had likely received some private lessons from our Lord, and afterward, they thought they knew everything while the “dumb masses” knew nothing. But as we later see, when Jesus predicts his coming passion and they rebuke him, when he prepares them for suffering and they angle for seats of honor, and when he is arrested and they scatter, it becomes clear: They had not understood his message at all.

Once we hear one explanation of one parable, we might think we already know all there is to know. But God’s word is infinitely deep, speaking to us differently at different points in our lives. We must always remind ourselves that we are barely scratching the surface.

When I was younger, I thought the parable of the sower was simply about different types of Christians: those who hear God’s word but don’t understand it, those who receive it but never let it take root, those who let it be choked by the distractions of daily life, and finally, those who allow it to bear fruit. My question then was: What kind of soil am I?

As I grow older, I realize I am not just one kind of soil. In different areas of my life, I can be the path, the rocky ground, the thorny patch, and thankfully also the rich soil. There are times when I am more open to God’s word, and there are seasons when I am more hardheaded, when the seed cannot break through the crust of my pride and layers of so?called “knowledge” (yet another example of the Dunning-Kruger effect). My question is now: How can I be more aware of the shifting soils in my life, and keep turning them over so they can be fertile?

We are far from exhausting the parable. There are still many ways we can interpret it. Some readings stand apart and cannot be blended with others; some harmonize and reinforce each other. Yet all carry within them the possibility of growth, especially when they begin with a sincere question.

We can ask: Will there be times when the seed of the Kingdom will just not bear fruit? The parable can help make us more realistic: Yes, there will be failure. But the parable still gives us hope: When the seed does succeed, it will more than make up for what was lost. The yield will be thirty, sixty, or a hundredfold.

We can ask: How can we become good soil? A “plantita” friend who is an advocate of composting once taught me that what looks like waste can, with patience, become life. You mix it. You smell it. You wait. Her description gave me a striking image of God the Gardener: unafraid to plunge his hands into the mess that is us, to get dirt under his fingernails, even to deal with all our… well, manure. And from what others throw away, he brings forth soil rich enough to bear fruit. We may begin as dust, but in his hands, dust becomes promise.

We can also ask: But isn’t it unfair to the seeds that were sown on the path, the rocky ground, and the thorny patch that they landed where they did? This question, though, I will leave unanswered. It will be part of your homework.

Your prayer assignment this week: Instead of a song, we have a botanical lesson from Sir David Attenborough

Combine the video above with your own meditation on the Sower’s seemingly strange and wasteful way of planting. What can the expanded parable reveal? Can you see that parables are good soil—messy but also life-giving when you dig your elbows in?

For bonus points: When you receive Communion, see the Eucharistic minister or priest as the Sower. The seed is planted in you without judgment. There is no prior test to check whether you are good or bad soil. There is only hope that grace will take root and grow.