Search Party uses a process called the Four Fields to help us, and those that we train, to think about our steps through a process to enter into places where Jesus is not known, share the Gospel, make disciples, start new churches, and raise up new leaders who will do the same. At the end of this post, you will find a video to explain the process in a visual manner, but let’s walk through the parable one step at a time in an attempt to understand what Jesus is saying.

Jesus told a story of a man who was sowing seed in a field. Here is the full parable:

He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.”

Mark 4:26-29

Jesus is illustrating with this parable how the kingdom of God works. It is important to emphasize this point: Jesus is illustrating how the kingdom of God works.

Why is that important? Jesus is the king in the kingdom of God. He told his disciples that all authority, in heaven and on earth, has been given to him. If you have all authority, whether in heaven or on earth, you are the king!

So in short, as Jesus is telling this parable and saying “this is what the kingdom of God is like…”, he is essentially saying: “This is how things work in my kingdom.” Or maybe we could paraphrase Jesus in another way saying, “In my house, it works like this…”.

This is the only parable that describes the growth of the kingdom of God, so as workers in the kingdom who desire to see the kingdom grow, it is important that we pay attention to what Jesus is saying. The king is telling us how his kingdom grows!

He also said, “This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground.

Mark 4:26

Jesus first says that there is a man who was scattering seed. Of course, the first thing that the man would need besides the seed would be a field in which he would scatter the seed. But in this parable, we see the field go through four different stages.

In the first stage that the field goes through, as the man enters the field, there isn’t anything currently growing. It is really just an empty field, which is why the man wants to scatter seed. The man wouldn’t go into a field where there are already plants, where the crops were already growing. No, instead, he would only go to sow seed where there were no plants growing.

If we think about this from the perspective of the kingdom of God, from the viewpoint of what Jesus is trying to teach his disciples, we are looking for the places where the kingdom of God has not yet come. We are looking for the places that God has been preparing people to hear and accept the Gospel message. Jesus said that no one can come to him unless the Father draws them, so we are looking for the people and the places that do not believe and those whom God is drawing to Jesus.

Within these empty fields, the man goes to scatter the seed along this ground, which is the next stage of the field. As we think about this stage of the field, we should remember how Jesus sent out his disciples to spread the message about the kingdom of God. The man is scattering the seed to see the kingdom grow.

And what is this seed? There may be a few different responses to this question. The seed could be our testimony, telling what God has done in our lives. Or the seed could be the Gospel itself, telling others how they can enter the kingdom of God. Or possibly it could be the word of God, reading the Bible or helping another person hear and understand the scripture. Each of these, and even other things as well, could be considered to be the seed that the man is sowing.

Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how.

Mark 4:27

Now, some people may receive and accept the seed, accept the message, while others will not. The man doesn’t know how the seed sprouts and grows. He doesn’t understand how all of this works. His job is to sow the seed and then he goes to sleep at the end of the day. But what we do know is that there is a growth process.

All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head.

Mark 4:28

As we find people that accept the message, we cannot make them grow because we don’t know how the growth works, but there are things that we can do to create the right environment for growth. We can water the plants, we can fertilize, and more. Jesus says that the soil produces the grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. It is a slow process. It doesn’t happen overnight, but it does happen. It does grow.

What is Jesus saying? He is talking about the process of discipleship, both in becoming a disciple and helping others by discipling them. In fact, Jesus also told his disciples to, “teach them to obey everything I have commanded you”. That is a command that we believe is also for us today. So in this stage of the field, we want to reproduce disciples by growing the new disciples, helping them to both understand and obey the commands of Jesus as they continue to grow in Christ and in the basics of our faith.

As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come.

Mark 4:29

As these new plants continue to grow, Jesus says that they will eventually reach maturity, at which point the man will harvest the grain. It has grown to maturity and is now ready to be harvested and gathered. From the perspective of the kingdom of God, we are starting the process of gathering people together for the purpose of gathering a harvest for the kingdom.

Finally, we should ask ourselves, who is this man that is out sowing the seed? Some scholars and commentators believe that Jesus is speaking about himself. Others believe that Jesus is talking about his disciples. We believe that it could be either one, and actually even both.

If we believe that the man in the parable is Jesus, we can understand that Jesus both gathered an initial harvest of his disciples and will one day return to complete the final harvest.

On the other hand, if we believe that the man is one or all of Jesus’s disciples, we would understand that his disciples went on to fulfill Jesus’s words that his disciples would do even greater things than him. In other words, the kingdom of God grows cyclically, just like the agricultural seasons. It does not just happen once, but over and over and over again. Jesus started the process of seeing the kingdom grow, but his disciples continued after him, over and over again, until that process and the revolving cycle has now come to us in our time.

We believe that the these four stages that the field goes through, or the “Four Fields” as it is called, represent the process of growth that Jesus described for his disciples so that they would know what they should do. We see Paul, in fact, go through this same process as he traveled on his three missionary journeys that are recorded in the book of Acts. He went into new, empty fields. He frequently went to the synagogue and shared the Gospel. He made disciples. And finally, he left a church that would continue the work. After this, Paul brought some of the leaders from the cities where he worked to do the same process of kingdom growth that he was doing, now in other locations.

This is the process of growth of the kingdom of God that Jesus described to his disciples and this is the same process that we are continuing to follow today.