The Parable of the Sower (MRK 4:1-9)

[4:1] Again Jesus began to teach beside Lake Galilee. The crowd that gathered around him was so large that he got into a boat and sat in it. The boat was out in the water, and the crowd stood on the shore at the water's edge.

[4:2] He used parables to teach them many things, saying to them:

[4:3] “Listen! Once there was a man who went out to sow grain.

[4:4] As he scattered the seed in the field, some of it fell along the path, and the birds came and ate it up.

[4:5] Some of it fell on rocky ground, where there was little soil. The seeds soon sprouted, because the soil wasn't deep.

[4:6] Then, when the sun came up, it burned the young plants; and because the roots had not grown deep enough, the plants soon dried up.

[4:7] Some of the seed fell among thorn bushes, which grew up and choked the plants, and they didn't bear grain.

[4:8] But some seeds fell in good soil, and the plants sprouted, grew, and bore grain: some had thirty grains, others sixty, and others one hundred.”

[4:9] And Jesus concluded, “Listen, then, if you have ears!”