Mark 4:1-9

1Again he began to teach by the lake. Such a large crowd gathered around him that he got into a boat on the lake and sat there while the whole crowd was on the shore by the lake.

2He taught them many things in parables, and in his teaching said to them:

3“Listen! A sower went out to sow.

4And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it.

5Other seed fell on rocky ground where it did not have much soil. It sprang up at once because the soil was not deep.

6When the sun came up it was scorched, and because it did not have sufficient root, it withered.

7Other seed fell among the thorns, and they grew up and choked it, and it did not produce grain.

8But other seed fell on good soil and produced grain, sprouting and growing; some yielded thirty times as much, some sixty, and some a hundred times.”

9And he said, “Whoever has ears to hear had better listen!”