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The apostle is showing the effect of character on our power to understand truth. Neither soil is barren. Both lands drink in the rain that often comes upon them. But the fatness of the one field brings forth thorns and thistles, and this can only mean that the man's vigour of soul is itself an occasion of moral evil. The richness of the other land produces plants fit for use by men, who are the sole reason for its tillage. This, again, must mean that, in the case of some men, God blesses that natural strength which itself is neither good nor evil, and it becomes a source of goodness. We come now to the result in each case. The soil that brings forth useful herbs has its share of the Creator's first blessing. What the blessing consists in we are not here told, and it is not necessary to pursue this side of the illustration further. Bat the other soil, which gives its natural strength to the production of noxious weeds, falls under the Creator's primal curse and is nigh unto burning. The point of the parable evidently is that God blesses the one, that God destroys the other. In both cases the apostle recognises the Divine action, carrying into effect a Divine threat and a Divine promise.

I. DRINKING IN THE RAIN THAT OFTEN COMES UPON THE LAND CORRESPONDS TO BEING ONCE ENLIGHTENED, tasting of the heavenly gift, being made partakers of the Holy Ghost, and tasting the good Word of God and the powers of the world to come.

II. THE NEGATIVE RESULT OF NOT BRINGING FORTH ANY USEFUL HERBS CORRESPONDS TO FALLING AWAY. God has bestowed His gift of enlightenment, but there is no response of heart and will. The soul does not lay hold, but drifts away.

III. THE POSITIVE RESULT OF BEARING THORNS AND THISTLES CORRESPONDS TO CRUCIFYING TO THEMSELVES THE SON OF GOD AFRESH AND PUTTING HIM TO AN OPEN SHAME.

IV. To be nigh unto a curse and to be given in the end to be burned CORRESPONDS TO THE IMPOSSIBILITY OF RENEWAL. God renders men incapable of repentance, not because they have fallen away once or more than once, but because they scoff at the Son, through whom God has spoken unto us. The terrible impossibility of renewal here threatened applies, not to apostasy (as the early Church maintained), nor to the lapsed (as the Novatianists held), but to apostasy combined with a cynical, scoffing temper that persists in treading the Son of God under foot. It hardens the heart, because God is jealous of His Son's honour, and punishes the scoffer with the utter destruction of the spiritual faculty and with absolute inability to recover it. This is not the mere force of habit. It is God's retribution, and the apostle mentions it here because the text of the whole Epistle is that God has spoken unto us in His Son.

(T. C. Edwards, D. D.)

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KJV: For the earth which drinketh in the rain that cometh oft upon it, and bringeth forth herbs meet for them by whom it is dressed, receiveth blessing from God:

WEB: For the land which has drunk the rain that comes often on it, and brings forth a crop suitable for them for whose sake it is also tilled, receives blessing from God;