^5 (A)“A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell along the path and was trampled underfoot, and the birds of the air devoured it.

Warning Against Neglecting Salvation

2 Therefore we must pay much closer attention to what we have heard, lest we drift away from it.

²³ For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks intently at his natural face in a mirror. ²⁴ For he looks at himself and goes away and at once forgets what he was like.

¹⁵ And these are the ones along the path, where the word is sown: when they hear, Satan immediately comes and takes away the word that is sown in them.

^11 (A)Now the parable is this: The seed is ^(B)the word of God. ¹² The ones along the path are those who have heard; then the devil comes and takes away the word from their hearts, so that they may not ^(C)believe and be saved.

The Parable of the Seed Growing

²⁶ And he said, ^(A)“The kingdom of God is as if a man should scatter seed on the ground. ²⁷ He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; ^(B)he knows not how. ²⁸ The earth produces by itself, first the blade, then the ear, then the full grain in the ear. ²⁹ But when the grain is ripe, at once ^(C)he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.”

¹¹ And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

² And ^(A)he was teaching them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: ³ “Listen! Behold, ^(B)a sower went out to sow. ⁴ And as he sowed, some seed fell along the path, and the birds came and devoured it.

³⁷ He answered, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.

The Parable of the Weeds

²⁴ He put another parable before them, saying, ^(A)“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, ²⁵ but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds^[a] among the wheat and went away. ²⁶ So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared also.