Understanding with the Heart

During the pandemic, and well after it, the small church I look after was almost empty. We even had meetings with only two or three people. And even so, we kept going. Every week. Without giving up.

It has been a long time since I preached the way I used to. Today I talk. I ask. I listen. I share more than I teach. And, believe it or not, in this time of so few people, we spent almost two years talking about the same subject, week after week.

At the end of each meeting, I used to ask:
“So, what touched you today?”

And the answers came, sweet and surprised:
“Pastor, how beautiful... I had never heard this before!”

And I thought:
“But I have been saying this for two years...”

One of the people who said this is very dear and faithful, with many years in church.
And do you know what is most beautiful?
Today she discovered it. Today she understood. Today she was set free.

It is beautiful to see, in her simplicity, the shine of a new vision.
The joy of someone who is finally seeing.
Not because someone explained it better, but because the Spirit touched her.

This taught me that the word only enters when the ear opens.
And the ear only opens when the heart grows quiet.
And the heart only grows quiet when the Spirit has freedom.

But this reality is not only inside the church.
Out here, in everyday life, with friends and very cultured people, the same thing happens. We talk about deep, simple, true things. The person is enchanted, moved... but two days later, doesn't even remember.

It is not a lack of intelligence.
It is an excess of distraction.
We live in a world where almost nothing remains.
Because almost no one listens with the heart.

For years, I also shared these truths with my blood brothers and sisters. With all love. But I confess: in many moments, I felt that I bored them. As if my conversations were too heavy, even tedious.

And then, in the last few months, everything began to change.

I received a message from one of them that touched me deeply. It said more or less this:

“I confess that at the beginning I found your texts and conversations tedious (because of my lack of knowledge), and you even asked for my opinion... Today, everything is becoming clearer and clearer, and your texts have helped me a lot. Thank you, bro.”

This made me cry in silence.
Not from sadness, but from gratitude.
Because the seed that seemed forgotten... germinated.

That is why we keep going, with patience, with love, repeating the same truths.
Because when the ear opens... everything is new.
Even what has been said for years.

These last months have also made me see something new about the parable of the sower.

I always heard that the different soils represented different types of people. But today I see that the four soils can also represent different moments in the same person. A heart that one day was hardened like the edge of a path may later be full of stones, then choked by thorns... until, at last, it becomes fertile soil.

What changes? Time. The process. The silent work of God.

It is not only about the type of soil. It is also about the season of planting. And about the patience of the sower, who throws the seed even when planted in the dust.

Because in the right time, even the old seed sprouts.
And what seemed lost, blooms.