Sod of the Heart
Icon by the hand of Antonios Fikos "And in his sowing, some fell along the road: and the birds came and ate it...[To] all hearing the word of the kingdom and not understanding, the wicked one comes, and snatches what was sown in his heart: this is the one sowed along the road."--Mt 13:4,19 The sowing of the seed in our hearts is not of our doing: what we have control over is what soil we have prepared. The sower sows freely, and without His sowing our preparation of the soil is ineffective: "How can one believe without hearing? And how can one hear without a preacher?" Therefore we must prepare the soil of our hearts well, not letting it become like a road. Hear what St. Cyril of Alexandria says: "A wayside is almost always hard and unbroken, because it is trodden down by the feet of all those who pass that way, and seed is never sown there. No sacred or divine word, therefore, will be able to enter those who have minds that are hard and unyield...