As clearly as I have ever heard anything from the heart of God, He spoke these three things to me for all of us;

Grow up and get with the program
Get your eyes off yourself and onto the big picture
Lay down your tradition and unbelief and fasten your seatbelt.   

Guess who gets the blame? God, the word, or the faith message! Some of us whine and cry, "Well this faith message doesn't work –I confessed it and I didn't get it”. I kept hearing this from people who had been believing for finances. “Some thirty, some sixty and some a hundred fold, “bah humbug”.

Matt 13:23 But the one who received the seed that fell on good soil is the man who hears the word and understands it. He produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty, or thirty times what was sown."

Many people, who quote that scripture, really never stop to ask why they are not getting the 100-fold. Yes we all know the scriptures just prior to say some seed fell on other than good soil. Assuming most of you believe that you are good soil, why are there various returns? Matt 13:23 is not a multiple-choice promise ...if it were; we would all choose the hundred. This scripture relates to the “hearing of the word”. However, many have used the “?-fold return” as it relates to “money seed”. So let us look at it from that angle.

God is not up there saying, “Well I think I give the poor widow a hundredfold return for her need is the greatest, the preacher thirty and Jane a sixty fold return because her mortgage is due next week”.

No! He works from spiritual principles that He established in the beginning. Now out of His mercy, He may divvy out the return like the example, but the widow, the preacher and Jane “bless her heart” should not always count on it happening according to their need. 

Guess what! There nothing is wrong with God and the word, as some would lead us to believe. We had better consider our ways. I have been thinking a lot about this concept. I believe there is very little balanced teaching of the gospel about this subject. Balance defined is where all the responsibility is on not on God. If you look closely, most of the time God says. “I will, if you will do certain things”. all around, I see the confusion and disillusionment of the people who have not heard both sides of the message.  I am of the opinion that a “back to basics” approach to the faith message is necessary.

In the days just prior to this writing, I had been thinking about another way to explain to people why they do not and perhaps should not always get everything God has for them when they think they ought to. Now I knew in the answer in principle, but I always want scripture that will confirm that which I speak or write. Systematically I have to dig for scripture. Usually, the concept or principle comes and God inadvertently leads me to the foundational scriptures to substantiate it. Please understand that a related seed had to have been planted or God would not incubate it. I know the concepts are revelation because I have not been provided these through teaching elsewhere.

Now let’s switch back to the true meaning of Matt 13:23 (Amp). As for what was sown on good soil, this refers to the one who hears grasps and comprehends the word...

God’s determination of the return is not based on the hearing, but the level of wisdom and understanding with which the man implements the knowledge that came when he heard. Hearing brings knowledge, but unless he pursues and gains wisdom and understanding, he cannot receive a hundredfold return on the word sown.

I had also been studying the covenant and its benefits. One of the scripture references was Galatians 3:19. I read on and suddenly it was as if God was giving a specific explanation of why people do not get what they ask for knowing He has promised it. This developed an entirely new slant on the matter. He answered as follows through the Apostle Paul as follows:

Gal 4:1-3 What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world.

All the promises in the word are “yes and amen”. However, we do have the responsibility to come to understand and expect the inheritance in order to get it. We must remember that unbelief kept the children of Israel out of the “Promised Land”.

God, being our Father, Guardian, and Trustee must hold some of our inheritance in escrow until we mature enough to handle the things that we are destined have. Children do not have a grasp of the concept “inheritance”. (Super Abundant Provision, Anointing, the fullness of God in Christ, etc.). That determination and the timing are in the Father’s hands and best judgment. Usually He is waiting for us to mature enough to make a withdrawal from that escrow.
Since babies do not know the true purpose of things they misuse and abuse things. Babies think everything is for them, they think their problem, or desire is the only thing that matters. 

Babies become impatient. By the time, they get something, many time it no longer holds the appeal, it once held. Babies have a limited ability to focus and even less understanding “why” they even want “that thing”. As they mature and gain trust in the father they become more patient in the wait. They still want things they do not really need. Eventually they come to realize that they do not have to scream and cry for their father to provide their basic needs ...food, clothing, and shelter. As they grow, they begin to learn that there are consequences for them if they abuse their toys through anger or disobedience.

In retrospect, many of us can thank God for unanswered prayers. We are like the little dog that chased the car; God only knows what the dog thinks he would do with it when he caught it.

Babies do not begin with meat, but at some reasonable point in time, they should be weaned off milk and placed on solid food. We must realize that it is not about things or needs. It is the Father’s good pleasure to give. We must realize that it is His desire to release our inheritance to establish the kingdom. 

(Rom 14:17 NRSV)  For the kingdom of God is not food and drink but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit.

(Luke 12:31-32 NIV)  But seek his kingdom, and these things will be given to you as well. “Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom.

(Heb 5:12-14 NRSV)  For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic elements of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food; for everyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is unskilled in the word of righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, for those whose faculties have been trained by practice to distinguish good from evil from evil. Therefore, let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity.

Clearly, we have a responsibility to grow up. According to our diligence in the word and communion with the Father, we can grow quickly, thank God. Often the excuse we use and much of what we flippantly blame on ‘God’s timing’ is really ‘Our Timing’. Most of the time we are not waiting on God, He is waiting on us - TO GROW UP. He is probably thinking, “Boy I hope I don’t have to keep all this stuff for them until they get here”.

As our Father, He is trustee, and guardian of our inheritance. While we are yet children, He gives us things we need when we need them. He supplies our NEEDS according to His riches in glory. However, He is not obligated to fulfill a need that we have created because of immature desires although sometimes He will. If He does, it will not be through an obligation but only be through mercy or grace that He meets those kinds of needs. Remember, this is a Father-child relationship.

He is a wise and generous distributor of our inheritance. He is not willing to sacrifice His ultimate goal ...building our character. Many times, when we have to call on His mercy and grace, we realize we have missed it somewhere. Usually by the time, He comes through for us, we have had time to get a revelation of where we missed it and repent. Every father’s obligation is to build character and responsibility.

God obligated himself to give in abundance kindness, love grace, mercy, and other things that are in His nature. Most of the scriptures that relate to abundance relate to these things. But, when the word talks about exceeding and super abundantly above, it places the responsibility on us according to the power that we have allowed to work in us.  

Eph 3:20  Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that works in us,

From time to time, He will give His immature children the some of the benefits to meet the needs of others, especially in the area of the gifts of the spirit, with His supervision. But, if the maturity is not there for us to handle or rightly use it, He will not let us walk in that anointing permanently.

1 Cor 13:11 When I was a child, I talked like a child; I thought like a child, I reasoned like a child. When I became a man, I put childish ways behind me. 1 Cor 3:1-3 Brothers, I could not address you as spiritual but as worldly‑‑mere infants in Christ. I gave you milk, not solid food, for you were not yet ready for it. Indeed, you are still not ready. You are still worldly. For since, there is jealousy and quarreling among you, are you not worldly? Are you not acting like mere men?

Solid food is meat. Even Jesus did not immediately receive access to the fullness of God. The word says, And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.’ Finally, when He had reached maturity, Jesus said, ‘my meat is to do the Will of the Father.’ Jesus had access to the fullness of God and all the provisions that go with it because He knew the purpose of the Meat.

Eph 4:14-15  Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.

Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. Doesn’t this seem to indicate that you can lack some things if you are immature and that with maturity you can become complete? The inheritance to which we have access is gained by faith (ultimate trust) and rhema (revelation) not shallow head knowledge.

Instead, of speaking the truth in love, some in the pulpit speak whatever gathers a crowd and succeed in false or unbalanced doctrine because the listeners are so immature as to not discern it or weigh it against the Word. Instead of blaming our immaturity for the word not working, God gets the blame. No wonder we remain double minded –it is really because of our simplemindedness. You cannot get the mind of Christ (single mindedness) without a diligent relationship with Him and the word.   

James 1:4-8 Perseverance must finish its work so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything. If any of you lacks wisdom, he should ask God, who gives generously to all without finding fault, and it will be given to him. But when he asks, he must believe and not doubt, because he who doubts is like a wave of the sea, blown and tossed by the wind. That man should not think he will receive anything from the Lord; he is a double‑minded man, unstable in all he does.

 Eph 4:14-15  Then we will no longer be infants, tossed back and forth by the waves, and blown here and there by every wind of teaching and by the cunning and craftiness of men in their deceitful scheming. Instead, speaking the truth in love, we will in all things grow up into him who is the Head, that is, Christ.

 John 16:12 “I have much more to say to you, more than you can now bear. But when he, the Spirit of truth, comes, he will guide you into all truth. He will not speak on his own; he will speak only what he hears, and he will tell you what is yet to come.

A CHILD KNOWS HIS DADDY’S VOICE

A child must learn to distinguish His father's voice from the voice of a stranger, truth from deception. This requires time, communication, and intimacy with His father. The child cannot understand or handle everything that is in the Father's heart for him. First, some information is only pertinent to a specific time span in the child's life and understanding. Secondly, if the father told the child everything at once he would be overwhelmed.

Gal 4:1-3 What I am saying is that as long as the heir is a child, he is no different from a slave, although he owns the whole estate. He is subject to guardians and trustees until the time set by his father. So also, when we were children, we were in slavery under the basic principles of the world.

Heb 5:11-13, 6:1 We have much to say about this, but it is hard to explain because you are slow to learn. In fact, though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you the elementary truths of God's word all over again. You need milk, not solid food! Anyone who lives on milk, being still an infant, is not acquainted with the teaching about righteousness. But solid food is for the mature, who by constant use have trained themselves to distinguish good from evil. Therefore, let us leave the elementary teachings about Christ and go on to maturity.

Infant-3516. nepios, nay'‑pee‑os; from an obsol. particle ‑ ne‑ (implying negation) and G2031; not speaking, i.e. an infant (minor); fig. a simple‑minded person, an immature Christian:‑‑babe, child (+ ‑ish).

Mature 2244. helikia, hay‑lik‑ee'‑ah; from the same as G2245; maturity (in years or size):‑‑age, stature.

2245. helikos, hay‑lee'‑kos; from  helix (a comrade, i.e. one of the same age); as big as, i.e. (interjectively) how much:‑‑how (what) great.

Measure3358. metron, met'‑ron; an appar. prim. word; a measure ("metre"), lit. or fig.; by impl. a limited portion (degree):‑‑measure.

2245. helikos, hay‑lee'‑kos; from  helix (a comrade, i.e. one of the same age); as big as, i.e. (interjectively) how much:‑‑how (what) great.