"But when the wheat sprouted and bore grain, then the
tares became evident also. "The slaves of the landowner came
and said to him, 'Sir, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does
it have tares?' "And he said to them, 'An enemy has done this!'
The slaves said to him, 'Do you want us, then, to go and gather them up?' "But
he said, 'No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the
wheat with them. 'Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and
in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, "First gather up the
tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my
barn."'"
Insights: Today we conclude the parable. It continues on with verses twenty-six and twenty
seven. It became obvious at some point
in the growth of the weeds that they are indeed not wheat. These workers are
shocked. They would not have been shocked if there were just a few of these weeds
because they were common to the area.
It’s a grassy kind of weed and it grows wherever it wants to grow. They were, however, shocked because the whole
field was full of them. Remember from yesterday, the Greek phrase used
indicates that the ENTIRE field was planted with these weeds by the enemy. This vast amount of weeds makes the workers
wonder if the master had given them the wrong kind of seed when they planted. Next we move to verses twenty-eight and twenty-nine. In these verses we can recognize these weeds now
because the heads have matured. We can
tell the difference between wheat and weeds.
The color was even different, they were a slate gray color by now, and
so, these workers said, “We can tell them apart now, we'll go through the field
and we'll tear those weeds out.” But the land owner said, “No, leave them in
the field, because in pulling the weeds, you might pull up the roots of the
wheat.” Then Jesus concluded the parable
with verse thirty. In this verse the
whole point of the parable hinges. There
is going to be a reaping. There is going
to be a burning. It is just not going to
happen right then as the workers had thought, but at the end of the harvest
season. Now, that's the narration. A
very simple story and easy to understand, but what does it mean? Well, that's what we will learn the rest of
the week.
Questions:
- Are you shocked when you perceive the amount of evil
that exist in the world?
- Is your response to pull out that evil or to try and change it?
Prayer: Father, I desire
to be a change agent for You. Give me
the boldness to be more proactive in sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ to
those who are lost and perishing. Amen.
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