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THE ACT OF THE ENEMY
Matthew 13:24-30; 36-43
Last week we saw clearly that the enemy does everything in his power to keep the seed from getting into good soil but regardless of all his efforts some does; but don’t think for a moment that he gives up. We see that in the parable of study today.
This parable presents the problem of evil. The fact of the mingling of the evil with the good is a condition confronting us in all grades of society, all forms of government, in the home and the church. No matter how we try to separate the corruption it finds a way. The real and the counterfeit are ever with us.
The field is the earth and the earth is the Lord’s. The field, then, is the world that God loved. The sower is Jesus. As the Creator, He made man upright and it was not long until the enemy came and sowed tares into God’s wheat, Adam and Eve. “His enemy” that is Christ’s enemy. The enemy sowed into a field that was not his.
Jesus put forth the parable and then He sent the crowd away. He goes into the house and the disciples follow wanting to know the meaning of the parable. So in vss. 37-43 He tells them.
So the seeds have been sown and we see that we have two products.
Explain about the wheat and the tares. It’s hard to tell the difference until the harvest. Sowing tares among the wheat is a form of revenge.
Then we have two questions.
Vs. 27. You sowed good seed, where dis the tares come from?
Vs. 28. Shall we go and pull them up?
Let me say that you might think you are wise enough to discern the good and the evil but you or I are not. The time of separation will come, when angels and not men, will secure the wheat and burn the tares.
There will be two harvests.
In vs. 39 He tells them that the reapers are the angels not men.
In vs. 30 He tells that the reapers will bundle them to be burned.
Have you noticed that in our world things are bundling together.
In our commercial world, in which private interests are being eliminated. Unions and corporations dominate industry and commerce. In our social world and social media. If you disagree you are canceled. In the political world the same. In religious world it Protestants, Roman Catholics and Jews.
After the gathering and binding there comes the destruction by fire. Human history set toward judgment.
But a different harvest awaits the wheat, which is to be gathered into he divine barn. There will be no tares in that barn, just as there will be no wheat in the furnace of fire.
We live in the age of grace when tares can become wheat and sinners can be fashioned into saints. Jesus came to defeat he enemy and has and you can choose Him today and be safe.
`The more the Lord has of our heart, the less the devil will have.