24 Jesus told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. 26 When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared.
27 “The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’
28 “‘An enemy did this,’ he replied.
“The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’
29 “‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’”
31 He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. 32 Though it is the smallest of all seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds come and perch in its branches.”
33 He told them still another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into about sixty pounds[b] of flour until it worked all through the dough.”
34 Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable. 35 So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet:
“I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world.”[c]
‘Christians’ in the West Will Be Uprooted
Jesus, amongst us are those who claim they know you and don’t have a clue. I am grieved by those who know enough to be done with and leave you on the shelf. You become like a self-serving talisman or a genie in a bottle. Then there are those who go through the motions week by week. They trundle to church and say their prayers. However, who really knows you? Who is truly gauging their life by how they serve you? Most people are gauging your performance by how you serve them. Then they will gladly distance themselves from you for ever.
I don’t want that. I want us all to find you. You are so polite, standing cap in hand and waiting to be invited. You are a lover, and you are just. It is a terrible combination. You don’t force yourself upon us as any lover does not. Then you do not live with us for eternity, since we have chosen our abode. Damnation is not so much a prison as a condition. It is a condition of isolated regret. Is is a condition of eternal fascination with self. Jesus, why are you not more agressive? Why do you not expose the weeds for what they are sooner? Why must it be final and forever?
Questions
- Who plants the wheat and who plants the weeds?
- What kind of people are weeds?
- What is the emphasis of the parable?
- Who mingles with Christians but is not part of the harvest?
- Why do many in the west so passively assume they have been planted by God?
Plymothian 