We've been considering over the past weeks, Matthew chapter 13, these wonderful parables of the Lord Jesus Christ that are contained in it, which represent the kingdom of heaven on earth. What a thought, the kingdom of heaven on earth. The thought of the first parable over the last five weeks, the sower and the seed. And we thought of all of those different types of grounds into which the good seed of the gospel will have to fall. And we know that the devil opposes the kingdom. And so the devil opposes the growth of the seed and will seek to destroy it. So that's the first parable. There are two other parables which show us that there'll be a mixture of good and bad until the end of the age in the visible church. Despite the valiant best efforts of the Master's servants, all of this will continue to the Judgment Day. And this is shown in what we've read today in the parable of the wheat and the turd and it will be re-emphasized when we come to the close of the chapter, the parable of the net cast into the sea. There are further two parables. that shows that the gospel church at first can be very small. We ought not to despise the day of small things. But in the process of time, it'll become a very considerable body and the parable is told of the grain of mustard seed and that of the leaven. There are two more parables intended to show that those who expect a salvation by this gospel will have to venture their all for it. If you're not prepared to give your all up for the Lord Jesus Christ, how can you be his disciple? How can you profess to be his follower? We see that in the treasure that's hidden in the field and in the power of grace. We're gonna work our way through these just very slowly. Now, Matthew Henry. Matthew Henry, the great commentator, he includes verse 51-52 as the 8th parable. in which the comparison of the disciple is that of a householder who ascribe you out of his treasure chest, brings forth instruction old and new for the benefit of others. Now there are many commentators who do not see that as a parable, but when we come to it, I'll explain my own thoughts on it. The kingdom spoken of as being in the world in the parable of the wheat and the tares, I believe it represents not the world geographically, But I believe it represents the visible church in the world on earth. The Savior repeatedly spoke about the kingdom of heaven. And he said, it's like undone to. It's like undone to. Verse 11, 24, 31, 33, 44, 45, 47, 52, right down Matthew 13. The kingdom of heaven is like undone to. So the kingdom of heaven, the visible church, is like undone to a field. The Lord Jesus gave the private exposition of this parable to the disciples when they were out of the public domain. We consider just a few weeks ago the parables are not just little stories to tell to boys and girls. The parables are solemn declarations of judgment that only sometimes the disciples were allowed to understand. Here this kingdom of heaven and earth in which Christ rules, in which Christ cares for, has to face opposition. It has to face the infiltration of the enemy. And we have this age-old conundrum of why good and evil are allowed to coexist, even in the visible church. That's a mystery to most people. So Christ, in his exposition and in his explanation, he lays the groundwork. The sower, of course, is the Lord Jesus Christ. He's the master of the field. He sows only the best seed. The field in which he sows is the visible church. Christ is at work in the professing visible church right across the world. And the church is denoted as being his. It's his, it's his field, verse 24. It's not confined to one nation. It's not confined to one geographical location in the world. I just love the thought that even in our little congregation here and on along, all those different places, even over the last few months that we've been supporting and interacting in, Christ has a people in that part of the field. They're there. They're his children. He loves them. It's not confined anymore to the Jewish nation. And it's good to know, brethren and sisters, wherever you go, that the world belongs to Christ. It's not the devil's, and he's the rightful owner of it. The good seed then represents, not the word of God in this parable, the good seed in this parable represents the children of the kingdom. They have his life in them. Just as the good seed of the wheat had life in it, so the children of the kingdom have God's life in their souls, and that's what makes them different. What makes them different from everybody else is they have the life of God in their soul, and that is why they'll grow, and that is why they'll flourish, and that is why they will produce fruit that's unto life eternal. But the tares represent the children of the wicked one. The devil. And they're deliberately sown by him amongst the wheat. Why? Because he aims to control the field. If the towers, if the weeds can ruin Christ's seed, then the field will be his. And dominion is always his objective. He always wants to take control. He wants to be in charge. And that's the great battle all over the world today. The devil is battling to take control and to take charge. Here we have rebellion. We have that rebellion of sinful men to usurp the rightful ruler of his kingdom. But despite the opposition, and it is immense, and in certain parts of the world it's unto blood, there are Christians today who couldn't meet in a public fashion such as we are meeting, who sing their hymns just in whispers, who say their prayers silently, who meet in secret. But we're privileged to meet in a public manner as this. And verse 39 assures us that God is going to give a harvest right across the world. And ultimately the Savior's plan will be fulfilled and Satan will be defeated. the judgment day will usher in the great defeat of evil. So in our study of this parable today, we'll just see how far we can get in it. We're going to look with you at how the kingdom commences, continues, and will be consumed at the end of the age. It touches every aspect of our lives. Those who are in the visible church, that's you today. If you're in this building, you're part of the visible church. You're in that place where Christ's influence is made known and where his word is made bare. You're part of the visible church. We're talking about you today. You're in the meeting. And it tells us about all aspects of our lives. It tells us who we are, it tells us where we're going, and it tells us how our journey will end. So first lesson that we'll glean from this parable today is that the kingdom, the kingdom of God is growing in the world. That's reassuring for all of us. It's growing, it is growing. The field, it's not located in the most favorable of locations. It's located, we can say spiritually, in a fallen, broken, sinful, rebellious world. That's where this field is located. And yet it's still producing fruit. Here in Ireland, it's still producing fruit, north and south. Here in Europe, it's still producing fruit, all over it, with all of its many variations, it's still producing fruit. America, Asia, Australia, Africa, wherever you are in the world, it's still producing fruit unto life eternal. And that's quite amazing, considering where it's located in a fallen world. And it's even more amazing when you look inside the field and see the many inherent weaknesses that are there. And when you look inside and see how the enemy has infiltrated the field. But despite the opposition, within and without, and where it's located, it's still growing. that should bless our hearts and encourage our souls today. The seed was not just sown in this parable, but the Savior emphasized that it actually had started to grow. That is the emphasis here. Verse 26, when the blade was sprung up and brought forth fruit. When the blade was sprung up and brought forth fruit. So in the parable of the sewer, we've mentioned, we know the seed was the word of God, but in this parable, the seed represents, verse 38, the children of the kingdom of God. So the son of man is growing. It's not a wonderful just expression. He is growing us. He's growing us. We haven't reached completion. We haven't reached our finished point yet, else we wouldn't be here. That's a fact. We haven't reached the end of the journey, and he's growing us, and this is how his kingdom rules. and has extended from shore to shore. I just love that 72nd Psalm, and you sang it lovely today. You should read it when you go home, the whole Psalm, please. The metrical version says, verse eight, his large and great dominion shall from sea to sea extend, and from the river shall reach forth unto earth's utmost end. Isn't that what Jesus told the disciples? In Acts chapter 1 and verse 8, he shall be witnesses unto me, unto the uttermost parts. And unto the uttermost parts, the gospel is going forth and the gospel is being reached. I think it's wonderful to think that you and I were included in that good seed of the children of the Son of God. And we are growing, we are maturing. What a field study that opens up to us. Benjamin Keech, the great Puritan of years gone by, he has a very big volume on the parables and the miracles of Christ. His is the benchmark for all other commentaries, I think. And he draws some wonderful parallels between the wheat and the true believers. Believers, just like the wheat, they are the product. They are the product of a rare seed, a very choice seed. So wheat is not seed that you can just, as it were, glean from the roadside. The seed of the wheat is nurtured. It's something that has to be tended and looked after. And you and I were the product of the seed of the Holy Spirit. We wouldn't be here today without the workings of the Spirit of God in our lives. That seed must first be sown in the earth. The seed of wheat must be sown in the earth first of all before it will increase And so the seed of grace, it has to be sown in the heart of the individual before it can grow. And I want to say to all of you young and old in the gathering today, if the seed of the gospel hasn't gone into your heart, it can't grow in your heart. It has to go in. There has to be an internalization of what you believe. There has to be a reception, a believing, a receiving of the gospel in order for it to produce fruit that is on to life eternal. We know even in Bible times that wheat was a very profitable sort of grain, and there's nothing more profitable in the world than the people of God. They're despised, they're ridiculed, they're considered as just a secondary issue in many, many lands, and yet they're the light. They're the salt. You take the Christian out, it's all darkness. You take the Christian out, it's all corruption. This is special seed indeed. Special seed indeed. When the full ear of the wheat has reached its maturity, it hangs down. There's a humility about the Christian that is a mature Christian. There's a wonderful humility and sincerity about the child of God that has reached some level of maturity in their own lives. And of course that wheat has to die in order to be harvested. And there's a day coming when you and I, we will die barring the second advent of the Lord Jesus Christ. We're going to die. It was part of God's great plan for us. I think we're reminded here, we think of the weight. of our dual role in the ministry, as Terry Johnson put it in his book, is to sow gospel seed. That's evangelization. That's what we're about. I don't think we have any other business. We sow the seed of the gospel, but also we grow believers in their faith. That's sanctification. So there's teaching, there's evangelization. We're to witness the gospel. We're to evangelize the lost. But dear believer, at the same time, we're to gather for worship. Witnessing must not be put before worshiping. And worshiping must not be neglected because you say I'm outwitnessing. This is our business. I think these are the two pillars upon which all evangelical churches have to be built. You're witnessing, you're worshipping, you're sowing, you're growing. That's the thought that's conveyed here in this parable. The field in which the wheat was sown, Jesus tells us here that it was infiltrated by the enemy. We read about that in verse 25. But while man slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. They didn't try to burn down the wheat as we read in other parts of the Bible. This was much more subtle. This was sowing the tare, the weeds amongst the wheat. What happened? Verse 37, the last part, it says, The good seed. He that soweth the good seed is the son of man. But look at verse 38, the latter part. The tares are the children of the wicked one. In the visible church of the Lord Jesus Christ, we can say that God is at work, but so is the devil. The devil sent his minions. in the parable of the sower. Remember those birds of the air that swooped down to snatch away the good seed of the gospel. But here the enemy comes by stealth in the dark. Satan always likes to work in the dark. And he enters in under the cloak of darkness, under some other pretense. And instead of rooting up the seed that has been sown, Instead of burning down the field that is ready for harvest, he knows that if he sows at the start weeds, tares amongst the crop of wheat, the farmer's going to be in trouble. Many commentators tell us that these tares, these weeds that were sown, were once known as Darnell, the bearded Darnell, a very poisonous wheat. And the complication with this weed was, in its early stages, it just was similar to what wheat looked like. And you couldn't have told the difference between the two. And so you had the tar growing and the wheat growing. And in those early stages, nobody could tell the difference. And so they grew on together. But then when the year started to appear, the difference started to manifest itself. And the owner's servants in the parable, they want it just to go in. Let us go in and we'll root it up and we'll pull it out. There aren't many preachers like that. They're gonna go in and they're gonna root up and they're gonna pull out. But just hold on a minute. Before you go into the field and root up and pull out, let's look at the rest of what the verse says. The wise master knew that such weeds couldn't been pulled out because the roots were so intertwined with that of the wheat. But they would be separated at the harvest because their ears look totally different. Is it not so that the seed of the serpent from the gate of the Garden of Eden has always tried to destroy the seed of the woman? But right to the judgment day, no amount of infiltration, no amount of impersonation can destroy Christ's seed and its fruitfulness. As a church, as far as lies within us, It behooves us to stay awake. It behooves us to guard against those that would sow spiritual, theological, modernistic terrors amongst us. Let's not go to sleep spiritually and allow the devil to come in under the cloak of darkness and do his devious work. It's a wake-up call. It is a wake-up call, this parable, to every minister, to every session, in all of our churches to take heed because the devil is busy, under the cloak of darkness, sowing the seeds of error and heresy. And yet there's a caution in the parable as well. The caution is that seed and those weeds, they grow very closely. If you rush in and tear up one, you will damage the other. Many may profess Christ, but they're poisonous. That's why the Apostle John said to try the spirits to see whether they were of God. We need to be wary of individuals who lift themselves up. The cult of personality, I think has virtually destroyed large segments of the broad evangelical church. It's not what the Bible says, it's what this man says, that man says, the other man says. Those terrors are so obvious in the evangelical church today. I think we need to guard against the terrors of novelty. Novelty. Those who promote new things just for the sake of new things. Those who promote new doctrines, introduce new concepts, just for the sake of introducing things. We've done this for so long. So now it's time to change, but why do we need to change? Well, we don't know why we need to change, but we're going to change anyway. I have been challenged, so greatly challenged by this over the past week as I've thought about this. On this side of eternity, Jesus said, the wheat and the tares, they grew together until the harvest. And it has been a question that has been troubled righteous minds. Why? Why is evil permitted to survive, thrive? And righteousness seems to struggle. Well, we have to come back to basics. Basics reminds us that God is sovereign. God in his providence has ordered all things according to his own wise plan. We can't go to God and say, what are you doing, God? It's not sensible what you're doing. God has planned it. He has planned that good and bad be mixed together and grow together in this world. Why? That the good should be exercised spiritually. and the bad left inexcusable. You know, if you had nobody ever to challenge your beliefs, you would soon lose grip of what you believed. It's good when somebody challenges your belief. It's good when somebody says to me, you know, why are you doing that? And why did you say that? I don't mind that one iota. As long as you don't mind me asking you, well, why are you asking me? What's the objective? There's a definite difference when we get to the end of the journey between heaven and earth. God has his own wise reasons for leaving it so. I know there are many Christians, I'm not trying to be controversial here today, there are many Christians who believe that the wheat is going to be secretly taken away before the harvest. There's going to be a secret rapture of the church Oh, there's no secret harvesting of the wheat here in this parable, is there? I can't see the secret rupture here. I can't see it anywhere else in scripture either. I think as Christians, we need to keep things in perspective. And this is, I think, my understanding of this parable. There is no shortcut in the process of sanctification. And many have tried to escape this present evil world and have found it impossible. That was the whole idea of monasteries and nunneries a way back in the early centuries of the church. They would go into closets, they would hide themselves away from the world, they would just meditate, they would work, they would be alone with God. And we know that those places become centers of great depravity and of great sin. Scripture never contradicts Scripture. We are not going to be able to separate ourselves from towers. They will be with us to the end of the journey. I am not trying to put forth here, and I just want to put this in here, that This chapter teaches that there's no such thing. This parable teaches there's no such thing as church discipline. I believe in church discipline. I believe in the fair and balanced exercise of church discipline. Jesus taught church discipline in Matthew's Gospel 18. It is taught right throughout the Pauline epistles and in the general letters of the New Testament. But I'll come back to what I've been trying to say to you as we look at the wheat and the tares going together. despite all our valiant efforts, the church will never be perfect until we get to heaven. And as we pilgrim here on earth below, there's always going to be tears beside the wheat. And if you get the perfect church, if you haven't joined the church, and you're looking for the perfect church, and maybe you're going down Ticking all the boxes, that would suit and that doesn't suit and that suits and that doesn't suit. My advice to you is you find that perfect church, don't you join it. You'll destroy it. I believe there are some issues, some sinful issues so intricate that only the judgment day will sort them out. There are those who use the excuse, oh, I couldn't join the church. I wouldn't join that church because of what they perceive to be imperfections. Such and such a one goes there. Somebody said something to me, somebody looked at me, somebody did something to me. I think we've got to accept there's no utterly pure church. There's no utterly pure church. I'm saying this to free Presbyterians. The free Presbyterian is not a pure church. It couldn't be. It's an impossibility. It couldn't be. Our own confessional standards remind us in chapter 25 section 5. It says, the purest churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error, and some have so degenerated as to become no churches of Christ but synagogues of Satan. Nevertheless, there shall always be a church on earth to worship God according to his will. The purest churches, wouldn't we want to put our name up there, are subject both to mixture and error. Patience, forbearance, care, love are all needed when we exercise discipline in the church. There's always the danger of doing more harm than good when we rush in with a rash spirit. Christ, Matthew Henry said, would rather permit tears than endanger wheat. What a challenge that is for us today. This parable of the wheat and the tares, I've preached it in the gospel, and it is a gospel parable, but it has so much to say to us as Christians, as part of the professing visible church. May the Lord give us wisdom, wisdom in seeking to apply the truths to our hearts and to our lives. we're going to draw the line there, because that's only