Matthew 13: The Wheat and the Weeds
Passage (NIV): Matthew 13
Preacher: Mark Kingston
Matthew 13 · Week 3 · The Wheat and the Weeds
The Parable
Jesus tells a story in Matthew 13 about a farmer who plants wheat. Overnight, an enemy creeps in and sows weeds among it. When the workers spot them, they want to pull the weeds out straight away. The farmer says, “No. Leave it. You can't tell them apart yet, and if you start pulling, you'll destroy good wheat in the process. At harvest time, I'll sort it. Not you."
Here's what gives this story an edge: the Greek word for "weeds" describes a plant called darnel - a toxic ryegrass that looks identical to wheat right up to harvest. You cannot easily tell the difference from the outside. Which is exactly the point.
Harvest Language
Whenever we look at someone and quietly write them off - "she's unsaved, he's too far gone" - we're speaking harvest language. End-of-story words. And we're nowhere near the end of the story! Only God sees the whole journey. Only God sees what's really going on inside a person. We see the outside. God sees the heart.
And before any of us mentally hands this off to someone else ( ie “those really judgemental Christians out there…”), we should sit with this. A 2015 Barna study found that 87% of young adults outside the church describe Christians as judgemental. Nearly nine in ten. That's not one bad church having a bad day… that's a reputation we've earned. It shows up in our language - "saved," "unsaved." In our body language. In the small ways we let people know they don't quite belong. It shows up in me. It shows up in you. This parable is talking to us…
Not All Judgement Is Off the Table
This doesn't mean we switch off our judgement entirely. We're still called to name what's unjust, to stand with people being crushed, to gently help each other stay close to Jesus. That kind of judgement is very much our job. But pronouncing on where someone will end up - deciding who's finally in and finally out? That's completely different. And it isn't ours.
C.S. Lewis said it beautifully in The Great Divorce: "There are only two kinds of people in the end: those who say to God, 'Thy will be done,' and those to whom God says, in the end, 'Thy will be done.'" That final verdict isn't God losing his temper. It's God, with full knowledge and full love, honouring the direction a person has chosen across their whole life. He sees the whole story. We see a snapshot. That's the difference.
So What Are We Here For?
If pronouncing eternal judgement on others isn't what we're here for, then what are we here for? The answer in Matthew 13: Fruit. Abundant, overflowing fruit.
“Fruit” is how the bible describes what its like when you become more like Jesus by spending more time with Jesus. Stay close to Jesus, and good things - real things - will grow in you. Stay close enough, and they'll grow to overflowing.
Jesus paints this picture earlier in Matthew 13, in the Parable of the Sower. Good seed, good soil - and a harvest of sixty, even a hundredfold. That's what God is after in us. Not survival. Abundance. So much it spills over into the people around us. And here's the gift - you don't manufacture it. You just keep following Jesus, and the fruit comes.
Fruit With a Destination
Paul gives list of fruit that comes from God and is grown in us in Galatians 5:22-23. Things like love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, gentleness, faithfulness, self-control. We tend to read it as a self-improvement list. But every single one of those is grown in you for someone else. For example,
Love grows in you for people who've been badly loved.
Joy for people stuck in despair.
Peace for people locked in conflict.
Patience for people who need time to believe God is actually for them.
Kindness for people who think it has to be earned.
Faithfulness for people who've been let down by everyone who was supposed to stay.
This is God's answer to the world's brokenness - good fruit, grown in ordinary people, and given away. That's what we're here for…
Reflection Questions
1. Harvest Words
What words have you heard - or used - that quietly decide who's in and who's out with God? How did they sit with you?
2. An Honest Mirror
Why do you think so many people outside the church experience Christians as judgemental? What might they be picking up on?
3. Staying Close
Fruit grows as a byproduct of staying close to Jesus - not from trying harder. What would it look like, this week, to simply spend a little more time with him?
4. Given Away
Look at the Galatians list. Which fruit do you sense Jesus growing in you - and who around you might be needing exactly that?
5. Deep Longing
What fruit do you most long to see growing in you - and what might shift in the people around you if it did? Tell God about it. He loves to hear the longings of his people.
