I want you to turn back, if you
haven't already, to the 13th chapter of the Gospel of Saint
Matthew. Matthew's Gospel, chapter 13.
I want today, God willing, to speak to you on the subject of
the parable of the tares and the wheat. And I hope that the
Lord will be pleased to own this message and to use it for the
edification of His flock. and for the salvation of the
lost sheep. I want us to read beginning with
verse 24, read down through verse 30, and then we'll read our Lord's declaration or as he explained
this parable unto the disciples before we begin our message this
morning. Beginning with verse 24, another
parable put he forth unto them saying, you remember that our
Lord spoke to this multitude that was was satting on this
occasion to hear him he spoke to them by parables and he explained
the reason for that in our reading this morning. A parable is an
earthly story that illustrates a heavenly truth. Now, then,
no earthly story could possibly illustrate a heavenly truth completely. Brother Mahan told us that when
he was here. But this is a story here that's
going to set forth a blessed truth that we need to understand,
that we need to know in our hearts. And so, the kingdom of heaven,
our Lord says, is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in
his field. But while men slept, his enemy
came and sowed tares among the wheat and went his way. But when
the blade was sprung up and brought forth fruit, then appeared the
tares also. So the servants of the householder
came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed
in thy field? From whence then hath it tares?
He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servant said unto
him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But he said,
Nay, lest while you gather up the tares, ye root up also the
wheat with them. Let both grow together until
the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to
the reapers, gather ye together first the tares, and bind them
in bundles to burn them, but gather the wheat into my barn."
Well, the disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ, those who had ears
to hear, And the Lord had blessed them to have knowledge and understanding. He had given them eyes to see
and ears to hear his precious and wonderful truth, yet they
did not understand this simple story which our Lord had told.
And so in verse 36, then Jesus sent the multitude away. and
went into the house. And his disciples came unto him
saying, Declare unto us the parable of the tares of the field. Explain
this to us. Make it known to us what it is
that you meant by this parable of the tares in the wheat. He
answered and said unto them, here he explains it, He that
soweth a good seed is the son of man. He goes on to say, the
field is the world, the good seed are the children of the
kingdom, but the tares are the children of the wicked one. The
enemy that sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end
of the world, and the reapers are the angels. As therefore
the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it be in
the end of this world. The Son of Man shall send forth
his angels, and they shall gather out of his kingdom all things
that offend, and them which do iniquity, and shall cast them
into a furnace of fire, there shall be wailing and gnashing
of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine
forth as the Son in the kingdom of their Father, who hath ears
to hear, let him hear." Now then, this is our Lord's
explanation of the parable of the tares in the wheat. Now there are several things
that I want us to notice this morning in this parable and in
the explanation which our Lord gave to the disciples of this
earthly story. Now the first thing I'd like
for us to notice is the mixed condition of the Lord's Church
in this world. Now we take note that in verse
41, the Son of Man shall send forth his angels, and they shall
gather out of his kingdom all things that offend, and them
which do iniquity. Now this kingdom, gather out
of his kingdom, and I believe that what this means is that
sphere in which God reigns. We know that God reigns over
the whole world, but He in particular and specifically reigns in His
church. The church is the place of habitation
for God through the Spirit, and I believe that what this particular
parable is talking about is talking about the mixed condition that
exists in our Lord's church in this world. Now, we read in the
book of Acts in chapter 1, or in chapter 2 it is, and let me
just read these, you don't have to turn there, but we read two
verses here. In verse 41, it says, Then they
that gladly received his word were baptized, and the same day
there were added unto them about three thousand souls. And then in the 47th verse, It
says, praising God and having favor with all the people and
the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved. We find that the Lord has sown
his people in the world and certainly he has put those into the body
as it has pleased him. God puts his people in the church. And this is what we read here
in verse 37, he that sowed the good seed is the son of man. Now then, we also take note of
the fact that the enemy, as the Lord explained it when he first
told this story, he says, but while the man slept, this good
farmer, had went out and he sowed the wheat in the fields and while
the good man slept his enemy came and he sowed tares among
the wheat and went his way. And so what we have here is that
the Lord he establishes and builds up and adds to the church such
as are being saved and then at the same time the enemy is putting
into the church. He brings those into the church
which are referred to here as tares. Now, one of the things
that we ought to understand at the very outset here is that
these tares, that they look exactly like the wheat. that you cannot
tell them apart externally, they look exactly like the wheat. And the only way they can be
told apart is to let them grow together until the end, until
the fruit appears, and then it will be discernible unto the
angels, the reapers, who are the wheat of God and who are
the tares of the evil one. Now the visible church is set
before us here then as a mixed body, and it is a field in which
wheat and tares, they grow side by side, and we ought to get
that picture that we must expect to find in every one of the Lord's
churches unbelievers, converted people, believers, and then also
the unconverted. We ought to expect to find them
in the membership of the body. The children of the kingdom and
the children of the wicked are all mingled together in every
congregation of baptized people. And we ought to expect that.
Now, the purest preaching of the gospel of the Lord Jesus
Christ will not prevent this from happening. Now, we know
that there was a Judas in the camp of the disciples. And we
know that there was a Cain in the first family on earth, in
Adam's family. And while there was a righteous
one, Abel, There was also this cane that slew his brother Abel. And so throughout the history
of the Lord's Church, in every age of the church, the same state
of things has existed. There has been a mixture of tares
and wheat. in the Lord's Church. There has
never been a visible church on earth or a religious assembly
of which the members have all been wheat in which you could
go in and say everybody in here is the wheat of God. Everybody
in here is saved. Everybody in here is truly the
children of God. Everyone here is of God's elect
Everyone here makes their calling and election sure, they're all
the wheat of God. Now beloved, you will not find
a church on earth where there is not a mixture of lost people
and saved people. Now the devil has sown tears
in every church. The most strict, now hear me
out, I said first of all that the purest preaching of the gospel
will not prevent this. And secondly, I want to say that
the most strict and prudent discipline will not prevent this either.
It will not prevent it from happening. Well, do what you will to purify
a church. You will never succeed in obtaining
a church where all the members are wheat. where every member
is a child of God. Now I'm knowing some very zealous
people in my time who were so zealous that they were dead set
on rooting up all the tears out of the Lord's Church. They set
out to do it, that they seemed to think, they were called to
that, and that they were not aware of the truth of this parable
here, and so they went out. Cares are going to be found among
the weak, hypocrites and deceivers will creep in, and if we're extreme
as some are to obtain purity, We may do more harm than good
because our Lord said when these servants, they came to Him and
said, wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? Do you
want us to root out these tares? Do you want us to tear them out?
And He said no. lest while you gather up the
tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. And so our Lord would
not have these to go out and attempt to dig up all of the
tares out of the wheat. He said you'll root up some of
the wheat with the tares. Now that's the earthly story.
Certainly we know that none of the children of God are ever
going to be lost and that none of the children of God's ever
going to be in any way affected by the tares to the point where
they're finally going to be lost. But that's the earthly story.
Our Lord said, no, don't go out and you can understand. You go
out and start pulling up those tears out of the wheat, you're
going to uproot some of the wheat. And certainly, this is what our
Lord is teaching. Now we run the risk of encouraging
many a Judas Iscariot and breaking many a bruised reed if we go
out attempting to dig out and to tear out all of the tares
out of the wheat. Now in our zeal to get rid of
the tares, we're in danger of then affecting in an ill way
those whom the Lord has planted, those whom the Son of God has
sown. Now those who care not what happens
to the wheat, they have little of our Lord's mind, and they
do not care, they just will do whatever they have to do. They
think somebody's unconverted, some poor sheep of Christ maybe
is not showing all the evidence, that they ought to show, and
so they're out to grab them and to throw them out. Well, there's
another thing here that I want us to see this morning, and that
is this, that if we're looking for the conversion of the whole
world by preachers and missionaries, we better study this parable
and beware of such an idea. Because, beloved, nowhere does
the Bible teach that everybody's going to be saved. Nowhere does
the Bible teach that everybody inside the local visible church
is saved. And that's the point I'm making.
We've got a mixed congregation even here today. Inhabitants
of earth, Being all the wheat of God, never will it be. It
will never be so. Now the tares and the wheat then
will grow together, and they will grow together until the
harvest. Some are going to be lost to
the very end. There are some people whose eyes
are shut, whose ears are sealed, and they will never hear. They
will never be converted. They will never believe the gospel.
And our Lord explained that in the early part of this chapter
in our reading. They never will be saved because
their eyes are shut. And preaching won't do it. Nothing
will do it. because from eternity God has
in his own sovereignty determined to pass them by. And so in this
world do not expect that everybody's going to be saved, that everybody's
going to be converted because it's not going to happen. And
then we know also that there's some people who look around,
they get into a church and they look around and they see that
there are hypocrites. And they see that there are unconverted
people in the church. And they look around a little
bit, and so they say, well, I just feel that I ought to get out
of here. I think I ought to go to a better church. I ought to
go to a church where there's not so many hypocrites. Now let
us remember this parable, and I think that we'll understand
that we won't ever find in this world a perfect church where
that we have all week. We're just not going to find
it. Now, certainly there are reasons for people leaving churches. There are reasons. And if the
gospel is not being preached, if Christ is not being exalted,
if the truth of God is not being expounded, if the message of
the gospel is not clear and plain, then certainly you ought to go
somewhere where it is being preached. And the message is plain, but
remember this, beloved, that we can spend our lives going
from one place to the other, trying to find a situation where
that there is no mixed congregation, where everybody is the wheat
of God. And you will never find it as
long as you live. Because it's not to be found
this side of heaven. It's not to be found. Only the
church of the firstborn, when it's assembled in heaven, will
be all wheat. Here below, there is no congregation
that is all weak. Now then, the cause. Let's talk
a little bit about the cause of this mixed condition. In verses
24 and 25. And when our Lord told this parable,
He said, The kingdom of heaven is like unto a man which sowed
good seed in his field. Now the Lord has on purpose sown
his people and he's added them such as were being saved, he
added unto his church, unto his body in the world. Now the Lord's
done that, he's done it on purpose and when he did it, he knew that
there was going to be this mixed condition. And now if you read
verse 25, while he slept, The enemy came. The enemy plants
those that are the terrors. They are put into the church
by the enemy. And they come in and they look
as good as any one of the elect of God externally. They look
good. I mean they act good. They speak
the language of Canaan. And you couldn't tell them apart
many times from those that are true possessors of the heavenly
life. Now then look at verse 37. He
answered and said, He that sowed the good seeds of the Son of
Man. I know what I'm talking about because Jesus made it clear
in his explanation. He said it's the Son of Man that
plants the good seed. God's elect, God's people are
put into the church by the Lord Himself. Now I believe that all
God's people are in the General Assembly, they're all in the
body of Christ. Every one of God's people are
in Christ's body. And then we have these visible
local congregations which are expressions of that body of Christ. Now nobody gets into the body
of Christ except those that the Son of Man sows. But in the visible
church, you've got those that are the seed of God, and then
you've got those who are sown by the devil into that congregation. Now then, if you look down here
in verse 39, it says, the enemy that sowed them is the devil.
Now that makes it clear, don't it? The enemy that sowed them
is the devil. The devil put them in there.
The devil brought them in. Now then, let's go on. I want
to talk a little bit about the conduct of the Lord's servants
toward these tariffs. I think this is necessary. Let's
talk about it a little bit. Look at verse 27 and 28. So the
servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst
not thou sow good seed in thy field? Most certainly he sowed
good seed in his field. Then the servant said, From whence
then hath it tares? Why does it have these tares?
And he said to them, An enemy hath done this. An enemy done
it. And the servant said, Wilt thou
then that we go and gather them up? But he said, no, lest while
you gather up the tares, you root up also the wheat with them. Now the servants here of Christ,
the servants of Christ, they love their master and they make
his interest their own. They're zealous about the interest. of their master as we ought to
be. As every member of the Lord's
church ought to be very zealous about the interest of the Lord
Jesus Christ in the church. And they look anxiously to the
crop. You know Paul told the church
at Corinth, he said, you're God's husbandry. He said, you're God's
field. You're where God grows his crop,
is in the church. And so, these servants of the
Lord, they look to the crowd, and they see, they spot these
terrors, and they have a question upon their lips. And God's servants
today still have the question, Lord, what do you want us to
do about this? What do you want us to do about
these hypocrites? And what do you want us to do
about the tares that are in the church? What can we do? Well,
as we said, they notice the tares and they want to put an end to
this mixture. They want to get rid of these
people that are of the mixed multitude. They want to get them
out of the church. Now the tares and the wheat are
so much alike, as we've explained, externally, that even the servants
of Christ now cannot separate them. The servants of Christ
have not the discernment and the ability to separate the tares
from the wheat. Now if you'll take note in verse
39 that the reapers, notice this, the reapers are not servants
but they're the angels. They're not the servants. I mean
there, listen to me now, servants need higher wisdom, listen, higher
wisdom must be given than what the servants have in order to
be able to separate the sheep from the goats. The servants
don't have the ability to tell you who's saved and who's lost.
The servants can't look over the congregation and say, that
person is saved, that person is lost, and so on and so forth.
Now beloved, we have, listen, there's certain situations and certain things
that hinder us from being able to do this. We are barred from
doing this on account of the difficulties that are involved
in it. Now the gift of discerning of
spirits that the early church had, They had the gift where
they could, somebody get up and say something, and somebody in
that congregation could get up and everybody look to him and
say, now brother, was what that man said, was it of the Lord?
Was that of God? Did that come from the Lord?
Did that come from God's throne? And that fella could tell you
in a minute, he'd say, no, that's not of God. And the church would
say, reject it immediately because the man who had the discerner
of spirits would say, no, that's not from God. And if he was to
say, listen to him, brother, because that is from the Lord,
then the church would listen to what that individual said.
Now that was before the complete New Testament was given. But
discerners of spirits were not even able to undergo this work
of rooting out the tares and the wheat. We do not have the
ability to do that. Now, we do not know what degree
of imitation is compatible with a total absence of true godliness. Now you think about that a little
bit. We just don't know. Let both grow together, the Lord
said. Now this is the Lord's own decision.
It's not the decision of some Baptist church. It's the Lord's
own decision. He said, let them both grow together
until the time of harvest. The reapers are the angels. Now
the reapers, who are the angels, are they're free from the manifold
infirmities by which we are now encompassed. Ignorance. We just simply don't know the
facts. We just simply can't tell you
all the time who is saved and who isn't saved. If you'd have
looked at old Lot, you'd have swore up and down he was a lost
man. You would have followed him and
you'd be sure that he was lost. But the word of God says he was
a righteous man. And so he was a converted man,
he was a saved man. If you'd have looked at David
at different times, you would have said all the evidence points
to the fact that this man is nothing but a sinner. through
and through. He's not converted, he's not
saved. Ignorance, my friend, bars us
from being able, bars these servants from being able to root out the
terrors out of the wheat. Now then, let's go a little further.
Selfishness. many times might enter into the
picture. Prejudice, impatience, partiality, animosity would enter
in and somebody said, well I'm mad at that fella anyway. Out
he goes. We'll kick him out, pull him
out, grab a hold of him and jerk him out of the ground, out of
the soil and throw him away. I don't like the looks of him.
And so it is, beloved, but the angels, they're not affected
by all of these infirmities that you and I are affected by. They're not bothered by all this
stuff. Now this, and I want you to understand, this does not
in any way, shape, or form destroy what the Bible teaches about
church discipline. Now you listen carefully to what
I'm going to say here because this is very, very important
and you need to distinguish here between what I'm telling you
this morning and what the Bible says about church discipline.
Now church discipline is taught. by many plain passages in the
New Testament Scripture, and no interpretation of any parable
may be put over against that, and set it aside in any way,
shape, or form, and I'm not doing that, and I'll show you why.
Discipline, listen to me now, discipline, church discipline,
rightly understood, is for the saving of a man to the church
in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such a one, considering
thyself, lest you also be tempted. Now then, so discipline is in
order to bring somebody back into the fellowship of the church.
The purpose of it is not to throw him out, but to restore him unto
the church. However, this sometimes must
be done. There are times when we must
throw him out. There's time when they must be dealt with. There's
time when they must be severed from the body. Turn to Matthew
chapter 18. Matthew chapter 18. And let's look here at verses
15 and 17. Verses 15 through 17 of Matthew 18. Moreover, Jesus said, if thy
brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault
between thee and him alone. And if he shall hear thee, thou
hast gained thy brother. But if he will not hear thee,
then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two
or three witnesses every word may be established. And if he
shall neglect to hear them, tell it unto the church. But if he
neglect to hear the church, let him be unto thee as a heathen
man and a publican. Let that man be, just consider
him as a man who's never tasted the grace of God, a man who's
never been converted. Let him be as a heathen man and
a publican unto you. Now turn over, if you will, to
1 Corinthians chapter 5. 1 Corinthians chapter 5. And notice what the scripture
here says. In verse 7, he said, purge out
therefore the old leaven, that you may be a new lump as you
are unleavened. Now Paul's talking about the
church here, the body of Christ at Corinth, and he said, you
purge out that old leaven. that old leaven of sin, unrighteousness
and wickedness. You purge it out that you may
be a new lump as you are unleavened. In Christ we are unleavened. Sin has been taken away. Sin
has been put away. Sin is no longer, as we might
say, that which we have to deal with because the Lord has already
dealt with it. Now for even Christ our Passover
is sacrifice for us and that's where it took place. Christ died
for our sins. Christ was nailed to the cross
and paid the penalty of our sins. We are unleavened. Therefore, he says, let's keep
the feast, let's take the Lord's Supper, not with the old leaven,
neither with the leaven of malice and wickedness, but with the
unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. Now, he says, I wrote
unto you an epistle not to accompany with fornicators. yet not altogether
with the fornicators of this world or with the covetous or
extortioners or with idolaters for you'd have to go clear out
of the world to get away from them out here in the world. But
now, he says, I have written unto you not to keep company
if any man that is called a brother If he be a fornicator, covetous,
idolater, railer, drunkard, or a gambler, with such a one, know
not to eat. No, you don't take the Lord's
Supper with those people. For what have I to do to judge
them all so that are without? Do not ye judge them that are
within? Certainly we judge them that are within. Those that are
outside the church, we can't touch them because they're not
under our jurisdiction. But them that are without, God
judgeth. God will take care of them outside
the church. Therefore put away from among
yourselves that wicked person. Put him away from among you if
he be guilty of these sins, and if he will not repent, and if
he will not be restored to the body, then put him away. Now
these referred to both in Matthew 18 and in 1 Corinthians 5, they
make it obvious by their conduct, they make it, I want to say,
obvious by their conduct when they'll not hear the church,
when they will not repent, when they will not be brought, Into
a place of submission to the truth of God and to the body
of Christ They make it plain and obvious by their conduct
that they're goats and not sheep and so therefore they ought to
be excluded from the church and they ought to be because it is
obvious that that their hearts are not toward the Lord Jesus
Christ, that their hearts are not in tune with the gospel,
and that their lives are not being lived, but coming to the
gospel of God's free grace. But these cares, and we, back
in Matthew chapter 13, but these cares and these, this week, I
want you to say, I want you to understand with me, and I want
to say this clearly if I can, that externally, and I've said
this, I've said it over, I want to repeat it, that externally
they are alike, but vitally they are different. Inwardly, they're
different, but these tares, they put on a show, and brother, sister,
you cannot tell. They do not make it obvious that
they're goats. They imitate, and how well can
some people imitate life in Christ? How well can a person? Well,
it depends on how good an actor they are. It just depends on
how hard they try, you see, to imitate true believers. And this you must understand
in regards to the tares and the wheat. Externally you cannot
tell them apart. But there is a vital difference
inside. One of them is converted. One
of them saved. One of them was God's elect to
begin with. One of them is regenerate. And
the other is not. Now as they grow, their vital
differences become more manifest. And the scripture says they do
grow together. Can you picture that wheat field? And that wheat's
growing. And there comes them tares right
along with it. But there's going to come a time
when that wheat's going to mature and Abterras are going to mature,
and then you'll be able to tell the difference. The Reapers will
come, and the Reapers, they'll separate them, you see, and we'll
talk a little bit about that in just a moment or two. But
God permits them to grow together for a time, but there is a destined
period, as we said, of separation coming. Ours is to accept a profession
of faith right now, and leave the final judgment for God's
future. Man comes to me and says, I believe
the gospel. I believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And over there in the book of
Acts, the scripture said as many as believed the word were baptized
and there was added 3,000 in one day. You think every one
of them was the wheat of God? Well, I won't say that there
wasn't, but I certainly believe that there were probably some
tares in those 3,000. That was that day added to that
local church there in Jerusalem. There were some tares there.
And so this is my point here this morning. Ours is to accept
a profession of faith. Man says, I believe the gospel,
then if you don't have some good reason to believe that he is
not believing the gospel, then if you've got some good reason. to suspect that he's in ignorance
or that he doesn't know what he's talking about, then you
better baptize him if he asks you to. And leave the final judgment
for God's future. Leave the judgment up to the
Lord. Judge nothing Paul said before the time when the Lord
comes and make manifest the hidden things of darkness. There's a
lot of things we don't know. As we said, we talked a little
bit more before about our infirmities. We just can't judge everybody.
We don't know. We don't have any way of knowing.
And I'd rather make a mistake on the side of leaving tares
in the church than casting out some poor, afflicted child of
God, some weak sheep of the fold, and casting them out and bringing
discouragement upon them. I'd rather err on the side of
just leaving the tares in until the Lord separates them. Now
that brings me to the last thing and that is that there is to
be a day, there is to be a day of separation. between the godly
and the tares, the ungodly members of the visible church and the
godly members of the visible church, and this takes place
at the end of the world. When the end of the world comes,
there's going to be separation. Now the present mixtape of things
is not to be forever. The wheat and the tares are to
be divided at last. The Lord's going to divide them.
Now the Lord Jesus shall send forth his angels in the day of
the second advent, the second coming of our Lord, and the professing
Christians in the world at that time are going to be divided
into two companies. into two companies. Those mighty
reapers, they'll make no mistake, in that day they shall discern
with unerring judgment between the righteous and the wicked
and place every individual in his own lot. The sheep on the
right hand, the goats on the left, the Lord is going to separate
and he's going to divide. The true saints, the wheat of
God, shall receive glory, honor, eternal life, salvation. The tares, the worldly, the ungodly,
the outward religious maybe, but the unconverted shall be
cast into the furnace of fire to be burnt. The Lord said they're
going to be the tares first, are going to be gathered, and
they're going to be put in bundles, and they're going to be burnt
in the fire. They will reveal their true character,
their true nature. Who have ears to hear? The Lord
said, let him hear. If you got ears to hear this,
hear it! The angels are coming and they're
going to take out of his kingdom, gather out of his kingdom all
things that offend and them which do iniquity. The foundation of
God standeth sure, having this seal. The Lord knoweth them that
are his, but let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart
from iniquity. Now then, as we go on here, we
see then that this day is coming. Who hath ears to hear, let him
hear. We must not, as Baxter said, misinterpret God's patience
with the ungodly. Oh, you say the Lord's going
to let them grow up with the wheat until the last day. God's patient with the ungodly. Well, He is. God is patient. God's meal does grind slow, but
my friend, it does grind. And the day is coming when the
Lord is going to get around. to executing justice upon the
hypocrite and upon that one who is considered and known to be,
by him, to be tares in the church. Let the hypocrite tremble. Let
the tares tremble. Do not misunderstand the patience
of God. God's going to get around to
separating the precious from the vile. Let the believer in
Christ chasten, try, tested, afflicted with his head hanging
down most of the time. You've been around wheat fields
and you've seen when the wheat is mature how the heads hang
down. Most of God's people, their heads
are hanging down all the time because of the corrupt flesh
and nature which they have. with the idea that we have within
ourselves many, many times that we're nothing but terrorists,
just nothing but terrorists. We couldn't possibly be weak
and be what we are, be as weak as we are. We couldn't possibly. You remember the story in the
Bible about the publican and the Pharisee? Well, the Pharisee,
he thought he was all weak. Wasn't a bit of chaff in him.
Thank God I'm not like other men. I thank God that I'm righteous. I do this, I do that. He said,
I'm just all wheat, Lord. And that old publican, he said,
there's no wheat about me, I'm just chaff. That's all I am. And he felt he was nothing but
chaff. Now that's the difference, you
see, between the hypocrite and the true child of God. The true
child of God thinks that he's bound to be a terror, that he'll
never make it to be included here in the wheat that the Lord
puts in his barn. But the poor child of God needs
to take heart. He needs to take heart. The boss
of the archangel, the trump of God, will proclaim no terror
for the elect of God and for those that are truly in the fold. No, because by the trump of God
and the boss of the archangel, the people of God will be summoned
to join that perfect church. to join that perfect communion
above. God's people will be drawn because
they're wheat. How fine and beautiful will be
the wheat to look at in the Lord's barn when all of the tares are
taken away, when all the tares are gone. How wonderful and how
beautiful the wheat. Gather the wheat into my barn,
says the Lord. He says to the reapers, gather
the wheat into my barn. Then the redemptive purpose of
God will be fully accomplished. The wheat in the barn. He sowed
good seed. He shall have his barn filled
with it at the very last. The barn will be filled with
the wheat. He shall see of the travail of
his soul. He shall look into that barn and all there is there
is wheat. All that's there is that good
seed which was sown. He went forth weeping. bearing
precious seed, but he shall come again rejoicing, bringing his
sheaves with him. Gather the wheat into my barn.
Satan's efforts have all been defeated, they have all been
thwarted. The enemy came, he sowed the
tares among the wheat, hopeful that the false wheat would destroy
or materially injure the true, but he failed in the end. They
had been separated now by the Lord. Now the terrors, they could
not choke the weak. The evil one shall be put to
shame. Upon the belly shalt thou go,
and dust shalt thou eat. The evil one put to shame. Well,
beloved, here we have a word of separation. And I want you
to look at verse 30. We have this word of separate.
Let both grow together until the harvest. In the time of the
harvest, I will say to the reapers, gather you together the tares,
bind them, burn them, and then gather the wheat into my barn.
This is indeed a word of separation. Now this separation must be made.
The soul of the saved and the unsaved may live together here. The Lord says let them live together,
let them grow up together, but they must not live together in
another world. They will not live together above. The command is absolute. Gather
the tares, gather the wheat, gather them, separate them, burn
them, put them in my barn. It's a word of separation. Center You hear this morning,
can you hope to go to heaven? Can you hope to? I just speak
a word to those of you that are the terrors, and I say to you
this morning, you never yet loved the Lord, did you? You never
yet loved the Lord. You've acted like you do. You've been in the midst of people
that have. You maybe said you did, but you
never loved the Lord a minute. You have never lived for the
glory of God five minutes in your life. Now listen, you get
tired of worship, the worship of God just on the Lord's day. What makes you think that God's
going to endure unwilling worshipers in heaven for all eternity? You say, I just can't hardly
stand to be in a church service for an hour or to be in a church
service for an hour and a half, listen to an hour of preaching.
I can't hardly stand it. Well, how do you think God's
going to tolerate you for all eternity in His presence? This
business of worship, this business of fellowship with God and prayers
and singing of hymns is going to go on for all eternity, all
eternity. And the true, the wheat, are
going to be involved in this worship and service of their
God day and night for all eternity. You think you're going to heaven
and you got no taste for heavenly things? You got no taste for
it at all? You really got no appetite for
the things of God? My friend, listen, you must be
separated. You must be set apart. from the Lord's people forever
and ever. This separation involves an awful
difference of destiny. I want to impress that upon you.
Now the bundle in the fire and the weed in the barn, can we
get this? This separation is eternal! It's not a separation for a day
or two while you clean up your act and while somebody prays
you out of purgatory. No! This separation is for all
eternity. There's no hope or possibility
of change in the world to which you're going. Once you pass out
of this life, it's over. You say, why must there be such
a difference? The tares acted just like the
wheat. Why must there be such a difference?
Why is it that God's going to do this, that he's going to burn
people that acted right, that acted like they were Christians,
that went through the motions? Why is God going to burn them?
Well, listen, there has always been a difference between these
people. And that difference has existed
since the day of election. Since the day when God chose
his people in the Lord Jesus Christ, this difference has existed. It just didn't start whenever
the devil sold them in the church. It was from the day of election
that this difference has existed. The wheat was sown by the son
of man, the tares by the enemy. They are totally different plants. And you'll find it out when the
fruit matures. You'll find it out. A regenerate
person and an unregenerate person, altogether different people.
One is alive, the other dead. One is saved, the other is lost.
One a child of God, the other is a child of wrath. Well, so
we have here a word of separation. We have here a word of destination,
don't we? Gather the wheat into my barn. Gather it into my barn. Now the
process of gathering in the wheat will be completed at the day
of judgment, but it is, I believe, going on every day. The wheat,
from hour to hour, the saints are being gathered home, one
by one, we're being gathered home to the Lord. This is the
wheat being taken home, the tares, they're going one by one too,
but there's going to come a day when this, like we said, when
this final separation, the angels are going to make the determination
Every hour the wheat's being gathered into the Lord's barn,
and that is where they want to be. That's where the wheat wants
to be. If the wheat that's in the field,
if it could speak and say something, what it would say is that the
ultimate for which we live and grow is to be put into the barn,
to be put into the grain rain. That's what the ultimate is.
We want to make it because all the frosty nights, all of the
sunny days, all of the dew and the rain that we went through,
everything is for this. that we might be gathered into
the farm, that we might be gathered into the granary. Every process
of the wheat is tending toward the granary. And it's so with
the people of God, with the children of God. Everything is working
towards heaven, towards that gathering place, towards the
congregation of the righteous, towards seeing our Lord's face. face-to-face with the Lord Jesus
Christ. The poet said, they all shall
be there, the great and the small. Poor I shall shake hands with
the blessed Saint Paul. And so all the people of God,
great or small, are going to be gathered into the Lord's granary. They're going to be gathered
into the Lord's barn. To wheat the barn is a place
of security. Once you get in that barn, then
all of its growth perils are past. And it's so with us as
the people of God. Once the Lord takes us home,
we've reached perfection. We've reached absolute perfection. It has rewarded, listen, the
weak has rewarded the labor of the husband because The wheat
has come to full maturity and it's in the barn. And the husbandman
or the farmer is happy. And God will be happy all along
the expected day when it begins. Brother, sister, what a blessing
it will be when you and I shall have come to our maturity and
Christ shall see in us. the travail of his soul, and
he will be satisfied. No matter when or where the wheat
grew, it shall be gathered into one barn, gathered never to be
separated again. All the wheat into one barn,
that they all may be one, Jesus prayed. All errors removed, all
mistakes corrected and forgiven, the one Lord, the one faith,
the one baptism known by all the true wheat. What a blessed
gathering it will be when God gathers his people home. It would
be hell now as I thought about this. It would be hell to me
to be shut out of such a blissful society. Would it be hell to
you to be shut out of a place like this? To be shut out of
the Lord's barn? To be shut out of the granary?
Oh my soul, would that not be hell in itself to have those
reapers to say, over there on the left is where you belong,
over on the left you're going to be gathered to be burnt, over
there, over there. My friend, it would be hell itself
if there were no burning. If there were no everlasting
birth, if there was no smoke of men's torment to ascend up
for a day or night, if there was no great gulf fixed between
the saved and the lost so that the lost could not go over where
the saved, if there was no worm to gnaw at the conscience of
men for all eternity in hell, if there was no such a thing
as that, it would be hell enough to be separated. from the wheat
and to be kept out of the Lord's barn forever and ever. Now then,
I hope this morning that we've been able to say things, these
things, the things that we meant to say in such a manner that
it was acceptable, in such a manner that it was helpful, in such
a manner that it might be useful. We want to speak those words
that God would use to save his sheep and to edify his people. But I felt a burden, a heavy
burden to preach this. At this time I just felt a heavy
burden to preach it. And I hope that the Lord will
own it and use it. This is a very serious, a very
serious message. Let him that hath ears to hear
Let Him hear. Let Him hear. Let Him hear. Father, we give thanks this morning
for your word. Give thanks for your truth. If
there be somebody here today, our Father, that knows of a certainty
that they are tares, they know that they have no heart toward
God, no love toward Christ, no heart that hates sin or that
strives to overcome sin, and that they just simply are living
and going along for the ride, and they're mixed up in the congregation,
but they're lost. and they have no hope in their
soul, I pray that this may be a time when thou would lay hold
of that soul and bring them to a true relationship, a true heart
relationship with the Lord Jesus Christ. And then Lord, we know
in that that we've studied thy word, we know that there are
going to be tears that are going to persist on. and are going
to be convinced that they're okay and that they'll go on until
the harvest until the reapers come and cast in the sickle father
father give help to thy people strength to thy people give us
grace oh lord to persevere on and to be what we ought to be
in your church and to live for your glory and your honor knowing
that the seed of that which is in our lives here will be that
which for all eternity we will be occupied with. Grant us thy
grace in sufficient measure. We pray for Christ's sake. Amen.