The Morris County chronicle. [volume] (Morristown, N.J.) 1877-1915, 1910-06-21
The
Sunday School
INTERNATIONAL LESSON COM
MENTs FOR JUNE 26.
Subject: The Parable Of the Taress
Matt. 13:24-3O, s6-43-Com-
init Verses 81, SO.


GOLDEN TEXT. Then shall the
righteous shine forth as the sun in
the kingdom of their Father Matt.
13:43.
TIdE.--Autumn, A. d. 28.
PLACE.-By the Sea of Galilees
near Capernaum.
EXPOSITION III. Two Sewers. "a.
20. Here, as in the preceding lesson,
Jesus appears as a sower of good
seed; but in the preceding parable.
"the seed is the Word Of God; in
this parable the good seed are the.
sons of the kingdom" ". 38). But
the sons of the kingdom are them
selves the product of the Word of
God Gas. 1:18; Pet. .23); SO that
there is a close connection between
the two parallels and the two sow
ings. 1t is by sowing 'the Word of
God" that the Son of man sows sons,
of the kingdom There are in this
world sons of the kingdom only
because Jesus had sown them. The
world is His field He has pur-
chased it by His blood; the devil has.
forfeited it by his unfaithfulness.
But the devil does not like to relin-
quish the world of which he was once
the prince emo. 12:31). But the
world belongs to Christ. the sons of
the evil one" are sown in it, but they
don't belong in it, and when the har-
vest comes they will be gathered out.
and sent to their own place. There is
deep significance in two words In
verse rs, His enemy" The devil is
our enemy, but he is primarily
Christ's enemy There is no one
whom he hates as he hates the Son of
God Christ receives what the devil
aspired to, the worship of the uni
verse (Heb. 1:6; Rev. 5:11-13; comp.
Matt. Az; Ez. 28:16, 40. The
devil seeks to caricature and thwart
Christ's work at every step. Christ
sows good seed in His field, the devil
comes by stealth and sows tares. The
parable brings out very clearly the
personality of the devil, the certainty
of bis existence, the malignity of his
heart, the activity of his movements,
the cunning of his operations, the
subtlety of his methods. If there Is
not personal devil, the enemy Of
Christ, this parable is meaningless.
There is absolutely no necessity in
the drapery of the parable to bring
him in He is in the parable because
he exists in fact. The tares in the
world are his work. Christ sowsi
sssons of the kingdom" by sowing
good seed, 1.-THE Word of God;" the
devil sows sons of the evil one" by
sowing bad seed, doubts and ques-
tions and error (Gen. 81, 4; Thess..
2:9, 10). The devil did his work
while men slept" He always acts
under cover and while men are off
guard He does much of his work
to-day while Christians and ministers
are doing. He brings in the sub
tleties of disguised infidelity ("higher
criticism" etc. and masked pantheism
while we are nodding, and some day
we wake up to find the "tares' spring.
ing up everywhere among the wheat.
When the devil had done his work he
went away" He got out of sight.
He always does He even stirs up
some to argue that there isn't any
devil anyway"
III. Two Crops Growing Together,
1920. There are just two classes Of
men: Sons of the kingdom" or
children of Cod and "sons of the
evil one" ". 38, R. W, or children.
of the devil" q John, 3:1O). The
two classes are not always distin-
Tvs. 20, 30) but they will be distin-
guished and separated when they are
ripe, the one for heaven and the other
for hell. But it will, fortunately, be
the angels and not men who do the
separating ". All. History fur
nishes countless instances of the
devils sowing tares among Christ's
wheat Re. g., Jno. 1882; Acts 5:3;
10Th shtcfo~xy 1ord +bn XkTnrA
of God warn us against deciding that
all that appears among the wheat
must itself be wheat While the
tares were not distinguishable from
the wheat until they began to grow.
they were tares from the very first
There were those who wished to root
up the tares at once, but the time was
not ripe, nor were they competent to
do the task. There are those who in
haste long to extirpate 1.-THE sons of
the evil one" at once from the world,
but the Master says, 'tlet them both
grow together until the harvest
Premature separation, by religious
persecution, would mean injury to
wheat as well as destruction to tares.
This history has abundantly proven.
This parable does not forbid church
O1oSaPlAACs nO uClQ 10 --uOL lHG
church, but 1.-THE world ". $50,
Church discipline is positively com.
manded in the Bible Il Cor. 5:3-5,
IL; Rom. 1917; 2 Thess, 3:6, 40.
In the delay in separating the chaff
from the wheat we have another illus
tration of Gods long-suffering (cf.
Pet. S:9)
III. Two Harvests, 80, So, 3G-41,
Separation comes at last. 1t is lin
the end of the age" ". SO, r. v.
Marg.). The reapers are the
angels They are to be the minis.
tiers of Gods boundless grace towards
the sons of the kingdom" and the
executioners of His wrath towards
"the sons of the evil one" The tares
are to be gathered and the wheat is
to be gathered" but the one for
burning in ''the furnace of fire.
where there is inconsolable grief and
impotent rage ". 42), the other into
Gods storehouse, the Kingdom of
their Father" where they shall
shine forth as the SUM- Is the fire
literal2 1t is in the Interpretation of
the parable as well as in the parable
itself Evil is not to gradually disap-
pear from the world, but to grow size
by side with the wheat until the
harvest
More Than KnowIcdOe