The Meaning Of The Parable Of Tares

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J7

Banned
Apr 2, 2017
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#1
Jesus's Parables are of immense significance. Here for discussion is the parable of the wheat and the tares

Matthew 13

24 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: 25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way. 26 But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. 27 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? 28 He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? 29 But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of 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.
...
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. 37 He answered and said unto them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; 38 The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one; 39 The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. 40 As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. 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; 42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.43 Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.
.....
49 So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, 50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.51 Jesus saith unto them, Have ye understood all these things? They say unto him, Yea, Lord. 52 Then said he unto them, Therefore every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.
 

maverich

Senior Member
Jun 27, 2017
294
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#2
the spirit is the wheat, the flesh is the tares, growing side by side.
your life will always reflect the best of times and the worst of times
 

J7

Banned
Apr 2, 2017
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#3
Except, if we are growing spiritually, our flesh nature should be withering
 

notuptome

Senior Member
May 17, 2013
15,050
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#4
Wheat represents believers. Tares represent pretenders.

For the cause of Christ
Roger
 
H

heartofdavid

Guest
#6
Wheat represents believers. Tares represent pretenders.

For the cause of Christ
Roger
Close enough.

In reality,tares look like wheat,but are a life sucking weed.
(offensive) ....to the master of the field.

They,the tares,are burned. Gathered and burned at harvest.

That burning of "pretenders" is after the millennium at the GWT Judgement
 

maverich

Senior Member
Jun 27, 2017
294
34
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#7
j7 obviously you didn't read the post, they grow side by side, since when does wheat have the ability to kill tares, it is spirit and flesh, each seed is you, and yes the tare could represent, someone who will attempt to suck the life out of you.

your flesh and spirit are always side by side, old man, new man, the old man, (flesh) will always be trying to kill the new man.

when the time come lord jesus will take your flesh, and destroy it.
 

notuptome

Senior Member
May 17, 2013
15,050
2,538
113
#8
j7 obviously you didn't read the post, they grow side by side, since when does wheat have the ability to kill tares, it is spirit and flesh, each seed is you, and yes the tare could represent, someone who will attempt to suck the life out of you.

your flesh and spirit are always side by side, old man, new man, the old man, (flesh) will always be trying to kill the new man.

when the time come lord jesus will take your flesh, and destroy it.
This is teaching universalism. Everybody has spirit and flesh so you are teaching that all will be saved.

Wheat and tares look alike on the outside but God Who sees the inside knows which is which. It is a teaching against judging one another and stressing that not all that looks Christian is Christian.

For the cause of Christ
Roger
 

loveme1

Senior Member
Oct 30, 2011
8,083
190
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#9
It is explained by the Messiah. There is no second guessing He is telling you what happened.
 

Nehemiah6

Senior Member
Jul 18, 2017
24,167
12,764
113
#10
Wheat represents believers. Tares represent pretenders.
Something which often gets overlooked is that it is the Enemy who sowed the tares "while men slept". In other words, Satan is constantly at work within the churches, planting false professors. In view of the apostasy that is taking over churches in North America and Europe, it would seem that the tares are predominating. "While men slept" indicates the general apathy in Christendom to deal with false doctrine and false practices within the churches. Even when something which is clearly against Scripture (e.g. ordaining homosexual clergy) people do not leave those churches and denominations en masse as they should.
 
Feb 7, 2015
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413
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#11
I found this to be rather informative:

The parable of the tares is instructive in dealing with the question: Does history reveal a progressive separation between the saved and the lost? The parable begins with the field which is planted with wheat, but which is sown with tares by an enemy during the night (Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43). The parable refers to the kingdom of God, not to the institutional church. “The field is the world,” Christ explained (Matt. 13:38). The good wheat, the children of God, now must operate in a world in which the tares, the unregenerate, are operating. The servants (angels) instantly recognize the difference, but they are told not to yank up the tares yet. Such a violent act would destroy the wheat by plowing up the field. To preserve the growing wheat, the owner allows the tares to develop. What is preserved is historical development. Only at the end of the world is a final separation made. Until then, for the sake of the wheat, the tares are not ripped out.

The rain falls on both the wheat and the tares. The sun shines on both. The blight hits both, and so do the locusts. Common grace and common curse: the law of God brings both in history. An important part of historical development is man’s fulfillment of the dominion covenant. New productive techniques can be implemented through the common grace of God, once the care of the field is entrusted to men. The regularities of nature still play a role, but increasingly fertilizers, irrigation systems, regular care, scientific management, and even satellite surveys are part of the life of the field. Men exercise increasing dominion over the world. A question then arises: If the devil’s followers rule, will they care tenderly for the needs of the godly? Will they exercise dominion for the benefit of the wheat, so to speak? On the other hand, will the tares be cared for by the Christians? If Christians rule, what happens to the unrighteous?

This is the problem of differentiation in history. Men are not passive. They are commanded to be active, to seek dominion over nature (Gen. 1:28; 9:1-7). They are to manage the field. As both the good and the bad work out their God-ordained destinies, what kind of development can be expected? Who prospers most, the saved or the lost? Who becomes dominant?

The final separation comes at the end of time. Until then, the two groups must share the same world. If wheat and tares imply slow growth to maturity, then we have to conclude that the radically discontinuous event of separation will not mark the time of historical development. It is an event of the last day: the final judgment. It is a discontinuous event that is the capstone of historical continuity. The death and resurrection of Christ was the last historically significant event that properly can be said to be discontinuous (possibly the day of Pentecost could serve as the last earth-shaking, kingdom-shaking event). The next major eschatological discontinuity is the day of judgment. So, we should expect growth in our era, the kind of growth indicated by the agricultural parables.

What must be stressed is the element of continuous development. “The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field: Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof” (Matt. 13:31-32). As this kingdom comes into maturity, there is no physical separation between saved and lost. That total separation will come only at the end of time. There can be major changes, even as the seasons speed up or retard growth, but we should not expect a radical separation.

While I do not have the space to demonstrate the point, this means that the separation spoken of by premillennialists — the Rapture — is not in accord with the parables of the kingdom. The Rapture comes at the end of time. The “wheat” cannot be removed from the field until that final day, when we are caught up to meet Christ in the clouds (1 Thess. 4:17). There is indeed a Rapture, but it comes at the end of time — when the reapers (angels) harvest the wheat and the tares. There is a Rapture, but it is a postmillennial Rapture. Why a postmillennial Rapture, the amillennialist may say? Why not simply point out that the Rapture comes at the end of time and let matters drop? The answer is important: We must deal with the question of the development of the wheat and tares. We must see that this process of time leads to Christian victory on earth and in time.
 
Feb 7, 2015
22,418
413
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#12
One very simple point to consider is this one:

Suppose a sinner [a TARE] had become so powerful that he owned 5,000 corporations (his board of directors are also sinners).

Each company provides 500 jobs. Along come the "angles", and before the end of time, they rip up those tares (we are not even considering all the rest of the world here)

Immediately, two and a half million people are thrown out of work. No more money. They lose their houses, cars, and possessions. They and their families begin to starve to death.

Get it? Evil as TARES might be, WHEAT and TARES depend upon one another for survival in this world. Do you not realize that a vast number of the beneficial inventions, advancements, discoveries, and contributions to society have come strictly from the camp of the TARES?
 
Last edited:

loveme1

Senior Member
Oct 30, 2011
8,083
190
63
#13
One very simple point to consider is this one:

Suppose a sinner [a TARE] had become so powerful that he owned 5,000 corporations (his board of directors are also sinners).

Each company provides 500 jobs. Along come the "angles", and before the end of time, they rip up those tares (we are not even considering all the rest of the world here)

Immediately, two and a half million people are thrown out of work. No more money. They lose their houses, cars, and possessions. They and their families begin to starve to death.

Get it? Evil as TARES might be, WHEAT and TARES depend upon one another for survival in this world. Do you not realize that a vast number of the beneficial inventions and contributions to society have come strictly from the camp of the TARES?

Romans 9

Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? 20Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? 21Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? 22What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: 23And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, 24Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
 
H

heartofdavid

Guest
#14
I found this to be rather informative:

The parable of the tares is instructive in dealing with the question: Does history reveal a progressive separation between the saved and the lost? The parable begins with the field which is planted with wheat, but which is sown with tares by an enemy during the night (Matt. 13:24-30, 36-43). The parable refers to the kingdom of God, not to the institutional church. “The field is the world,” Christ explained (Matt. 13:38). The good wheat, the children of God, now must operate in a world in which the tares, the unregenerate, are operating. The servants (angels) instantly recognize the difference, but they are told not to yank up the tares yet. Such a violent act would destroy the wheat by plowing up the field. To preserve the growing wheat, the owner allows the tares to develop. What is preserved is historical development. Only at the end of the world is a final separation made. Until then, for the sake of the wheat, the tares are not ripped out.

The rain falls on both the wheat and the tares. The sun shines on both. The blight hits both, and so do the locusts. Common grace and common curse: the law of God brings both in history. An important part of historical development is man’s fulfillment of the dominion covenant. New productive techniques can be implemented through the common grace of God, once the care of the field is entrusted to men. The regularities of nature still play a role, but increasingly fertilizers, irrigation systems, regular care, scientific management, and even satellite surveys are part of the life of the field. Men exercise increasing dominion over the world. A question then arises: If the devil’s followers rule, will they care tenderly for the needs of the godly? Will they exercise dominion for the benefit of the wheat, so to speak? On the other hand, will the tares be cared for by the Christians? If Christians rule, what happens to the unrighteous?

This is the problem of differentiation in history. Men are not passive. They are commanded to be active, to seek dominion over nature (Gen. 1:28; 9:1-7). They are to manage the field. As both the good and the bad work out their God-ordained destinies, what kind of development can be expected? Who prospers most, the saved or the lost? Who becomes dominant?

The final separation comes at the end of time. Until then, the two groups must share the same world. If wheat and tares imply slow growth to maturity, then we have to conclude that the radically discontinuous event of separation will not mark the time of historical development. It is an event of the last day: the final judgment. It is a discontinuous event that is the capstone of historical continuity. The death and resurrection of Christ was the last historically significant event that properly can be said to be discontinuous (possibly the day of Pentecost could serve as the last earth-shaking, kingdom-shaking event). The next major eschatological discontinuity is the day of judgment. So, we should expect growth in our era, the kind of growth indicated by the agricultural parables.

What must be stressed is the element of continuous development. “The kingdom of heaven is like to a grain of mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field: Which indeed is the least of all seeds: but when it is grown, it is the greatest among herbs, and becometh a tree, so that the birds of the air come and lodge in the branches thereof” (Matt. 13:31-32). As this kingdom comes into maturity, there is no physical separation between saved and lost. That total separation will come only at the end of time. There can be major changes, even as the seasons speed up or retard growth, but we should not expect a radical separation.

While I do not have the space to demonstrate the point, this means that the separation spoken of by premillennialists — the Rapture — is not in accord with the parables of the kingdom. The Rapture comes at the end of time. The “wheat” cannot be removed from the field until that final day, when we are caught up to meet Christ in the clouds (1 Thess. 4:17). There is indeed a Rapture, but it comes at the end of time — when the reapers (angels) harvest the wheat and the tares. There is a Rapture, but it is a postmillennial Rapture. Why a postmillennial Rapture, the amillennialist may say? Why not simply point out that the Rapture comes at the end of time and let matters drop? The answer is important: We must deal with the question of the development of the wheat and tares. We must see that this process of time leads to Christian victory on earth and in time.
Except that there is a rapture in rev 14,during the GT. That in itself ruins it for all but a pretrib rapture.
 
Feb 7, 2015
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413
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#15
Except that there is a rapture in rev 14,during the GT. That in itself ruins it for all but a pretrib rapture.
Just curious............. There are so many different renditions of this "Rapture" floating around out there, that I am never quite sure which one you guys might be talking about at any given time.

In this particular "Rapture" of yours, who gets to go, and who has to stay?
 
Dec 21, 2012
2,901
39
0
#17
Jesus's Parables are of immense significance. Here for discussion is the parable of the wheat and the tares

Matthew 13

24 Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: 25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way. 26 But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. 27 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? 28 He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? 29 But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of 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.
...
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. 37 He answered and said unto them, He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man; 38 The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom; but the tares are the children of the wicked one; 39 The enemy that sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels. 40 As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire; so shall it be in the end of this world. 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; 42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.43 Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.
.....
49 So shall it be at the end of the world: the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just, 50 And shall cast them into the furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.51 Jesus saith unto them, Have ye understood all these things? They say unto him, Yea, Lord. 52 Then said he unto them, Therefore every scribe which is instructed unto the kingdom of heaven is like unto a man that is an householder, which bringeth forth out of his treasure things new and old.
This is about the partial rapture when God shall judge His House first at the pre trib rapture event. He is excommunicating saved believers found not abiding in Him, but receiving the vessels unto honor in His House.

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; 42 And shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth.43 Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Who hath ears to hear, let him hear.

It would be an assumption to believe that the furnace of fire is referring to hell or the lake of fire when there is a fire coming on the earth. Jesus cannot lose any one which is why He will get His lost sheep that went astray that were left behind as they will be resurrected after the great tribulation to be received in His House as vessels unto dishonor.

The weeping and gnashing of teeth is the loss of that first inheritance of being received as vessels unto honor in His House, but God will wipe the tears away from their eyes in performing that miracle to get past their loss for the prodigal son will find that he is still son as they will serve the King of kings in raising up the generations coming out of the milleniel reign of Christ.
 

J7

Banned
Apr 2, 2017
1,915
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#18
Good points WT...

Satan seems to be mimicking Christians according to this parable.

I guess if we apply to say the RCC it makes total sense as it is a place where Christians and servants of Satan are intermingled.

If they had ripped up the RCC, then I guess it would have negatively impacted real Christians in that organization
 
R

RamahDesjardin

Guest
#19
Why are people talking about flesh vs spirit when Jesus said exactly what the parable was about in 38-39? There's nothing to debate since Jesus explained it.
 

Zmouth

Senior Member
Nov 21, 2012
3,391
134
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#20
Another parable put he forth unto them, saying, The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field:
For the seed shall be prosperous; Zech 8:12

OMG another false prosperity teaching.......:rolleyes: