Matthew 13:41, commentary and pictures

In Christ's explanation of the wheat and tares the good seed are the children of the kingdom sown by the Son of man, and the tares are the children of the wicked one sown secretly by Satan, growing together in the world until they ripen. The harvest is the end of the world and close of probationary time, when the Son of man sends forth His angels as reapers to gather out of His kingdom all that causes offense and all who practice iniquity. Those gathered out are bound and cast into a furnace of fire with wailing and gnashing of teeth and destroyed, while the righteous are gathered into God's garner to shine as the sun in the kingdom of their Father and receive eternal life. This work of separation belongs to Christ and His angels alone at the harvest, so people must not judge character or uproot the tares now lest they harm the wheat, for only Christ and His angels know each heart by its fruits and never err. Evil and evildoers therefore remain in His kingdom until the end, which rules out a temporal millennium of universal righteousness before His personal return, and calls His people now to keep the church free from the world's sinful practices and bindings and to ripen as wheat for His garner.

Parable Setting and Symbols

Matthew 13:41 belongs to Christ's explanation of the wheat and tares, in which the good seed are the children of the kingdom sown by the Son of man and born of God's word and truth. The tares are the children of the wicked one, people embodying error and false principles sown secretly by Satan the devil, not by God or His angels. Satan sows false believers among Christ's people, and their false profession dishonors God, misrepresents salvation, and puts souls in danger by crowding out good and spreading evil from heart to heart and person to person. As diligent teachers should sow sound doctrine, so Satan diligently sows evil among what is good.

The field in the parable is the world. In the sense describing God's work to save people through the church, the field signifies the church of Christ in the world, where people grow and ripen for God's harvest.

The harvest is the end of the world, the close of earth's history and the end of probationary time, when the harvest is ripe and Christ comes to gather the precious grain. The reapers are the angels. Until then the conflict between divine and satanic agencies in decided opposition and vital conflict continues, with everything that can be shaken being shaken so that what cannot be shaken may remain as God tests and proves His people. During that time the tares can long resemble wheat without changing their final separation, when the tares are rejected and the wheat gathered for Christ.

Final Separation by Angels

At the end of the world, when Christ comes, the Son of man sends forth His angels as reapers to gather out of His kingdom everything that causes offense and sin and everyone who practices iniquity and does evil. The harvest is the end of the world, the good seed are the children of the kingdom sown by the Son of man, the tares are the children of the wicked one sown by the devil, the field is the world, and the reapers are the angels. Until that harvest the wheat and tares, genuine and counterfeit Christians, grow together in the church militant, which is not yet the church triumphant, so the kingdom is not brought to a universal state of righteousness and peace before Christ's personal return. At that time Christ Himself judges who belongs with the family of heaven by character shown in words and works, for church membership and a claim to piety do not establish that someone is a Christian.

Those gathered out are cast into a furnace of fire with wailing and gnashing of teeth, bound together and burned and destroyed just as tares are gathered and burned, while the righteous are gathered into God's garner and kingdom and shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. The separation gathers the righteous to reward them with eternal life. The tares remain tares until the harvest and are not changed into good seed or into the righteous, but are gathered for destruction. The wicked remain wicked rather than becoming righteous, and like tares they remain as they are until they are separated from the righteous and destroyed in the fire.

That separation removes the wicked so they will trouble the righteous no more. Until then people who falsely profess piety may resemble Christ's true followers and deceive others, but at the harvest good and evil will no longer be mistaken for one another. At that final ingathering God gathers His faithful, while the wicked are bound together for the fires of the last day and each person's choice determines which group they belong to. The earth will be purified by fire, and at that time all the wicked are destroyed so that they become as though they had not been, after which every voice in the whole universe unites in joyful praise to God. This great day of final ingathering, when the Lord of the harvest sends forth His reapers to gather the tares together in bundles for the fire and to gather the wheat into His garner, is typified by the Feast of Tabernacles as the feast of harvest.

Judgment Left to Christ

The work of gathering offenders and evildoers out of the kingdom at the harvest, which is the end of the world, belongs to Christ alone because He lived humanity and alone understands human weakness and human striving to attain Christian perfection. No person has the right to measure the characters of fellow men or to root up the tares now, lest the wheat be rooted up with them. The separation is the angels' work at the harvest, not the work of people, and people must not try to judge character, condemn others, or uproot the tares before that time. To attempt it wrongly harms the wheat Christ is drawing to Himself, since Satan has sown false believers among Christ's people whose false profession dishonors God, misrepresents salvation, and puts souls in danger, yet they are to remain until the harvest which marks the end of probationary time. For that reason the church is not to be broken up, disorganized, or separated into groups by people before the harvest, but the tares are to remain among the wheat until the angels gather out those who do evil while the wheat is gathered into the garner.

The church militant today is composed of wheat and tares, genuine and counterfeit Christians, and is not yet the church triumphant, so good and evil must grow together until the harvest. Evil and those who do wrong remain within His kingdom until that harvest at the end of the world, when He sends His angels to remove everything that causes sin and everyone who practices iniquity, the wicked then being cast into the fire while the righteous shine in their Father's kingdom. The reapers are angels, and until they come the difference is not forced by men. Human beings cannot reliably distinguish the righteous from the wicked because tares resemble wheat and false professors of piety may resemble Christ's true followers and deceive others. In the churches hypocrites exist as tares among the wheat, while those who really believe are genuine with no pretense, true in heart and soul and action, yet outward appearance does not reveal who is wise and who is foolish because those who hold the truth in unrighteousness appear outwardly like the wise and people cannot read the human heart. Christ is the true Watcher who knows the false from the true and never makes a mistake in His estimate of character, and His angels know each person by fruits, are commissioned to counterwork those who fight against the truth, and will never err or mistake in gathering them, so that at the harvest good and evil will no longer be mistaken for one another and the wicked will be removed to trouble the righteous no more.

Church membership and a claim to piety do not establish that someone is a Christian nor decide destiny, for good and evil may grow together in the church until the separation makes the difference clear. At the harvest Christ, not human beings or human authorities, judges who belongs with the family of heaven, judging each person by words and works with character determining who is worthy to dwell with heaven's family. That truth teaches humility and distrust of self rather than judgment or condemnation of others. Only those whose characters are formed without fault, without spot or stain, in the sight of a pure and holy God will be acquitted, and at that great day of judgment every person will be judged according to deeds done in this life.

Prophecy and Doctrinal Bearings

The verse rules out a temporal millennium in which the whole world is converted and the church completely triumphs before Christ's second coming, for evil and evildoers remain within His kingdom until the harvest at the end of the world when He comes and sends His angels to remove everything that causes sin and everyone who practices iniquity. The wheat and tares grow together until that harvest, so the kingdom is not brought to a universal state of righteousness and peace before His personal return. The wicked remain tares until the harvest and are not changed into good seed, but are gathered for destruction while the righteous receive eternal life.

The gathering of the tares into bundles ready to be burned is being fulfilled now as the wicked bind themselves together in groups ready for judgment and destruction. The turmoil and confusion filling the cities through labor unions and strikes, combinations, confederacies, cruelty, force, misuse of power, strife between labor and capital, crime, selfishness, and pride is that self-bundling, by which men in the different trades are brought into bondage under union control and led to disregard God's commandments. This combining is not God's planning but the planning of a power that must in nowise be acknowledged, and it hinders God's work, with satanic agencies leading people into wickedness that brings them to judgment and with those who yield to Satan, the general of rebellion and leader of transgressors of the law, taking sides with him by uniting in combinations such as labor unions formed or to be formed and becoming tempters and helpers in his schemes and in every phase of oppression. Those who claim to be children of God are forbidden to join that binding, while God's people on earth see its evil and refuse to unite with the enemy, and the wheat are gathered into the barn. Those who remain in connection with secret societies will be gathered as one with them and burned up with the bundles of tares in the last day.

The separating work is the fearful work of the third angel: selecting the wheat from the tares and binding or sealing the wheat for the heavenly garner. That application also calls for separating the vile from the precious. The great day of final ingathering is typified by the Feast of Tabernacles as the feast of harvest, when the Lord of the harvest sends forth His reapers to gather the tares together in bundles for the fire and to gather the wheat into His garner. At that time all the wicked are destroyed so that they become as though they had not been, after which every voice in the whole universe unites in joyful praise to God.

The verse shows the fate of withered, lifeless branches severed from Christ: they are burned when the Son of man sends His angels to remove from His kingdom all that causes sin and those who do iniquity. The faithful ripening like wheat for God's gathering and the wicked ripening like weeds for destruction are on opposing paths with divided loyalties and no unity of purpose between the worldly and those faithfully serving God.

Present Application to Life

Matthew 13 is life-and-death instruction to be read and heeded, warning against being blinded by human sophistry and mocking of sacred things, for it sets forth the judgment when angels separate the obedient from offenders and every person is judged according to deeds done in this life. Only those whose characters are formed without fault, without spot or stain, in the sight of a pure and holy God will be acquitted before Christ, who contemplates the future destiny of those for whom He gave His life. God has given every person his work, and Christ will cooperate with all who cooperate with Him by wearing His yoke and learning His meekness and lowliness, while angels will love and minister to them in every phase of life.

The gospel calls together in church capacity those who come out from the world, and the kingdom must be kept free from the sinful practices of the world even while tares grow together with the wheat in the church militant. The church is therefore not to be broken up, disorganized, or separated into separate groups by people before the harvest, since the separation of the wicked from the righteous is the angels' work at the harvest when the tares are gathered for burning and the wheat into the garner. The gathering of tares into bundles ready to be burned is being fulfilled now as the wicked bind themselves together, and the turmoil and confusion filling the cities through labor unions and strikes, combinations, confederacies, cruelty, force, misuse of power, strife between labor and capital, crime, selfishness, and pride, by which people are brought into bondage and led to disregard God's commandments, is that self-bundling planned not by God but by a power that must not be acknowledged. God's people are therefore not to center their work in the cities and are not to unite with trades unions, combinations, or secret societies, but to stand free in God preserving individuality and looking to Christ, to see the evil of that binding and refuse to unite with it, and to use all entrusted capabilities in giving the last warning message to the world. Those who yield to Satan as general of rebellion and leader of transgressors, taking sides with him by uniting in such combinations and becoming tempters and helpers in his schemes and in every phase of oppression, bind themselves into bundles for burning by fire in the last day, and those who remain in connection with secret societies will be gathered as one with them and burned up with the bundles of tares.

A Christian's actions can influence others toward harm or toward what is right, so students and believers should avoid sowing tares that cause others to stumble and instead sow the kingdom's good seed. Those who make defective church members their theme, habitually seeing and talking of evil and feeding on real or supposed faults of brethren, will themselves be ranked among the counterfeit Christians who offend and do iniquity and are gathered out at the harvest. Instead all must feed on Christ as the only perfect pattern of Christianity and the Sin-bearer who alone takes away sins, by coming to Him, believing on Him, eating His flesh and drinking His blood, and making His words, which are spirit and life, their theme. Feeding on Christ produces obedient true experience, while feeding on faults produces contentious false experience that obeys unrighteousness.

In the churches hypocritical tares exist among genuine Christians who are true in heart, soul, and action with no pretense, and Christ as the true Watcher knows the false from the true by character and never errs or mistakes in His estimate. The sins of professed Christians excuse no soul and do not justify blaming Christ and His ministers, for Christ gave His life to save all who believe in Him. Christ is willing to cleanse His kingdom and every soul of all that would offend. The imagery of tares applies to unreliable people working alongside the faithful who complain and sow evil, and to the spreading of destructive doubt and questioning whose imagined objections are like a straw figure set up to attack. The application calls for separating the vile from the precious, which is the fearful work of the third angel in selecting the wheat from the tares and binding or sealing the wheat for the heavenly garner.