Kingdom Parables Pt 3: Wheat and Tares

 

March 27, 2022                            NOTES NOT EDITED
Kingdom Parables—Pt. 3:  Appearances Can Be Deceiving
Matthew 13:31-33

SIS – What an individual, family, church, or nation becomes is a matter of nature, not appearances.  Or, True success—eternal success—is a matter of something internal not external.

When we hear the term, “mustard seed” in regard to faith in the New Testament we immediately think about the small size of the seed.  The same can be said for the “yeast, or leaven” which seems to be more for emphasis than for a separate discussion.  So, we will consider these two parables together as an examination of two very “small things” with a very great influence.  Let’s read these parables together:

Mark 4:30–32^{(CSB) 30}And he said, “With what can we compare the kingdom of God, or what parable can we use to describe it? ³¹ It’s like a mustard seed that, when sown upon the soil, is the smallest of all the seeds on the ground. ³² And when sown, it comes up and grows taller than all the garden plants, and produces large branches, so that the birds of the sky can nest in its shade. 

³³ He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and mixed into fifty pounds of flour until all of it was leavened.”

Matthew and Luke have this similar discussion.  Unmistakably, the tiny size of the seed in regard to the significant impact it has (“birds get shelter”) is a major part of the Lord’s teaching.  This is a picture [SLIDE] of mustard seed on person’s finger and the microscopic yeast.  They are tiny.  As I said, the same applies to the “tiny size of yeast compared to how large a loaf gets.”  The primary issue, however, is not of the “size” of the mustard seed or the yeast (leaven), but of their “nature.”  The seed and leaven perform according to their God-ordained nature.  The secondary issue goes to the “mixture” idea of the kingdom.  Birds are usually bad in the Bible and yeast is universally a symbol of worldliness and evil.  Both these ideas must be considered in an examination of the nature of the “Inaugurated Kingdom” as it operates in the real world today.

What appears on the surface as a comparison based upon small size verses large impact, is actually a comparison between “appearances and reality” or “appearances and nature.”  By all appearances, the mustard seed—our faith and activity in the present kingdom—is small.  Evil as we have seen in the other parables is ever-present and seemingly getting the upper hand much of the time.  However, “appearances are deceiving.”  While according to appearance the mustard seed is small and insignificant, according to its nature it is large and significant.  It is the very nature of the mustard seed to grow and have a significant impact on this life, and also eternity.

While the disciples were very aware of the “size” of the mustard seed, they did not appreciate the “nature” of the mustard seed.  This is the mustard seed version of seeing a “glass half-empty.”

Remember the inaugurated kingdom verses the consummated kingdom we learned about last week?  At times during this “inaugurated kingdom,” it appears faith in God is insignificant is has very little potential for making any lasting change.  But, that is simply a “false appearance.”  In reality, everything is moving exactly as God ordained toward a “consummated kingdom” in which evil and chaos is completely vanguished.

Scholars are divided as to how to interpret these two parables.  The key issue rests with determining whether the “birds and leaven” illustrate something good or something evil in regard to the church.  What these parables really represent is “size versus nature.” The other issues are perhaps important, but secondary. 

I believe that when all the evidence is taken together and sound principles of Biblical exegesis are followed, the conclusion must be reached that Jesus is not “praising the mustard bush, nor encouraging the influence of leaven.”  He was illustrating the difference between appearances and nature. 

Also, as I said weeks ago when we looked started this study of the Kingdom Parables in Matthew 13, that these seven parables were intended as a “unit” teaching basically one main truth.  That main truth is this:  from the time of Jesus Christ’s departure from earth to the time of His return the world (Kingdom), including the church, will be a mixture of good and evil, but good (the King) will ultimately win the battle.

That mixture can be addressed personally as the “flesh versus the spirit” in an individual believer, and it also applies to the church made up of individual believers, and of the world made up of individual churches.  Evil is ever-present until the consummation of the kingdom; but it is not ultimate in authority.

The great growth of the mustard bush is a symbol of good, and the birds are a symbol of evil, just as we would expect.  The tremendous growth in the rising bread loaf is good, but the influence of leaven is universally not good in the Scriptures.

So, the key to understanding the nature of the Kingdom in this the world in the absence of the King (Jesus) rests on understanding the co-existence of both good and evil in the world.  The church operates in the context of a “hostile” environment and her greatest threat is not from a lack of influence, but from a lack of integrity.

Life this side of eternity will always be a struggle against evil and suffering, both for the believer and non-believer.  One’s nature will determine whether one wins that battle or loses for eternity.

There will always be a battle between good and evil influences, even in the Church.  This is the reason Jesus gave us these parables.

READ TEXT:  Matthew 13:30-34

I had to fight off the temptation to surrender to the more popular notions that these two parables describe the “unimaginable success” that a Christian or Church would have if they followed Jesus.  Many well-known, well-respected scholars hold this position in regard to these two parables; though, certainly not all.

Dictionary.com gives us the typical, popular version of a definition for SUCCESS as 1. the favorable or prosperous termination of attempts or endeavors.  2. the attainment of wealth, position, honors, or the like.

Basically for most people success is about size:  the size of one’s house, the size of one’s bank account, and the size of one’s fame, in which in all instances bigger is better.  This idea I think permeates how many scholars view these two parables.  Bigger is better.

I don’t think these parables teach that at all.  In fact, THREE IDEAS surface from our text that seem to teach just the opposite.  Let’s examine the relationship between a greater size and success.  I’ll use three declarative statements to help bring out the meaning or our text.

1.  Greater size (appearances, externals) does not mean greater success for a church.

Matthew 13:32 (CSB) ³² It’s the smallest of all the seeds, but when grown, it’s taller than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the sky come and nest in its branches.”

The mustard seed bush in this parable reached a surprisingly large size.  This is no exaggeration but something people in that region were used to seeing. The mustard plant is actually an herb, not a tree, but some bushes have been known to reach up to 12 feet in height.  The mustard seed is also not technically the “smallest” seed in the botanical kingdom—the orchid is smaller.  [SLIDE, SEED] Yet, the phrase “as small as a mustard seed” was a well-known proverb in the Middle East.  It meant “smallest of the seeds sown for food.” [See SLIDE, TREE]

The mustard bush reached an incredible size, but appearances are deceiving.  In reaching this abnormally large size, the mustard seed  provided refuge for all kinds of birds.  We know from what Jesus said in the parable of The Sower, the birds often represent evil people and errant doctrines. So, what appeared to be very successful, actually was not as good as it seemed.

Bigger is not always better.  Outward appearances do not always tell the whole story.  Christianity (both true and false versions) has spread to every continent on the globe.  You can find churches that are as large as shopping malls – but still, there are more lost people on the planet now than at any time in the history of the world.  Outward growth can be deceiving.

The fact that mustard seeds grow into large trees and yeast expands into an entire loaf must be considered along with the fact that both birds and yeast have negative representations in Scripture. 

2.  Smaller size does not limit the significance of a church

Matthew 13:33 (CSB)  ³³ He told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven that a woman took and mixed into fifty pounds of flour until all of it was leavened.”

The issue of size verses significance is further strengthened in consideration of the “yeast.”  It not only is “small,” but it is “microscopic” (3 to 4 microns avg.  Micron=1000^th of a millimeter). Yeast (leaven) are fungi that eat sugar and make alcohol and carbon dioxide.  This causes dough to “balloon up” or rise.  Yeast are invisible to the naked eye, but have enormous significance to a lump of dough. Size—whether great physical strength, great fame, or great fortune—is not the measure of significance.  Consider that well-known inventor, George de Mestral [SLIDE]. Raise your hand if you ever heard of George de Mestral.  Yep! That’s what I figured.  Raise your hand if you ever heard of “Velcro.” [SLIDE] Mestral created what would commercially be called, “Velcro.”  This hook and loop fastener is EVERYWHERE in our world.  It’s even been found “out of this world!”  Apollo astronauts used it to fasten down stuff in zero gravity of space.

Mestral became curious about how things like “burr seeds” [SLIDE] stuck to his dog and his pants after hunting.  He examined one of these “burrs” under the microscope and noticed “hooks” that would stick to anything with a loop—clothes and fur for example.  The hook and loop fastener that became Velcro took him 11 years to get from an idea to a working product with a patent.  Nobody knows his name, but his life has been extremely significant.

Where the Mustard Seed Parable focuses on the external issue of the Kingdom, the Leaven Parable focuses more on the internal issue.  Yeast is almost universally negative and representative of evil and error in the Bible.  Even that which is not seen or is easily ignored can have very significant consequences.  The nature of “yeast” is evil and the consequences is that it can grow quickly and exponentially. The internal issue in the Kingdom of Heaven is simply this:  a little bit of error goes a long way!  Doctrine is extremely important.

Mustard seeds do what mustard seeds do—grow.  Yeast is always (except for two mentions in the Book of Leviticus) associated with bad influences.  Both have significance far beyond their diminutive size.   So, here’s the conclusion of the matter.

3.  Size is not the issue.  Nature is the issue.

By “size” I mean “any external measure of success,” or as I’ve said before, “appearances.”  Appearances can be and often are deceiving.

The Bible refers to this as a “nature” issue.  The oldest scientific statement mentioned in the Bible sets forth the principle of “seeds producing after their kind, or nature.”

Genesis 1:12 (CSB) ¹² The earth produced vegetation: seed-bearing plants according to their kinds and trees bearing fruit with seed in it according to their kinds.

Jesus applies that scientific principle of “producing after one’s kind (or seed) to the spiritual world:  Matthew 7:17–18 (CSB)

¹⁷ In the same way, every good tree produces good fruit, but a bad tree produces bad fruit. ¹⁸ A good tree can’t produce bad fruit; neither can a bad tree produce good fruit.

Paul outlined this same principle in regard to the “competing natures of the human soul, or the flesh that produces evil after the flesh and the spirit that produces good after the Spirit.”

Romans 8:5 (CSB)  For those who live according to the flesh have their minds set on the things of the flesh, but those who live according to the Spirit have their minds set on the things of the Spirit.

Paul went on to develop this theme of “competing natures” in the Book of Galatians where Paul concludes this:

“Follow the Spirit nature and you will produce good according to the Spirit, and not evil according to the fleshly nature.” (paraphrase, Gal. 5:16).

Non-believers have only one “nature.”  That nature is the flesh and it produces evil—it cannot do otherwise.  The believer has two natures, both flesh and spirit.  The believer has the nature and the ability to produce good according to the Spirit.  For the believer, it is all about “which NATURE” is doing the producing.”

The idea of “artificially manipulating the nature” (you could insert here—the Doctrine of Works) of a thing in order to get a better (usually meaning a bigger) result is nothing new.  People have been breeding animals to get bigger, better beef, and even breeding flowers to get bigger, brighter flowers.  People have been trying to change human behavior with politics, psychology, education, and religion since the dawn of man—these have never changed man’s nature.

Over the course of my high school career, I bred and cross-bred many generations of fruit flies. We manipulated the color of their bodies—some dark, some light.  We manipulated the size of their wings—some normal, some bearly visible.  Yet every time we bred a new generation of fruit flies with varying mutations one extremely important characteristic remained true—they always came out fruit flies.  That was their basic nature and it never changed—never!

No matter how many times you breed, cross-breed, and otherwise manipulate a cow – it is always a cow.  A rose is always a rose.  A mustard seed always produces a mustard tree.  A yeast always causes bread to rise. That’s their natures.  The nature of a thing can be manipulated, but it cannot be changed.  The sin nature of a man, woman, or child cannot be changed—except by being “made new by accepting the gift of salvation God offers in Christ and being filled with the Holy Spirit.”

Here's what the Bible says about that:  “If anyone be in Christ he or she is a new creation; behold the old nature has disappeared and a new nature has come.”  (2Cor. 5:17)

Salvation gives us a new birth and a new nature.

So often people fall into the trap that success is about “external issues” like size, strength, wealth, skill, education, inheritance, or a thousand other external things.  Eternal success—which is the only success that really matters—is about something “internal” not something external—what is our “nature.”  In these twin parables of the Mustard Seed and the Leaven the issue is not “size,” but “nature.”  Success is not measured externally, but internally.

The primary application of these parables I want to leave simmering on our hearts this morning is this:  nothing will ever change the evil in our world until we let Jesus change the nature of men’s hearts.

The matter at hand is all about “nature.”

Nobody had to tell the seed to grow.  That was its nature. Nobody had to tell the yeast to spread.  That was its nature. A thing does what it’s nature tells it to do.

All the evil in the Kingdom of God (His world, His church, and His people) has nothing to do with anything external, but it is an “internal” problem – a problem with the sin nature.

Success is defined according to the world as “a degree or measure of succeeding; a favorable or desired outcome; the attainment of wealth, favor, or eminence.”

This definition is founded upon appearances, not reality. Appearances are deceiving, just like the tiny mustard seed that becomes a tree and the microscopic yeast that balloon dough into a fat loaf.  True success, whether with individuals, families, churches, or nations, has nothing to do with external appearances, but internal natures.

In 1979, a skinny, unimpressive quarterback from Notre Dame was drafted in the third round by the San Francisco 49ers.  Many fans felt that the 49ers had wasted their draft opportunities for the third round and that this skinny, unimpressive rookie would turn out to be a huge disappointment.  In fact, on Tuesday, April 18, 1995, after about 16 stellar seasons in the NFL, superstar Joe Montana had gone on to win an impressive four Super Bowls.  John Madden, the famed coach and sports announcer once said, “Joe Montana is the greatest quarterback who has ever played the game.”  A quarterback who didn’t look like much in the beginning turned out to be one of the greatest to ever play the game.

Appearances can be deceiving.  What matters is not how things appear, but how God has ordained them to be.  God has a plan.  You can put your trust in Him.  In this world in may look like faith is tiny and insifnificant—but from small beginnings will grow huge blessings.