At the time of the writing of this epistle, this letter to the churches, John is about 90 years old.  His writing, which is inspired by the Holy Spirit, is brilliant.  His writing is pure, divine truth. He pens one statement of absolute truth after another, in a cyclical fashion, each statement building upon the other, oftentimes restating the same truth but from a different perspective.  It is really brilliant stuff that deserves our careful study and contemplation.  And it must be careful study, because even though every word that he writes is inspired truth, there are certain statements that if considered in isolation, taken out of context with the whole of his writing, can lead a person into false doctrine.

And that is exactly what John is writing to avoid.  In the seventy years or so since Christ’s ascension, the church had gone adrift from the sure anchor of the gospel.  The church had suffered many attacks from false teachers and false doctrines that threatened to shipwreck the faith of many. It doesn’t take a seismic change in doctrine to lead one to spiritual shipwreck.  It may only take what seems to be a minor change of course to lead one further away from the truth and eventually cause shipwreck.

Now John wrote this epistle he says in the first few verses of chapter one, that we might have fellowship with God and with Jesus Christ His Son, and that our joy may be full.  That is the purpose of the gospel, that we might know God, to be known by God, that we might have life in Him, that we might have fellowship with Him, and that our joy might be full. 

Then in chapter 2, vs 1 John says that he is writing that they sin not. And at the end of the letter, he says that he is writing that they might have eternal life. It’s interesting to note how all of these purposes work together, synchronistically. Our fullness of joy comes from our fellowship with the Father. Our fellowship with the Father is dependent upon our being cleansed from sin. And so, he now writes to them that they sin not.  Because sin breaks that fellowship we have with God, and that results in a loss of our joy.

So the area in particular that John is concerned about is sin.  He reveals sin as a hidden reef which threatens our faith, that robs us of fellowship with God, and takes away the joy of the Christian life. You know, the enemy tries to tell us that sin is not really a problem.  That sin isn’t really sin.  Or that God doesn’t really care about sin.  Or that you can live in sin and still have fellowship with God. But John argues conclusively in chapter one that such thinking is a lie.

For instance, in the previous chapter, John said this is the message, that God is light and in Him there is no darkness at all.  Darkness is a metaphor for sin.  God is pure, God is holy and righteous, and there is no sin in Him at all.  God cannot tolerate sin.  God cannot condone sin.  He cannot have fellowship with sin.

So based on that truth about God, John says that you can’t walk in darkness and have fellowship with God. You can’t live in sin and have fellowship with God.  Sin breaks fellowship with God.  1John 1:6 “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and [yet] walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.”  Sin prohibits our fellowship with God. By living in sin, we quench the Holy Spirit.  And God says His Spirit will not strive with man. God is light, and He cannot participate with darkness.  He cannot abide with sin.

John goes on to show the nefarious ways in which the enemy tries to get us to accept sin and think that all is well.   The enemy tries to get us to say we have no sin. To get us to think that we are somehow not guilty of sin. The law doesn’t apply to us so sin is not a problem.  Or to just ignore the problem of sin altogether.  Sin is never addressed in a lot of churches today.  God is love, and that is all that they want to focus on.  But John said in vs8, “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us.”

Instead of ignoring sin, or saying that sin is not an issue, or saying that we have no sin, John said the way to have fellowship with God is to confess your sins.  “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”

Another way that Satan tries to deceive and cause a broken relationship with God is to say that sin isn’t sin.  Something that you like, something that you think will make you happy, but which the word of God says is wrong, you say this favorite thing of yours is not sin. You over rule God’s word.  And that’s exactly what John says in vs 10, “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.”  You have put yourself in the place of God and decided that what you want to do is not sin.  Obviously, the word of God is not in you because the word of God says that it is sin, and you say it is not sin. Once again, the result is the same, you are abiding in sin, and because of that you cannot have fellowship with God.

Let’s think of it this way.  Imagine you are learning to play the piano.  The teacher provides you with a piano that is in tune, it’s perfectly capable of playing the greatest songs ever written.  And she gives you a music sheet with all the notes written out of a beautiful song that you are supposed to learn.  And she tells you to learn to play that song perfectly.  Now to do that, you must practice.  In the process of practicing, you are going to make mistakes, aren’t you? But the key to learning to play the piece is not by pretending that the notes don’t matter.  It’s not learned by hitting the wrong notes and just continuing on as if nothing happened. It’s not learned by playing any notes that you want to play if you think it sounds ok.  The way to learn is to recognize the correct notes, and to recognize when you don’t play the right notes, and to correct it. That’s a poor illustration of what it means to recognize and confess your sin. That is what John refers to in chapter one as practicing the truth.  To practice the error is to walk in darkness, but we confess our errors, we confess our mistakes, and practice the truth.

So the goal of the Christian life that John wants to emphasize is that you should not sin.  He says in vs1 of chapter 2, “Little children, I am writing these things to you that you may not sin.” That is the goal. That is the standard.  As 1 Peter 1:16 says, “YOU SHALL BE HOLY, FOR I AM HOLY.”  We are to be conformed to Christ’s image, to walk as He walked, to follow in HIs steps. 

Eph. 1:4 says, “just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we would be holy and blameless before Him.”  Ephesians 5:25 says, “Christ also loved the church and gave Himself up for her, so that He might sanctify her, having cleansed her by the washing of water with the word, that He might present to Himself the church in all her glory, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that she would be holy and blameless.”

God wants us to be free from sin so that we might have fellowship with Him and have fullness of joy. So make no mistake, God doesn’t want us to sin, He doesn’t want us to accept sin as a fact of life that we can’t really do anything about.  He doesn’t want us to condone sin and say it’s ok.  He doesn’t want us to ignore sin or try to act as if we don’t have sin.  God wants us to be free from sin, but if we sin, He wants us to deal with it so we can be cleansed from it.

God doesn’t say He doesn’t want us to sin because He doesn’t want us to have fun.  That’s what the devil tries to tell us.  Sin looks like fun.  In fact, sin sometimes is fun, but only for a season.  God isn’t concerned with limiting your fun, God is concerned with a life of joy.  Joy is eternal, fun is temporary. You can go out partying with your friends and start drinking and you may have a lot of fun for the evening.  But it doesn’t usually end well.  I was thinking yesterday of a friend I know that has recently reached the breaking point in alcoholism. Drinking was a lot of fun when he first started out as a young man. But over the years, drinking has taken it’s toll.  He has now lost his family, ruined his health, suffered so much loss.  Drinking is not fun anymore.

So John is writing unto them “That you may not sin.”  That’s the goal. That’s God’s standard for fellowship, for joy.  That’s the divine ideal.  But the fact is that no one is able to attain to it perfectly.  Sanctification is the process of being holy, but it is a process that will not attain perfection until Jesus returns. 

In the prayer of dedication for the temple, Solomon prayed in 1Kings 8:46 that God would answer their prayer, “When they sin against You (for there is no man who does not sin).”  And in Ecclesiastes 7:20 it says, “Indeed, there is not a righteous man on earth who [continually] does good and who never sins.” And we should all be familiar with Romans 3:23 which says, “For all have sinned and come short of the glory of God.”  John in the previous chapter said that if we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.

So the fact that we will sin is a foregone conclusion, but that doesn’t mean that we have a fatalistic view of sin, that it is something which we can’t do anything about.  We should all strive to live a life in which we don’t sin. We should all strive to play the notes to the beautiful song that God has written for us, so that we may live a life that is joyful and harmonious with God, and beautiful in God’s eyes. But a lot of times we don’t make much of an effort to do that.  The author of Hebrews said in Hebrews 12:4 “You have not yet resisted to the point of shedding blood in your striving against sin.” In other words, you’re not trying very hard. There is much that we can do to resist sin.  We fight against the temptation to sin on three fronts, from Satan, from the world, and from our own flesh.

In regards to Satan, James tells us to resist the devil and he will flee from you.   And in regards to the world,  1Cor. 10:13 says, “No temptation has overtaken you but such as is common to man; and God is faithful, who will not allow you to be tempted beyond what you are able, but with the temptation will provide the way of escape also, so that you will be able to endure it.”  So if you fall into temptation it is because you did not take God’s escape route that He provided.  You did not rely on the strength of God to endure it or overcome it.  And in regards to the flesh, Paul says to discipline your body and make it your slave, rather than being enslaved to the lusts of the flesh.

So we can overcome sin, we can practice the truth to eliminate sin, but if we sin, John says we have an advocate with the Father.  The word advocate in Greek is “paracletos”. It is the same word that Jesus used when He promised the disciples that He would ask the Father to give them another Comforter.  The word literally means, called alongside to help.  We have a diving Helper.  God doesn’t just tell us not to sin, and leave us on our own to resist and keep from sinning. But He gives us the Helper, the Spirit of Christ, to comfort us, to convict us, to control us, to give us the power over sin.

That word paracletos also can be interpreted as Intercessor.  An intercessor is one called alongside to help, but in the position of a defense attorney. And John identifies our Intercessor as Jesus Christ the righteous.  In the position as an Intercessor, Jesus is not declaring our innocence.  He is not saying that God should not count our sin as sin.  But He is saying, count their sin against Me. Charge Roy’s sin on My account.  I will pay for it through death on the cross. He is righteous, He is holy, He is the spotless Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world upon Himself.  He became sin for us that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him.

Isaiah 53:4-6 speaks of this intercession saying, “Surely our griefs He Himself bore, And our sorrows He carried; Yet we ourselves esteemed Him stricken, Smitten of God, and afflicted.  But He was pierced through for our transgressions, He was crushed for our iniquities; The chastening for our well-being [fell] upon Him, And by His scourging we are healed.  All of us like sheep have gone astray, Each of us has turned to his own way; But the LORD has caused the iniquity of us all To fall on Him.”

And Romans 8:34 asks, “who is the one who condemns? Christ Jesus is He who died, yes, rather who was raised, who is at the right hand of God, who also intercedes for us.”  It is because Jesus is the righteous, Son of God, the One who created us, the One whom holds together all things by the word of His power, the One who is the exact nature of the Father, the exact radiance of the Father’s glory, because He died in my place, because He took the wrath of God upon Himself, I am free from the condemnation of sin. And because I am forgiven and made righteous through Him, I have fellowship with God and the fullness of joy.

If we sin, not only do we have an Advocate with the Father, but Jesus Christ the righteous is also, according to vs 2, “the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.”  Propitiation is one of those words that we may hear only in the Bible.  It’s not a word used in common language today. And so it’s not very well understood.  

Propitiation means quite simply Satisfaction.  As I said earlier, God did not suddenly decide to stop counting sins, but He stopped counting them against us that believe, and instead counted it towards Jesus Christ.  But the point made in propitiation is that God must count sins.  If God is just, if God is holy and righteous, if God is the Judge of the Earth as the Bible says He is, then He must count sin.  He must vindicate those who have suffered.  He must punish the evil doers.  And the Bible teaches that God will judge the earth and everyone that has lived on the earth.  Every thought, every word, and every deed will be judged.  God is a God of justice. And justice must be served.  Those who break God’s laws must receive the punishment due them.

In the Old Testament, there is a picture of propitiation that helps us to understand propitiation.  God gave Moses instructions for the building of the tabernacle and later for the temple.  And inside the courtyard of the temple, there was the holy place and inside the holy place was the Holy of Holies.  It was the place that God met with His people, and only once a year could the high priest enter it to make atonement for the sins of the people. The high priest would go once a year to placate God, to satisfy God, to appease God’s wrath against the sins of the people by the sprinkling of the blood of an animal sacrifice on the mercy seat.

Inside the Holy of Holies was the Ark of the Covenant.  And inside the ark there was the covenant of Moses,  which was the 10 commandments. I find it interesting that inside the Holy of Holies, there is a box, and the box contains the word of God.  That’s it.  There is no statue, no representation of deity, just the word of God in a box, a jar of manna and Aaron’s rod.  When we want to worship God we don’t go bow down to a statue, or kneel and pray to a statute, but we go to the word of God.  

So the box was made with gold, and the lid was gold.  And the lid on the top of the ark was known as the mercy seat. On each end of the ark, there was a cherub, a cherub made out of a piece of solid gold with its wings going across the lid. Cherubim were angels whose particular purpose was to be guardians of the holiness of God. Above the ark was the Shekinah glory of God, which was the light and smoke in which was the presence of God. 

On the Day of Atonement, the high priest entered with fear and trembling into the presence of God in the Holy of Holies, and sprinkled the blood of the sacrifice on the mercy seat.  The blood covered the law, so to speak.  It was the sacrifice made to appease the judgment of God, to be the propitiation, or the satisfaction,  for the sins of the people.

But actually the whole sacrificial system prescribed in the Old Testament by God didn’t satisfy Him. The sacrifice of Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, year after year after year, and all the sacrifices in addition to that, all of the burnt offerings, all of the sin offerings, all of the trespass offerings, all of the other offerings offered millions of times through history never satisfied God. None of those sacrifices ever paid for one, single sin. They all just pointed to the ultimate sacrifice that one day would atone for sin.  And that ultimate sacrifice for all sins, of all people, was made by Jesus Christ on the cross. He was the propitiation, He was the spotless Lamb of God that takes away the sins of the world.  Nothing else could do that, the other sacrifices could only symbolize His sacrifice.  And His sacrifice was sufficient, it satisfied the wrath of God against sin, once and for all.

The Bible says that punishment for sin is death.  God said, “If you eat of the tree, you will surely die.” Sin entered into the world and then death by sin.  It is appointed unto man once to die, and after that the judgment.   God is just, He is holy.  He is the Supreme Judge over all the earth.  He will not lie concerning what He required concerning His law.  He will mete out justice as demanded by His word.  Jesus satisfied that requirement of the law.

But that satisfaction for sin is applicable only for those who have accepted Jesus as their Savior and Lord.  For those who have not, who reject Christ, there remains the wrath of God. In John 3:36, it says, “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; he who doesn’t obey the Son shall not see life but the wrath of God abides on him.” The condemnation of the law abides on the one who rejects Christ. If you reject Christ, then the only way that God can be satisfied for your sin is to require your death.

Romans 6:23 says, the wages of sin is death. Thats the bad news.  Then the good news, “but the gift of God is eternal life to everyone that believes. First Thessalonians 1:10 says, “Christ has come to deliver us from the wrath to come.” 

First Peter 2:24, “He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.” First Peter 3:18, “Christ also died for sins, once for all, the just dying for the unjust.” And then 1 John 2:2, “He is Himself the propitiation for our sins.” He was our substitute, He took our place, and paid our price, that we might have life through Him.

Rom 3:23-26 says, “for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,  being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus;  whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. [This was] to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed;  for the demonstration, [I say,] of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus.”  God is just, He requires justice, but He is the Justifier, meaning that He has provided a way for us to be justified by transferring our guilt upon the righteous Son of God.

One last point that needs to be made.  John says at the end of vs 2, “He Himself is the propitiation for our sins; and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.”

Does this mean that Jesus has literally satisfied the wrath of God for the whole world? Does the whole world mean that everyone is saved? Has Jesus  satisfied God’s justice for everybody who’s ever lived? If so, then why be concerned about condemnation? Why all the warnings and why preach the gospel?

The answer is found in Leviticus 16; 17 when God gave instructions about the day of Atonement, God made it clear that the high priest was making atonement only for the people of Israel. The Day of Atonement was only for the Jews.  But he great news for the rest of the world comes to light in the new covenant.  Here in vs2,  John says Jesus is the propitiation, He is the atoning sacrifice, not just for the Jew’s sin, not just for the select ones, but for the sins of the world.  Every person, from every tribe and nation has the offer of atonement presented to him. God has made salvation available to whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord, shall be saved.

I pray that if you have not accepted the free gift of salvation, the forgiveness of sins, the cleansing from sin and the righteousness of Jesus Christ that you would do so today.  Today is the accepted time of salvation.  The inviatation is open and waiting and has been extended to all who will believe. Call upon Jesus today and be saved from the condemnation of your sin, and receive life from God, that you may have fellowship with God, and that your joy may be full. 

In the first century, Christianity was facing a problem which we still have with us today. The problem was a false gospel, a false Christianity, propagated by false teachers. That has always been a threat against the church, and it remains so today.  The enemy works to destroy the church from within and without, and attacks from within are sometimes more difficult for us to discern and to deal with.

So John’s epistle is addressing this by looking at the doctrinal distinctive’s of the gospel, and in this passage, presenting a contrast between the message of God, and the message of false Christians.  In vs 5; he says this is what God says.  And then in the remainder of the chapter he says this is what false Christians say.  So he says in vs 5, this is the message of God; that God is light and in Him in no darkness at all.  That’s the standard.  That’s the absolute truth. God’s standard is total light, absolute truth, complete righteousness.  And he says if you have life from God, if you have fellowship with God, if you are born of God, then you must be like God, of the same standard as God.

That establishes the second part of John’s thesis in vs 5, which is that “in Him there is no darkness at all.”  God cannot have fellowship with darkness, because that is contrary to His nature that He is light. 

So John has given us God’s message, God’s standard, that God is light. Perfect, holy, the source of truth, the source of life. And then starting in vs 6 through chapter 2 vs 1, John gives us three messages of false Christians.  He identifies each statement with the phrase, “If we say…” And in so doing he gives us three false claims of false Christians. 

Let’s just identify the three messages of false Christians first of all.  Vs 6, “If we say that we have fellowship with Him and yet walk in the darkness.”  That’s the first one, claiming fellowship with God.  We will talk about what constitutes fellowship in a moment.  But that’s the first claim of man. The second message of man is in vs 8, “If we say that we have no sin.” And the third message sounds very close to that, which is in vs 10, “If we say that we have not sinned.”

Now after each of those assertions of man, Joh gives a rebuttal according to the truth of God. Notice that after each of the statements of man, which are introduced by the phrase “If we say…” that John follows with the rebuttal that what man says is a lie. And then he sets forth God’s standard in response to what man has asserted. 

So John draws a great contrast; God’s message is light.  Man’s message is darkness. God’s message is truth.  Man’s message is a lie.  And John wants to draw the distinction between what God says, and what man says.  As Paul states in Romans 3:4, Let God be found true, and everyman be found a liar.  John gives us here three claims, three false claims made by false Christians.

The first assertion that we’re going to look at are those who claim to have fellowship with God. The word fellowship is from the Greek word “koinonia.”  That word is part of the name of our church, incidentally.  I chose that name purposefully because it relates the true nature of the church with God.  Koinonia, according to the Greek concordance means association, community, communion, joint participation, intercourse, intimacy, partnership.  Literally, to have fellowship with God is to share common life.

So they claim to be possessors of eternal life. They claim to belong to God. They claim to possess salvation, to be in the Kingdom. They claim to be a Christian. So many people today claim to have fellowship with God.  They claim to know God. But in fact, the evidence of their life says that they do not.  Vs 6 says, “If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and yet walk in the darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth.” 

So they claim to be Christian, but they walk in darkness, and so they are liars because they do not practice what they claim.  If they were truly in fellowship with God, then they would not walk in darkness, because God cannot participate in darkness.  In Him there is no darkness at all.

John says that they walk in darkness.  That simply means that they live in sin.  They live habitual, consistent sinful lives.  He is not talking about just the big sins, the really blatant sins.  But sin is sin.  Sin is anything that is not in accordance with God.  

And we can inversely deduce from his statement, that they practice sin.  Notice he says that since they walk in the darkness, they lie and do not practice the truth.  So if they are not practicing truth, they must be practicing sin.  They walk in sin, they practice sin.  It’s speaking of a habitual sinful lifestyle.  Their life has a pattern of sin.

However a Christian is characterized by a change of lifestyle.  A change of heart.  A change of desires. If they have fellowship with God, then that means they want to be like God, to mirror God, to do His will.  John states the positive part of the contrast this way; vs7, “but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin.”

So a true Christian does not walk in darkness, but he walks in the Light, because God is Light.  He walks after God.  He is a follower of Christ.  That means he goes where Christ goes.  He does what Christ does.  He loves what Christ loves.  Peter has a great way of describing that following, that discipleship of the Christian.  In 1Peter 2:21 he says, “For you have been called for this purpose, since Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example for you to follow in His steps.”  He uses a word there translated as “example”  which in the Greek is hypogrammos. That was a writing tablet with all the letters of the alphabet, given to school children as an aid in learning to draw the alphabet, which they did by tracing over the letters. That is what is meant to be a follower of Christ. Tracing our attitudes, our actions, our steps over His life. And that is something that John and Peter both indicate must be practiced.

So that walk in the light, the life of following Christ, of patterning your life after Christ, results in fellowship with one another.  The one who is walking in the Light has fellowship with God and with the body of Christ, which is the church.  In the garden of Eden before the fall, Adam and Eve had fellowship with God.  The scripture says they walked with God in the cool of the evening. To walk with, to talk with, to have fellowship with God is the result of walking in the Light.  I think if you are truly saved, you will desire fellowship in the church.  If you’re going to a church that is truly preaching the word, that is populated by people who have been saved, I think you’re going to desire regular fellowship.  I think the mark of someone who is not truly saved is that they have no desire for fellowship with God’s people.  Their life of sin makes fellowship uncomfortable for them.  They don’t have fellowship because they are convicted, and they get irritated that they are convicted, rather than converted, and so they avoid church as much as possible. But the one who is truly walking in the light wants to be in church every time the door is open.

And the other aspect of walking in the light John says is that the blood of Jesus Christ cleanses us from all sin.  If you believe in who Jesus is, that He is the Son of God, and you believe in what He came to do, which is to be a substitute for sinners through His death on the cross, then you receive forgiveness of your sins, and you receive His righteousness.  It’s the great transaction.  My sins are transferred for His righteousness.  But that results in more than just forgiveness.  It results in a new nature, a righteous nature.  It results in the indwelling of the Holy Spirit.  And all of that combined produces something greater than just forgiveness.  John says it cleanses us from sin. It takes away the desire for sin.  It takes away the power of sin.  The blood of Jesus not only provides forgiveness, but it provides the power over sin, so that we are no longer under it’s power.  We have been set free from the penalty of sin, and the power of sin. One day, at the return of Jesus Christ, we will be set free from the presence of sin.  But even now, we have been cleansed from sin.  It no longer defines us, or controls us, nor do we practice it any longer.

So the contrast should be apparent.  If you say you have fellowship with God but walk in darkness you are lying.  Because he that has fellowship with God walks in the Light with God and does not participate in darkness, but has fellowship with God and other Christians, and is cleansed from sin by the death of Jesus Christ.

The second assertion the false Christian makes is in vs 8, “If we say that we have no sin, we are deceiving ourselves and the truth is not in us.” There are a lot of self professing Christians who don’t like the word sin.  I remember one lady who came to our services for a while many years ago, and she obviously didn’t care for my constant preaching about sin.  She very pointedly made the comment to my wife and I one day that she had left the last church because the pastor always preached about sin.  Well, she left our church soon after as well, because I unapologetically preach about sin.  

I do so because sin is endemic to our nature.  Sin is the reason for the problems of the world.  Sin brought about the curse upon the world.  Sin is the number one cause of death in the world.  Did you know that? It’s not the Covid.  It’s not cancer.  It’s sin.  It is 100% fatal.  And every one of us has been infected with it.  In fact, the Bible says that is spreading, and it is terminal.  You are going to die because you have been infected with sin. And my job, as a preacher of the message of God is to tell you that you have been infected, but that there is a vaccine, there is a cure for sin.  And it is Jesus Christ.  He is the only cure.  I think it’s interesting to note that one of the things that they recommend for Covid is a daily mega dose of Vitamin D.  The best source of Vitamin D is the light of the sun. And I am here to tell you that the only cure for the disease of sin is the light of the Son. Walk in the light, as He is in the Light.

So John says that this person who claims that they have no sin are deceiving themselves.  They are not deceiving God, and they probably aren’t deceiving anyone else who witnesses their life. But they are self deceived. Because the truth is Romans 3:23 that says “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God.”  The truth is Romans 3:10-12 which says, ”THERE IS NONE RIGHTEOUS, NOT EVEN ONE; THERE IS NONE WHO UNDERSTANDS, THERE IS NONE WHO SEEKS FOR GOD;  ALL HAVE TURNED ASIDE, TOGETHER THEY HAVE BECOME USELESS; THERE IS NONE WHO DOES GOOD, THERE IS NOT EVEN ONE.”

And your sins have caused a fatal separation between you and the source of life and light. Your sin has created a great chasm between you and God that cannot be breached.  So if you say that you have no sin, you are deceiving yourself and the truth is not in you.  And if the truth is not in you, then the light is not in you, so the life of God is not in you, and you do not have fellowship with God. You are not saved. You are not a Christian. You’re deceiving yourself by thinking you have fellowship with God but in fact you are still dead in your sins.

Then John gives the rebuttal, the antidote for sin.  He says in vs 9, “If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.”  The way to fellowship with God is through confession of our sins.  That’s how we are cleansed from sin.  That’s how we are cleansed from all unrighteousness.  I like how in that verse John distinguishes forgiveness from cleansing.  As I said, salvation is more than just forgiveness, it’s being given righteousness,  a new nature, a renewed spirit, an indwelling of the Holy Spirit to give us victory over sin. 

Now confession is the key to salvation, but it’s also the key to fellowship.  Even after we are saved, we still may find ourselves falling into sin from time to time.  It’s part of our old nature, and we are not delivered completely from our old nature until the day when we receive a new body and God creates a new earth. But when we sin, even as a Christian, we hurt our relationship with God.  We disrupt our fellowship with God.  2 Cor. 6:14 says, “what fellowship has light with darkness?”  In order to restore that right fellowship with God we need to confess our sins and ask for God’s forgiveness. 

David said in Psalm 32,  “When I kept silent [about my sin, my body wasted away through my groaning all day long. …  I acknowledged my sin to You, And my iniquity I did not hide; I said, “I will confess my transgressions to the LORD”; And You forgave the guilt of my sin.”  

In Psalm 51, when David prayed for forgiveness and restoration after his sin with Bathsheba was uncovered, he was a child of God.  He had fellowship with God, but it was damaged not only because of his sin, but because he had tried to cover his sin.  But he confessed his sin and asked for restoration.  Listen to part of his prayer.  “Wash me thoroughly from my iniquity And cleanse me from my sin.  For I know my transgressions, And my sin is ever before me.  Against You, You only, I have sinned And done what is evil in Your sight, So that You are justified when You speak And blameless when You judge. …  Behold, You desire truth in the innermost being, And in the hidden part You will make me know wisdom. … Hide Your face from my sins And blot out all my iniquities.  Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me.  Do not cast me away from Your presence And do not take Your Holy Spirit from me.  Restore to me the joy of Your salvation And sustain me with a willing spirit.”

When we confess our sin as David did, then John says that God is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. God is faithful and righteous, or just.  What does that mean?  God has punished Jesus Christ for our sin.  He has exacted the penalty due to us upon Jesus Christ.  So it would be unjust for God to hold our sin against us, because our sin was held against Jesus.  And so based on our faith in Christ as our substitute, we have forgiveness of sin. And notice once again John uses the word cleanse.  God gives us forgiveness and restoration that we might live free from the power of sin.

The final assertion that false Christians make is found in vs 10.  “If we say that we have not sinned, we make Him a liar and His word is not in us.”  The previous person said that they had no sin.  This person says that they have no sin.  I don’t see much of a difference in the two statements.  But perhaps the previous person of vs 8 says that he was not a sinner.  And  this person denies that what he is doing is sin.  That may seem like a minor distinction.  But I think it’s a common claim among professing Christians today.  They would like to think that what they think is ok is not sin, even though it is contrary to what God says.

The usual excuse is that when the Bible spoke of this issue, whatever it is, it was a cultural thing.  When Paul said it was not permitted for a woman to teach, well, that’s cultural.  When the Bible speaks about homosexuality, it’s not really talking about a loving, committed relationship between two people of the same sex.  The big one today that is glossed over is living together.  The common refrain is that if the young people love each other and they decide to live tougher without being married it’s ok, because love is more important than legality. But whatever sin it is they want to excuse, they override the word of God.

Now when they make the excuse that their sin isn’t really sin, that God doesn’t care about this thing, then John says that they make God a liar.  That’s pretty serious.  In the other assertions, John said that the people making the assertions were lying.  In this claim, the person makes God a liar.  Now we know that God cannot lie, because in Him is Truth, and there is no darkness at all.  So I think what John is saying is that they are in effect calling God a liar.  God didn’t mean what He said.  God didn’t speak the truth.  To call God a liar is blasphemy.  

The other thing John says is that when they make this claim, God’s word is not in them.  Now some commentators say that the word should be capitalized.  That it is speaking of Christ.  And that may be true.  If they are blaspheming God and saying that their sin isn’t sin, then they cannot be saved, and thus Christ is not in them.  But I also think it is applicable to the written word.  Those that say such things cannot know the word, they do not have the light of the word in their hearts, they do not comprehend the word.  Psalm 119 says, “Your word have I hid in my heart that I might not sin against you.”  The word of God is a preventative for sin. The Word of God is the antidote.  But the word of God is a preventative. 

So what is John’s rebuttal to this claim of the false Christian that they have not sinned?  It’s found in vs 1 of chapter 2. I would remind you that the chapter designations are not inspired.  I do think that they are for the most part helpful but they are later additions to the Bible as we know it. They are not in the original text.  And in this case I think the chapter break is not helpful.  The answer is in vs 1; “My little children, I am writing these things to you so that you may not sin. And if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous.”

The Bible teaches  that we all are sinners by nature.  John desires that we do not sin, but because we are sinners, there is an antidote which is the blood of Jesus Christ.  And if we sin, we have an advocate who is Jesus Christ.  Advocate comes from the Greek word “Paracletos,” which means one called alongside to help; or an Intercessor. 

That word paracletos, someone called alongside to help is reminiscent of what John was talking about when he said Jesus cleanses us from all sin.  Because of the righteousness of Jesus Christ which is credited to us, which is granted to us, we have the Spirit of Christ residing in us.  And because the Spirit of Christ resides in us, we have the power to overcome sin.  God doesn’t just say to us in the new covenant, do not sin, but He gives us a Helper so that we might not sin. And that Helper is the Spirit of Christ.

Jesus in the Upper Room before His trial and crucifixion promised the Helper would come to them and what He would do.  He said in John chapter 16 “But I tell you the truth, it is to your advantage that I go away; for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you; but if I go, I will send Him to you. 8 “And He, when He comes, will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment; 9 concerning sin, because they do not believe in Me; 10 and concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father and you no longer see Me; 11 and concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world has been judged. … 13 “But when He, the Spirit of truth, comes, He will guide you into all the truth; for He will not speak on His own initiative, but whatever He hears, He will speak; and He will disclose to you what is to come. 14 “He will glorify Me, for He will take of Mine and will disclose [it] to you.”

When we have the Helper indwelling in us, then we will know the truth of God’s word, because He will reveal the truth to us.  Those that call God a liar the truth is not in them, and the Word is not in them, so they twist the truth to validate their sinful lifestyle.  But for those who know the truth, to them who are walking in the light, and are sons of light, the Spirit of Truth is given that we might know the truth and the truth would make us free from the bondage of sin.  We have a Helper and an Advocate with God who is in us, and who helps us, both at the throne of God where the judgment of God lies, and who helps us here on earth because He understands our weaknesses, having been in the flesh as a man like us.

What a wonderful gift we have been given in our salvation.  We have forgiveness of sins, power over sin, power over death, even eternal life, and fellowship with God who is the source of life and the source of joy. And we have the help of God, we have the Helper, the Spirit of God within us to help us as we go through this time on earth.  He is our Comforter, our Helper, our Advocate, our Shield, our Defender, our Captain, our Substitute, our Sacrifice, He is the Word of God, our Savior, and our Lord.  I hope that you know Him, that you know the fellowship of God.  If you don’t have fellowship with Him, you can do so today by confessing Jesus as Lord and Savior, confessing your sins to receive forgiveness and cleansing, that you may receive life everlasting, and the power to live life free from the condemnation of sin.  The invitation is given to you today to receive Jesus as your Savior and Lord.  Call upon Him today and receive life in Him. 

Today we are concluding our series on the parables of Christ by looking at the parable of the wedding feast. And I want to first consider the historical context in which this parable is given. This would have been Wednesday of the last week before Christ’s death. On Friday, He will be crucified. On Sunday, He will rise from the dead. For three years He has been preaching and teaching the Gospel of the kingdom. He has been presenting Himself as the Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior of the world. He has been offering an invitation into His kingdom to the people of Israel, the Jews. And now at the end of His ministry He has come into Jerusalem for the final act. He knows that the religious leadership have rejected Him as the Messiah. And in just two more days they will turn Him over to the Romans to be crucified.

On Monday, He had entered Jerusalem on a donkey to the sounds of crowds crying Hosanna! The common people expected Him to be king and to overthrow the Roman occupation and take the throne of David. But on Tuesday, instead of doing that, He went to the temple and overthrew the money changer’s tables and drove out the merchandisers from the temple. And in so doing, He sealed His fate with the High Priest, the Pharisees and the Sadducees. They wanted Him dead.

So this is Wednesday, and He has come back to the temple, and this time He comes to preach. And in His message, He gives three parables, a trilogy of kingdom of heaven parables, which prophetically forecast the rejection by the Jews and the judgment that will befall them because they failed to accept Him as their Messiah and King.

The first parable He gives in this trilogy is the Parable of Two Sons. It is found in chapter 21 vs 28. “But what do you think? A man had two sons, and he came to the first and said, ‘Son, go work today in the vineyard.’ And he answered, ‘I will not’; but afterward he regretted it and went. “The man came to the second and said the same thing; and he answered, ‘I [will,] sir’; but he did not go. Which of the two did the will of his father?” They said, “The first.” Jesus said to them, “Truly I say to you that the tax collectors and prostitutes will get into the kingdom of God before you. For John came to you in the way of righteousness and you did not believe him; but the tax collectors and prostitutes did believe him; and you, seeing [this,] did not even feel remorse afterward so as to believe him.”

Jesus explains this simple parable to show that the religious Jews claimed to do the will of God, but actually did not, and thus would not enter into the kingdom of heaven, whereas the sinners who repented would enter the kingdom of heaven.

The second parable of the trilogy speaks of the judgment that will fall on those who rejected the gospel of the kingdom, which was again directed at the religious leadership of the Jews. Jesus said in vs 33 “Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT AND DUG A WINE PRESS IN IT, AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey. When the harvest time approached, he sent his slaves to the vine-growers to receive his produce. The vine-growers took his slaves and beat one, and killed another, and stoned a third. Again he sent another group of slaves larger than the first; and they did the same thing to them. But afterward he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the vine-growers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance.’ They took him, and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-growers?” They said to Him, “He will bring those wretches to a wretched end, and will rent out the vineyard to other vine-growers who will pay him the proceeds at the [proper] seasons.” Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures, ‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER [stone;] THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES’? Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it.”

Now that parable is pretty self explanatory as well. But irregardless, in expounding it, Jesus makes it clear that He is speaking it about them, the religious Jews. That the kingdom of God will be taken away from them, and they will receive the judgment of God because of their rejection. Whereas the kingdom will be given to a people who will produce spiritual fruit.

And Matthew says that the Jews did recognize that He was speaking about them. I think it’s possible that they recognized Jesus was speaking of God as the Father, and He as the Son of God, and that they would kill Him. I think it’s possible that they even knew that He was the Messiah, but He was not the kind of Messiah that they wanted. He was going to destroy their livelihood, their financial rackets, and their position of power. Look at vs 45 “When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was speaking about them. When they sought to seize Him, they feared the people, because they considered Him to be a prophet.” They had already planned on killing Him, but were just waiting for the right opportunity.

Now we come to the third parable in this trilogy, which we will look at in a little more detail, as Jesus gives more insight, and a different perspective on the same issue of rejection of the kingdom of God and the judgment due to those who do so. There are four parts to this parable, similar to four parts in a play. The first act we will call the invitation rejected.

The story is about the kingdom of heaven, which was the foremost topic of Jesus’s teaching. As we have repeatedly stressed, the kingdom of heaven is not speaking of what we often think of as heaven, per se, but is referring to the rule of heaven, the rule of God in the hearts of His people. It is a spiritual kingdom, where those who have been born of the Spirit have their life, their inheritance, in the realm of Christ.

Jesus says in vs 2 “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come. Again he sent out other slaves saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are [all] butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast.”‘ But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them.”

So the kingdom of heaven may be compared to a wedding feast given by the King for His Son. A wedding was in those days the most important social event of a person’s life. And a royal wedding would have been the most important social event of a lifetime. Imagine being invited to attend Prince Charles and Diana’s wedding back in the early 80’s when that event occurred. It was perhaps the most prestigious, most desirable social event in England of the century.

Jesus says that the kingdom of heaven can be compared to that kind of wedding. He is taking the most important, significant event of person’s spiritual life and comparing it to a situation that can be more easily comprehended by mortal man -a wedding invitation by the royal family.

In those days, the wedding was not given a specific date. The exact timing of the bridegroom was something of a surprise. The general time frame would be known, and the invitation was given out to make the people aware that it could be very soon, on a moments notice.

We know from a previous parable we studied that the bridegroom is Christ, and the bride is HIs church. Jesus is saying in this parable that the invitations to the wedding feast had gone out. And as the moment arrived for the celebration, the slaves of the king were sent to those who had been invited to attend, but they were not interested in coming. It says in vs 3, “they were unwilling to come.” This was an unthinkable thing, that the people would not want to attend the king’s wedding celebration.

But the king responds to their rejection with graciousness. He sends out his slaves again, to ask them to come to the wedding feast. This time he adds that he has prepared this grand feast, the oxen and livestock have been butchered, and everything is ready. That indicates a tremendous expense on the part of the king, which was prepared for their enjoyment.

But they paid no attention to the second summons from the slaves. They went on about their business, one to his farm and one to his place of business. Such a callous display towards the king’s invitation would have been unthinkable. The listeners of Jesus would have been shocked to hear of such disregard for the king’s invitation. The first group of people in the parable were just too busy with their own agenda to be bothered with the king’s business. What they were doing seemed more important and more enjoyable.

As bad as that was, the second group of people Jesus describes are even worse. They take the king’s slaves and beat them, and murder them. In the context of the story, this is just outrageous behavior. Why would you beat up and murder the servants who invited you to the king’s celebration? It’s unthinkable.

Now what is Jesus describing here? I think it’s pretty clear. The king is a picture of God, the king’s son is the Christ, and the wedding celebration is an invitation to be part of the kingdom of His Son. The invitation had been given to the Jews. They were the ones first invited to enter the kingdom of heaven. They were the preferred guests, the priority list. The gospel was given to the Jews first. They were the called people of God.

And the kingdom was offered to them. They were invited as the special guests who were able to enter the kingdom. But they were not interested. They had their own agenda which they were more interested in. They were busy making money, doing deals. They were so callused that they refused the invitation again and again.

And even worse, they mistreated and killed the prophets that God sent to them. Jesus said in Luke 11:47 “Woe to you! For you build the tombs of the prophets, and [it was] your fathers [who] killed them.” Vs 49 “For this reason also the wisdom of God said, ‘I will send to them prophets and apostles, and [some] of them they will kill and [some] they will persecute, so that the blood of all the prophets, shed since the foundation of the world, may be charged against this generation.”

That takes us to the second act, the rejecters punished. Verse 7, “But the king was enraged, and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers and set their city on fire.” The king’s graciousness and mercy has an end. HIs patience has run out. His wrath is poured out on the rejecters, and it is justified. They have murdered His innocent servants, rather than submit to His rule and be a part of His administration. So the wrath of God is poured out on the Jews because they have rejected His invitation.

History tells us that just as Jesus depicts in this parable God burned the city of Jerusalem with fire in AD 70. Over a million Jews were killed when the Roman general Titus surrounded the city and in the process the temple was destroyed and burned. The remaining Jews were scattered all across Asia. God’s justice was served against a people that rejected His invitation, they rejected His grace, and they rejected His Son. Because Israel as a nation rejected the Messiah, God rejected them as nation. And so the invitation is given to others who will bear the fruit of it.

That brings us to the third act, the new guests are invited. We see that in vs 8 “Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Go therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find [there,] invite to the wedding feast.’ Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.”

The instruction from the king is to go everywhere and get everyone that will come. That’s the mandate of the church’s mission, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to all creation.” That’s the mission. Because of the rejection of Israel, we that were not a people have become the people of God. He has sent His message into every nation to everyone. “As many as you can find, invite them all to come.”

Vs 10 “Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.” The invitation to enter the kingdom of heaven is given to whomever will come. What Jesus is indicating here is that their acceptance of the invitation is the key to entering, not their morality, not either how good of a person they are, nor how bad of a person they are. It’s not dependent upon their nationality. But simply all who accept the invitation can enter. Accepting the invitation is the criteria, accepting the grace of God, not how good of a person you may be.

And that brings us to the last act, the intruder expelled. Vs 11 “But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed in wedding clothes, and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?’ And the man was speechless. Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’ For many are called, but few [are] chosen.”

So this great crowd of people who accepted the invitation were in the wedding hall. And there is one man who is not dressed in the wedding garment. Now we are not told exactly what this garment looked like, nor exactly how it is given, nor how this man does not have it. But what we can assume is that it correlates to the robe of righteousness which God provides to those who believe in Christ and have accepted Him as their Lord and Savior.

We find direct correlation to this robe of righteousness that all who enter must wear, in Isaiah 61:10 which says, “I will rejoice greatly in the LORD, My soul will exult in my God; For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, As a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, And as a bride adorns herself with her jewels.”

The hymn we often sing, “The Solid Rock” has a line which speaks to this, which says, “Dressed in HIs righteousness alone, faultless to stand before the throne.” The robe of righteousness is one that we receive by faith from Christ. It’s His righteousness. Our sins are transferred to Him, and His righteousness is transferred to us. That’s what 2 Corinthians 5:21 says, “God caused Jesus, who knew no sin, to become sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.” It’s Christ’s righteousness which becomes our wedding garment, without which no one can enter the kingdom of heaven.

This man without the wedding garment is asked by the king, “Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?” And the man was speechless. He had no answer. When we stand before God in all His holiness, we will be ever so aware of our own sinfulness. We will have no excuse. In our natural state, many people think that they are a pretty good person. I can’t tell you how often I hear people say that. Somehow, in spite of all that they have done wrong and all the good that they have not done in this life, they somehow think deep down inside I’m really a good person. Well, when the day comes when they stand before God and they see themselves in the light of righteousness and perfect holiness, then they will throw themselves prostrate on the ground and say as Isaiah said, “Woe is me, for I am ruined! Because I am a man of unclean lips, And I live among a people of unclean lips; For my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts.”

I want you to notice that the garment which the guests received was provided by the King. It was given to them. They did not already have it, they could not earn it, but when they accepted the invitation it was given to them. That gift is called grace. Eph.2:8,9 “For by grace are you saved through faith, and that not of yourselves, it’s a gift of God, not of works, lest any man should boast.”

So this man who rejected the garment is in effect no better than the Jews who rejected their Messiah. He is indifferent. He doesn’t value the garment which the King provided. He wants the benefits of the kingdom perhaps, but He doesn’t think that the means by which he is granted an invitation is important. He thinks he can do it his own way.

I think one of the most tragic songs I have ever heard is the song by Frank Sinatra, “I did it my way.” I remember after he passed away a few years ago, and hearing all these tributes about him on the radio, and they all seemed to want to play that song. And I just couldn’t help but wonder where he was at that moment, and if living life his way, according to his agenda and his set of standards, was good enough to enter the kingdom of heaven. I don’t know the state of his soul, but I know the standard for heaven, and it’s not doing it your way. It’s not entered according to how you think God should be, or based on your own merits. But entrance is only admitted through Jesus Christ.

I know that when I stand at the gate of Paradise, and perhaps some angel says to me, “Friend, what are you doing here?” My only plea will be, “I am with Him. Jesus Christ invited me to come, and He has provided the garment of righteousness required to enter.”

Well, this man had no answer. He was speechless. And so the king said “bind him up and throw him into outer darkness. in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”
Listen, the Bible says hell was prepared for the devil and his angels. Hell wasn’t made for you and me. Paradise was made for you and me. God has prepared a place beyond our imagination for those that love Him. But when we reject Jesus, we reject Paradise and choose to listen to the enemy, and as such they that do so will suffer the same fate as he who they chose to obey.

Jesus closes this parable with a very simple statement, “For many are called, but few are chosen.” The call has gone out to the world, but only a few are chosen. The gospel invitation is sent out everywhere to everyone. Some are indifferent. Some are hostile. Some try to crash the wedding party on their own terms. But few are chosen. And with the word “chosen,” we’re introduced to the sovereignty of God in salvation. I think we can parse this word from a lot of different perspectives, but the one perspective I want to focus on is the sovereign act of God in granting salvation, granting righteousness to those who believe. You believe, and God grants you the kingdom. He graciously bestows upon you an inheritance in the kingdom. He makes you His child and gives you all the benefits of an heir.

But the great emphasis that Jesus gives in this parable is not on the election of God, but the acceptance of the invitation by man. He has extended to you that invitation today, to join HIs kingdom, to receive the righteousness of Jesus Christ and become a child of God. The question is, will you come to Him and bow to Him and believe in Him, that you may be dressed in the robe of righteousness by which you may enter? Come to Him today. The invitation is given to you.

We are continuing in our series on the parables of Jesus, and today we have come to a trilogy of parables which I believe are teaching a similar principle, albeit from differing perspectives.  These parables are part of a greater sermon that Jesus taught which is called the Olivet Discourse.  

Last week we looked at another parable from this sermon, which comes directly before these three. It is the parable of the sower. If you will recall, in that parable Jesus spoke of four types of soil, representing four conditions of the heart, all of which received the seed which was the word of God, but two failed to produce any real spiritual growth, one produced growth which was choked by weeds and thorns and did not produce fruit, and then one soil, the good soil, which produced varying degrees of fruitfulness.

Now the first parable in this series of three sort of builds on the parable of the sower by using a similar illustration of sowing.  Some aspects are similar, and some are different. For instance, in the previous parable Jesus taught that there were four types of soil, indicating believers and non-believers.  In this next parable, He teaches that there are two types of seed. 

Let’s consider then the parable of the wheat and the tares.  Jesus said, ““The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went away.”  

I have repeatedly explained in our study of the parables that when Jesus speaks of the kingdom of heaven, He is not speaking of the eternal abode of the righteous, or a place somewhere in outer space where God lives and the saints shall live with Him.  But Jesus is speaking of the sovereign reign of God.  The Bible says that heaven is My throne, and the earth is my footstool.  God is the creator of the world, and He rules over the world.  Not all the people in the world have submitted to Him as Sovereign, but one day every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that Jesus is Lord.  Until that day, when He is revealed from heaven in power and glory, men are given the gospel, an invitation, that the way to gain citizenship in the kingdom has been offered through Jesus Christ.  That invitation was given when Jesus came to earth the first time. Men are given the opportunity to receive Him in this age and be spiritually reborn as sons and daughters of God.  And then when the King returns in His glory at the end of the age, those who are His people will join Him to live and reign with Him forever, but those who rejected Him during their life, will be cast out of the kingdom into eternal punishment. 

So when Jesus speaks of the kingdom of heaven, He is speaking of the intermediate age between the first coming and the second coming of the King.  It is the age in which we live on earth now.  God is on the throne in heaven, and He is over all the earth.  He has established His rule and law and proclaimed the good news of the kingdom and invited all who believe to enter.  And at the end of this age He will come again to judge the earth and consummate the final age of His kingdom on earth. 

The teaching of the kingdom of heaven was nothing new to the Jewish audience that listened to Jesus.  But they had a distorted view of what that would look like.  They were expecting the Messiah to be King, and to take up the throne of David in Jerusalem, to defeat the enemies of Israel, and establish Israel as the nation of God, which dominates the world, and to whom the world serves.  They expected a kingdom on earth, but with Israel as the people of God, and the rest of the world to be in subjection to them, or to be destroyed by the Messiah.  They expected that reign to begin immediately upon the inauguration of the Messiah and that it would never end.  They did not understand that it would be a spiritual kingdom for a long time, during which both righteousness and evil would be in effect on the earth for what has been 2000 years now, until the day when the Messiah returns to consummate that kingdom.

So when Jesus teaches concerning the kingdom of heaven, He is in effect correcting, if not  overturning the stereotypical views of the Jews.  And it must have been difficult for them to understand because like most people, they heard what they wanted to hear.  That’s why Jesus concluded the previous parable by saying, those that have ears to hear, let them hear.  Their hearing was hindered because they did not have spiritual insight.

The disciples,  on the other hand, did have spiritual insight, and so after Jesus had given the parable to the multitude, He went in the house, in vs 36, and the disciples asked Him then to explain the parable to them.

The interesting thing which Jesus taught,  is that during the present age, as the kingdom of heaven is in effect, there are those who are in subjection to the king, and those that are not. He says in vs 38, the field is analogous to the world. The entire world belongs to the king.  Those that have submitted to the King are those illustrated in the previous parable as the good soil.  They received the word of God, the seed, the gospel, and that seed sown in good ground has produced spiritual life.  And a similar analogy is given in this parable; Jesus says the good seed that was sown by the sower are the sons of the kingdom.

But in the parable Jesus says that there is an enemy of the king, who sowed tares among the wheat while the king’s men were sleeping.  In HIs interpretation of the parable Jesus identifies the enemy as the sons of the evil one.  These are those who have believed the lies of Satan. They are not concerned about the things of God because they have believed the lie rather than the truth. And so consequently they are doing the devil’s work in spreading lies and deceit amongst the world.

The idea of this happening while his men were sleeping is something that should be elaborated on.  There was a book that was written by John F. Kennedy while he was still a young man at Harvard.  And the book was titled, “Why England Slept.”  It was about how England and other western countries seemed to sleep while Hitler was ascending to power and preparing to take over Europe.  

A similar reference was made by many people regarding the Japanese invasion of Pearl Harbor.  While America was asleep, the warplanes of Japan were making their descent upon the unsuspecting forces in Pearl Harbor.  That same stealthy kind of approach by the enemy is what Jesus is referring to here in this parable.  It indicates the way in which the enemy works.  He is deceitful.  He works by lying, by subterfuge. He takes advantage of darkness, which is an idiom for ignorance.  And he works by counterfeiting.  The tares look like wheat.

It also indicates that Satan takes advantage of the lethargy and slumber of the church.  The job of the church is to be the watchman, to be wakeful, to be on the alert.  Peter says, be on the alert, because your adversary the devil goes about as a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.  But the devil is working while we are sleeping.   There was an album that came out years ago by Neil Young, called Rust Never Sleeps.  That may be said about the devil.  He is working 24/7 knowing that his time is short.  But meanwhile, the church seems to be taking a perpetual nap, while the corruption that is in the world is spreading at a frightful pace.

Jesus said the enemy sowed tares among the wheat.  Tares look like wheat when they are young, but in fact produce a poisonous fungus which makes a person sick.  That sickness is a pretty apt illustration of the nature of the lie of Satan. He promises happiness and fulfillment but in the end it only produces death. And the field which is the world receives the lie of Satan and they become corrupted and poisoned by sin which produces death.

That illustrates an important principle which I mentioned a moment ago.  The work of Satan is often a work of counterfeiting the gospel with another gospel.  A gospel without power, without conviction, without repentance, without the cross, without  judgment. Someone has aptly said, “Where the good seed is sown, there the evil is scattered thickest. False christs and false apostles dog the true like their shadows. Every truth has its counterfeit.”  Satan masquerades as an angel of light, and his message is a lie construed to look like the truth.

We have counterfeit churches in which the true gospel is not proclaimed. We have counterfeit ministries in which the Word of God is not taught. We have counterfeit ministers who open up the Bible and who twist it into false doctrine.  In other words, the counterfeit is always there in the presence of the true, and it is very easy to be misled by them if we are not students of the Bible, and come to the Lord and ask him to explain His word for us.

In the parable, the servants of the landowner come and ask him “‘Do you want us, then, to go and gather them up?’  That would seem to be the logical conclusion.  But Jesus says the landowner replies, “No; for while you are gathering up the tares, you may uproot the wheat with them. Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.”’”

What that indicates is that there is a danger to uprooting the counterfeit.  In an actual field of wheat, the roots of the tares may be intertwined with the wheat.  Pulling up the bad would perhaps inadvertently uproot the good. Also, the similarity between the two may be cause for a mistake to be made by the reapers.  And so Jesus says let them both grow.

I think it’s a mistake to try to draw too many conclusions from some elements of the story, particularly this element of not uprooting the tares until harvest. I”m not sure that we can draw too many analogies from that and be certain of our deductions. We might be tempted to say that perhaps even a false teacher could lead someone to become a believer.  And that may be one way of looking at it.  However, what I think the salient  point that Jesus is teaching is that the angels of God will wait until the judgment to separate the wheat from the tares.  I don’t think that Jesus is saying that we should not identify false teaching or should not call out false teachers.  There is plenty of evidence in scripture that indicates that we should call out false teaching and we should warn others concerning it.

But that is not what Jesus is primarily teaching here.  I think the primary lesson that He is illustrating is that both wheat and tares will be allowed to grow until the harvest.  And at the harvest, it will be clear which are wheat and which are tares, because the fruit will be evident.  The point is that there will be a judgment which will determine the sons of the kingdom from the sons of the evil one. Jesus said, “Allow both to grow together until the harvest; and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, “First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.”

Jesus expounds on that in vs 40 “So just as the tares are gathered up and burned with fire, so shall it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send forth His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all stumbling blocks, and those who commit lawlessness, and will throw them into the furnace of fire; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then THE RIGHTEOUS WILL SHINE FORTH AS THE SUN in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.”

I want you to notice that in the parable, Jesus refers to the tares as being burned, and in the interpretation of the parable Jesus again says that that lawless and stumbling blocks will thrown into the furnace of fire.  The point being that in both the parable and the interpretation, fire is fire.  The fire doesn’t symbolize something that is not fire.  So we don’t see the terror of hell which is symbolized by fire,  diminished in any way by the interpretation, but actually the reality of hell is reinforced.  The fact of a burning, actual fiery hell that lasts forever is clearly illustrated in this message.

But while the judgment at the end of the age is given great emphasis, the main point of the parable is that both wheat and tares are sown in the kingdom, and will be allowed to continue to grow until the day when Christ returns, and at that time will come the judgment.

And another point that is illustrated in the interpretation of the parable is that the deeds of the unrighteous will be the evidence that they never were converted. Jesus calls them stumbling blocks and those that commit lawlessness.  And by inference, the deeds of the righteous will be the proof that they are sons of the kingdom, even as the fruitfulness was an indication in the previous parable.  Deeds are not the means of salvation, but deeds are the evidence of it, or the evidence that you are not of the kingdom.  That should be clear from the parables. 

Now there are two other parables that Jesus gives immediately after the wheat and the tares. These two are not interpreted by Jesus.  However, I believe the key to a proper interpretation is found in the fact that they come in the sermon before the interpretation of the wheat and the tares.  And so I think that positioning indicates that they are part of a trilogy of parables which are teaching a similar principle, only one of which will be interpreted, but the juxtaposition of the other two before the interpretation means that they share in that interpretation.

Notice then the parable of the mustard seed. Jesus said in vs31 “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field;  and this is smaller than all [other] seeds, but when it is full grown, it is larger than the garden plants and becomes a tree, so that THE BIRDS OF THE AIR come and NEST IN ITS BRANCHES.”

In this parable we see that the birds of the air nest in the branches of the mustard tree when it is full grown.  If we use the principle of expositional constancy, then we can deduce that the birds are a picture of the devil and his angels as identified in the parable of the sower.  In that parable Jesus says the birds who snatch away the seed is the evil one.  

The sower would be Jesus, if we follow the exposition of the previous parable. In this case, the mustard tree would be the church, which springs up from the good seed, which when fully grown becomes a tree big enough to have birds nest in it’s branches.  

What Jesus is illustrating here is similar to that of the wheat and the tares.  Within the kingdom exists both wheat and tares, both good and evil.  And within the church, the offshoot of the seed, exists both good and evil.  The devil and his angels find safe haven in the church.  We saw that same principle in the previous parable with the idea of counterfeit churches, and a counterfeit gospel.  Satan has always found a suitable site for subterfuge in the branches of the church, counterfeiting the truth with a lie.

Another thing that is worth pointing out about this parable is that a mustard seed does not produce a tree that big, but is actually a bush. Jesus seems to lay stress on the fact that this plant grows bigger than the other plants in the garden to become a tree.   A mustard seed producing a tree is abnormal growth.  And so we can see that what Jesus is teaching is that the church grows abnormally large, and as a result it harbors false teachers and false churches within it.  But if we apply the same teaching about the end of the age which we have seen previously, then at the end of the age, the fruit of the church will be evident and will precipitate the judgment of the unrighteous who have counterfeited the gospel.

Now I would be remiss if I didn’t say that the interpretation I have presented of the mustard seed and the parable of the leaven, is not the mainstream interpretation.  Most traditional commentators have taken the approach that the mustard seed is a picture of the church which will expand throughout the age and throughout the world. They say the same thing about the leaven, that it’s a picture of the church’s rise and prominence in the world.  That may be true, or not true, but either way I don’t think that is what Jesus is teaching.  Again, besides the principle of expositional constancy, I would point to another evidence for my view as the positioning of these two parables.  They are a continuation of the principle being taught in the wheat and tares, which is interpreted after they are all presented, signifying that they all share in that interpretation. 

Now that being said, let’s look at the last parable in this trilogy which I think will verify my position even further.  Vs 33 “He spoke another parable to them, “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three pecks of flour until it was all leavened.”  All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables, and He did not speak to them without a parable.  [This was] to fulfill what was spoken through the prophet: “I WILL OPEN MY MOUTH IN PARABLES; I WILL UTTER THINGS HIDDEN SINCE THE FOUNDATION OF THE WORLD.””

This parable of the leaven is very short and simple.  And yet it too is often misinterpreted as a picture of the growth of the church.  But the problem with that is that leaven is always presented in the Bible as a picture of sin and corruption. Jesus on at least a couple of occasions preached, “beware of the leaven of the Pharisees and the Sadducees.” They were the stumbling blocks which prohibited the Jews from coming to Christ.  He was speaking of the corrupt teaching which was being done by them which kept the Jews in bondage.  And in the Passover, leaven is a picture of sin, and they were to search out the house for leaven and throw it out, and eat unleavened bread.  It was a  picture of getting rid of the sinful, corrupting influences of the world.

So if you are consistent with that symbolism, then the woman taking flour and adding leaven to it until it was all leavened is not a picture of the church growing in a good way, but growing in a bad way.  The leaven is a corrupting influence which causes the dough to rise.  And so the corrupting influence of sin in the church spreads to all the church.

We also see a similarity in the woman hiding the leaven in the dough, and the enemy sowing the tares while they were sleeping.  Both indicate the stealthy, subversive nature of the tactics of the enemy to sow bad seed in the church.

The idea of hiding leaven in three measures of meal would have offended any observant Jew. This certainly isn’t a picture of the church gradually influencing the whole world for good. Rather, in the context of increasing opposition to His work, Jesus announced that His church would be influenced by corruption and false teaching and a tolerance for sin.

In the final analysis, we must examine ourselves in light of these parables as to whether or not we are truly sons and daughters of the kingdom, or whether we have been deceived by the lie of the devil and are actually children of rebellion.  Jesus said by their fruits you shall know them.  Those who have confessed Jesus as Lord have received the righteousness of Christ resulting in being born again spiritually as children of God.  And as such, they have a new nature, and their deeds are evidence of that.  Those that are in rebellion are still in their sins, and are  still carnal, and their lawless deeds are evidence of their nature.  

The difference might not be easily seen.  On the surface, the regenerate and the unregenerate may look the same.  But God sees the heart.  And on the day when we all are judged at Christ’s appearing, God will separate the sheep from the goats, the righteous from the unrighteous, and the wheat from the tares. 

If you are here today and you have realized in your heart that you have never been born again spiritually through faith in Jesus Christ as Lord, then you still have the opportunity to surrender to Jesus Christ today.  Today is the acceptable day of salvation.  Today Jesus invites you to join His kingdom.  I pray that you will call upon Him today and be delivered from the dominion of darkness to the kingdom of Jesus Christ.  Don’t put it off.  Call upon the Lord today and be saved.  

Today, of course, is the holiday we call Easter. The origins of this holiday are not completely clear. Some people think that the Emperor Constantine changed a pagan holiday on this date to become a day which the resurrection of Christ would be celebrated. That cannot be verified. But we do know that by the time of Martin Luther and the Reformation, the association by Christians with Easter as a celebration of the resurrection was pretty much established. So much so that the translators of the King James Version substituted the word Easter for the original word Passover in Acts 12:4. Most of our modern versions do not have that substitution. The NASB, for instance, reads the passover, not Easter.

So consequently, we do not actually find Easter mentioned in the scriptures. However, we do celebrate the Lord’s resurrection every Sunday. It being the day of His resurrection, the first day of the week, we come together to worship the Lord.

One aspect of the resurrection though that is rarely considered is how it applies to me. The Bible says in 1Cor. 15:20-22 “But now Christ has been raised from the dead, the first fruits of those who are asleep. For since by a man [came] death, by a man also [came] the resurrection of the dead. For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ all will be made alive.” So we learn from that there is a resurrection for us that believe, in the same way that Christ was resurrected.

But in a manner of speaking there are two resurrections for the believer. The first is when we are dead in our sins, and made alive in Christ. There is a resurrection from death to life which is our spiritual rebirth. It is when we become a Christian. Jesus said you must be born again by the Spirit. Salvation then, comes as a result of first dying to the old man, and then being born again as a new man by the Spirit of God. And then at Christ’s second coming, there will be a bodily resurrection, at the last trumpet, when the dead in Christ will rise first and meet the Lord in the air. At that point our bodies will be changed from corruption to that which is incorruptible. It will be changed from mortal to immortal. But first comes the spiritual regeneration, when we die to the old man and are born again in the Spirit.

In speaking of the bodily resurrection from the dead, Paul said in 1 Cor.15:36, “That which you sow does not come to life unless it dies; and that which you sow, you do not sow the body which is to be, but a bare grain, perhaps of wheat or of something else. But God gives it a body just as He wished, and to each of the seeds a body of its own.” Now he is speaking of the resurrection from the dead there. But it also can apply to our regeneration, when we die to the flesh, and are raised up to live with Christ, to walk from that point on by the Spirit, and not by the flesh any longer.

Now I don’t intend on preaching a typical Easter message today. But I did want to make the point that the importance of Christ’s resurrection has greater implications than simply His body coming out of the tomb. But because He lives, we live. Because He was resurrected we shall be resurrected. However, I also think that this principle of resurrection to new life is illustrated to some degree by the parable we are studying today. As most of you should know, we have been studying the parables of Jesus for a number of weeks now, and today we come to what is known as the Parable of the Soils.

This chapter is a continuation of a long day of teaching that Jesus did beginning in chapter 12. That same day, according to vs 1 of chapter 13, Jesus sat by the seashore. Jesus teaching at the beach seems to be a common occurrence in the gospels, as most of the time His teaching was outdoors. And on this occasion such large crowds gathered to Him that he moved to a boat and the crowds came near the waterline to hear Him.

Jesus began to teach them, and He spoke to them in parables. Just as a reminder, a parable is not a morality tale, it’s not an allegory. It is a fictional illustration set in the physical world used to teach spiritual principles. The first story that He tells is one that would be readily appreciated by his audience, who were from an agrarian culture, people that would easily understand and relate to this illustration of sowing and reaping. Not only that, but surrounding the Sea of Galilee were farm fields on the hillsides which could have been in the process of being sown at that very moment. And so the people could have been hearing Jesus describe what their eyes were witnessing in the distance at that very moment.

Now we are also fortunate, because in this parable, which is not always the case, Jesus explains the parable later to the disciples. So we can be certain that we understand what He was teaching. So there are two parts to this passage, the first part is the telling of the parable which the crowd received, and then the explanation of the parable which the disciples received. And there is an interlude in between where Jesus explains why that is so.

So Jesus presents the parable to the crowd on the beach saying, “Behold, the sower went out to sow; and as he sowed, some [seeds] fell beside the road, and the birds came and ate them up. Others fell on the rocky places, where they did not have much soil; and immediately they sprang up, because they had no depth of soil. But when the sun had risen, they were scorched; and because they had no root, they withered away. Others fell among the thorns, and the thorns came up and choked them out. And others fell on the good soil and yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. He who has ears, let him hear.”

Now that’s all that the crowd got to hear. They had to figure it out from there. And I have to say that even though the crowd was from an agrarian culture, and they probably had living examples on the hillsides doing the exact thing that Jesus was speaking of, they probably had no clue as to what He was really saying. Perhaps the best that they could extract from it would have been something along the lines of – most of your work will be unprofitable, but if you do a lot of it, some will be profitable. So perhaps they thought the moral of the story is to work hard and some of it will pay off eventually. After all, there was no real reason for the people to be see a spiritual application in that story. Everything that the gospels tell us makes it pretty clear that the multitudes who were drawn to Christ were really only looking for physical “blessings” in the way of food, or healing, or being able to have Israel reinstated as an independent monarchy under the reign of the Messiah who would be an actual king and would defeat their enemies.

There inability to discern the truth of the parable is why Jesus ends the story with the cryptic phrase; “he who has ears, let him hear.” This was not a call for all to listen. Rather, it was a call for those who were spiritually aware to understand the spiritual lesson being taught. It was said in recognition that they were not spiritually listening. They were only interested in physical things. But Jesus is saying that there is more than physical lessons here. There is a spiritual lesson which they needed to hear, but they first needed to gain spiritual awareness.

So Jesus has this great big crowd who have all come to see Him. And He gives them this cryptic sermon that they can’t possibly figure out on their own and He walks off the beach. And the disciples, I imagine, think that Jesus has blown a good opportunity. He failed to make the message clear, and bring it home with a suitable sentimental story and an invitation to walk the isle repeat this prayer after me.

So perhaps reproachfully, they say, “Why do You speak to them in parables?” There might have been a huge number of people who made a commitment to follow Christ that day, but instead, He left a lot of people on the beach scratching their heads, asking one another, “what did it mean to you?”

So the disciples question why Jesus taught in parabl, and He answers by saying in vs 11 “To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted. For whoever has, to him [more] shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him. Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand. In their case the prophecy of Isaiah is being fulfilled, which says, ‘YOU WILL KEEP ON HEARING, BUT WILL NOT UNDERSTAND; YOU WILL KEEP ON SEEING, BUT WILL NOT PERCEIVE; FOR THE HEART OF THIS PEOPLE HAS BECOME DULL, WITH THEIR EARS THEY SCARCELY HEAR, AND THEY HAVE CLOSED THEIR EYES, OTHERWISE THEY WOULD SEE WITH THEIR EYES, HEAR WITH THEIR EARS, AND UNDERSTAND WITH THEIR HEART AND RETURN, AND I WOULD HEAL THEM.’ But blessed are your eyes, because they see; and your ears, because they hear. For truly I say to you that many prophets and righteous men desired to see what you see, and did not see [it,] and to hear what you hear, and did not hear [it.]”

Now that answer deserves a message of it’s own to plumb all the depths of what Jesus said. But we aren’t going to take the time to parse it all this morning. However, the gist of what Jesus is saying is that it takes spiritual life, new eyes and new ears that are spiritually tuned, in order to understand the spiritual truth of the parable. The disciples had that new life. The multitudes did not.

In His answer Jesus revisits the principle we talked about last week in regards to the Parable of the Talents. That to him who has, more shall be given, and him who does not have, even what he has shall be taken away. And if you remember we said that which they had was spiritual life, and those that did not have spiritual life would even lose what they did have, which was natural life. Jesus says the same thing here in regards to why He speaks in parables. If they don’t have spiritual life, then they cannot understand spiritual truth.

It really goes back to what Jesus said to Nicodemus in John 3. You must be born again. That which is born of the flesh is flesh, and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit. Without being born again, without new eyes and new ears, there can be no understanding of spiritual things.

Then Jesus explains the parable to the disciples. He says, hear then the parable of the sower. I originally called my message the Parable of the Soils. That seemed to make sense to me, and besides, that’s what most commentators called it. But Jesus calls it the parable of the sower. And so I changed my title. It’s Jesus’s story, and I suppose He knows best.

However, the tendency to call it the parable of the soils is due to the fact that Jesus describes four types of soil in the parable. He gives practically no description of the sower. We are not even told who he is. But we can deduce that the sower is Jesus Christ Himself. And we can find justification for that in another parable,

There is a parable which we will look at next week which begins in vs 24 of this chapter, called the parable of the wheat and the tares. And Jesus explains that parable in vs 37, saying, “The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man…”

I’ve mentioned before a principle of hermeneutics called expositional constancy, that means symbols in scripture seem to have the same meaning. And you might be able to make that case here. It’s safe to say that if the Lord is the sower in one place, He certainly could be the sower in another place. After all, the good seed comes from Him, doesn’t it? That’s not a stretch. So we could conclude then that the one who sows initially is the Lord Jesus Christ, the One who has the word of life.

And that assumption clues us in on what is the seed in the parable. The seed is the word of God. Jesus calls it in vs 19 “the word of the kingdom.” It could also mean the message of the kingdom. Luke records this same parable and in Luke 8:11 he adds “the seed is the Word of God.” So the message of the kingdom is contained in the Word of God. Jesus began His ministry preaching the kingdom of God is at hand. Over and over again He has given instructions concerning the kingdom of God, or the kingdom of heaven. The message is that Jesus is the King of the kingdom of heaven, and His rule is over heaven and earth. The message is the good news, the gospel, that God has made a way for man to enter into His kingdom, and receive the blessings of the kingdom. The blessings of the kingdom are life, spiritual life, abundant life, eternal life. So the gospel, the word of God, is the seed which Jesus Christ is spreading abroad over the earth.

And I think the point should be emphasized that without the word of God a man cannot enter the kingdom of heaven. Jesus doesn’t give an example here of a patch of soil in which no seed was cast, because that should be obvious. Without seed, there can be no growth, no life. So it’s important that we recognize the essentiality of the word of God in salvation. I could say a lot about that, but we don’t have time. However, I do want to emphasize it, because I’m afraid that so often today the word of God is being de-emphasized. We substitute all kinds of things in the church for the preaching of the word, singing, skits, dramas, films, etc. And we wonder why people are not saved. Paul said in 1Cor. 1:18 “For the word of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.”

Now that brings us to the soil. Jesus gives us four types of soil. And the soil symbolizes the heart of man. The heart, when spoken of spiritually, is really the soul. It is the seat of man’s intellect, emotions and will. Jesus references the aspect of the intellect especially in the first soil, the packed hard road beside the field. There were byways through the farmer’s fields that allowed people to traverse across their property without trampling on the crops. And these byways were not cultivated. They were hard packed. And some of the seed cast by the sower falls on the hard packed soil that is not broken up. It lays on top and Jesus says the birds of the air come and eat the seed.

He says when anyone hears the word of the kingdom and does not understand it, the evil one comes and snatches away what has been sown in his heart. So we see in that statement several things. First, the necessity to understand the word. That incorporates the intellect. Secondly, the birds are interpreted as the evil one. That references the devil and his angels, and Jesus indicates that they can snatch away the word of God. The word of God is foolishness to these people who don’t understand it. So they disregard it, and the devil makes sure that it is dismissed as foolishness and not brought back to their mind. And the third thing Jesus teaches in that statement is that the soil is the heart. The word of God was sown in the heart.

Romans 10:10 says, “for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.” The first soil illustrates a hard, unbelieving heart in which the word is not received.

Jesus next interprets the rocky soil. Vs20 “The one on whom seed was sown on the rocky places, this is the man who hears the word and immediately receives it with joy; yet he has no firm root in himself, but is only temporary, and when affliction or persecution arises because of the word, immediately he falls away.”

Rocky soil is soil that is a very thin layer of dirt over a bed of rock. And because the root can’t go down, the growth spurts up, but when the sun becomes hot, there is no moisture in the soil and the plant wilts and eventually dies. Jesus interprets this as a person who hears the word, but has not counted the cost of discipleship. This is what I spoke of earlier, in order for the seed to grow, it must first die. There is a cost to Christianity, a cost to following Christ. It requires a sacrifice of your will, for doing His will. Some people are happy to accept that Jesus died for their sins so that they can receive the blessings of God. But they don’t realize that they need to die to their flesh as well. Jesus said take up your cross and follow Me. That’s what it means to confess Jesus as Lord. These people were not saved and then lost it, they were never saved at all. They had a superficial salvation, but never a true conversion.

The third soil is the thorny soil. Charles Spurgeon gave a great sermon on just this soil alone. He hardly mentioned the other soils, just the thorny soil. And perhaps because if I had to guess this is the most pervasive one. Thorns are pervasive, aren’t they? I noticed again yesterday that the first things to get green in the field around my house is the thorns. They take over. You don’t need to plant thorns, they are naturally prolific.

Jesus said in vs22 “And the one on whom seed was sown among the thorns, this is the man who hears the word, and the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth choke the word, and it becomes unfruitful.” I’ve always had a question in my mind whether or not this person is saved or unsaved. The first two were clearly unsaved. This one I’m not so sure. I think the indication is that if he persists in that condition then he is unsaved. But perhaps there is a chance that this person is saved, he has new life, but he backslides. He turns back to the things of the world that he was supposed to have forsaken. He becomes so enamored with the world again and the pursuit of money, or his career, or something that is carnal, fleshly, that it chokes the spiritual life to the point that it doesn’t produce fruit.

But maybe I’m being overly generous in that assumption this person could be saved. Because Jesus says in Matt. 7:16-20 “You will know them by their fruits. Grapes are not gathered from thorn [bushes] nor figs from thistles, are they? So every good tree bears good fruit, but the bad tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot produce bad fruit, nor can a bad tree produce good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire. So then, you will know them by their fruits.” So, the bottom line is that a life that does not bear fruit is not truly a Christian. Perhaps there is a time where God has to do some pruning, some cutting away, some cultivation in order to take away the thorns and weeds which are choking out the life, but the bottom line is that fruit is the evidence of spiritual life and the lack of fruit is evidence of no spiritual life.

Well that leads to the last type of soil, and that is the good soil. The seed which fell on the good soil *yielded a crop, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty. Jesus said in vs 23 “And the one on whom seed was sown on the good soil, this is the man who hears the word and understands it; who indeed bears fruit and brings forth, some a hundredfold, some sixty, and some thirty.” The number of the fruit there is not of primary importance. But what is important about the good soil is that it is fruitful. How much may depend on other conditions. But the point is that believers bear fruit.

The question is, what is fruit? A common misconception is that fruit is leading other people to Christ. That may play a part in it, but that is not specifically what Jesus is talking about. Fruit is righteousness. It’s a life of righteousness. Not just being declared righteous by faith, resulting in justification. But living righteously, which is sanctification.

I’ll give you a couple of verses to support that. Phil. 1:9-11 says, “And this I pray, that your love may abound still more and more in real knowledge and all discernment, so that you may approve the things that are excellent, in order to be sincere and blameless until the day of Christ; having been filled with the fruit of righteousness which [comes] through Jesus Christ, to the glory and praise of God.” The fruit of righteousness. It comes through Christ living in you. No longer you living for your desires, but Christ living in you.

Another is Heb. 12:10-11 talking about our earthly fathers, “For they disciplined us for a short time as seemed best to them, but He [disciplines us] for [our] good, so that we may share His holiness. All discipline for the moment seems not to be joyful, but sorrowful; yet to those who have been trained by it, afterwards it yields the peaceful fruit of righteousness.” There it is again, the fruit of righteousness, sharing in God’s holiness.

Righteousness is the fruit of the new life. John said in 1John 3:7 “Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous.” That’s the evidence of being truly saved. That’s the evidence of being a Christian. There is a new life of righteousness which is evident to the world.

That life of righteousness is what the scripture refers to as sanctification. Hebrews 12:14 says, “Pursue peace with all men, and the sanctification without which no one will see the Lord.” Sanctification is holiness, righteousness. It is being holy because He is holy. And so let me close by saying this. Examine yourselves this morning in the light of this parable. Which soil do you think characterizes the state of your heart? Do you not understand this message and are going to forget about it as soon as it’s over? That’s the soil by the road. Or are you like the rocky soil? You had some sort of spiritual experience once and because of that you think you are saved. But in reality the word of God has never taken root in your heart. And so there has not been any spiritual life.

Or do you recognize yourself as the soil that is thorny? You believed the word, you have had some spiritual growth, but the the worry of the world and the deceitfulness of wealth are choking the word, and your life is unfruitful. If that’s the case, you need to uproot those thorns, confess your sin to the Lord and ask Him to cleanse you, to renew a right spirit within you. Repentance is the plow that produces good soil, which results in the fruit of righteousness.

Psalm 51:10, 12, 17 Create in me a clean heart, O God, And renew a steadfast spirit within me. … 12 Restore to me the joy of Your salvation And sustain me with a willing spirit. … 17 The sacrifices of God are a broken spirit; A broken and a contrite heart, O God, You will not despise.