Wheat and weeds

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Date: 21 June 2020

Wheat And Weeds

In late February, the world sat riveted as news broke about the COVID-19 spread in South Korea. More than the speed of vast numbers infected from one super-spreader ‘aunty’, it was the light shed on the doomsday cult, Shincheonji. It was a cult with strange beliefs, and yet had over 200,000 followers including those from countries across Southeast Asia! Why are people misled? Why does God even allow that to happen? Cults essentially deny that Jesus is the Son of God, the perfect sacrifice for man’s redemption. This central truth is displaced and replaced.

In the parable of the wheat and weeds, Jesus articulated the inevitable question that was in the thoughts of the listeners, “And the servants of the master of the house came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? How then does it have weeds?’” (Matthew 13:27). In other words, if God created only good, how could evil enter and mess up the good work? Why is good seed growing alongside the evil when he is overseeing the work? Jesus reveals the grace of God in the situation in three assurances:

    • The good seed will in no way be hampered in their growth. The presence of the weeds will not stop the growth of the harvest. By God’s grace, genuine faith will not be easily derailed by false teachings.
    • The need to retain the wheat alongside the weeds is necessary so that the difference between the crop and that of the weeds becomes obvious. The true church of Jesus, by God’s grace, must be distinctly different from cult believers in their faith in Jesus.
    • The contrast between the two varieties of grass becomes obvious when the plants mature and bear grain at harvest-time. It is then that the real gets separated from the fake. By God’s grace, at that hour of judgement, the marks of the true Church of Jesus will be evident as they overcome the accuser by the blood of the Lamb and the word of their testimony.

Jesus further taught that, like both the mustard seed and the yeast in a dough, the growth of the kingdom of God and the inward transformation of Christ in us may be small, yet we cannot underestimate its impact within God’s sovereign plan.

In the battle waged against COVID-19 at the medical front, we are grateful that the hospitals have not been distracted from treating people with other urgent medical needs. Likewise, instead of being caught off-guard with false teachings showing up, the devotion to sound teaching of the word, prayer, and the holy communion, remains the key to safeguard the purity of growing faith and the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ.