Matthew 13:24-53

We are in the middle of a series of parables of Jesus that Matthew has gathered together in one place.  For the next parable, the disciples later ask Jesus for an explanation and get one.  We will look at the parable and the explanation together.

Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43 Good seed and weeds

There is a weed called darnel that looks like wheat in its early stages of growth, but that is poisonous to humans when it matures.  This is what the parable is talking about: that you can’t tell at the beginning whether a plant is wheat or darnel.

What do you find most striking in this parable?

What do the owner’s slaves want to do, and why does he tell them not to?

This parable is often thought to be talking about the church.  What is the message for the church in the owner’s restraint?

In the parable, the entity who messes up the owner’s field is called an “enemy” (verse 28), and in verse 39 Jesus calls that enemy “the devil.”  To what extent do you think the devil is at work trying to mess up the good harvest of the kingdom of God?

Jesus says that the seed represents “the children of the kingdom” (verse 38).  Notice that this is different than in the previous parable, where we are the soil.  Here, we are seed, which God has sown in the world.  Seed is sown so that it can produce a harvest.  What kind of harvest do you think we are meant to produce?

Wheat doesn’t turn into weeds, and vice versa; but people have the ability to change.  What can happen that might make someone turn from being more like a weed to being more like a good seed?

Do you think that one reasons why God doesn’t want to pull up the weeds until the end of the age is because people can change?  If so, how what is the message for us in the owner’s restraint?

How are we doing in fulfilling this teaching?

This parable teaches that there is an ultimate separation of the good and bad at the time of the harvest.  What criteria are used to decide who is separated out of God’s harvest?

What is the message for us in knowing there is a final judgment?

In Jesus’s explanation of the parable, who is responsible for the ultimate separate of the wheat from the weeds, the good from the bad?  What does that tell us?

(Footnote: Some scholars think the explanation of the parable in verses 36-43 did not come directly from Jesus but from the early church.  There is no way to know this.  But either way, the explanation is part of the inspired canon of Scripture, so it doesn’t really change anything.  I would like to think that the disciples were, at least sometimes, self-aware enough to know when they were lost and ask for explanations.)

The parable we just looked at is the first in a series of parables where Jesus begins by saying, “The kingdom of heaven is like (or can be compared to)….”  That doesn’t necessarily mean that there is a particular element of the parable that represents the kingdom.  Rather, it means that the actions in the parable resemble in some ways what happens in the kingdom. Jesus is saying: The way things happen in the kingdom of heaven is sort of like the situation where….

A parable is not an allegory; you can’t compare every element of the human story to a specific spiritual element.  Rather, we need to look for the overall message of the parable.

Some scholars think the key point of the parable itself (verses 24-30) is the need for patience: don’t try to kick all of the sinners out of the church – that’s God’s job at the end of time.  Others think the key point is in Jesus’s explanation (verses 36-43), where those who cause sin and do evil face ultimate judgment.  What is the key point you take from this parable?

Notice that in the end, “the righteous will shine like the sun” (verse 43).  Picture yourself shining like the sun in the kingdom of heaven.  What is your response to that image?

What can you do now, to help you shine like the sun in the kingdom of God?

Matthew 13:31-35 Mustard seeds and yeast

The mustard seed was used as a reference for a very tiny size.  The mustard seed grew to as high as 10 feet in Galilee.  Jesus is not claiming that mustard seeds literally turned into giant trees – exaggeration is a common feature in parables and other kinds of stories in Jesus’s time.  But Luke uses the word “garden” in Luke 13:19, where Matthew says field (13:31), and the mustard seed turned into a very large bush in a garden, large enough to tower over other plants in the garden.  Jesus’s goal was to contrast the size difference, from tiny seed to large bush, not to present a botany lesson.

In Matthew 13:33, where Jesus refers to “three measures” of flour, the unit of measure he uses is the sata.  Three sata is the equivalent of around 9 gallons, or 144 cups.  So he is referring to a huge amount of flour be leavened by the small lump of leavened dough that served as the “yeast” or leavening agent when Jews made leavened bread.

What is the meaning of the parable of the mustard seed?

What is the meaning of the parable of the yeast?

What do these parables tell us about the kingdom of God?

What does this tell you about God is doing in our world?

What do you think our role is in this kingdom that is growing so large?

Is there a lesson here for us when we try to start new efforts to promote the kingdom of God?  Are we, in effect, planting a mustard seed?  What does that tell us?

How is leaven or yeast, which transforms a lump of unleavened dough into something more, an apt metaphor for the kingdom of God?

Notice that leaven here is treated as a good thing, whereas in other situations it was considered as something that represented sin.  Jesus used every example available to him to make his points.

In verse 35, Matthew quotes from Psalm 78:2 to explain Jesus’s use of parables.  But in the second half of that quote, he makes an extraordinary claim about Jesus.  What is he saying Jesus does?

Matthew says that, even though Jesus is speaking in parables, he is revealing things that have been hidden since the creation of the world.  Earlier we were told that Jesus speak in parables so that people have to make an effort, open their ears, and soften their hearts if they want to understand Jesus.  Matthew is saying that those who don’t make that effort are missing out on truths that humans have not had access to since the world was created.

If Jesus’s parables contain such deep truths, how should we respond to them?

Matthew 13:44-50 A treasure, a pearl, a net

What do the parables of the treasure and the pearl tell us about the attitude we should have toward the kingdom of God?

In the parable of the net, Jesus again shifts the focus to the final judgment.  What is his point?

All of the parables are told in figurative language.  People sometimes seize on one or another element of a parable and try to take it literally.  Seed, yeast, fire, etc. are all figurative illustrations to teach deeper truths. The deeper truths are that God is building a great kingdom and patiently tolerates a lot of evildoing while it is germinating, that participation in that kingdom is the greatest treasure one could have, and that there will be a final judgment that separate those who have embraced God’s kingdom from those who have not.

The language in all of the parables is figurative.  What do you think the final judgment will be like?  What do you think the “separation” of good and evil people will look like in the final judgment?

Matthew 13:51-53 Using both the old and the new

Matthew concludes this collection of parables with a parable about using all of the revelation that God has given to us.

In this closing parable, Jesus compares a scribe to a head of a household.  What is the comparison?  What is the “storeroom” (NABRE) or “treasure” (NRSV and most other translations)?

What do the “new” and the “old” stand for?

In verse 52, Jesus refers to a “scribe.”  Some scholars think that in Matthew’s church people entrusted with the ministry of teaching may have been identified as “scribes,” so that this passage might be aimed partly at them.  In a broader sense, Matthew himself could be seen as a “scribe” who brings forth treasures from both the “new” teachings of Jesus and the “old” teachings of the Hebrew Scriptures.  We too, have access to the treasures of God’s kingdom.

In what ways are we called to bring forth “treasures” from both the “old” and “new” parts of our faith?

Take a step back and consider this:

These parables, taken together, present an interesting image of the believer: producing fruit but not prematurely forcing out those who are not doing the same; giving up everything for the kingdom but not separated from the wicked until God does the separating at the end of time.

What attitudes and virtues can help us find this balance of being all-in for Jesus but not trying to be the judge who separates out those who don’t?