Dear Christian friends:

We all like to be in style and fashionable. We want to be and do and live like other people around us. My daughters keep bothering us to buy them Kiks although they have good shoes and overshoes. Why do they want Kiks? Because all the other girls in school are wearing Kiks. That's the style in fashion.

People don't want to stand alone and be different. But we Christians must learn to stand alone and be different, and not follow or copy the proud, sinful world in all its vain and wicked ways.

If we could join a church and all the other people in town joined with us and lived like Jesus teaches then we would be eager to join the church. Sometimes joining a certain church is fashionable. All the leaders of the city belong to that church. But usually those churches do not really believe in Jesus and follow Him.

In the Bible Jesus explains that most rich people and important people do not believe in Him. That the true believers are a small group compared with unbelievers.

In our text Jesus impresses this on our hearts and minds with the parable about the wheat and the tares. With this parable Jesus teaches us Christians:


First of all, we should see from this parable that unbelievers and believers are all mixed together here on earth as weed grass and wheat are mixed together in a large field. We should not expect to find all of our neighbors and friends and business friends agreeing with us in our faith.

If many other deaf do not agree with us or mock us about our faith, that should not surprise us about our faith. Out in the field you always find weeds and wheat mixed together. Jesus says the Kingdom of heaven is like a man who planted good seed. But when the good seed grew up then also the tares (bad seed) which the enemy planted grew up too.

So don't let the "tares" bother you or scare you. Expect that to happen, and continue growing and multiplying "wheat" like a good "plant" of God.

We should not let the unbelievers trouble us or scare us and at the same time we should not give trouble to them or hurt them because they do not believe in Jesus. Also we should not try to force them or punish them in any way, but live in peace with them as much as we can.

Jesus shows this in our text. When the servants saw the tares growing with the wheat they asked the Lord if they should go and pull up the tares. The Lord said, "No, lest while you gather up the tares you also uproot the wheat with them. (verse 29)

In the past often the church used the sword and power of the government and laws trying to force people to believe in God and then the church would join with the government to judge and punish the unbelievers.

The holy wars of history; the Inquisition in Spain, The Crusades; the first governments in America, the Puritans in New England are samples of this.

Using force and punishment destroys true faith. Both believers and unbelievers get hurt that way just as if you try to pull weeds out of a grain field. You will uproot also the good wheat.

God has not given the sword to the Church or the power to judge and punish unbelievers. That power God has kept back for Himself. Jesus will judge all on the last day.

God has given His church one weapon, the Sword of the Spirit, the Word of God. We should preach and teach the Gospel of God's love and mercy. How He gave His only Son to live and die for all people. We should visit and urge and plead with unbelievers to be sorry and confess and believe in Jesus. We should warn them with God's Word about their death and how they on the Last Day must stand before the Judge-Jesus.

That's all Jesus asks us to do: Testify, witness, preach, teach and baptize. And He asks us to do this in love and kindness, not in pride and revenge. Then if people change and believe fine, we thank and praise God's Holy Spirit. But if they continue and do not believe, we are satisfied.

Whether people around us believe or not we should go ahead and do right and good, give much wheat like a stalk of grass multiplies much, so we should grow and multiply good works for God's honor and glory. A wheat stalk continues growing and multiplying wheat no matter if many weeds grow near by.

So we should continue our faith and do good and right for God no matter if others around us do or do not. One time a lady stopped going to church. The minister asked, why? She said, "My husband won't go to church with me." Her husband was an unbeliever. But she should go to church and continue her faith and do Christian works no matter if her husband refuses.

Sometimes the deaf church members are afraid to go ahead in faith and good works, because they are a small group. They say, "We are too small we can't do anything. Too many deaf never come to church." That is the wrong thinking. Remember Jesus' words here. Tares grow mixed with wheat. Jesus says in another place we are in the world but not joined with it.

Don't let the many unbelievers in the world trouble you. Don't you give trouble to them. But continue like good wheat, grow strong in faith and multiply good kind works for Jesus. At last on judgement day we shall all be free from tares and those that mock and try to trouble us.

Amen.