Lesson 6 · November 9, 1901
Tares
Lesson Scriptures.—.
Aid.—.
- 1.What did our Lord again speak?
- 2.What was this parable given to illustrate?
- 3.To what did He compare the kingdom of heaven?
- 4.What did the enemy do? When?
- 5.When did the tares appear?
- 6.Apart from the fruit, then, were the tares readily distinguished?
- 7.What is the great test as to true or false teachers? .
- 8.Who told the house-holder about the tares?
- 9.What question did they ask?
- 10.What was the reply?
- 11.What was the servants' second question?
- 12.What answer was given?
- 13.What reason was given for this answer?
- 14.How long must both grow together?
- 15.At that time, what will be said to the reapers?
- 16.What is done with the tares?
- 17.What is done with the wheat?
- 18.Who especially inquired about the parable?
- 19.Where was Jesus when this inquiry came?
- 20.Where were the multitude?
- 21.Who sowed the good seed? What is the field? The good seed are who? Who are the tares? Who sowed them? What is the harvest? Who are the reapers?
- 22.Of what is the gathering and burning of the tares a simile? Out of what are these offenders gathered? By whom is this done? Where are they cast?
- 23.What shows the literal character of the fire and the suffering?
- 24.At that time who will shine forth? Where?
Notes
The tares represent a class who are the fruit or embodiment of error, of false principles. "The enemy that sowed them is the devil." Neither God nor His angels ever sowed a seed that would produce a tare. The tares are always sown by Satan, the enemy of God and man.
It is from enmity to Christ that Satan scatters his evil seed among the good grain of the kingdom. The fruit of the sowing he attributes to the Son of God. By bringing into the church those who bear Christ's name while they deny His character, the wicked one causes that God shall be dishonored, the work of salvation misrepresented, and souls imperiled.
Christ has plainly taught that those who persist in open sin must be separated from the church; but He has not committed to us the work of judging character and motive.
The Redeemer does not want to lose one soul; His experience with Judas is recorded to show His long patience with perverse human nature; and He bids us bear with it as He has borne.
The Saviour does not point forward to a time when all the tares become wheat. The wheat and tares grow together until the harvest, the end of the world. Then the tares are bound in bundles to be burned, and the wheat is gathered into the garner of God.
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