The Growing Conflict: Tares amongst the Wheat

There is a waging war taking place all around us. This growing conflict is spiritual in nature and takes place on a battlefield that is invisible and unimaginably extensive. It is ever-increasing in its intensity. Its casualties are the souls of all men and women, without exception. It is a war in which we all must partake - there is no escaping or dodging recruitment. And it finds its origins in an ancient garden thousands of years ago between the rivers, where the Sovereign King declared to the fallen prince and princess and to the sinister serpent that led them to sin against their benevolent Creator that there would be enmity placed between the woman's offspring and the serpent's offspring - between those citizens who are recast in the image of righteousness and peace and the seditious army of rebels set on perverting all that the King had created and continues to govern. This declaration would promise a growing hostility between the two groups of offspring that would set the course of history. It would be filled with not only rancor, hate, and blood shed on the corporeal plane, but it would reveal the eternal outcomes of all involved.

Jesus speaks of this mysterious conflict in Matthew 13 as he discusses the nature of his advancing kingdom. First, he compares the wheat that a man grows in a field to the injurious tares that an enemy subversively plants amongst his crop. The weed in its earliest stages of growth looks very similar to the wheat, resembling many of its qualities. The conflict of interest between the two plants, however, begins to come to fruition as the weed's growth is quite malevolent and antipathetic towards the wheat's own survival. And yet, the reality sinks in: the two will continue to grow alongside one another until the end, because an attempt at ridding the field of the malicious weeds would inevitably cause damage to the surrounding wheat. The wheat is said to be the sons of the kingdom, while the weeds signify the sons of the evil one. Again, Jesus points us to another parable - this time a mustard seed and a measure of leaven in bread. Both the mustard seed and the leaven are small and of little consequence in the beginning, but as time continues, the mustard seed grows into a grand tree with extensive branches while the leaven continues to grow as it is cooked, eventually pervading throughout the whole lump of bread.

The war is real and violent and carries with it cataclysmic implications for all who are involved. The seditious offspring of the serpent will continue to grow in number, influence, hatred, and severity of tactics to try to ensure their ultimate victory. But we can be assured as those citizens of the King, recast in his Son's image, that his kingdom is present now in the world, that it will continue to grow and quietly pervade like the growing mustard seed and the leavened bread despite all the evil powers that come to battle against it. In fact, all the powers of Hell cannot stand against this ever-expanding kingdom.

SDG