The Wheat & the Weeds

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It's a good day to be alive, amen.

Hey, if you're gonna make me fight for it today, we can fight for it.

Hey, the Broncos already played, man.

We got time.

We got time, man.

We'll take it to two, three, four o'clock.

Let's go, man.

Matthew 13 is where we're gonna be today.

Listen, one of the things that happened when Jesus was preparing his disciples, he had three years.

Jesus, it's hard to believe that Jesus only had three years to equip his disciples and to basically download everything that he had for them.

And he said, I'm gonna give you the best of what I got in three years, and then the Holy Spirit will fill in the rest.

But he prepared his disciples, he prepared the crowds not only how to live faithfully into the kingdom, but what to expect of the world when he would leave.

And one of the ways he did this is he uh he used a storytelling device called parables.

And some of you guys are familiar with parables, as Jesus would speak and address people, he would rarely just say it directly.

This is what it's like, this is what to expect.

He would tell these short stories called parables uh for what Eugene Peterson calls, he would tell it slant.

He'd always come at an angle because he knew how the mind worked and how the heart works.

Sometimes we need new ways to think about kingdom realities, right?

And the reality of the world.

And so I'm gonna read this parable out of Matthew 13.

I think this is good for us for today.

And this is a little bit of a precursor for where we're gonna go in our teaching series over the next several weeks.

This is just a standalone message today, and it's a story about a field.

It's a story about wheat and weeds.

It's a story about what happens when good and evil grow side by side, true and false, and what we are to do in the middle of that tension.

Are you guys with me this morning?

So, Matthew 13, starting in verse 24, join me for this parable.

Starting in verse 24, he put another parable before them saying, The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a man who sowed good seed in his field, but while his men were sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and went away.

So when the plants came up and bore grain, the weeds appeared also, 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?

He said to them, Any enemy, and he said, An enemy has done this.

So the servant said to him, Then do you want us to go and gather them?

But he said, No.

Let both grow together until the harvest.

And at harvest time, I will tell the reapers, gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned up, but gather the wheat in my barn.

Let me just pause there just for a second.

In the middle of this parable, he then would share two other parables that had a little bit of a different angle.

He'd share a parable of a mustard seed growing small and then finally into a large tree, and then he'd share a parable of a woman who was who was leavening bread, and she'd put a little yeast in the bread and wait till the whole thing was leavened.

But his disciples still had some questions as they do and as we do, right?

And so what happened in verse 36, he would go on to explain the parable that we just read.

Verse 36, here's what it says.

Then he left the crowds and went into the house, and his disciples came to him saying, Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.

And he answered, The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.

The field is the world, and the good seed is the sons of the kingdom.

The weeds are the sons of the evil one.

And the enemy who sowed them is the devil.

The harvest is the end of things, and the reapers are angels.

Just as the weeds are gathered and burned with the fire, so will it be at the end of the age.

The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will gather out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all lawbreakers, and throw them into the fiery furnace.

In that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father.

He who has ears, let him hear.

And let's just say this together.

This is the word of the Lord.

Thanks be to God.

So as we receive this word, it's not a not a light one, is it?

Not not a light parable.

He but what he does is he, Jesus, as he always does, is he uses a parable to explain a cosmic reality.

And he says, if I'm going to explain this cosmic reality, let me just start with an everyday scenario like a field and some seeds.

Now, every great story that you've ever read or listened to or seen in a movie, it has is basically a template, all right?

And it's very predictable.

The elements of a good story are all predictable.

Every story has a set amount of characters.

There's always a hero, there's typically a victim or a villain, and there's always a guide or a sage in the story.

So you just pick any story you can think of, and you can pull some of those out.

All right.

So Lord of the Rings, any Lord of the Rings fans here?

So we know, everyone's like, how how excited should I be right now?

Um, Lord of the Rings.

So we know the hero is Frodo, he's the unlikely burden-bearing hobbit.

And the victim of the story is like this middle earth threatened by darkness.

And within the story, you've got Gandalf, the wise counselor who provides direction of vision, but like the villain of the story, everybody knows the villain of Lord of the Rings, the Sauron, the embodiment of evil, deception, and domination.

All right?

So we have those, and you need all of those characters in order for the story to work.

Okay, what about Lion King?

Any Lion King fans out there?

So Lion King is the same thing.

Let's go Disney for a second.

So the hero, Simba, the reluctant, winded, you know, you know, child king, um the the victim of this was the the the pride lands decaying under bad leadership.

Do you have a couple guides or sages in the story, right?

Rafiki and Mufasa, one who speaks to his bass, one who speaks to his destiny, but then the villain is who?

See, you guys, come on.

Scar.

Scar.

He's a deceiver.

He's a deceiver.

He's a usurper of rightful rule.

So Scar is is the one who's coming against them, right?

Um, how about let's let's just do the easiest one of all time.

This has gotta be the easiest, all right.

This is this is a slow pitch, okay?

Star Wars.

Come on, Star Wars?

Okay, thank you.

Star Wars.

The hero is come on.

Luke Skywalker.

Young Jedi searching for identity and calling.

The victim is is is the really the rebel alliance and this galaxy at large.

Everything's at stake if he doesn't win the day.

The guide or the sage in the story is in one movie it's Obi-Wan Kenobi, right?

In the next one, it's this tiny little alien dude, Yoda.

And they have the plan to call Luke into a higher purpose.

But the villain, the villains, maybe the most famous villain of all time, is Darth Vader, right?

Or the Emperor.

And they're they they they they they represent like a seduction of power and fear, right?

And they're coming against the hero.

And so all of these stories, if you think about the stories that we watch in the movies, the stories that we read about, they all have very clear characters because it's the way we think is through the lens of stories.

We we, you know, most of us we actually daydream, but 30% of our day is we're daydreaming about things, right?

So that's the challenge I have right now, is like you might be daydreaming about something else.

But when you're watching a movie, you don't daydream at all.

You're not thinking about bills that you have to pay or what you have to do this afternoon.

You when you daydream, because stories help us make sense of reality, and we use stories to make sense of our reality.

We we use stories to know what we're living for and what we're fighting for, and uh and and every story has a hero, some a victim, a guide, and a villain.

I'm not gonna talk about all of those, but here's what I'm gonna say.

When we don't know who our villain is, we will find one.

When we don't know who our villain is in our story, the story of our lives, we will find one.

So if you don't know who your villain is, you will make somebody else a villain in your life.

This is the temptation we always face.

And that might mean you make your spouse your villain.

It might mean you're making your boss your villain, it might mean TSA is your villain, right?

When you're traveling.

And it could be a lot more than that.

Sometimes our villain becomes entire people groups or nations.

It becomes much larger than that.

And the thing is, people in power actually know this about us, which is why every ideology has a villain, every political party has a villain, every media outlet has a villain.

If you want to know how to move someone to action, is give them a villain that they've the belief that they're fighting against.

All right?

Back to the parable, though.

Here's why this matters.

Jesus is telling this parable for a couple reasons.

Not only to remind them of the work of God in this world, but to remind them that there is an enemy as well that seeks to destroy the work of God in the world.

And in case anybody is confused about who the villain of Jesus wants them to know that there is an enemy in this field, and he makes it clear that this enemy is the evil one.

In this parable, he doesn't say the enemy is Caesar, he doesn't say the enemy is Pilate, he doesn't say the enemy is Herod.

In this parable, it's very clear the enemy of their souls is Satan himself.

Do you guys know that you have a villain in your story?

It's probably not who you think it is.

Your villain of your story is Satan himself.

Okay?

It's the first thing we I want, I just I just believe, like in this in this parable as we come in, the first thing that we can point out, though, is that we have an enemy.

And that might seem very, very simplistic to you, but the reason we have to be reminded of this is this.

We live in a highly secularized nation.

So the way we think is highly secularized.

And what that means is we come to believe that all of the problems that we face are rational, logistical, logical problems.

Everything can be solved with either hard sciences or soft sciences.

Everything has an explanation, and there's very basic ways that things are uh have gone wrong.

That's that's that's kind of the world that we're living in outside of this room.

So when things go wrong, and that's our worldview, that there's nothing in the supernatural, it's all just what's at face value, then we have no other choice than to look at each other and say, Oh, I get it.

You're the problem, you're the villain in our nation.

The enemy is working over time for us to not to see him, but to look at each other and say, you're the problem.

And what's happening right now is that we now have a chasm that's so wide, that's so wide that we have no choice but to turn against each other.

But in Jesus' worldview, there is a clear enemy, and it's not the person you're sitting next to, it's not the person across town.

God said, There is an enemy who did this.

God didn't sow these seeds, the enemy sowed these seeds.

And yes, there are wicked people, yes, there are wicked governments or ideologies, but behind them all is an adversary and an accuser who's working in a sophisticated way in the shadows while everybody is asleep.

And in scriptures, this this word for Satan, it's it's a it's a it's a word that actually means an accuser.

He's the father of lies, he works to spread lies about you and lies about other people, and he comes for really one reason to steal to steal, to kill, and destroy.

Can I just remind you of something today?

He hates you.

He hates your family, he hates your marriage if you're married, he hates this church, he hates your community, he hates your relationships, and he will find anything good happening in your life and seek to sow discord, distraction, confusion, and chaos into your life.

And you're thinking, I thought this was supposed to be good news here today.

But you need to know that there is an enemy that is working night and day as well.

He works in the shadows even while we're asleep.

And so we're in this theme.

We've talked all year about living for the sake of others.

We know that God lives for the sake of others, but did you know the enemy he lives for the sake of others as well?

So God lives for the sake of others' salvation, the enemy works for the sake of others' destruction.

He is also, he also has plans for the world and the world that God is building.

And what this parable shows us though, that the devil, the way that Satan works is he he doesn't do anything over there.

He seeks to go into the field of where God's already at work to so sabotage into what God is already doing.

He plants weeds in the middle of the wheat, not outside of it, not somewhere else.

He gets in the mix of what God is trying to do and he messes with it.

It's all in the same field.

And we feel this in the world, we can feel this in the church, we can feel this in your own our own lives, can't we?

Do you ever feel like God is doing something in my life, but there's also some weeds at work in the middle of it?

So, what this is what Jesus is trying to point to.

He said, Listen, you need to understand that as I send you out, you're going into a world where it's all going to be growing together.

So here's the thing the enemy wins in one of two ways in our lives.

Number one, we become completely unaware of him.

And we think that everything is another problem.

That's number one.

Number two, we become completely obsessed with him.

And look at, and and and and our mind is only about what the enemy is doing.

Here's what C.S.

Lewis wrote in his famous book, Screw Tape Letters.

He said this in the introduction.

He said, There are two equal and opposite areas into which our race can fall into about the devils.

One is to disbelieve in their existence, and the other is to believe and to feel an excessive and unhealthy interest in them.

Come on.

So one of the things that we are up against when it comes to living in a story that has a clear villain is number one, we're either not aware of him at all, and we think everything else is something else, or number two, we become so obsessed with him that we forget everything else that is going on in our lives.

And that's what I think Jesus, he goes into this next movement of this parable.

So number one, we have an enemy, but number two, we need to remind be reminded that good and evil grow together.

Are you guys with me?

So this word weeds, there's another word in some translations that's tares.

It's this word tares.

And it's actually a specific kind of weed called darnell.

And it was a serious problem in wheat fields back in the first century because that the tear seeds got mixed in with the wheat when it's uh uh when the wheat would be ground to flour and the bread would be ruined and become bitter.

There would be, and so there was a law in the first century that you couldn't sow tares in an enemy's lawn, right?

Which I just think that I just want to point out, uh that's a good law, and it's too bad they had to they had to create that law.

I have you ever wanted to sow bad seeds in an enemy's lawn?

You just think about that.

Like, it's not the first thing that comes to mind when it comes to like getting back at an enemy, right?

Like somebody gives me an HOA violation, like if I'm gonna find out where they live in the middle of the night, ha ha ha ha, get some dandelion seeds, ha ha ha ha ha, and just kind of throw it all over their lawn.

Got you, right?

Um that's not the first thing that comes to mind, but but the thing is that it made it had everything to do, the wheat fields had to do with provision, it had to do with uh uh with having a healthy harvest that was good for everybody.

So darnell was a poisonous wheat.

And here's the here's the problem.

The wheat and the tares or the weeds, the specific one darnell, it looks exactly the same.

We have a photo here.

So wheat before it's fully ripe looks a lot like these tares, this darnell, this this this this weed that as it grows up.

So as it grows, you actually cannot tell the difference between the two.

They all looked basically the same.

It was all mixed together.

There wasn't a good field over here and then a bad field over there.

It's really clear what's bad, what's good.

It was all mixed together.

You guys ever feel like that?

That in life, like all the good and the bad are mixed together.

This is exactly what Jesus is saying.

It's all kind of comes together.

But the reason why it's all mixed together is because the enemy's number one goal is to try to ruin what is good.

That's his number one goal in life.

The enemy doesn't do anything creative in your life.

He's not somewhere else trying to do something new.

He does nothing new.

He doesn't create, he can only counterfeit.

God creates and the enemy counterfeits.

So what the enemy always tries to do in our lives is he tries to sow good seed, he tries to sow bad seed where God is trying to do something new or trying to do something good.

That's why there's so much mixture in our lives.

This happens in our lives, that happens in the church, that happens certainly in the world that we live in.

Listen, I'll be the first to admit, listen, I'm a son of the kingdom of God, but I do a lot of things that are weedish.

All right?

If you know me, you'll you'll see some weeds over time.

This happened just even a few weeks ago.

I I got done preaching, and then I came home, and within an hour, after a Sunday morning, I got into this massive argument with my wife, my best friend, you know, my my wife covenant relationship.

We get in this massive argument within an hour of preaching the best message of my life.

Okay, I go home and immediately I thought I was so holy.

You guys had I had your captive attention for like half an hour, 45 minutes.

I go home, and then all of a sudden, all these weeds that I was convinced that weren't there just came to the surface, and I realized that it was a combination of both, I was tired physically.

I had some, I had some some tender spots in my heart, my some wounding that was undealt with, some hurt that just I had not dealt with.

And and all of that kind of came together and the right things were said at the right time.

The enemy came in and said, This is what she means by that, this is what's going on.

And I reinterpreted that and I exploded.

And I was, and then I did that, and I was like, ah, I was like immediately felt, first of all, I was like, Oh, I'm gonna, you know, I'm gonna deal with this once and for all, but then immediately I felt like just this sense of shame come over.

Like, man, I thought, I thought I was past this, I thought I was better than this.

I didn't think that those weeds still existed, especially not within half an hour of my sermon.

That was so good.

But they were there, right?

I have to do this sometime with my team, like even with the team around the church.

Like, there's times where I say things out of insecurity, I say things out of an unhealed place.

I say things because the enemy comes in and messes, and I want to be able to be seen.

It's like, no, there's no, this field is completely wheat.

It's all wheat.

I'm the professional Christian here, right?

I get paid to do this.

It's all wheat here.

And it's just not true.

I have to look.

No, there's weeds in the middle of the wheat.

But what the enemy wants us to do is he wants us to see the weeds and and to become so overwhelmed by them, to be so ashamed by them that we actually forget of the wheat that is still in the field.

It means that this we we we have the opportunity in this world that has mixture, we have the opportunity to get so obsessed with the weeds that we forget that God is still growing wheat.

Let me say it again to you.

The enemy wants you to get so obsessed with the weeds that you would forget that God is still growing wheat in your life, in this church, and in the world.

We can get so focused on eradicating what is wrong, we forget that what God is doing completely.

Do you guys ever feel?

That way.

And this is what the servants are going through in this story.

They're like, hey, do you want us to go sort this out?

We'll go pull all the weeds.

And the farmer, the master within this parable says this back to his servants, no, you're not going to do that.

Because if you spend all of your energy trying to pull up those weeds, you're going to pull up all the wheat with it.

We're going to do is something different.

We're going to let it grow.

And over time, I'm going to deal with that.

I'm going to deal with it myself.

We'll get to that in a second.

But don't we have this tendency to obsess more over what's wrong than to look at what is right?

I do this with my kids.

Maybe you do too.

They bring home a report card.

On the report card is an A, two Bs, a C, and an F.

What's the first one that you're talking about with your child?

The F.

Tell me about this weed on your report card.

I want an answer.

This weed doesn't belong in your report card.

No, no, no.

But but what about, hey, you are you're crushing it in this class.

That is so awesome.

Like amazing.

What's happened?

Like, why are it sound?

It looks like in this one class you're doing so well because something's connecting with you.

Let's talk about that.

No, listen, I'm not saying that the F doesn't matter.

But how much of our tendency is to say, no, we're gonna get in, we're gonna clean this thing up.

We're gonna get it all out of there.

And then in doing so, we we can completely miss over the bright spot and in our lives, the bright spot of what the enemy or what what God is doing in our life.

The enemy wants you to give up on the wheat altogether.

That's really what it's about.

And so some of you, even in your marriage, you've seen a lot of weeds pop up.

You've seen a lot of your weeds pop up.

And the enemy would want nothing more than to say, no, no, no, this is all this is just a bed of weeds.

It's not true because you made a covenant in your heart before the Lord.

There is wheat in that field.

The enemy wants you to give up on what good has been cultivated and what God's plan for your marriage is.

But God wants to remind you, no, there's still wheat in this field.

Yeah, I want to help you deal with the weeds, but don't give up on the wheat.

Don't give up on the wheat.

It's still there.

You see the weeds, do not give up on the wheat.

Some of you see your friendships, you have friendships or family members, and there's a lot of weeds.

And you're like, is this even worth it?

Is this worth pursuing this relationship?

I just feel like the word for some of you today is don't give up where there is still wheat.

The enemy wants nothing more than to separate, than to divide.

All you see is the weeds.

Don't give up on the friends that God's given you and the family God's given you.

There's still wheat to be fought for.

Somebody shout back at me.

There is still wheat to be fought for.

Same in your church.

This church is not perfect.

We got weeds.

And we ask God to deal with the weeds.

But there's still wheat here.

And it's worth fighting for.

Same in your community, same in your nation.

There's a lot of weeds.

But let me ask you, in the world right now, are there more wheat?

Are there more weeds or are there more wheat?

See, some of us, the world we live in, it's just all weeds.

That's all all we are aware of is what's wrong.

But I'm just telling you, God is not done on this planet.

He's not done in this nation.

He's not done on this earth.

Yes, it's it's a mixture of a lot of things, but he is not done.

And at the end of the day, whatever is unresolved, he will deal with himself.

Did you guys know?

Maybe you don't know this, but Gen Z, this is the first generation after 30 or 40 year decline of church attendance in America.

Gen Z is the first generation to reverse the curve.

Gen Z is the first generation to reverse the curve.

That's happening right now.

And some of you didn't know that because you're so consumed with what's wrong in our nation or the church.

No.

Gen Z is coming back to God.

And they're turned, something is turning in their hearts to God.

There's revivals happening on campuses all across the United States right now.

Do you know that?

Gen Z is turning back to God.

They're saying we've done it our way.

We want to focus God.

We want to turn back to you.

That is wheat.

God is growing wheat in this world.

I had breakfast with a pastor from India a few weeks back.

His name is MK, and I'm having breakfast.

He's asking me about our church.

I'm asking about his church.

And he just casually mentions that he got saved, you know, his whole family got saved back in 2010 because his brother was miraculously healed because a Christian came and prayed for their Hindu family in India.

Their whole family ended up coming to know the Lord because his brother got healed.

And he decided, I want to give my my life to this.

Back in 2010, he did he got training to become a pastor, but then he started training other pastors.

And he said, since 2010, we've trained uh um uh over 9,000 pastors in India, and in just the last 15 years we planted 47,000 churches.

I was like, cool, man.

We're doing a fall fest on October 24th.

You should uh you should stop by.

Um, it was one of the one of those things I'm like, what?

What is happening here?

No, no, no.

India is special to the heart of God.

And like, we don't know that.

God is at work, he's not done with her.

He's at work.

He's the enemy wants to convince you it's all gone to crap.

I'm just telling you, God is not done.

He is on the move all around the world.

The gospel has not lost its power.

It's not, it has not lost its power.

Now, Jesus is not saying that the weeds don't matter.

That's not what he's saying.

He's not saying you shouldn't fight for what's right.

He's not saying that either.

But he's saying in your zeal to do what's right, sometimes you can overlook and possibly uproot what the Father is doing right before you.

So be careful.

So be careful.

So we do work to identify the good and evil.

It's not all ambiguous.

You can see it in our world, the good and evil.

Sometimes we know what to do about it, sometimes we don't know what to do it, which is why this parable ends with this promise of listen, the harvest is at the end of the age.

At the end of the age, I will send my angels to reap the harvest, and I will separate all that is within you, all that is among you, all that is in this world.

I will I I will be the judge here.

Do you guys actually know that it's good news that God is a judge?

Do you actually that that feels like bad news?

It's good news that God's judge because evil deserves to be accounted for.

Both in our lives and the lives of the world, and we're living in an age where God is giving us time to repent and to come back to him.

He's giving us the time to return to him.

That's why it's an age of grace, because he's like, the reason I haven't dealt with this yet, because I'm giving time for the world to turn back to me.

But there is coming a time where he will judge all things.

And we do our best to sift through the wheat and the weeds at the end of the day.

God knows what needs to be judged.

We are not judged.

He is the judge, he will judge the wickedness of the world.

You would judge the wickedness of our own heart.

But in this moment, he is being patient and slow to move, which is hard for us because we want him to act fast.

Evil is all around.

But God says, I want you to grow in righteousness in the midst of what is evil.

God did not send you to Mars in order to grow in Christ's likeness.

You guys realize that?

You didn't like, you didn't, you didn't come to follow Jesus say, you know what, I'm gonna get you out of this wicked world.

Let's go to Mars.

There's nobody screwing anything up on Mars.

There's no power struggles on Mars, right?

There's no injustice happening on Mars that we know of.

There's none of that.

No, he said, I want you, I'm gonna save you, then I'm gonna have you grow up in the middle of this field that is full of both at the same time.

And you're gonna feel it in your heart, you're gonna feel it in your mind, you're gonna feel this tension for the entire life that you live.

But at the end of the day, as you as you as you hold on to what I'm doing, what I'm going to do at the end of the day is I'm going to look at everything that is mixed, everything that's unresolved, and I'm going to deal with it myself.

No, that's so frustrating.

His disciples were frustrated with him.

This the thing is, this it's hard because we don't want to wait for that to happen.

His disciples got mixed results.

You guys realize even his disciples went out and they prayed for people and things wouldn't happen.

They prayed for people and demons didn't come out.

Things weren't happening as they expected.

Sometimes it happened, sometimes it didn't happen.

John the Baptist was there, and John the Baptist is in jail.

He had to go send people to Jesus to ask them, hey, can you clarify something for me?

Are you the savior of the world?

Because I'm still in jail right now.

Right?

I thought you were the one that was supposed to heal the sick and and and bring open blind eyes and and release the captives from jail.

By the way, I'm the one of those captives, and I appreciate if you just move on to that part of your cosmic plan.

Jesus said, No, I'm not gonna do it.

I'm not gonna do it.

I'm gonna do it another time.

So you need to be patient in the meantime.

So part of what it means, part of what it means to trust God, the fact that He is gonna deal with all this, is number one, that we grow in patience and trust in Him.

But number two, instead of obsessing with the weeds out there, we start with the weeds in ourselves.

It's a time of repentance for ourselves.

We need God to sift us first, and the scriptures are very clear.

Judgment will come to the household of God first.

Judgment comes to the household of God first.

Which means that I believe it's a time of purification in the church.

It's a time of turning back to Him.

And as we do that, we foil the enemy's plans to separate and divide.

Judgment comes to the household of God first.

And maybe you're here wondering, maybe you're like newer to the faith and you're wondering, gosh, why is all this good?

Why is there almost so much evil in the world while there's good?

And and I just want to remind you, even you, if you've not yet followed Jesus yet, you have an enemy.

This is why this is happening, because you have an enemy, and the enemy is dead set on tainting and spoiling and diluting anything God is trying to do on this earth.

If you want to resist that enemy and be a part of what God's doing, it's your invitation to give your heart to God to be filled with the Holy Spirit so you can be an agent, a son and daughter of the kingdom who pushes back the work of darkness, who puts our trust in God, and in the middle of the mixture, in the middle of the field that's full of wheat and weeds, we can be, we can be those who are found faithful and turning our attention to God without changing the subject.

Part of the way, our warfare against the enemy, we're gonna talk about this a lot in the next several weeks.

Part of our warfare against the enemy is keeping our eyes set on what God is doing and not changing the subject.

Not changing the subject.

Not changing the subject.

Not changing the subject.

We want to change the subject, but God is saying, no, I'm growing wheat in the same field.

So what does all this mean for us today?

How do we live in a mixed field?

In a world, in lives where it seems like it's all growing together.

A few things this morning.

I'm gonna have Bayern come up and play some keys while we uh just reflect on a few questions here.

Number one, we practice discernment, not paranoia or judgment.

We practice discernment, not everything that is uh good.

And we're living in a time where some people will call evil things good and good things evil.

And so we live in a time where we have to practice the discernment of spirits.

We have to learn how to know what is good and evil, and starting with ourselves.

Where have we fought the wrong enemy in the wrong way?

That's a question that we need to ask.

Where have we fought the wrong enemy and in the wrong way?

We practice discernment, and that's a gift from the Lord to perceive the times that we live in.

Not everything is at face value.

So we need the wisdom of God to know how to fight the enemy of our souls, not the enemy that man devises around us.

Our battle is not against flesh and blood, but against rulers and powers and principalities of this present darkness, right?

So we need God's help to discern.

But number two, we practice discernment, but number two, we celebrate the wheat.

We don't get consumed by the weeds.

How do we partner with what God is growing right now?

There's there's places that God is in work in your life right now that deserve shouts of thanksgiving, shouts of gratitude.

There's there's things that God is doing that the enemy would want nothing more than for you to be blinded to what God is doing in your life, what God is doing in our nation, and what God is doing in this world.

Can we become the kind of people who can celebrate the wheat in the middle of the weeds?

Yes or no?

We must be the best at celebrating the wheat.

But number three, we trust the harvester.

We trust the harvester.

God will judge what we cannot.

Some of us are very tired because you're fighting, you're fighting for what's right, and I get it.

But for some of us, it's it's grown into impatience, it's grown into frustration, it's grown into anger.

And we have to ask ourselves: are we trusting the harvester that God, the judge, will make right of what is wrong?

We practice discernment, we celebrate the wheat, we trust the harvester.

And in doing these things, we're participating with this present age of the inbreaking of the kingdom of God.

See, next week we're gonna start a new exploration and we're gonna double-click on some of these themes.

We're starting a series called Unseen Realm, and for the next several weeks, we're gonna expose this enemy that we're dealing with that is dead set against you, and we're gonna talk about the weapons of our warfare.

We're gonna talk about what he fights us with and how we fight against him.

And we're going to explore what it means to become the kind of people that live into the unseen story that's in the scriptures, that's in our world that we're not often tuned into, but God is calling us to be aware of in this world.

It's gonna be awesome.

You want to be here next week when we kick that off, okay?

The unseen realm.

There is a whole world that you don't understand that is existing all the way around us, but when you have eyes to see it, then you can enter into the right kind of storyline to understand that God has a plan and a purpose, and at the end of the day, he is a king of kings and he's good and he will win the day, and we can be a part of his team when we wake up to his kingdom.

Yeah?

But today, listen, here's the word for today.

Here's the word for today.

In a world full of weeds, I think Jesus wants to remind us that he is with us, he is growing good things.

Not everything is ours to sort out, but in the meantime, we get to be a people of discernment, patience, and hope.

We get to clue in, say, God, give me your mind to know how to live faithfully in this moment and give me a new trust in you that you are the judge over all.

You will make all things new.

So just put your hand on your heart this morning.

We're gonna pray.

Jesus, today we thank you that you've called us into your kingdom.

And in this particular word, God, I thank you that you are at work in our world and in our lives, and where the enemy'd want to separate, divide, and sow weeds, we thank you today that you want to remind us of where you are at work so we can be a part of what you're doing.

Make us discerning people, perceptive people, God.

If there's places that we are about to throw in the tower or give up on what you're doing, I thank you for a turnaround even right now that you'd give us faith to see, faith to fight, faith to believe, faith to hope, faith to stay in the game, because you're not done yet.

And while it's messy, we just announce that you're not done yet in this church, in our lives, in our nation, God.

And I just pray that you would give your church, each of us here, strength to trust in you, to hope in you.

Until one day, Lord God, you will make sense of the whole thing and you will order all things according to your purposes, Lord God.

Would you start with us here this morning?

Start in our own hearts.

Start in our own hearts, God.

We thank you, Jesus, for your work here today.

And it's in your name we pray.

Amen.

Amen.

Let's stand together.

Let's stand together.

Come on, you can feel free to clap.

I heard that over there.

Clap for it's not for me, it's for God's word to us this morning.

And listen, we're gonna have our ministry team come forward today.

And some of you, you're feeling some weeds in your life, and you're like, I just need help seeing what God is doing.

Maybe you've been blind to what God is doing, and you need eyes to see.

I'm gonna have our ministry team come forward.

And maybe you're not on the ministry team this morning, but you don't see anybody else up, so you can be the ministry team this morning.

Um, you can come forward.

Uh I'm guessing Bob has a word here today, so I'm just gonna let him share that and then we'll get moving.

Thank you.

Sit down for a minute.

Carly, don't leave, please.

I need you down here.

So um, sit down for just a moment.

Luke doesn't know that we're gonna do this.

But uh, where's Megan?

Megan, can you come up here, please?

Carly, where's Josh?

Is Josh in here somewhere?

All right, come on up here.

And uh Graham Piper, could you come up here too, please?

Come on up here.

Come on up here on the platform.

So, for everybody's information, um we're sending a team of leaders to New York City this week.

Uh and they're on a journey, and uh we're gonna take a minute to bless them in this journey and to give them a word from the Lord.

And so you get to peek into this moment, okay?

So, for you guys, I know that um Jeanette and Travis will be going too, and they're not here today.

There's Josh.

Good to see you.

You know, in my company, and the companies I've worked with, this would not be allowed.

You're all gonna travel on the same plane.

You're our leaders, and you're gonna travel on the same plane.

Now, this isn't a critique of your travel arrangements, the point is you are so valuable.

You may not have an idea of how important you are.

And we know you're in God's hand, so you're not gonna crash and burn.

But you are that valuable to us because you hold in your hands the hearts of the people behind me, and those that aren't even here today that would be here.

You hold all of that, and we trust you and we treasure you.

So the Lord says this.

He says, You're gonna go to New York City.

This is not a Kronos journey, this is a Kairos journey.

And I want to read you something from Philippians.

It's in the first chapter, and it's in the 27th verse.

And it's a word to you, and it says, Whatever happens, keep living your lives based on the reality of the gospel of Christ.

Then when I come to see you or hear good reports of you, I'll know that you stand united in one spirit and one passion, celebrating together as conquerors in the faith of the gospel.

And then you will never be shaken or intimidated by the opposition that rises up against.

All of us.

Your courage will prove to be a sure sign from God of their coming destruction.

Now, in the King James, it doesn't say a sure sign from God.

What it says is an evident token.

That's the language.

It is an evident token.

And I'm here today to tell you that when you go to New York City on your Kairos journey, you will receive an evident token.

And that evident token, why it might be in a little back street in Queens, or it might be in Staten Island or on Broadway or Wall Street, there's a lot of places it could be.

But listen, you do not have to seek it, it will find you.

You will have that evident token even if you don't know it in the moment.

And so carry that with you and joy.

Know how you're valued, true?

That's right.

And I want to pray with you as Paul prayed.

Because I know you.

Because I know that you have been called by the Lord to endure the conflict in the same way Paul did.

I know you've suffered.

I know you've suffered from him.

So Paul says this.

He says, I pray for your unity.

I pray for your peace that does pass all understanding.

I pray for your anointing and the power that's been released to you and entrusted to you.

I pray that as you travel, you will find rest, you will find peace, you will find revelation, you will find strength.

And when you return, you will return to us safely.

Equipped, re-energized, with a greater vision and more power and more authority and more love and more care.

And I bless you with all that in the name of Jesus.

Amen?

Amen.

Is this so?

Do we agree?

Okay.

Thank you.

Awesome.

That was great.

Thank you guys.

Um, let's stand together.

Let's stand across the room.

And hey, listen, as we end today, this is what kind of what we're doing.

We're gonna have, I'll be up front, we'll have some other leaders up front that would be willing to pray with you.

Some of you, I think that is a word for you, though.

Maybe you're so consumed with the weeds that you have been blinded to what God's doing.

We want to pray for you because we want to be a people that pay attention to what God's doing in our life, all right?

So we want to we want to pray up front.

If you need prayer for anything else, you can come up as well.

As we leave, though, um, if you're a guest with us, we want to meet you in the back.

We want all of you to stop by the fall fest table, sign up for all the needs that we have for fall fest, get some invitations, go invite some friends.

It's gonna be an awesome time.

And I'm gonna pray for us as we go.

So may the Lord bless you and keep you, may He make his face to shine upon you.

May He be gracious to you and give you rest.

All right, go in the strength of the kingdom of God.

Love you guys.