Understanding the Kingdom of God (Pt 11) : The Wheat and the Weeds: Growing Together in God's Kingdom

The Kingdom of God, part 11. And I'm calling it the Wheat and the Weeds. The Wheat and the Weeds.

And my first point is called Growing Together in the Kingdom. Growing Together in the Kingdom. Jude.

Little obscure book with so much meaning in it. Verse 22 says this, and I want you to the heart of God in this.

And you must show mercy to those whose faith is wavering.

Rescue others by snatching them from the flames of judgment. Show mercy to still others, but do so with great caution,

hating the sins that contaminate their lives. Now all glory to God who is able to keep you from falling away

and will bring you with great joy into his glorious presence without a single fault.

All glory to him who alone is God our Savior. Through Jesus Christ our Lord, all glory, majesty, power and authority

are his before all time and in the present and beyond all time. Amen.

It's called the Doxology, and we're learning straight away on God's heart towards people who are wavering in their faith

and and those who are strong in their faith, reminding them that it's God who holds us.

The message Bible puts it like this. Go easy on those who are hesitant in the faith.

Go after those who take the wrong way. Be tender with sinners, but not soft on sin.

The sin itself stings. To high heaven

and now to him who can keep you on your feet, standing tall in his bright presence, fresh and celebrating

to our one God, our only Savior, through Jesus Christ our Master. Be glory, majesty, strength and rule

before all time. And now until the end of time. Yes.

See, God is reminding us that there are those who are fragile in the faith who don't have a revelation of God.

Either they're not saved yet or they're barely saved.

If you hear what I'm saying, they're not sure where they stand. You got to be tender with them.

Remember, it is the goodness of God that leads to repentance, not the hammer of God that leads to repentance.

And when a person is fragile in their faith and they're in a tender place, there's a way you treat them.

Then on the other end of the spectrum are those who stand strong in the faith and they love the Lord and He wants to stop you from being full of pride.

And the way it does, it says, I want you to remember him who's keeping you standing tall.

It's his presence. It's his grace and his mercy. It's not something you've done.

You haven't achieved your way to the throne of God. God has drawn you he's brought you

and now he wants to Jesus wants to address the phenomenon of those people who look, talk and act the same,

but they're actually not the same. And he wants to speak to us about it.

So what he does is he gives us a parable the wheat and the weeds. And we're going to discover that the farmer discovers a problem.

So if you have a Bible you want to turn, I'm reading from the New Living translation, Matthew chapter 13.

Matthew 13 · chapter mention

While you're finding your way, just want to remind you or let you know that within two weeks the coffee shop will be fully operational.

The Bible school, the ETS is going to get started this week as well. And kids church will be almost done the next two weeks.

We're going to work hard and we're almost ready. Matthew 13:24 here's another story Jesus told

Matthew 13:24

the kingdom of heaven is like a farmer who planted good seed in his field. But that night as the workers slept,

his enemy came and planted weeds among the wheat, then slipped away.

When the crop began to grow and produce grain, the weeds also grew. The farmer's workers went to him and said,

sir, the field where you planted the good seed is full of weeds. Where did they come from? An enemy has done this.

The farmer exclaimed. Shall we pull the weeds out? They asked. Let's stop right there.

Someone once gave this quote. The person who said that a job well done never needs repeating has obviously never weeded a garden.

You would agree with me. Every season the weeds come again. You don't know where from, you don't know how they got there.

In fact, I have become an expert in almost nothing.

But what I have done is I've watched in our garden where weeds come from in it's the seeds that we give the birds

and then the birds do their little poop, you know, that little and then whatever they letting down the enemy, the birds,

whatever they dropping on our lawn comes up that doesn't look like grass. That's just from my experience

and we all have ideas what happens when you pull weeds out of a garden. But a wheat field is not like an average garden

and the hearers of this parable knew what Jesus was talking about in in fact, you can't tell where the weed stops and where the weeds begin.

They look very similar when they start growing together in the field. In fact, the weeds are called darnel or falseweed.

They resemble in their early stage, especially in the leaves, each other.

If you look at those pictures, if you had a quick glance, you wouldn't Almost know which one of those was which.

The differences only become more apparent at harvest time when the grain heads can be seen.

And if you pull the weeds out during growing season, you'll destroy the wheat.

And isn't it interesting that the Bible says in Revelation 22:2 that the leaves of the tree of life are for the healing of the nations?

Revelation 22:2

And in the early stages of development of a church of anywhere, when you see all sorts of people starting to grow together

and mingle and hang around together, they all look full of potential. They. They all look equally good, isn't it?

I mean, I shook about 100 hands this morning. And most of you showered,

most of you brushed your teeth and your hair, and you're looking good this morning. Most of you look rather attractive.

The leaves are great, I see, full of potential. But the grain heads, which is at harvest time speaks of maturity, fruitfulness.

The grain heads becomes the measure of the sons of daughters of the kingdom. Not knowledge, not experience,

not how bright your little light shines, not whether you know that verse in the Bible and that one and where to find it.

God says, wait for fruitfulness, wait for harvest time. Because at harvest time in a field is when you can see

that the grain that has heads on it, it is fruit. Fruitful fruitfulness is the mark of a son or a daughter in the kingdom of God,

not appearance, fruitfulness. So the farmer says in verse 29. No, he replied.

And I said, can we uproot the weeds in the early stages? No, you'll uproot the wheat if you do, let both grow together till harvest.

Then I will tell the harvesters to sort out the weeds, tie them in bundles and burn them, and put the wheat in the barn at harvest time.

No one's going to be concerned about destroying the wheat by mistake because it will have matured. It will be obvious to the farmer which is which.

And the farmer gets to decide when harvest time is. The farmer gets to decide when the harvesters are going to start harvesting.

And the clock is ticking. And what Jesus is saying is in nowhere in this process with weeds and wheat in the same field,

nowhere in this process is the farmer out of control. Even when the workers can say, what's going on here, what's happening?

He's firmly in control. It's a little bit of the lesson Job learned before God.

I've just started my Bible reading plan again, and being the overachiever I am, I've finished already. So I've started my new one.

And I've just finished the book of Job, where they all rail against God. And then God reveals himself in his glory and his power.

And he says, if you can't even catch the Leviathan, what are you going to do with me? And Job repents.

And him and his friends are going to say, God, we had a false view of you. We want to see you as you are.

In this parable, the wheat, the weeds, and the harvesters are all going to have a look at the farmer.

They are going to understand how awesome and amazing the farmer is. And the farmer wants them to grow together.

And now I want to look at my next point, which is this. The seeds for the world. The seeds for the world.

Remember, the farmer plants the seeds. Now, the disciples are a bit confused about this story.

So they go to Jesus later in the day and say, please, can you explain to us what's going on? Yeah. Matthew 13:36.

Matthew 13:36

Leaving the crowds outside, Jesus went into the house. His disciples said, please explain to us the story of the weeds in the field.

Jesus replied, the Son of man is the farmer who plants the good seed. The Son of man.

Jesus is the farmer who plants the good seed. And the farmer is also the word. John 1:14.

John 1:14

The seeds are sown by the Son of man in the same way that in the parable you get normal seeds that are growing and become wheat.

There are sons and daughters of the kingdom that, that Jesus plants with the intention of making them mature.

And the sowing comes when they hear the word of God. Remember the parable of the sower with the four kinds of seed.

So Jesus said, I plant the seed into different kinds of soil. When a seed, when a soil responds to the seed

and that person is born again, they become a son or a daughter of the kingdom. And the moment you become a son or a daughter of the kingdom,

God pulls up the chair in your life. He brings you close and he starts to look at you. And he starts to look at your life and says,

now I want to show you, I'm the farmer, you the seed. It's not the other way around. I decide what happens.

And I brought you to this place and I've talented you and gifted you and put all sorts of things inside you,

because it is my absolute intention to. To take you as a seed and to plant you into this world.

And when I plant you in this world, it is my full expectation that you are going to mature and become fruit bearing.

Matthew 13:43 says, the righteous will shine like the sun in their Father's kingdom.

Matthew 13:43

God wants to plant you into this world. So that your light will shine. Are you okay with that? Then Jesus continues.

Verse 38. The field is the world, and the good seed represents the people of the kingdom.

The weeds are the people who belong to the Evil One. That's hectic. The enemy who planted the weeds among the wheat is the devil.

The harvest is the end of the world, and the harvesters are angels. The field is the world.

It's the world of family, the world of business, this world around us, even the world of church. It's the world of humanity.

And the enemy places people in the world who look like us, talk like us, they act like the people of the light,

but they are not obedient to God and they are not submitted to his authority. But they live in the world with us,

they work with us, they vote with us, they put petrol in with us, they play sport with us, they live next door to us.

And some have been planted by God and some have been planted by the enemy. And there's a coexistence in this world.

But you have a God above who wants to redeem this world using the seeds that he has planted into the world which he calls wheat.

It's a pretty straightforward story so far. Hey. They're the ones who have received the word of God and they're maturing.

And at the same time are those who 1 John 5:19 says, are those in the world that are still under the control of the evil One.

1 John 5:19

And we know who is wheat versus weeds because as James says in chapter one, verse 21,

he says the word God has planted in your hearts, which has the power to save your soul. Now, how did you become a Christian?

You see, spiritual life through the word of God came into you. And when you got born again,

the power and the authority of the Word of God, by the Spirit of God got in you and started to organize your life in new ways.

From marriage to relationships, to attitude, to finance, to friendship, everything starts to change.

God starts to rearrange your value system to fit the kingdom of the world. And out of this comes a fruitfulness.

We look different, we act different, we talk different. This is our life as a son or a daughter of the kingdom.

What a travesty when you can work with someone your whole life and they didn't know you were a Christian.

Because this parable tells us there's going to be a whole lot who all look the same, talk the same, act the same, but they're not the same.

And when they mature, that's when things will become different. And that's why? The Bible says, put off the old person and put on the new.

Submit yourself to Jesus because something is going to happen and you'll notice that the difference between the wheat and the weeds

is that the wheat have put on Christ. They have come to know Jesus. Here's a beautiful verse for you.

Romans 13:14. Clothe yourself with the presence of the Lord Jesus Christ,

Romans 13:14

and don't let yourself think about ways to indulge your evil desires. Have you ever thought about the implications of that phrase

when you've read it? Clothe yourself with the presence of the Lord Jesus. There is beauty, there is wonder in the presence of the Lord.

It's incomparable. Can I tell you, the presence of the Lord is something we need to become more familiar with together.

That's why for me in worship this morning, we just paused a moment in the presence of our God,

because when you learn in a together corporate place how to access the Lord, it becomes so much easier to go home

and have your own devotions where you wait upon him and you learn to access Him. Your glory is the fact that you've clothed yourself with Christ.

The breath, the presence of the Lord literally sustains us in this life. The mark of a Christian is someone who has been planted

as a wheat seed into the world. Ephesians 4:24 says, Put on your new nature, created to be like God, truly righteous and holy.

Ephesians 4:24

Jesus is trying to explain that in the same way that that seed, that wheat seed was planted,

it has incredible power and potential wrapped up in its DNA, isn't it? A little seed is planted in the ground

and it becomes wheat or it becomes a weed, depending on the DNA that's put within that seed.

And what we're being told here by Paul in Ephesians is that when you became a Christian literal new DNA was put inside you.

You were created to be like Christ. You don't just believe something different to people in the world.

A whole new nature has been put inside you at salvation. And the intention of God is that you will renew this world.

You'll redeem it through the fruit you bear. God wants you and I to be fruit bearers.

Did you notice that last announcement we gave was for rooted? Because in the last three weeks we've had over 83 people

respond to the gospel in the last three weeks. What now? Yes, we give you rooted material.

Yes, we contact you, we phone you, we send you messages. We do what we can. But I want to remind you

that there was no ministry of helps, there was no serving team in Acts when just like that,

God exploded the church with thousands that got saved in a day. And in Acts, chapter two, this is what the Bible says,

they devoted themselves to the gathering of the saints, to the breaking of bread, to prayer, to the ministry of the word.

They devoted themselves. When you came here to the front and you gave your life to Jesus,

a new seed was put inside you, a new nature was put inside you. And you devote yourself,

even if like a newborn baby, all you know how to do is waa, waa. That's enough to get God's attention and to get ours.

And that's why we're having rooted. And we're going to suggest if you're young in your faith, you're not established in your faith.

Get there, devote yourself. Lord, I need to grow in Christ. If church attendance was enough to grow you in Christ,

then every old sour person in church would be more like Jesus. But you know as well as I do,

there's some people been in church for, for a few weeks or months or years and you dare sit in their spot

and they arrive at church and you're in their chair. Do you see how the glory of Jesus comes out is not enough to make you into a Christian.

Mark my words, the devil attends some churches and he's not becoming more like Jesus.

It's when you devote yourself to put on Christ, put on your new nature, he says. And then Jesus says,

let me tell you how all this is going to end. Matthew 13:40. Just as the weeds are sorted out and burned in the fire,

Matthew 13:40

so it will be at the end of the world. The Son of Man will send his angels and they will remove from his kingdom

everything that causes sin and all to do evil. And the angels will throw them in the fiery furnace

where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous, I read that now, then the righteous

will shine like the sun in their Father's kingdom. Anyone with ears should listen and understand Jesus is saying.

The words I speak to you germinate inside you. They bring you into a spiritual life.

The born again person becomes a good seed planted in the world. And the moment you plant it in the world as a Christian,

you start to take the disorganization of the world around you and, and you bring it into the organized life of the kingdom.

By the way you live, your values, the choices you make, what you believe, what you say, how you speak, how you interact,

you start to shape your world around the kingdom of God. That's why we plant it into the world.

The downside of course, is that the inclusivity of the kingdom means we're going to have people in the exact same field,

the world, who are weeds and who still need to receive the word of God. Which leads me to this question,

Lord, why do you put them together? Maybe the Lord allows the wheat and the weeds to grow together

to provide time and opportunity for weeds to become wheat as they hear the word of the Lord.

Which leads to point 3. Why does God allow weeds? He says, there the field is the world and we're all invited.

Remember the parable of the great banquets? We're all invited, every single person. God excludes no one.

Every human being is invited into the kingdom of God. And God is not willing that any should perish,

but that all should come to eternal life. When you read verses with me this morning that says that the weeds are burned

and put aside and the wheat go into heaven, surely something in your heart that start to get a compassion

for people who don't know Jesus. Surely something of what you and I start to carry in this church is what now?

I have friends, neighbors, family members who don't know Jesus. And Jesus just told me what happens to them at the end.

I can't be like King Hezekiah who said, I will praise God. For me it's going to go well for the next 15 years.

All the trouble comes to those after me. You can't be so selfish. I believe God and I'll get on to my next point.

God gives us a net that that's so broad as this so that we can bring hundreds and thousands into the net.

The point is that together we understand there are consequences that are coming to the world. Everyone has been invited.

There are those who are in the kingdom and they live like it. And there are those who are in the kingdom space,

but there's no life in them. And there's two little propositions in and of, in and of that you and I need to pay attention to.

God plants us into the world, but we're not of the world. It's an in and of Christians can live properly in this world

with a Christ like character. And right next to us are people who are living in God's kingdom space,

who are offensive, lawless. They're not interested in the things we're interested in and God has put us right with them.

I know some of you are saying like, lord, please come again, My taxes are due. Let the trumpet sound the call to glory.

Can I tell you, God is a father and as a father he carries a deep Concern for children who are lost.

When God says, it is my heart that none should perish, but all that should come to eternal life.

He showed his love by putting his son on a cross, reminding you and I that God is going after every lost person

every single day, putting opportunities in their way. And he puts part of his opportunities for them is you.

He puts you there so that you can meet them, you can connect with them. And your wheat is supposed to shine

in the midst of these weeds. And then we find out. My fourth point. There's a net.

Now, these people Jesus was speaking to were fishermen, farmers, business people. They kind of get what he was saying.

And he goes like this. He realizes some of them aren't getting it, so he says this. Verse 47.

Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a fishing net that was thrown in the water and caught a fish of every kind.

When the net was full, they dragged it up on the shore, sat down and sorted the good fish into crates,

but threw the bad ones away. The people following Jesus had seen this for years. They knew exactly what he was talking about.

When you throw a net out, you don't sort the fish in the net. You catch everything. You don't discern straight away.

You bring them out of the water, you bring them out of their natural environment. Then you start to sort what's what.

I wonder, have you ever been to places where you've seen these guys catching fish in nets and you catch them

and it's too small, so you throw it back. Some fish get caught 10 times. 15, I've seen this game before.

15, 20, 30, 40, 50 times that eventually that fish gets caught. And the lesson we've been told is

give opportunities to everybody and keep giving opportunities. Just because someone says no to Jesus now

doesn't mean they'll say no next month or next year. You don't know what's happening in people's lives.

Some of you in this room, did you say yes the first time? Or like me, did you have to be badgered

before eventually God did something inside of you? The parables are teaching us there's a divide.

There are people in the kingdom who look like the kingdom, and there are people who look like they're in the kingdom and they're not.

But there are also people in the kingdom who don't look like they're in the kingdom. They are born again. They love Jesus.

They just refuse to grow. They just refuse to be fruitful. They don't see their mission through to be involved into the world,

to bring light all they see is, I'm saved. I'm going to heaven. God looks after me, and that's that.

And now Jesus is trying to get their attention too. And he's trying to say, come on. The reason I put you,

the reason I've planted you, is that you would become fruitful. Pay the price of fruitfulness.

By the way, how do you know you're a Christian? While I was baptized as a baby, I've got the photo.

For all I know, all that happened was you had a bath without soap. And more often it was a father dressed like a mother

who sang something in Latin over you. Jesus said, my sheep hear my voice. And when you plant a wheat or a weed

and you plant them in the ground, do you know that in harvest time, the wheat looks like wheat and the wheat looks like a weed?

And the one is fruitful and has a head of grain and the other one doesn't. It's that simple. You actually can't help.

How do you know you're a Christian? The spirit of God inside you confirms with your spirit. I'm a child of God.

I hear God. I know his voice. He speaks to me through his word. I am convinced I'm saved

and my life is being changed by the Holy Spirit. I'm becoming more like Jesus. It's actually that simple.

It's really not God. The problem is when the wheat and the weeds carry on looking the same and carry on acting the same

all the time, it gets confusing for the weeds because the weeds think it's okay to be weeds when the wheat is acting like weeds.

And that's why he says, I want you to be and live so different. I think John was talking about Those people

in 1 John 2, verse 19. These people left our churches, but they never really belonged with us.

1 John 2:19

Otherwise they would have stayed with us. When they left, they proved they didn't belong with us.

Now, you can't use that scripture to throw at people who leave your church for whatever reason. Sorry.

I got a job offering. Cape Town. Well, you were never of us. It's people who look and act apart

until Jesus and the world place a demand on your life at the same time. And when Jesus and the world

places a demand on your life at the same time, where do you go? What choice do you make?

It's easy when it's a worldly decision or a God decision. But when they both come at the same time, it's tough.

This text is talking about those who fell in love with the world. And you know what? They deny Jesus by their choices,

wheat and weeds. They don't want fruitfulness, they don't want to change. They quite happy to be weeds.

1 John 2:15 do not love the world or the things it offers you. For when you love the world,

1 John 2:15

you don't have the love of the Father in you. Because the Father and the world love different things.

For the world offers only a craving after physical pleasure, a craving for everything we see

and pride in our achievements and possessions. These are not from the Father, these are from the world.

You want to know weed thinking? There it is. And this world is fading away along with everything that people crave.

But everyone who does what pleases God will live forever. Suddenly your desire as you wake up this morning,

Lord, how do I please you? How do I honor you, Lord, in the way I live my life? How do I do it, Lord?

Dear children, the last hour is here. You have heard the Antichrist is coming. Already many Antichrists have appeared.

From this we know the last hour has come. Antichrists are obviously anyone who denies Jesus. The next verse explains,

these people left our churches. They never belonged to us, otherwise they would have stayed with us when they left.

It proved they didn't belong with us. It's possible to be in the kingdom space, but you're still a weed.

And then Jesus does this. He makes this distinction about being of the world or of the kingdom of God.

In John, chapter 17, verse 14 in his high priestly prayer, Jesus says, I've given them your word

John 17:14

and the world hates them because they don't belong to the world, just as I don't belong to the world.

I'm not asking you to take them out of the world, but to keep them safe from the evil one.

They do not belong to this world any more than I do. Make them holy by your truth. Teach them your word, which is truth.

Just as you sent me into the world, I am sending them into the world. And the whole point with the wheat and the weeds

is Jesus is saying, I'm about to ascend to heaven. And when I do, I'm going to leave you in this world

and and you're going to find people who look, talk and act and think just like you, but they're not like you.

Because only when the seed is planted inside and the Spirit of God is in them, I will then take them

and I'll put them into the world to rearrange the world to suit the kingdom of God. So don't go into the world

and be shaped by the world. As someone once said, if the devil wants to get you out of the call of God.

All he has to do is give you a bicycle or a set of golf clubs or a motorbike and you've gone on Sundays. Wow.

Saturday's family day. Sunday. You know, God gave me this before. We never see you again.

Can I tell you? Can I throw a third one in? How many? No one in this church. But how many moms have cried to God

for a little baby? Then they get it because God's kind. And you never see them again because this little baby,

this little beautiful baby becomes the biggest idol in their lives. Oh, I can't go to church for six weeks.

You know why? Just said there's diseases. Listen, there's diseases. After six weeks, every single one of you survived.

So my point is, the enemy will come with things. And he says, don't love the world. Don't get the world stuck into you.

I going to send you to bring change to it. You, my disciples, go into the world and preach.

The kingdom of God is at hand. But the kingdom will only be revealed through the sons of the kingdom,

through the daughters of the kingdom. And don't get waylaid by weeds who look like weeds. Oh, I can act like that.

And I close with this beautiful passage. Paul describes the effect these Christians have on people in the world.

These wheats. Listen to the words of 2 Corinthians 2 from verse 14, and let these words resonate with you this morning.

But thank God he has made us his captives. Just stop there for a moment. He has made us his captives.

You know, the wonderful thing about a captive is you only go with a person who holds you in captivity.

Says you can go where you can go, when you can go, how you can go, you are safe when you're his captor,

when he keeps you under the wings like a mother hen would keep her chicks. How many of you this morning walked into this place?

I've messed up. I've done this, I've done that. Things aren't right. I don't feel worthy.

I got a word for you this morning. You're not worthy. You never have been. None of us have.

That's why the grace of God has been shed abroad in our hearts that when you respond to this gospel of Jesus,

he takes you captive. And you know what? When you're his captive, you can't be someone else's, because you belong to him.

And he starts off this beautiful passage in 2 Corinthians, thank God he has made us his captives.

And I don't know about you. But my prayer would be lord, I'd rather be your captive than anybody else's.

Hey, we're going just now to Nigeria. It's not the easiest place. Bless all Nigerians who are here.

But there's a reason you're here. Not there. But we. I think I'm doing Henny. I don't know.

My 18th or 19th trip to Nigeria leaving at 12 o' clock today. Me and Yuri and Tom and it's going to be interesting.

But you know what? You go, you leave your family in God's care. You leave everything to do what you do

because you're his captive. And when he speaks and he has sons and daughters of the kingdom somewhere else

and he needs them encouraged and ministered to he needs and churches trained and leaders developed.

God says go. And you know what? Because you're my captive, go. And the loved ones I leave behind

are also my captives. I'll look after them. It's a knowing that God has them.

Remember John 17 Father, I'm coming to you. But I trust them to you. Lord, don't take them out of the world.

Keep them safe in it. You're a captive of the king. He's made us his captives

and he continues to lead us along in Christ's triumphal procession. In other words, it's the will of God

that he takes you as a captive into victory after victory, triumph after triumph.

You know your life is supposed to be a series of growing victories in him. And then this.

Now he uses us to spread the knowledge of Christ everywhere. Like a sweet perfume.

Our lives are a Christ like fragrance rising up to God. Wheat. But this fragrance is perceived differently

by those who are being saved and those who are perishing. To those who are perishing,

we are a dreadful smell of death and doom. Have you ever been around a braai and someone talks about Christianity?

We don't talk religion here. They don't want to hear what you got to say. But to those who are being saved,

we are a life giving perfume. My life as handiwork of God. Every time God squeezes me,

I've got deodorant. Vanessa bought me David Beckham. And when you spray David Beckham you squeeze.

Little bit of David Beckham apparently comes on me and she gets all excited. So I take David Beckham with.

But David Beckham can't come without squeeze. And everywhere we go he says there is a, there is a, there is a.

Let me just read it. We're a life giving perfume. And who is adequate for such a task as this.

So God will put you into this world as wheat, and. And he starts to put his squeeze on you.

And what comes out of you is the very character of Jesus. You see, we are not like the many hucksters

who preach for personal profit. We preach the word of God with sincerity and with Christ's authority,

knowing that God is watching us as the farmer watches the seed as it grow. He's watching.

And I want you and I to be encouraged that God has put us in this place at this time as wheat, not as weeds.

And we grow up with the weeds. But do not let the weeds shape your life. You start to shape theirs

with the perfume of the message of life that you carry. And listen, let's be honest.

If you are a little bit of a sour person, just choose today I'm going to be less sour. Is that all right?

Don't be that guy, that neighbour, that person say, you know what, Lord? Your spirit is alive in me.

I'm going to start to act like a weed. I want a full head of grain. I want to be fruitful to some degree.

I don't ever want to be the hindrance of people coming to Jesus. I want to be the reason they do.

And Lord, I don't know what I have to offer, but I know it's enough. Parable of the wheat and the weeds.

And then God says, you know what? I'm going to let you grow together all the way to harvest.

So it doesn't matter if you immigrate to Australia tomorrow. There's weeds there. Go the other end of the world to the usa.

There's weeds there. I think there might not be inland or Libya, because nothing grows there. Not even

wherever you go, the weeds will be. And God says, I've planted you where you are to make a difference.

That's why you're there. I'm the farmer, you the seed. I planted you. Now go and bear fruit.

Stand with me, please, Father. With the wheat and the weeds in the same field, there's a lot of wheat.

And when you find a wheat field and we've all clumped together in that wheat kingdom comes.

Because you said, when any two or three of you are gathered in my name, there I am in the midst of you.

And you said, where there is unity, you command a blessing. And so not only here in this room,

but in churches all around our nation and all around the nations of the world where people are gathered together

this morning as wheat together, I believe you command a blessing. And so we hold hands in a sense

to remind ourselves that in the field I'm not alone, I'm one of many. And we pray, Lord,

that in our togetherness would you cause us to become so much more fruitful? Would you cause us to leave old ways behind us?

Would you cause us, Lord, together this morning to be changed and transformed into the image of Jesus until we die?

That the older we grow, the more like Jesus we behave, not the less. Help us to grow into you, Lord.

And may this wheat field be so fruitful that we bring you so much pleasure. To God be the glory.

Not only great things he has done, but great things he does. Bless us coming week.

Look after us, care for us and our families. Fight for us, Lord. Take us into a beautiful future. We pray.

We commit ourselves to you in Jesus name. And all God's people shouted God bless.

Thank you so much for being a part of our meeting today. Can I just ask two things?

The first is if today the message has in any way been useful to you, would you mind just maybe liking it

or putting perhaps a statement down or a comment down that we can know how the ministry has helped you?

Maybe a thumbs up, maybe you can subscribe to the channel, do whatever, just so we can know what impact this message may be having on you.

And secondly, you may be someone who's saying, greg, I hear you. And this hope that Jesus has for us

can come into my heart and it can change me. But the reality is that I don't even know if I know Jesus.

I want to say two things to you right away. The first is he's near you right now.

The Bible says if you believe in your heart that he is the Lord and if you confess him with your mouth, you will be saved.

Which means you just need to where you are, turn to the Lord Jesus Christ even now and just say,

lord, here I am. I recognize who you are, confess my sin to you. I acknowledge you as Jesus Christ,

the Lord of all, the Son of the living God. And I want to follow you. I want to become a disciple of yours.

I want to give my life to you, Lord. And you can pray that prayer right now between you and the Lord.

Secondly, you can get hold of us. We could either send you some material, we can put you in touch with a really good church near you.

If you live in our area, you can come to us us. You can follow us on YouTube.

But it is good to get connected into the family of God, to get connected into a local church

that your life changes being surrounded with the family of God. Please stay in touch. God bless you.