(4.) Harvest Time.
The separation, which men’s hands are thus declared incompetent for, remains for angels’ hands in the day of the harvest of Christendom. They are the reapers then. The field is to be cleared of wheat and tares alike; and at one moment it is bidden both to gather the tares in bundles to be burnt, and to gather the wheat into the barn. Thus solemnly the day of Christian profession ends. But let us look a little more closely at the order and manner of it, which is of the greatest importance in order to understand it rightly.
“Gather together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them.” There is no actual burning yet; and there is no removal from the field. It is a separation of the tares in the field, so as to leave the wheat distinct and ready for the ingathering. In what manner, we must refrain from conjecturing; whether it will be gradually or suddenly effected, we do not know. The separation will be, however, made, and the true people of the Lord will stand in their own distinct company at last, when that day is come. There will follow then, not the removal of the tares, but of the wheat. The tares are left in bundles on the field; the wheat is gathered into the barn.
We know what that means very well; and how many joyful hopes are crowded into that brief sentence. The scene is pictured for us in 1 Thess. 4. The descent of the Lord into the air; the shout; the voice of the archangel and the trump of God; the resurrection of the dead in Christ, the myriads fallen asleep in him through the long ages of the past; the change of the living saints throughout the earth; the rise of that glorious company; the meeting, and the welcome; the henceforth “ever with the Lord:” all these are the various parts and features of that which these words figure to us: “Gather the wheat into my barn.” Suddenly, we know, this will be. “In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye,” this change will be affected; every living saint will be gathered out of the length and breadth of Christendom; and it will be left but a tare-field simply, with its tares gathered and bound in bundles, ready for the burning.
And where are the barren and blighted ears of false profession? Where is he of the stony ground? where the man in whom the good seed of the word was choked with cares of this world, and the deceitfulness of riches, and he brought no fruit to perfection? We have seen that the “tares” are not simply such, but the fruit of Satan’s perversion of the Word. They are not those of whom the Apostle Paul speaks as “having as form of godliness, but denying the power thereof;” but rather they are those, whether teachers or taught, to whom apply the words of another apostle, concerning “false teachers, who shall privily bring in damnable heresies, even denying the Lord that bought them,” and whose pernicious ways “many shall follow,” by reason of whom the way of truth shall be evil spoken of” (2 Peter 2) These are the tares of the devil’s sowing, and it is important to distinguish them from the mere formalist and unfruitful professor of the truth. It is on account of these, as both Peter and Jude tell us, that the swift and terrible judgment which ends the whole comes. “Enoch, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold the Lord cometh with ten thousands of His saints to execute judgment upon all.”
And yet the formalist, the man of mere profession, will not escape. In the judgment of the dead before the great white throne they will receive according to their deeds as surely as any, but that is long after the scene before us in this parable. Here is a simple question of good wheat for the granary or of tares for the burning. Nothing else is in the field at all. There is no middle class no unfruitful orthodox profession; all seem to have taken sides, before the solemn close of the time of harvest, either manifestly for Christ, or as manifestly against Him. Is this indeed so I and have we warrant for such an interpretation of the language of the parable?
The answer to this is a very solemn one; and we shall find it in the 2nd Epistle to the Thessalonians. In the first epistle the apostle had spoken of “the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ, and of our gathering together to Him.” He had assured them that even the sleeping saints would be brought with Christ, when he should come again (1 Thess. 4:1414For if we believe that Jesus died and rose again, even so them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him. (1 Thessalonians 4:14)); and that in order to accompany Him so on his return to earth, they would be raised from the dead, and together with all the living ones of that day, be caught up to meet the Lord in the air. Thus when he “appeared” to judge the world, they would appear with Him in glory (Col. 3:44When Christ, who is our life, shall appear, then shall ye also appear with him in glory. (Colossians 3:4)) He could therefore in this second epistle, beseech the Thessalonian Christians, by their knowledge of this coming, and this “gathering,” not to be shaken in mind or troubled as supposing or being persuaded that the day of the Lord had already come. That day (as all the prophets witness) is the day of the Lord’s taking the earth from under man’s hand and into His own, the time in which his judgments are upon the earth, and the, inhabitants of the world learn righteousness. That day, he assures them, shall not come unless there come a falling away (an apostasy) first, and that, man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition, who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped.
Now my object is not with any special application or interpretation of this. So much is manifest, that this “man of sin,” whoever he may be, is one who heads up an, or rather “the,” apostacy of the latter days. The evil, the mystery of iniquity, was already at work, even in the apostles’ days (verse 7). There was, however, for the present a restraint upon it. When that should be roved the wicked one would be revealed, who was to be destroyed alone, mark, by the Lord’s coming (verse 8).
Thus we are evidently in view of the same period as that contemplated in the parable before us, as well as of the judgment which Jude warns of. The passage in Thessalonians exhibits, however, the “man of sin” as the distinct head and leader of the latter-day apostacy, and moreover declares to us bow far this apostacy shall extend. The coming of the “wicked one” is declared to be with a terrible power of delusion which will carry away captive the masses of the unconverted among pressing Christians until none of that middle or neutral class remain. “Whose coming is after the working of Satan with all power and signs and lying wonders, and with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they may believe a lie, that THEY ALL might be damned, who believed not the truth but had pleasure in unrighteousness” (vss. 9-12). Thus terribly shall close the history of Christendom. The true saints once taken out of it, the door of grace will be closed forever upon those who have rejected grace. They will be given over to become, as they speedily will become, from being unbelievers of the truth, believers of a lie. The wheat being gathered out of the field, tares alone will be found in it.
The actual burning of the tares is not found is the parable itself, but in the interpretation of it which the Lord afterward gives to His disciples. “As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it he at the end of this age. The Son of man shall send forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity; and shall cast them into a furnace of fire: there shall be wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father” (40-43).
This is when the Lord comes as Son of man to take that throne which He has promised to share with His people. Then, when the time of “patience” is over, and the rod of iron shall break in pieces all resistance to the King of kings. Then “judgment” — long separated from it, — “shall return unto righteousness,” and the earth shall be freed from the yoke of oppression and the bondage of corruption. It is the time of which the 37th Psalm speaks, when evil-doers shall be cut of: but those that wait upon the Lord, they shall inherit the earth” (9); when “yet a little while, and the wicked shall not be: yea, thou shalt diligently consider his place, and it shall not be; but the meek shall inherit the earth, anti shall delight themselves in the abundance of peace” (10, 11).
Sometime before will the gathering for heaven have taken place and the saints have met their Lord, as we have seen. Now in this day of the judgment which prepares the way for the blessing of the earth, they are seen in their heavenly place. “Then shall the righteous shine forth as the sun.” Blessed words, which speak of their association with their Lord in other ways than simply as sharers of His rule with the “rod of iron.” For “unto you that fear my name,” says the word by Malachi to Israel, “shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings.” Who bears that name, we know; and how it speaks of earth’s night-time passed away. But “when Christ who is our Life, shall appear, than shall ye also appear with Him in glory.” So, as the Sun, shall the righteous shine forth in the kingdom of their Father. With Christ, like Him, they shine; themselves subject in one sphere, if rulers in another; but subject with all the heart’s deep devotion, where service is fullest liberty, serving as sons him whom they call, at the same time, God and Father.