HOW quaint is the picture before us this week, with the old way of harvesting and all its hard labor, yet men and women were just as happy doing their work that way, as they are now with, all the improvements. Can you tell what it is that will make people happy in whatever line of work they have to do? I am sure some of my readers can answer readily—it is through knowing the Lord Jesus as the One who has loved them and given Himself for them, a sacrifice on the cross. I trust all my readers may be given to know Jesus as the One who has died for them, and put all their sins away. But there is another thing our picture reminds us of and that is a harvest that God’s word tells us of in Matt. 13:3030Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn. (Matthew 13:30).
There He is telling us of a harvest of people that is to take place soon and of two classes which He likens to tares and wheat. Tares look like wheat until they come to bear fruit and then the difference can easily be detected. A man with experience in that line can tell the difference from the start, but to one who is not acquainted with it, he could not so readily tell. The tares are like a great many religious people who are not trusting in Christ and His finished work, yet by their religion they may look like real Christians, they are to be gathered into bundles for God’s terrible judgment, because they had not believed in Christ, but trusted to their own goodness as a means of salvation. But the wheat is what He uses as a picture of those who are His—who therefore have seen they could not save themselves, and believed in Christ as the only One who could save them; so at the time of harvest, the Lord Jesus will come in the clouds to take all His own to be forever with Himself. Be sure, dear, reader, you are among those who are likened to wheat, and not of those who are likened to the tares. Then when the Lord Jesus comes you will rejoice to go to be forever with him.
ML 09/02/1917