WHEAT AND WEEDS

Wheat is the main cereal in the Middle East and Europe. In the Bible it is mentioned directly, more than 70 times. Their scarcity leads to poverty and hunger and it is a symbol of the lack of divine blessing.1 Their abundance leads to wealth and satiety2 and it is a symbol of God’s blessing.3 Regarding the weeds, this word appears only in the Bible in the parable of the wheat and weeds. The weed is also a grass, but toxic, and therefore not edible. When the plant is small it is much like the wheat plant.

In the parable of the wheat and weeds, wheat symbolizes God’s children: ‘The field is the world; the good seed are the children of the kingdom, and the weeds are the children of the wicked’.4 The harvest is to separate the wheat from the weed and represents the end of world.5 The enemy that sowed it is the devil; the harvest is the end of the world and the reapers are the angels. This is not the only time that the harvest represents the end of the world and therefore, the time to gather God´s people. Also this time is represented in Revelation when it speaks about the Second Coming of Christ: And another angel came out from the house of God, crying with a loud voice to him was seated on the cloud, ‘Put in your blade, and let the grain be cut: because the hour for cutting it has come, for the grain of the earth is over mautre’.6

Jesus says to wait the harvest to separate the wheat from the weeds and that it should not be done like in other crops in which is most clearly what are weeds and can be torned before they grow. Obviously, the weeds represents the children of the devil.7 But the fact that the weeds and not another plant is used to represent them, indicates that it is not always easy, until the end, distinguish whether a person is truly from God or not. The parable shows us that the devil makes an overlapping work, sometimes indistinguishable in the first instance, among the people of God. The weeds are the false converts who give only a semblance of Christian, but in fact their nature is not converted, that is why we cannot judge them. But others are not confused with wheat, are scotch thistles because it can be clearly seen they are openly confronted by God, as shown by their behaviour and attitude. Therefore we must distinguish between what is a weed and what a thistle; so the attitude towards one or other must be different. It is very easy to confuse the weeds with wheat, but not a thistle. Everyone who follows the teachings of the Word of God will be part of that group chosen as wheat, and also will be able to see the result of their good choice in this life and not just in eternity. ‘And the work of righteousness will be peace; and the effect of an upright rule will be to take away fear forever’.8

 

Biblical References:

  1. Jeremiah 12: 13
  2. Genesis 27: 28, 41: 49; 1 Kings 5: 11
  3. Psalm 147: 14
  4. Matthew 13: 24-30
  5. Matthew 13: 39
  6. Revelation 14: 15
  7. Matthew 13: 38
  8. Isaiah 32: 17