Christians: What does the parable of the tares mean to you?

Question

Matthew 24-30

"The kingdom of heaven is likened unto a man which sowed good seed in his field: But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way. But when the blade had sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also. So the servants of the house-holder came and said Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in they field?...Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up? But he said Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them. Let 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."

Answer 1

Simple the Christians and non-christians will be together until the day of Judgement.

Answer 2

Tares is a species of rye-grass and it's seeds have poison in them. It looks just like wheat grass until the "ear" grows and then you can tell the difference. I understand it grows all over Syria.

In order to save his crop, he had to wait until the harvest time, gather up what tares he could and burn them so the seeds wouldn't scatter. Then he would be free to harvest the wheat.

I've always thought it means that sometimes it is more damaging to remove the tares (or evil) and that just by letting them go ahead and grow within your harvest you can remove it without it seeding into your wheat seeds. While most put it in general terms, as in the heathen among the faithful, I think of it on a more personal note, the evils within us.

Answer 3

It shows that there is a visible Church and an invisible Church. It goes along with the verse that says something to the effect that not all who say Christ is their Lord are actually His. In other words, there are people who do some things that make them look like Christians (such as going to church), but they're not. They look so much like Christians on the outside but on the inside they're not and because of that, only God knows the difference. He will only pull them out from the Church at the judgement.

Answer 4

KJV all the way!!

Jesus will remove the tares (People claiming Christianity who are NOT Christians) from the wheat (true Christians) in His own time...not our job to do so...have faith in Him.

Answer 5

It refers to the tribulation period and to the rapture. The tares are the people who refuse to accept christ. When the harvest is come the wheat(christians) will be taken home and the tares(non-believers) will be left for the antichrist

Answer 6

Separates real Christians from the fake ones. God will be the judge of that at the end.

Answer 7

To me it means or implies as a christian it is always very important to be alert. Satan came to steal, kill and destroy. so you need to be always to catious.
Salvation or inhereting the Kingdom of GOD is something that we work on every sigle day of our lives.
the bible says in Philipians3:20, our citizen is in heaven so we eagerly have to wait for our saviour by working on it without Fear and trembling.

Answer 8

That until Christs return both Christians and fake Christian would worship together. That He would decide who was what in the end.

Answer 9

It's supposed to mean, live and let live, and let God sort things out later. Of course, most Christians don't follow that one.

Other than the "sorting them out later" part, it's a rather decent thought. Of course, like most of them, it is over-simplified. There are times where you need to cut a cancer out before it affects the rest.

Answer 10

Nothing