Page 471 - Bible History

444 C RIST'S TEAC INGS, MIRA ES AND CHURCH
teaching and would lead sinful lives. He foretold this to the people in the following parable: ''The Kingdom of Heaven," He said, "is like a man that sowed good seed in his eld. But whilst his servants slept, his enemy came and oversowed cockle among the wheat and went his way. When the blade was sprung up and had brought forth fruit, then appeared also the cockle. The servants of the good man of the house, coming to him, said, 'Sir, didst thou not sow good seed in thy
eld? Vhence, then, hath it cockle?'
"He said to them, 'An enemy hath done this.' The
servants said to him, 'Wilt thou that we go and gather it up?' But he said, 'No, lest, perhaps, gathering up the cockle, you root up the wheat also together with it. Allow both to grow until the harvest, and in the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, ''Gather up rst the cockle and bind it into bundles to burn, but the wheat gather ye into my barn."
His disciples said to Him, ''Explain to us the par­ able of the cockle of the eld." Jesus said, "He that soweth the good seed is the Son of Man. The eld is the world, and the good seed are the children of the Kingdom, and the cockle are the children of the wicked one. And the enemy that sowed them is the devil. But the harvest is the end of the world, and the reap­ ers are the angels. Even as cockle, therefore, is gathered up and burnt with re, so shall it be at the end of the world. The Son of Man shall send His angels) and they shall gather out of His Kingdom all scandals and men that work iniquity and shall cast them into the furnace of re. There shall be weeping