THE MYSTERIES OF THE KINGDOM - PART 1 (Matthew 13)

THE MYSTERIES OF THE KINGDOM - PART 1 (Matthew 13)

H. A. IRONSIDE

MATTHEW 13 - THIS chapter brings to us a new revelation in connection with the presentation of kingdom truth. We have seen in the preceding chapter how the leaders of the people of Israel crossed the dead-line, and refused the proffered kingdom by deliberately discrediting all the credentials of the King. They attributed His power (which they could not deny) to Beelzebub, and so committed the sin against the Holy Spirit for which there could be no forgiveness, either in that age or in the age to come. This resulted eventually in the setting aside for the time being of Israel nationally, and the introduction of a new order of things which God had foreseen from eternity, but which had not been declared hitherto. In its fulness this involved the revelation of the mystery of the Church as one Body called out from Jews and Gentiles which the time had not come to unfold. But as preliminary to that Jesus spoke of other mysteries which had been kept secret from the foundation of the world, the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven. 

  From this point on, in Matthew’s Gospel, the term “the kingdom of the heavens” refers specifically, not to the final establishment of the kingdom of God over all the earth, but to the mysterious, or rather, mystical form in which that kingdom was to be manifested after the King Himself had returned to heaven, and until His second advent in power and glory to root out of His kingdom all offences and destroy all who work iniquity.  

The seven parables in Matthew 13 may be designated as follows:

1. The seed of the kingdom sown in the earth and its results.

2. Satanic imitation: the tares among the wheat.

3. The kingdom as a great world-church harboring evil as well as good.

4. The false church inserting the leaven of corrupt teaching into the food of God’s people.

5. Israel, God’s peculiar treasure, purchased with the world but hidden among the nations during the present age.

6. The Church the pearl for which the Lord impoverished Himself (2 Cor. 8:9).

7. The condition of things at the end of the age.

The word “mysteries” as here used does not necessarily mean something mysterious and, therefore, difficult to understand, but rather secrets which are revealed only to initiates. The Lord was ever ready to take into His confidence earnest seekers after the truth. He used the parabolic form for a double purpose. He desired to test His hearers, as to whether they really desired to know the mind of God or not, and also to illumine His discourses. Where people already had faith and had accepted His testimony up to a certain point He was prepared to give more; but where there was no real confidence in His message they would become more bewildered by the parabolic form of instruction than if He had spoken in plain language. 

 his is the explanation of the seed scattered on the wayside, only to be devoured by the fowls of the air. Note that the message is called distinctly “the word of the kingdom,” making it clear that it is by sowing the Word that the kingdom makes its way through the world. Satan and his emissaries are ever busy trying to annul the effect of gospel preaching. It is their sinister aim to fill the hearts and minds of the hearers with prejudice and unreasonable opposition so that they do not fairly weigh the message as it comes from the preacher’s lips; thus there is no favorable response whatever. The Word heard with the outer ear only is soon forgotten.

The stony-ground hearers. These represent those exuberant people who are ever ready to take up with almost any kind of religious propaganda, to listen to the proclamation of the gospel and its clearness without any depth of conviction or evidence of repentance. They profess faith in the Word, apparently receiving it joyfully, but because there is no root in them, nothing but an empty profession, they soon fall away, particularly when they find that the Christian way of life entails tribulation and persecution.

The stony-ground hearers are those who are also seen at first to accept the message, but have never really counted the cost of faith in Christ. They are not characterized by the single eye but are double-minded, occupied with the cares of this world and seeking after wealth; the temporal responsibilities connected with these things choke the Word, and so there is no fruit.  

 The good-ground hearers, where the soil has been prepared by the plowshare of conviction; and the Word falling into an honest heart is received in faith, and the message is understood as the Holy Spirit opens it up. The result is that the soul is born again, and the life becomes fruitful for God. There are degrees of fruitfulness, however. All do not give the same evidence of devotion to Christ and appreciation of the truth; and so the Lord speaks of those who bring forth some an hundredfold, others sixtyfold, and others only thirtyfold.

The third parable is that of the mustard seed: It speaks of the development of the kingdom of heaven into a great world power. Such dominions were frequently likened to large trees with spreading branches, as in the case of Babylon (Dan. 4); the Assyrian (Ezk. 31:3), and other similar powers. So that which began as a field of wheat developed, in the course of centuries, into the mustard tree. The professing church of God became a power to be reckoned with among the nations, but its branches sheltered all kinds of false professors and evil teachers. The birds of the air represent the hosts of evil, and these lodge in the branches of the mustard tree. It is a most graphic picture of what Christendom became throughout the course of centuries when the false church seemed to dominate the world.