Introduction

1. Have you ever seen this image before? Do you know what it means?

2. God’s Word sneaks in in surprising ways too. In your own words, what happened to this guy?

Getting into God’s Word

3. The ancient stories that people used to sneak meaning into hearts were called parables. We’re going to spend the next weeks looking at biblical parables.

Before we get into today’s parable, let’s consider an introduction to parables in general.

4. What do you think parables are?

Let’s read Matthew 13: 24-33. In this section, Jesus tells three parables:

  • the wheat and the weeds

  • the mustard seed

  • yeast

5. Briefly retell the parable of the weeds and the wheat in your own words, and try to avoid explaining it.

 

6. What is the surprise or twist in this parable?

7. Briefly retell the parable of the mustard seed in your own words, and again try to avoid explaining it.

8. What is the surprise or twist in this parable?

9. Briefly retell the parable of the yeast in your own words, and again try to avoid explaining it.

10. What is the surprise or twist in this parable?

11. Let’s discuss the meaning of this parable. What does this parable teach about the coming of the kingdom of God? If you aren’t sure or just want to think about it some more, watch the clip below.

 

12. Imagine that you were a Jewish person living in the first century as Jesus taught about the coming of the kingdom of God through these parables. Do you think that you would have understood what Jesus was trying to say, given the Jewish expectations of the immediate coming of the kingdom in all of its fullness? Why or why not?

13. Given that other “Messiah” figures existed around the time of Jesus, such as Judas Maccabeus, do you think it would have been easy or hard for the Jewish people to believe that Jesus was the true Messiah? Explain.

14. Do you think that it would have been surprising for the Jewish people to hear that the “enemy” of the farmer was not Rome but the Devil (Matthew 13:39)? Why?

Getting the Word into our lives

15. What do you see as the main or most common hindrances to the kingdom coming in your lives and the lives of the people around you?

16. In what ways do you see the promise of these three short parables:

that the kingdom is coming

that it primarily rules hearts

that it begins and works in small almost imperceptible ways

that it will eventually becoming visible

to be especially good and helpful?

17. Do you think that the truth found in these three short parables - that the kingdom is coming, that it primarily rules hearts, that it begins and works in small almost imperceptible ways, and that it will eventually becoming visible - is being lived out in your life and the group/tribe you belong to? If so, where do you see it (or not)?

18. If you don’t, believe this promise: God’s kingdom comes. Where his Word is and people receive it in faith, his rule and reign is coming.

“After the defeat of Hitler’s Nazi regime in World War II, Holocaust survivor and Christian Corrie ten Boom returned to Germany to declare the forgiveness of Jesus Christ. One evening, after giving her message, she was approached by a man who identified himself as a former Nazi guard from the concentration camp at Ravensbruck, where she had been held and where her sister, Betsie, had died. 

When Corrie saw the man’s face, she recognized him as one of the most cruel and vindictive guards from the camp. He reached out his hand and said to her, “A fine message, Fraulein! How good it is to know that, as you say, all our sins are at the bottom of the sea! You mentioned Ravensbruck in your talk. I was a guard there, but I would like to hear it from your lips as well. Fraulein, will you forgive me?” About this encounter, Corrie writes: 

“I stood there—I whose sins had again and again been forgiven—and could not forgive. Betsie had died in that place. Could he erase her slow terrible death simply for the asking? It could have been many seconds that he stood there—hand held out—but to me it seemed hours as I wrestled with the most difficult thing I ever had to do . . . I had to do it—I knew that. [The message that God forgives has a prior condition: that we forgive those who have injured us. . . . ] But forgiveness is not an emotion—I knew that too. Forgiveness is an act of the will, and the will can function regardless of the temperature of the heart. “Jesus, help me!” I prayed silently. 

 “As she reached out her hand to the former guard, Corrie says that something incredible took place. She continues: 

 “The current started in my shoulder, raced down my arm, sprang into our joined hands. And then this healing warmth seemed to flood my whole being, bringing tears to my eyes. “I forgive you, brother!” I cried. “With all my heart!” . . . I had never known love so intensely, as I did then. But even then, I realized it was not my love . . . It was the power of the Holy Spirit.” (Scott Sauls, A Gentle Answer, Thomas Nelson, 2020, pp.19-20)”