Chuck Larsen

Jesus was masterful in taking everyday events and turning them into major life lessons. This was especially true regarding his parables concerning what the Kingdom of Heaven was like. Everyone understood what Jesus was talking about because he took his scenes right out of everyday life. Barclay explains the Kingdom parables this way, “He took the parable of the sewer from the farmer’s field and the parable of the mustard seed from the husbandman’s garden; he took the parable of the wheat and the tares from the perennial problem which confronts the farmer in his struggle with the weeds, and the parable of the dragnet from the seashore of the Sea of Galilee. He took the parable of the hidden treasure from the everyday task of digging in a field, and the parable of the pearl of great price from the world of commerce and trade.” Barclay then suggests that the parable of the leaven is even more masterful. He writes, “But in this parable of the leaven Jesus came nearer home than in any other because he took it from the kitchen of an ordinary house.” This is what we read in Matthew 13:33, “The kingdom of heaven is like leaven (sour dough) which a woman took and covered over in three measures of meal or flour till all of it was leavened.”

Although some want to see leaven as a permanent illustration of sin as it usually is, here it is cast in a positive light. Jesus is explaining that just as leaven permeates the entire lump of dough, so too will the gospel message and the Kingdom of God permeate the entire world. One major observation concerns the difference between the beginning and the end. It starts small, like the mustard seed, but the growth is remarkable. To many, this contrast is the point of the parable. But I see another point based on Jesus explanation to Peter about the building of His Church. He explains that although Satan will come against it with all his forces, he will not prevail. The Church will continue to grow in spite of all the opposition. You see, once Jesus planted His church, the permeation is unstoppable. Just as bread cannot be “unleavened” the existence, growth, and victory of God’s kingdom is inevitable.

Don’t miss another truth associated with leaven. As one molecule of bread becomes leavened it transmits the effect to the particle next to it, and so on. It is the process God chose to advance His kingdom. Once we, the individual elements become leavened and vitalized by God’s grace, we pass that on to others around us. It’s the great purpose that Christ has for our lives. Jesus tells us all “go, make disciples…” Alexander Maclaren writes, “The Gospel needs to be passed through human lips in order that it may reach deaf ears. The purpose for which we have been apprehended by Christ is not merely our own personal salvation, whether we understand that in a narrow and more outward, or in a broader and more spiritual sense. No man is an end in himself, but every man, though he be partially and temporarily an end, is also a means.” God’s grace flows from a believer like yeast spreads to all that come in contact with it.

In Matthew 13:31-32, Jesus tells another parable to help us understand some qualities of the nature of the Kingdom of God. This is about a mustard seed. It says, “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches.” The point of the parable is as Chouinard says in the College Press NIV Commentary, “One would not naturally expect that from a tiny mustard seed would come a tree-like shrub attaining a height of ten to twelve feet, suitable for even birds to find a resting place. Yet, this remarkable natural phenomenon has its spiritual counterpart in the kingdom of God.”

First, from the small beginnings of Jesus and His 12 apostles grew a church of millions and millions around the entire world. F. F. Bruce, in his commentary on the Book of Acts, explains how this minor movement from a small outpost of the vast Roman Empire, grew into a world influence that still has room for more to roost yet today. This is the case of things that are of God. From the beginnings of His creation God brought forth Adam and Eve. Just two people, created in His image, were sent forth to populate the earth. Today in 2025 there are nearly 8 billion people, all descendants of just these two people. It is still growing today and so is the Kingdom of God. With each new soul who professes faith in Jesus Christ the church expands into an unimaginable tree. It’s the natural order of things that God creates.

Further, I’d argue that we see a clear growth process involved in the life of each individual Christian as well. It’s the natural order of things. Spence writes, “The Christian life should be one of progress, and it will be if it is healthy. Growth is a law of life, and it is a law that applies to the Divine life in the soul. The healthy Christian will grow in grace; his knowledge will expand; his spirituality will deepen; his capacity for service will widen; his enjoyment of the blessedness of the vision of God will become richer and more intense.” The interesting thing to me is that God is not done with me yet. Although I’ve long passed the point where my physical growth has ceased and I am well on my way down the physical scale of strength, my spiritual life continues to grow and flourish and will until God perfects it once and for all in His Kingdom. Spence goes on, “But there is no such decline for the spiritual life so long as it is healthy. That life knows no old age; it partakes of the unfading glory of the Eternal.”

There are at least two lessons we could glean from the parable of the fishing net regarding the kingdom of heaven. The first lesson was that when you cast a net into the sea you never know what you’re going to get. There will be both “good fish and bad fish.” It’s not our place to judge between the two at this time but to live together, like the wheat and the tares, until the “end of the age” when God will judge and send the angels to do the reaping. That’s the 2nd lesson. The reapers, the angels, will separate the “evil from the righteous.”

When we think of “evil versus righteous” we think of people who do good things and avoid doing bad things. But Jesus never pigeonholed us in that way. To Him “all have sinned.” To Him there were none righteous. He doesn’t separate people into two kinds; good or bad, Jew or Gentile, Rich or Poor, Male or Female, etc. We are all the same. In John 7:19 where Jesus was talking to the most righteous people of the land, He said, “Has not Moses given you the law? Yet none of you keeps the law.” Further, in Matthew 7:11, Jesus tells his disciples that they are “evil” even though they may give good gifts to their children. Paul addresses this same subject in the first three chapters of the book of Romans. In Chapter 1, verses 18-32, Paul describes how the most obviously wicked people need Jesus. In Chapter 2, he explains how the most religious people in the world are still sinners and need Jesus. Next, he explains how the most moral people in the world are still sinners and need Jesus. His conclusion is that “all have sinned and fall short” of God’s standard of perfection.

Yes, Jesus calls us to be perfect. When talking to the rich young ruler in Matthew 5, Jesus made it clear that the standard for admittance into the Kingdom of heaven was perfection. But then he says to the rich young ruler, “If you would be perfect…come, and follow me.” Jesus is the only path to perfection. In his summary of this discussion, John Piper writes, “The crucial question is: How is Jesus the path to perfection? One historic answer is that Jesus himself is our perfection. That is, when we are connected with him by faith, God counts us to be perfect because of Jesus, even though in ourselves we are not. Another historic answer is that Jesus, by his presence and power within us, transforms us so that we really begin to love like he does and move toward perfection, which we finally obtain in heaven. It seems to me that Jesus gives us good reason to believe that both of these answers are true.” Piper is right. We have a perfect standing with God because of our position “in Him.” He is also in the process of perfecting us through the presence of His Holy Spirit in our lives. He will complete that process when He brings us into His heavenly kingdom, thus preserving its perfect nature.

The Church is supposed to be a mystery form of the Kingdom of Heaven on earth. I think the parable of the fishing net is specifically referring to this. Jesus instructed the disciples to follow Him, and he would make them great executives of large corporations! No, wait, that’s not right. He told them He would make them fishermen. He wanted them to fish for men. Fishing in Jesus day was done with nets. We saw a sample of that when we were at the Sea of Galilee in Israel a couple of years ago. Jesus uses the illustration of fishing to teach us about the kingdom of heaven. In Matthew 13:47-50, He says “The kingdom of heaven is like a net that was cast into the sea that caught all kinds of fish. When it was full, they pulled it ashore, sat down, and put the good fish into containers and threw the bad away. It will be this way at the end of the age. Angels will come and separate the evil from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.”

There are (at least!) two lessons that we glean from this parable. First, when you cast a net into the sea you never know what you’re going to get. In the mystery form of the kingdom today, we have many who say “Lord, Lord,” but are really not part of the family of God. But we’ll never be able to tell who they are. It’s not even our place to judge others. Jesus frequently charges us to judge ourselves, but we’re not to judge others with reference to the sincerity of their profession. Thus, in the church today, God’s Mystery Form of His Kingdom, there are both good and bad fish. There are both evil and righteous residents. In another parable about the kingdom we read there are both wheat and tares and they should be allowed to grow together. We’re not to attempt to root them out, but rather coexist with them until “the end of the age.”

We are not to judge because there is no way we would ever be able to know a person’s heart. How could we determine the degree of a person’s guilt or innocence when Jesus made secret sins and hidden habits just as sinful as overt acts? We could never and should never presume to judge a person’s relationship with God unless we have lived sinless lives ourselves. It is also impossible for us to be completely impartial. We all have been infected with the sinfulness of self-interest and we often cannot help but spin things from our perspective. Only God can judge. Barclay concludes his discussion on this subject by saying, “But it was Jesus who stated the supreme reason why we should not judge others. No man is good enough to judge any other man. Jesus drew a vivid picture of a man with a plank in his own eye trying to extract a speck of dust from someone else’s eye.” No one on earth knows the true condition of another.

Jesus uses another parable to teach us something about the Kingdom of Heaven. In Matthew 13:45-46 he says, “The kingdom of heaven is like a merchant searching for fine pearls. When he found a pearl of great value, he went out and sold everything he had and bought it.” A popular interpretation of this parable suggests that the pearl of great value represents heaven and the only way we can obtain it is by selling everything we own. Others get a similar interpretation but suggest that Jesus is the Pearl of Great price, and we can’t have him and his salvation unless we sell all we own or give everything we have to obtain it. One commentator says that the Pearl is our salvation, which is similar to saying the Pearl is heaven. He writes, “The complete surrender of all possessions is the essence of salvation. It is, ‘I give up everything. I deny myself. I offer my life, both in terms of death, if need be, and in terms of obedience in life.’” He goes on to say that we can claim this great prize as our own “…by denying ourselves, picking up our cross daily, and following Him.” In my humble opinion, this puts Christianity in the same camp as every other religion in which salvation is matter of our own efforts and our own works. I have no good news (Gospel) to share if I have to share that message.

But, according to J. Vernon McGee, you and I are the Pearl! He writes, “The correct interpretation of this parable reveals Christ as the merchantman. He left His heavenly home and came to this earth to find a pearl of great price. He found lost sinners and died for them by shedding His precious blood. He sold all that He had to buy us and redeem us to God.” McGee quotes 2 Corinthians 8:9 here about how Jesus was “…rich, yet for your sakes became poor…” to explain Paul’s view of the Gospel as presented to the Corinthians. I think of Jesus’ own words about his mission to “seek and to save the lost.” He is the “seeker” of the souls of men who are precious in His sight. McGee then looks at the development of the pearl itself inside the sea creature. It’s a speck of dirt or sand. But the host accretes a substance that surrounds the speck over and over until it’s of great value. Jesus saw our sinful lives, an intrusion into his perfection, took them to the cross of Calvary where he accretes us with His love and coats us with His righteousness. See: McGee, J. V. (1991). Vol. 34: Thru the Bible commentary: The Gospels (Matthew 1-13) (electronic ed.) (194–196). Nashville: Thomas Nelson.

McGee looks then at the gates of heaven as described in the book of Revelation and says, “Notice the emblem on the outside of the city—the gates are made of pearls! That is no accident, friend; it is planned that way by Christ’s design. He is the merchantman “Who, when he had found one pearl of great price, went and sold all that he had, and bought it.” Thankfully, Jesus did not see us as the speck of sinful sand that we were, but as the precious pearl we would become. This is good news that can be shared and received with great joy! This great truth transforms believers through a lifelong process of spiritual growth into the perfect character of Jesus which will one day be fully realized in the Kingdom of Heaven where we will finally see Him and become like Him.