We have believed in the Lord Jesus, receiving Him as our Savior, but day by day we have to deal with the anxiety of this age and the deceitfulness of riches. Money is a big lie, deceiving everybody. The anxiety of this age and the deceitfulness of riches are like thorns to choke the life seed in us in growth and to make our heart unfruitful (Matt. 13:7, 22). Many believers are like this. They believe in the Lord Jesus. They call on Him and even pray to Him. Yet some thorns as the anxiety of life and the deceitfulness of money choke the life seed in them.
The above three kinds of hearts are under the enemy's frustrating work, but there is a fourth kind of heart. The fourth kind is the good heart, typified by the good earth. A good heart is a heart that is pure, single, and absolute toward God. It is a heart that does not care for the anxiety of the age or for money. A person with such a heart is pure, single, and absolute only for God. There is no choking of the life seed, no frustration, and no hindrance within him, so the life seed of Christ can grow in him to bear fruit, making him fruitful in Christ.
Man's heart was created by God, but Satan came in to make man's heart either like the wayside, like the shallow earth, or like the earth full of thorns choking the life seed. Satan works so that man's heart would not be available for God's purpose. All the different kinds of hearts in the negative sense are the results of Satan's frustrating work.
Satan, God's enemy, not only frustrates the constitution of the Body of Christ but also works to damage it.
Satan works to damage by sowing tares (signifying the sons of the evil one) in the midst of the wheat (signifying the sons of the kingdom) to restrict and damage the growth and development of the wheat (Matt. 13:25-30, 38-42). Tares are false wheat. At the initial stage of their growth, they look exactly like wheat. It is impossible to distinguish wheat from tares until the fruit is produced. The fruit of the wheat is golden yellow, but that of the tares is black. Today in Christianity, among so many real Christians, there are also some false Christians, Christians in name. At the beginning they look the same as Christians until they bring forth fruit. Then by their fruit people can discern that they are false Christians.
While the Lord Jesus is sowing Himself as the life seed, Satan is also sowing the tares. The farmers are not able to tell where the tares come from, but after the wheat has grown up, some tares are mysteriously among them. This typifies the devilish damage of God's enemy. Among millions of Christians there are thousands of tares, false ones. In the first part of the fourth century, Constantine the Great mixed the church with the world. He brought thousands of false believers into Christianity, making it Christendom, no longer the church.
First, we see the evil spirits as the birds coming to snatch away the word of life. Then Satan has another way. This way is his adding in some false ones to damage the growth of the real wheat. The false Christians among the real Christians always restrict and damage the growth and development of the wheat.