He had agreed to pay the laborers a penny a day. The men who worked all day thought they should receive more than those hired later in the day, but the master paid them all alike. Just so those of us who have been Christians only a short time will receive the same heavenly reward as those who have lived a Christian life for years. Salvation is just the same to all--it takes sin out of our hearts and fills them with the love of God. We must not put off getting saved; for Jesus said, "Watch, for ye know not the hour when your Lord doth come." This means that we are liable to die without a warning, and we should always be ready. The Wicked Husbandmen Another parable is about a man who had a vineyard and let it out to husbandmen. When the time for gathering grapes came, he sent his servants to the husbandmen that they might receive the fruit. But the husbandmen took his servants and beat one and killed another. He sent other servants, and they were treated in the same way. Last of all he sent his son, thinking they would honor him, but they caught him and killed him. [Illustration] Jesus spoke this parable to the wicked people about himself at that time. Christ himself had been sent to the Jews, who had been the people of God for ages past, but who had wandered into sin. From time to time God had sent good prophets to warn the Jews, but often the prophets were persecuted. At last God sent Jesus, his only Son, and him they killed. [Illustration] The Wheat and the Tares Christ told another parable. It was of a man who sowed good seed in his field; but while the servants slept, an enemy came and sowed tares, or weeds, and then went away so that the servants knew nothing of it. When the wheat grew, the tares also grew. When the servants noticed the tares, they asked the owner what it meant, as they sowed only good seed. He answered that an enemy had sown the tares. But he said that they should let both grow till the harvest, and that then the tares would be gathered and burned, but the wheat gathered into the barn. [Illustration] Jesus explained this: The field, he said, means the world; the owner means Jesus himself; the wheat means the persons who become Christians; the tares are sowed by Satan; and the weeds are wicked men. The wicked men and Christians are together here in this world, but at the judgment-day the righteous will go to heaven and the wicked will be punished. [Illustration] The King's Marriage-Feast Another parable was of a king's marriage-feast. The king invited certain ones to the feast, but they would not come; so he made an open invitation and sent his servants into the highways to invite as many as they could find, and these people came.