Parables of the Kingdom in Matthew 13

The strange little stories that we call parables make up about a third of all Jesus' words in Matthew, Mark and Luke. And it's striking how many of them he introduces with the words 'the kingdom of heaven is like...' He seems to think it's really important that we become familiar with the strange character of this kingdom - not just what it is, but also what it's like.

Matthew 13 contains a number of these parables and this series will take another look at some of them, asking what they show us about the character of God's kingdom.