Matthew 5:46-47

5:46 For if you love those who love you, what reward do you have? Even the tax collectors ¹  do the same, don’t they? 5:47 And if you only greet your brothers, what more do you do? Even the Gentiles do the same, don’t they?

Matthew 10:29

10:29 Aren’t two sparrows sold for a penny? ²  Yet not one of them falls to the ground apart from your Father’s will. ³ 

Matthew 13:27

13:27 So the slaves ⁴  of the owner came and said to him, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Then where did the weeds come from?’

¹ sn The tax collectors would bid to collect taxes for the Roman government and then add a surcharge, which they kept. Since tax collectors worked for Rome, they were viewed as traitors to their own people and were not well liked.

² sn The penny refers to an assarion, a small Roman copper coin. One of them was worth one-sixteenth of a denarius or less than a half hour’s average wage. Sparrows were the cheapest items sold in the market. God knows about even the most financially insignificant things; see Isa 49:15.

³ tn Or “to the ground without the knowledge and consent of your Father.”

³ tn See the note on the word “slave” in 8:9.