King James Bible
"Whose fan is in his hand, and he will throughly purge his floor, and will gather the wheat into his garner; but the chaff he will burn with fire unquenchable."
John the Baptist describes the Messiah holding a winnowing fork—a tool used to toss grain into the air so wind separates valuable wheat from worthless chaff. The threshing floor represents the place of divine judgment where Christ will completely separate the righteous from the unrighteous. The wheat symbolizes those who bear genuine spiritual fruit and respond to God's kingdom message. Christ will carefully collect and preserve these faithful ones in his storehouse, indicating salvation and eternal security for true believers. The chaff represents those who reject repentance and lack spiritual substance despite outward religious appearance. The unquenchable fire points to final, irreversible judgment—a stark warning that emphasizes the eternal consequences of rejecting the Messiah.