Weeds and Wheat

PROPERS:          PROPER 11, YEAR A 

TEXT:                 MATTHEW 13:24-30, 36-43

PREACHED AT ST. PAUL’S, MAGNOLIA SPRINGS, ON SUNDAY, JULY 23, 2017.

ONE SENTENCE:        Jesus tells us that the weeds cannot be separated from the wheat while they are growing, but God’s method of ultimately separating the two may be creative.

                                   

            Today we have heard a familiar parable from Jesus’ teaching.  And we even have his own interpretation of that parable – a rare gift of insight.

            I want you to take two lessons away from this gospel.  And I want to remind myself of those two same lessons.

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            First the parable, known as the Weeds and Wheat or the Parable of the Tares.

            Keep in mind that Jesus’ parables are set in a specific time in a distinct culture.  The time was 2,000 years ago.  The setting was half-a-world away.  The society in which he lived and ministered was largely rural and agricultural.

            So, Jesus uses a lot of agricultural images in his teaching.  Take, for example, last week’s gospel lesson, the Parable of the Sower.  He also speaks of the mustard plant, and the tiny seed which grows into that bush.  He talks about grapevines, and he makes frequent mention of sheep and shepherds. 

            That was the milieu in which he lived and taught.  They were familiar, accessible images to his listeners.  The metaphors he used at least had a chance of staying with the people.

            The same is true for the parable we hear today.  His parable included very familiar images.

Ponder the difficulty in raising a crop of wheat in those days.  No modern herbicides. No pesticides. No irrigation to speak of. Seeds were not modified to be disease resistant.

            So, a planter gambled with each crop.

            In Jesus’ parable, good seed is scattered.  The crop is hoped to be a bountiful harvest of golden wheat.  But, after the planting of the seed, someone comes in and sows weed seeds.  The genius of this ruse is that the weeds will largely be indistinguishable from the wheat.  The wheat and weeds will grow together, side-by-side.

            Jesus tells us that the separation will come later – after the harvest.  As the sheaves are bundled, it will become apparent which are the weeds and which are the wheat.  They will be separated into separate batches.  The weeds will be burned – in other words, disposed of.  The wheat will be gathered into the granary.

            What is the point in all this?

            I think Jesus is telling us that we – with our limited perspectives – cannot distinguish between those of us that are weeds, and those of us that are wheat.

            And more to the point, recognizing the complexity of human nature, we cannot distinguish between which aspects of who we are are weeds and which aspects of us are wheat.  Remember that Martin Luther coined the phrase, Simul Justus et peccator – Simultaneously justified and sinner.

            We are complex beings.  We have mixed motivations.  We have hearts and loyalties that are divided.  As Paul noted in the Romans reading recently, the thing that I would not do, I do.  And the thing that I would do, I don’t do.

            Please understand:  I am not equating Mother Teresa with Adolf Hitler.  Not everyone’s brokenness is equivalent.  Behavior does exist on the edges – but those cases are very rare.

            We live in the great center of the human condition. We are much more typical of what Paul describes.  We largely do our best… but not always. Despite our best intentions.

            That is the reason that it is only in extreme circumstances that what I call Formula 409 is used.  That is the excommunication provision found on page 409 in the Book of Common Prayer.  In my 30 years of ordained ministry, I have only seen it utilized twice – by other clergy.

            There are other occasions, too, in which misdeeds cause a person to be removed from a position of trust. There was a case of that just this week involving the Ole Miss football coach. But that is temporal, not eternal.

            There are occasions when someone needs to be told that their actions are looking a lot more like weeds than like wheat.  But those occasions are exceedingly rare.

            Largely, our call is to let the weeds and wheat grow together.

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            Now, to my second point.

            A number of years ago I read a series of novels by the British author Susan Howatch.  Her works included titles such as Glittering Images, Glamorous Powers, and Absolute Truths.

All of her books were theological in nature and set in the Church of England of the early 20^th century. Jonathan Darrow, an older, mystic priest, is the protagonist in more than one of her novels.

            One of the characters asks Jonathan Darrow about the ultimate fate – in the great judgement – of ordinary people who commit significant misdeeds during their lives.  Separating the weeds and wheat.  It is a subject on which we have no experience and on which we can only speculate.

            Darrow, a wise, older priest, says that he has wrestled that issue.  And his belief is that in the time after death, our souls are scoured by God’s divine spirit, with the good aspects of our beings being made eternal, and the evil which we do (in Shakespeare’s words) is separated out.

As the gospel today tells us, the broken parts of our spirits will be thrown into the furnace of fire – in other words, disposed of.  And those parts of our being which reflect the divine, again in the words of the gospel, will shine like the sun in the Kingdom of their Father.

            If you think about it, it is like gold being refined.  The impurities are cast off.  The gold is retained.  But, if we find a nugget of gold, surrounded by less valuable elements, we do not throw it away.

            Each of us is a bearer of internal gold.  Each of us also bears some inert elements.  Each of us represents wheat.  Each of us contains some weeds.

            Let’s grow together.