Weeds in the wheat

As a Novice in the Community, my work was varied, depending on which Sister I was working with at the time. One of my memories is the frequent weeding of the herb garden, for which I had to learn to distinguish between herbs and weeds. A frequent offender was mare’s tail, I seem to remember. This brings to mind Jesus’ parable on the weeds and the wheat in Matthew 13 (verses 24-30, 36-43), which is one of the few parables that comes with an explanation. It can be easy to read this as a warning for what happens after we die, for God’s judgement at the end times. Behave, do the right things, or you’ll be thrown into the fires of hell. But this might be a misreading. Is this parable really about what happens at the end times or is it actually about what is happening now? Is it a warning or a promise? What the parable actually says is that the weeds and the wheat grew in the field alongside each other, the wheat being the children of the kingdom and the weeds being the children of the evil one. Only at the harvest will the two be separated, at which point the righteous will ‘shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father’. Yes, this is a warning for those who pursue evil aims, but it could also be a promise. That, in this time, both will live alongside each other; that difficulties will happen. That this is part of life in this world at the moment, but it will not be this way forever. A promise that God takes evil seriously and it will be dealt with. In time, all will be made well. A promise, but one aimed to encourage us to live in the kingdom now, I suspect, rather than focusing us on what will happen eventually.

Living in the kingdom now, therefore, involves living alongside those who do evil, all causes of sin; most of us are probably honest enough to recognise that some of this involves ourselves. This passage is a parable, and life is more complicated that it implies; there is not a black and white division of ‘sinners’ and ‘righteous’ (which is probably just as well, or all of us would be on the ‘sinner’ side). The harvest is still growing at the moment, we are still in the field, so the good and the bad, the righteous and the evildoer are mixed up; we are growing and living alongside each other. That is the way it is now, but it is not the way it always will be. The time will come when all that causes sin, and all evil will be dealt with by God, and all will be as it should be. It is a promise for those who follow God, and a warning for those who go their own way. It is an encouragement to have faith in God. We are called to listen to what Jesus is saying (v 43, end). The kingdom is worth everything we have (see Matthew 13:44-46), and living in the kingdom will not be easy, as Jesus makes clear elsewhere. But we are to have faith: this will all be dealt with. When we go through difficult times, for whatever reason, we  can cling to the God who is Lord over all. That is not to say that we will not struggle, but this parable encourages us not to give up. Eventually, all will come right.

This takes me to the following chapter (Matthew 14). After hearing of the death of John the Baptist, Jesus withdrew to a lonely place. He wanted some time on his own, presumably with the disciples; to have time to grieve? To ponder the implications? Just to have some space from possible danger? We are not told the reason why, just that he went. But he did not get that time alone. The crowds followed him, demanding his attention, and he spent the day teaching and healing, until it was evening. The disciples may also have wanted some time alone, for their reaction at the end of the day is to send the crowds away; Jesus’ reaction is ‘you feed them’, and he proceeds to do so. But after all that, he dismissed both the crowds and the disciples, while he went up on the mountain to pray. Jesus’ focus was on his Father, and he took the time needed to renew that focus, however flexible he had to be about managing that.

So where is our focus? How can we ensure our focus is on God, as much as possible? How can we deepen our faith, so that we can be more focussed on God? Peter provides us with a pertinent example, still in Matthew chapter 14 (verses 22-33). After his prayer, which had gone on way into the night, Jesus is walking across the water, when the disciples spot him. Peter’s response is probably characteristic. He wants Jesus to ask him to come out on to the water. Jesus does so, and Peter clambers out of the boat and, with his gaze fixed on Jesus, starts to walk across the water to him. But he becomes distracted and notices the waves around him, and starts to sink. Jesus saves him, and they both end up back in the boat. Doubting, Peter had started to go under; had his focus remained on Jesus, would he have continued safely? I am not suggesting that we should all test how focussed we are on Jesus by going out and trying to walk on the nearest body of water. But I do think it is an example of what can happen when we get distracted or we lose focus. Naturally enough, we will often see the waves in our lives more than we do Jesus; sometimes we may feel very near drowning. But when we realise that, can we renew our focus on Jesus? Can we put into place whatever strategies are necessary to ensure we have the space to do that? Can we remember the promise of the parable of the weeds and the wheat that, in time, all will be made well, that God is in charge?