God s Wheat Field Mt. 13:24-30, 36-43 Sunday, July 20, 2014 The Rev. Sharon Snapp-Kolas, preaching Scripture. Prayer. Opening. The Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, William Rehnquist, was born in Shorewood, Wisconsin. After law school, his first practice was in Phoenix, Arizona, and while he was there he heard this story about Arizona that pretty well sums it up. In the very earliest days of the settlement of Arizona, the Archbishop of Los Angeles sent a missionary out to Phoenix to try to establish a church there. After two years, the priest returned to tell the archbishop that he could not establish a congregation in Phoenix. Why not? asked the Bishop. Are there no people there? Well, yes, there are people there, said the priest. But those who live there during the winter have no need of heaven and those who live in Arizona during the summer have no fear of hell. (source: James R. Gorman) Good and evil. That s a heavy topic. It s a topic that has confounded believers and atheists alike. It s a topic that has been the subject of many learned books and many learned debates. If God is good, why is there evil in the world? Are people basically good or basically evil? Scholars call it The Problem of Evil. In capital letters. We can almost hear the disciples asking Jesus, Why is there evil in the world? Or Kushner s question, Why do bad things happen to good people? 1
In today s reading from Matthew, Jesus tells a story that addresses the question of human evil. Why does God allow evil people to continue to wreak havoc in the world? We might expand Jesus topic given modern psychology to ask, Why does God allow good and evil to battle within the souls of human beings? It s not really such a modern question, though, is it? The Apostle Paul wrestled with it when he wrote the book of Romans For I do not do the good I want, but the evil I do not want is what I do, (Romans 7:19). The familiar Bible story of the wheat and the weeds is about a field in which God is still at work. It is about good and evil within the world, within the church, and within our own souls. But mostly it s about God s good, generous, hope-filled plans for us all. God is a patient farmer who tends growing things. Theologian Talitha J. Arnold offers some helpful detail about the weeds in Jesus story. The bearded darnel is a devil of a weed. It defies Emerson s claim that a weed is a plant whose virtues have yet to be discovered. Known in biblical terms as tares, bearded darnel has no virtues. Its roots surround the roots of good plants, sucking up precious nutrients and scarce water, making it impossible to root it out without damaging the good crop. Above ground, darnel looks identical to wheat, until it bears seed. Those seeds can cause everything from hallucinations to death. No wonder Jesus uses this noxious cheat weed to illustrate evil incarnate. Bearded darnel, also known as false wheat, is the botanical equivalent of the ravenous wolves in sheep s clothing of which he has already warned (Matt. 7:15). Moreover, Jesus says, this evil is intentional. Unlike the preceding story about a sower, this is not a parable of happenstance, good seed falling onto infertile soil. Here the enemy deliberately sows cheat weed in a field of good wheat. 2
I. The Soul. We might think of our own souls as the wheat field. In that case, we see that God is sowing good things into our lives and the Evil One sowing evil. It feels right, doesn t it? It feels true. Good and evil are at war within our own hearts and minds. I don t know about you, but I am grateful every day for the grace of God that makes allowances for my human sinfulness. I am loved and forgiven and offered a second chance every day, to allow more of the goodness of God to shine forth in my life. God doesn t tear up the field of my life because of encroaching weeds. God waits patiently, with hope, for a good and fruitful crop out of my life. Remember Mr. Rogers Neighborhood? I sure miss Mr. Rogers. It s a beautiful day in the neighborhood; a beautiful day for a neighbor. Would you be mine? Could you be mine? Mr. Rogers used to say: Have you ever noticed that the very same people who are bad sometimes are the very same people who are good sometimes? It reminds me of a story I may have shared it with you before. It s called, Two Wolves, and it goes something like this: An old Cherokee once told his grandson about a fight that was going on inside of him. He said it was between two wolves. One was evil: Anger, envy, greed, arrogance, self-pity, gossip, resentment, and false pride. The other was good: Joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, generosity, truth, compassion and faith. The grandson thought about it for a moment and then asked his grandfather, Which wolf do you think will win? The old Cherokee replied, The one I feed. (Anonymous) God is patient, and waits til the final judgment day to bring in the harvest and sort out the wheat from the false wheat. But we can choose right now, today, to feed God s goodness at work in our lives. Or we 3
can choose to feed the evil that is also at work, threatening to choke out the good. II. The Church. Dennis Kastens comments on the particular choices Christians can make for good. He comments on, the English author, C. S. Lewis, [who], in one of his books, points out that when people become Christians, if they are not careful, their sinning often shifts from the overt, outward, visible sins of lying, cheating, stealing, cursing and swearing, to the more inward, hidden, non-apparent invisible ones... and among them he lists a critical spirit... a spirit of judgmentalism, a censorious attitude. In fact, he points out that these sins are more commonly committed by church people than by those who are not. So prevalent is it in church circles, that it is sometimes labeled Christian cruelty. What is the sin of judging implied in Jesus Parable of the [Weeds]? What exactly is judging? If we see a man walk out of a bar and stagger down the street, it is not judging to say he is intoxicated. That is a statement of fact. Judging is jumping at unverified conclusions. It is relating as fact that which is only hearsay or conjecture. It is reading evil into another s motives merely because it seems obvious. We can be grateful that God does not rush to judgment. God is patient with us. In thankfulness for God s love and forgiveness of us, we can offer love and forgiveness to others. We can learn to see the actions of others as ambiguous. There may be good in what appears to be evil. There may be evil waiting to overwhelm what is good. I think of Leah Newport and her practical, down-to-earth view of people. I would ask her, now and then, for her opinion on various goings on at the church. I would seek her advice. Do you think it will upset folks if we do this, that or the other? I would ask. And Leah would say, matter-of-factly, People are always going to be upset about something. They re always 4
going to find something to get mad about. I just go ahead and do things, and let em be mad or upset! I am missing Leah every day, as are many of you here in this room this morning. One thing I miss the most is her practical, down-to-earth, realistic view of people, including herself. She saw the good in bad people and the bad in good people. And she just went ahead and did things, anyway, doing her best to serve God and his kingdom in a mixed-bag world. In fact, theologian Theodore J. Wardlaw describes the church as a mixed-bag reality. There is wheat among us, and there is false wheat. And it grows within each of us tendencies for good and tendencies for evil. Edward F. Markquart has a vision of the perfect church. It fascinates me. He writes: When I was a young man, during my seminary days of training to become a pastor, my ideal congregation was The Church of Our Savior s in Washington, DC. Among my peers and friends, that congregation was the ideal, the inspiration, the model to which we aspired. It was a small congregation of 200 people who renewed their spiritual vows each year. Their vows were to tithe, to attend Bible study every week, to pray every day, to be politically active for the poor every week. And they signed on the dotted line every year. These people were committed. That was my ideal community in those younger years. But not anymore. Maybe I have matured. But now, I want a community that is wide open to all people, including the uncommitted, the half committed, the lukewarm, the confused, the puzzled, the materialists, the messed up; the addicted, the afflicted: we are all welcome here. We want weeds and wheat in our church and besides, I am no longer sure which is which and who is who, as I used to be as a younger man. This is the image Jesus is painting in his story of the Weeds and the Wheat. This is Jesus vision of the kingdom, of God s invisible church in the world: a living, growing, flawed, 5
messy project of hope for all people. There s a story about a church that hired a new financial secretary. She had grown up in the church, and was so glad to return home from the big city so she could work in her loving home church. One day, after having been there for only a few weeks, she was instructed by the Stewardship Chairman to send out financial statements. When she did, the good church people turned into monsters. The phone calls started coming in. People started complaining. She started hearing complaints about the minister: - the Music... too loud.... or too soft - the air conditioner... too hot... or too cold. - the way people dress in worship. The lack of respect they show when they wear shorts. - the way the minister says a particular prayer. - the way the minister dresses. - and on and on. Is this the church I grew up in? she screamed! A year later, she handed in her resignation. I can't take it any more, she said. The backbiting, the back-stabbing, the complaining, the mean spiritedness of some of the members of the congregation. It's getting to me. Give me the business world any day! she concluded. The pastor didn't say a word. Instead he read her a story from the Bible. In it, Jesus compares the kingdom of God to a newly planted field of wheat. (source: Bob Pettigrew) The church is a mixed-bag reality. We are a motley crew, comprised of wheat and weeds. We are more like weeds one day, and beautifully reminiscent of wheat on other, better days. Hopefully we can be as patient with each other and God is with us. 6
Closing. God s wheat field is, of course, bigger than you or me. It s bigger than the Church. It s bigger than this ball of rock we live on that spins around the sun every year. God s wheat field is the whole of creation; the universe and all that is in it. Patrick J. Willson, a great preacher-theologian, eloquently describes it: Jesus did not say that the kingdom was like a rock, fixed and solid and firm and unchanging. Jesus did not say that the kingdom was like a giant machine that you put some things in and you get some things out and that what you get out depends upon what you put in. He said it was like an enormous tree that grows out of a tiny seed. A tree that grows so enormous that all the birds of the air can come and find shelter in its branches, even strange little ducks like you and me. He said that God was like a housewife who puts a smidgen of yeast in the three measures of flour and that yeast yields its life into the whole batch of dough. That is the way that the kingdom is growing from the very beginning into all that God has intended From the foundation of the world, the very first moment of creation, it is the kingdom that has been on God s mind, and God is infinitely patient as it grows. From the foundation of the world God is infinitely patient Praise God for his patience -- with you, with me, with the Church, with the world, and with the universe, as He awaits the fullness of His kingdom to emerge. The harvest is in His hands. The goodness of the outcome is assured. Jesus has won the victory. Thanks be to God. Amen. 7