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I've often wondered why grass is the preferred ground cover for a lawn. In the first place it is a food source but not for us, for livestock. Cows eat grass. Horses eat grass. Sheep eat grass. But, we don’t let them live so close to the house. They give us parasites. Actually, if we are so insistent on a food source growing right outside the door, we should consider the dandelion. It suits us humans much better not only as a food source, but also for wine and herbal medication – everything our anxiety ridden North American lifestyles need; eat, drink, and medicate. Down south we always said that a mess of greens three times a year kept the pipes clean. I’m can attest that dandelion greens work well for that. Dandelion root tea (possibly the nastiest thing you’ll ever drink) makes the liver very happy. They are also a richer source of Vitamins A and C, calcium, and iron than is spinach. Sorry Popeye. Even the milky juice of the dandelion is useful as bug repellent and wart remover. It would seem to make more sense for us to fill our lawns with dandelions than grass, but we just can’t tolerate a weed.
I have thought long and hard on this matter and I think I have figured out why we prefer grass in our yards: a well-manicured lawn of grass meets some deep psychological need in us to show that our wheat fields are plentiful. After all, grass is just a miniature, ornamental form of wheat. A weed-free lawn would mean that we are very successful. Therefore, a weed in the yard is a deep-seated psychological insult to what we call prosperity and we can’t have that.
So much for lawns, weeds in food crops are an entirely different matter. Weeds didn't become weeds until humanity became agriculturally based. Before that, weeds were simply plants in the flora that could be food or a remedy for whatever ails you. So, we let them be. Yet in a field of wheat or in a garden, weeds can wreak havoc on food production. There was a study that showed that weeds and food plants could co-exist up to three weeks in a plot of soil without encroaching upon one another's water and nutrients. But, if a weed goes four weeks, crop production can be reduced as much as 50% depending on the plants involved. When it comes to actual food production weeds aren’t just an insult to our vain need to appear prosperous. They are harmful and need to be removed.
So, looking at Jesus’ Parable of the Weeds we should be surprised that the sower tells his servants to let the wheat and the weeds grow together. That's preposterous. But the sower gives his reason and it’s a good one. If they were to pull up the weeds, they would also uproot the wheat and destroy the whole crop. Hmm...How can that be? Well, you have to know that there is a somewhat poisonous weed present particularly in Israel and Syria called the darnel. When it is sprouting it looks like wheat and you can't tell the two apart until it is too late. While sprouting the darnel will intertwine its roots with the surrounding plants so that if you try to pull it up you will destroy the roots of its neighbours. The only way to deal with darnel is to let it grow along with the wheat until harvest time when it happens that the wheat stalks will bow over in worship because of the weight of the seed while the darnel, which has a nearly hollow seed, will stand straight up. Then, you go through the field and remove the darnel and then harvest the wheat.
Jesus uses this parable to describe the kingdom of heaven. The kingdom is being sown into the world as individuals who have been made alive by God in Christ through the gift of the Holy Spirit. Yet, there are also weeds sown by Satan that look like the children of the kingdom but are evil imitations. The only way to tell them apart is at harvest time when the children of the kingdom are bowing over from the weight of the fruits they have born, a gesture of humble worship, and the children of the evil one are standing straight up, their empty fruits bearing no weight as if to say “Pick me first. I'm fruitful.” A life of true, heartfelt worship and compassion is what tells the wheat from the weeds.
Well, if we were to look at the world today, the field, we would not be too far afield to say that it looks like there was way more evil seed sown than good. There is a great deal of evil in the world and indeed we all are infected with it. Truly, one thing we must remember when talking about evil is that it has infected everyone and everything, so that there is no way anyone of us can point the finger of judgement at somebody else without first pointing it at ourselves. We each have done evil things even when at the time it seemed like the right thing to do. We have all done and continue to do evil and if we want God or government to go on an evil-cleansing tirade, then we have to be prepared to let that tirade start with us each. No one is innocent in a world where even our best intentions can wind up being the cause of evil and where evil can be used to do good. In this world that bears the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, not good or evil, we have to be careful not to look at others as if they are simply weeds needing to be removed. It’s way more complicated than that.
So, in this world of wheat and weeds it is better that we deal with our own weediness. We, like the slaves in this parable, have a unique vantage point – it has been given to us to be able to distinguish between what is wheat and what is weed. Therefore, we must look at ourselves. One of the signs of true Christian faith is that we come to realize the evil in our own hearts and our powerlessness over it; that of our own accord we cannot just step up and be evil free like the wheat. That’s what the darnel tries to do. Instead, we must humbly accept that there is no way out for us other than the Triune God of grace acting to save us, free us, and heal us of it. The wheat will entrust their lives to God’s will and care and be grateful and bow in worship before a God who as Jesus of Nazareth become one of us just as we are in our twisted brokenness and lived faithfully that we might truly have life. He suffered evil in order to do away with evil. He died in order to put an end to death. He was raised from death bringing into being a new humanity reconciled to God that is filled with his very life to live under his life-giving reign. He brings us each into this new for of human being by the free gift of the Holy Spirit.
The weeds, on the other hand, will continue to go it on their own. They say they believe in Jesus or God or in just being a good person. They are even for the most part most of the time very good people who do mostly good things. But their hearts are weedy. Instead of taking that long disturbing look deep into their hearts to see who they truly are as persons created in the image of the God of love and grace they step back, shirking that responsibility for this very essential human task and let it ride with that insidious cover-up, “Nobody’s perfect. But I’ve done my best to be a good and successful person. Just look at my front yard. By gummit, I’ve worked hard and it’s weed-free.” The weed seed keeps us from seeing ourselves in light of God's will and care for us; from seeing in all honesty that we can say nothing other than “I” am unable and have been unable to do anything other than fail on most to all points considered when it comes to being a human being created in the image of God who is steadfastly loving and faithful in all he does towards us. True wheat will look at the weed and humbly admit, “There, but for the grace of God, go I.” Wheat doesn’t strive to be a good and successful person; rather wheat tries to make reparation for the hurt it’s caused and strives to be gracious and healing in all its ways.
With this parable Jesus has stated the truth that it is God's business to rid the creation of evil, not humanity's. Jesus says, “Let them both grow together.” The word for “let” in the Greek language of the New Testament just happens to be the same word for “forgive” and our English translations really do not capture the depth of the meaning of that Greek word. Simple permission, simply letting evil to grow in our midst is not what we are to glean from this parable. In the very least the word in Greek means tolerate, tolerate the evil in our midst. Toleration requires active participation from us not just permission to be. Toleration in the very least requires that we be able to recognize what is evil in this world and in ourselves. Toleration means we struggle and suffer to learn how to live with something in our lives that we don't want there and can't get rid of.
If we pull in the Old Testament Hebrew word and idea for forgiveness our understanding will ripen. The Hebrew word we translate as forgive, nasah, means to lift up and carry. We do forgiveness in this world of wheat and weeds just like the four friends who lifted up and carried their paralytic friend to Jesus who could heal him pushing through the mob and busting through the roof of a house to get him there. Jesus looked at them and then said to the man, “Son, your sins are forgiven. Take up your mat and go home.” And he did.
The way we, the slaves of Jesus who share his vantage point on the field of wheat and tares, go about letting the two grow together is by living as Jesus did in our midst - by getting compassionately, graciously, and non-judgementally into the nitty-gritty of the lives of the people around us lifting up and carrying with them their joys and sorrows, their brokenness; listening and hearing their hurts and regrets and offering God’s forgiveness. Being the truest of friends to everyone in our lives no matter who they are or what they’ve done. Looking like Jesus so that they will know him when he makes himself known to them as the One who is compassionate, gracious, and non-judgemental towards them and the One who has always been with them in the nitty-gritty of their lives and the One who will now give them His very life.
So, let’s not get caught up in the weediness of other people. Let Jesus deal with our own weeds and the gracious and life-giving bluntly honest way he is with us, let us be that way with everybody we meet. Amen.
