Reading: Matthew 13.24-
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How's your garden lately? With the colder, drier weather, the garden has needed more attention and the lawn less. After all the rain we had at the beginning of the year, we had almost forgotten the necessity to water!
But how's your garden? Having a battle with weeds lately? Well, the dry weather has,
thankfully, affected weeds as well as wanted plants, but – have you noticed? – the
weeds seem to be good survivors. Dry as they may seem to be in that ill-
Every gardener has a battle with weeds. Some work hard to keep themselves in the winning position all the time. Others look ruefully at the garden and reflect that their struggle isn't making much of an impression. And others again seem to have conceded defeat!
You'll have to decide which description fits you best. My mother was a gardener,
so, while I find it difficult to maintain a garden at the present, I am not neutral
to the presence of weeds. I can be walking along a footpath and see some cobbler's
pegs growing next to a power pole -
How safe are the weeds in your garden? Have they got a great future? or are they an endangered species?
The thing about weeds is that they are unwanted intruders into the gardener's plan. They are making untidy what was planned to be beautiful. They take moisture and nourishment from what the gardener has planted. They've got to go!
The man, in the story of Jesus, planted only good seed. His battle with the weeds was complicated by an enemy who came at night and sowed weeds among the wheat.
These were not ordinary weeds which would be recognised early and rooted out, but darnel, which is common in Israel and resembles wheat except that its grains are black. In its early stages you can't tell the difference. By the time it can be recognised, it's too late – it must be left there and dealt with at harvest time. It couldn't be rooted out without pulling up good wheat as well.
So the man tells his servants, "Let the wheat and the weeds both grow together until harvest. Then I will tell the harvest workers to pull up the weeds first, tie them in bundles and burn them, and then to gather in the wheat and put it in my barn" (v. 30).
Last week we said that Jesus wasn't teaching farmers how to grow a crop when he told the story about the sower. That's true with today's story too. But perhaps his hearers all knew cases where such a malicious joke had been played. The story itself may have been very close to them in that sense.
But it was really about God's Kingdom and the world we live in. The way life works out often raises questions for us – and for others we meet. If there is a God of love, as you say, it is argued, how come there is so much violence and evil in the world?
And what about the church itself? If it is truly the Body of Christ, who is so little of the character of Christ visible in its members? And there's the rub! We can find explanations for the presence of evil in the unbelieving world, but with the church, we believe and know that it should be different.
Thirty years ago when we were in Toowoomba, my pastoral responsibility included the
Rangeville Church which was experiencing rapid growth. They had not long before moved
into the new, enlarged church building. A decision had been made not to have memorial
plaques on the various items of furniture that were donated. The largest donation
was the pulpit and, under some pressure, an exception was made, but the plaque was
on the rail facing the preacher but not visible to the congregation. The verse on
it came from John 14.21. Some Greek-
Her comment was not without its point. However, when I look at you, I do not see you as the Lord does – he alone can look at the heart. I may or may not be aware of the burdens you carry and the joys that are yours – but then do you understand mine, either? And the extent of your relation to the Lord isn't revealed by the gusto or reticence with which you sing the choruses or hymns, or even the manner in which you listen to the message.
The Lord of the harvest – the Lord of the church – knows the weeds and the wheat. But, unlike the farmer's situation, there is no state of fixity about it. We have the real possibility of genuine change and faith. We mentioned that also when talking about the sower and the soils last week. The Lord still desires – longs – that all should come to salvation. Those who may now be like the weeds still have the opportunity – by his grace and his Spirit – to become like the wheat, to make good.
It may come as a surprise to us that the farmer instructs his workers not to pull out the weeds – yet. There is the clear warning that the weeds will have to go eventually, but leave that to the angels at the end of the age.
We know that the church as we see it today – any church – seems in no sense to be
"prepared and ready, like a bride dressed to meet her husband", in the words of Rev.
21.2. In Eph. 5.25-
That is the church as the Lord intends us to be, but not the church as it is at present. Yet the solution is not ''weeding'' – whoever tries that usually ends up getting rid of wheat as well as weeds. We are all too prone to judge others by whether they are like us – or whether they like us! – rather than whether they truly belong to the Lord!
And in the final count, the question is to us all, rather than to others. We are meant to have fellowship, so if we belong to the Kingdom we ought to belong to the church. But belonging to the church doesn't guarantee by itself that we belong to the Kingdom.
The twelve disciples included Judas Iscariot, the one who betrayed him. And as they reclined at table for that last meal together, Jesus began to tell then that one of them would betray him. They didn't give a knowing nod, "Judas, of course! We have known that all along!" They didn't know – even then – and were upset as they began to ask, "Surely, Lord, you don't mean me?" (Mt. 26.22)
The Lord knows and, as we said last week, he is looking for a harvest in our lives – for them to be different and to make a difference in the bit of the world in which we live. His enabling Word makes that possible. But how are responding to it?
Let us come to him with the attitude that David expressed in Psalm 139:
Examine me, O God, and know my mind;
test me, and discover my thoughts.
Find out is there is any evil in me
and guide me in the everlasting way. (Ps. 139.23-
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© Peter J Blackburn, Buderim Uniting Church, 21 July 1996
Except where otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the Good News Bible, © American Bible Society, 1992.
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