Hang on to the hope
Based on Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43.
Video version available on YouTube HERE.
Farming wheat is not for the faint of heart- It takes courage and hope to plant seeds and wait for rain- especially in the arid climate of Galilee. Most years, it worked out. There was enough rain, and enough sun and not too many locusts.
For today’s parable, Jesus adds in another factor to the farming equation which I find unbelievable, even absurd- he asks his followers to imagine something outrageous- imagine that while everyone was sleeping, an enemy of the farmer came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away.
That is SOME enemy. A plotting, malicious yet skilled farmer who so hated the wheat farmer that the enemy collected weed seed, and in the dark of night, spent hours sowing it alongside the field of wheat. That’s a very committed enemy.
What could be the root of this hatred?
And why would Jesus teach about such hatred, such a malicious enemy?
I wonder if Jesus wanted to wake up naive people like myself who don’t like to think about enemies, treachery, hatred and evil in the world. Some folks, myself included, prefer to focus on the good in people, the positives. My life is perhaps sheltered from the realities of such enemies, I have the privilege of being shocked by such treachery.
Before heading to seminary, I once sat in a church class where a priest was leading a discussion based the Baptismal Covenant. One of the covenant questions is:
Someone in the group asked: “Do we really believe in evil?” I looked at the priest. Talking about evil and sin made me squirmy.
One person in the class then spoke up and said: “Evil is real. I see it every day.” He was referring to his work as an Assistant District Attorney. He saw the results of systemic evils in society as he prosecuted people who harmed the vulnerable, who participated in unthinkable evil. He was not someone who regularly attended church services, and I’m not sure if he believed that God existed, but he was very clear that he believed that evil existed. Some of you have seen evil, have dedicated your lives to fighting against it. You know that malicious enemy too well, you have felt the treachery of the enemy planting weeds at night.
In today’s parable, Jesus is not squirmy about the enemy. There are many ways to interpret this text, and as parables are intended to be unresolvable puzzles, I’m going to share a few interpretations for you to wrestle with:
First, the weeds that are planted by the enemy could be darnel, which is a weed that looks so much like wheat that if it’s growing alongside it, you could not tell until it was too late to simply pull it out. So, one interpretation might be that sometimes it’s a challenge for us to discern what it wheat and what is weed. What is good, and what is treacherous.
Second, the farmer tells the workers to wait and harvest the weeds with the wheat to avoid pulling out the good roots that might be entangled with the bad roots. Another interpretation of this parable might be that it takes time to overcome evil, and we must be careful to not throw out the baby with the bath water.
Third, the wheat has been often understood as people who do not take to heart the message of Jesus. This is a problematic interpretation that puts us in the role of judging, when I think the parable is challenging us to withhold judgement, to leave all that to God lest we uproot what is good growth around us.
A fourth interpretation teaches that each of us is a field, with both wheat and weed growing side by side. And we can notice that a part of our soil is nourishing weeds even as a part of our soil is nourishing wheat. And we can tend to the wheat, and trust God to separate good from evil at the right time.
Whatever interpretive lens you want to use here, I would suggest that this parable is deeply hopeful, supplying for us a quiet confidence to face each day trusting in God’s ability to outsmart the enemy in the end. That God knows just how to handle the weeds and the wheat at the right time. The Christian hope comes from a confidence in God’s certain victory over all evil. The Christian hope expects victory, expects salvation, expects redemption for this world.
Many realities challenge the hope that is within us, erode the quiet confidence in God’s certain victory. These realities, like a 24 hour news cycle, injustice, violence, suffering, patterns of thinking, can erode our confidence in God’s ability to triumph, and might convince us that evil is winning. These realities might lead us to think that being hopeful is outrageous, even absurd.
John Lewis, of now blessed memory, had an outrageous hope. Born in 1940, he faced the evils of a segregated society with peaceful protest, with courage, with hope. He faced taunts, beatings, arrests. As a leader of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, Lewis was a committed participant in some of the key moments of the Civil Rights movement, and as a leader, he walked through the valley of the shadow of death — there were dark days, when to hope seemed absurd. He went on to serve 3 decades in Congress, dedicating his life’s work to improving our society, committed to the project of weeding out what is evil in our from what is life-giving. He had a fearless hope, and although he died on Friday after a battle with cancer, his hope for a more just society continues in the work he began. The hope he had for a just world lives on in us.
We carry a hope that will outlive us, a hope that can seem precious and fragile, yet it is a hope enduring and true. It is a hope our ancestors nurtured as they migrated, worked, fought and struggled. It is a hope we carry forward into future generations.
I had a friend Meredith whose grandmother guarded the front door as we came into the house. There was a plastic carpet cover we were supposed to walk on, and we had to leave our shoes on the front porch. If you stepped off the plastic, she fussed at you until you complied. She would practically chase us with her little dustbuster, making sure we did not bring any dirt or grass into the house.
We need to be as vigilant as Meredith’s grandmother, guarding, fussing, sweeping away the things we do not want in our hearts and minds. We must be discerning constantly to attend to not only our words and actions but also our thoughts, because when our thoughts tip over to cynicism and despair, we find ourselves drifting away from the One who can help us distinguish between what is weed, and what is wheat. And we cannot afford to wander from the One who showed us that nothing is too outrageous for God’s love. That God’s love has the power to conquer death, and that is the best, most outrageous thing we can hope in- eternal life with God. Triumph over death forever.
The world has enough cynicism and despair already,
it is time for us to claim that hope that is within us. To grow that hope.
Not a naive hope, but a deep and wise hope in God’s power.
That hope that comes from knowing that we have been changed, by the grace of God.
That hope that comes from seeing lives transformed,
the hope that feeds us because we know, by the grace of God we have
lived this long and come this far
and we did not do it alone.
God has been with us all the way.
In order to feed and water the hope that is within you, you’ll need to get curious. Spend some time today getting curious about what you find hopeful, what restores your hope in God, and seek out more of that. Perhaps old hymns or being in the garden, or watching a toddler play. Young people fill me with hope, especially when they are exploring better ways to care for the environment, and more just ways to live together. Artists fill me with hope, adventurers fill me with hope, courageous people, selfless people, people who take big risks to love and be loved fill me with hope- especially people in recovery who do the hard work of healing.
What feeds and waters your hope? Whatever comes to mind- do more of that. Spend more time with whatever sows seeds of hope in you.
Hang on to hope, trusting that God’s timing is perfect and will win out. Here is a good and true saying for God’s people:
In the end, everything will be alright. If everything is not alright, it’s not the end.
Friends, we’ve got a ways to go until everything is alright, don’t we? Take heart, be strong, and grow that seed of hope that is planted within you, for whether or not we can perceive it, God is at work and God will triumph in the end.
