When Weeds Get in the Wheat

Pastor S. Carter McNeese

Parables of Jesus, Earthy Stories of the Kingdom • Sermon • Submitted 6 years ago

Matthew 13:24–30

Matthew 13:36–43

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Where were we last week?

What is a Parable?

Story that compares two unlike things, that is rooted in nature or common life, that is often creative and vivid, and that should spur us to action.

Where were we last week?

Jesus - Kingdom of God

Looked at the Parable of the Growing Seed.

Learned three things:

We must scatter the seed of God’s Word widely and liberally.

God, not us, is ultimately responsible for the growth of the Kingdom

There is a process to spiritual growth and we must give ourselves and others the grace, the time, and the space to grow and mature.

Parable of the growing seed found only in Mark and right after the parable of the sower.

Parable of the weeds in the wheat is found only in Matthew and right after the parable of the sower.

Likely that Jesus told many of these parables over and over again and that Matthew and Mark are recording separate times when the parable of the sower was told. Once, Jesus followed it with the Parable of the Growing seed and Mark records that and another time he followed it this parable of the weeds in the wheat and Matthew recorded that.

But it is clear that Jesus connects these two parables that we have looked at to the parable of the sower.

It can seem that, since Jesus gave an explanation to the disciples as to the meaning of this parable that it is all over and straight forward.

And that straight forward message is a good one and not one to be missed

But this is one of those times that if we don’t dig a little deeper we may actually be missing the full message that Jesus is trying to tell us.

Fear of Terrorism - all of the things that we do to try and prevent it.

Bioterror

too many zombie movies?

Too many stories about polio outbreaks?

Or wondered why they weren’t still immunization against small pox

Dying at the hand of some sort of bio agent scares me more than just about anything else.

This parable describes a kind of bio-terror

Not small pox in blankets or anthrax or pneumonic plague in the mail,

a form of terrorism none the less.

The parable we are looking at today is a form of bio-terror. True, it isn’t small pox in blankets or anthrax or pneumonic plague in the mail, but it is a form of terrorism none the less. See an enemy of some sort has sown weeds in with the good seeds of wheat that the householder sowed in his field. These aren’t any seeds, however. It’s not like its dandelions. The Greek gives us the clue that these are more than likely seeds of darnel. Darnel is a plant that is not only poisonous in its own right, it also regularly carries a fungus that can be death to wheat. Additionally, it also looks a great deal like wheat and it is almost impossible to tell the difference before the grains mature. At that point, the wheat turns a golden-brown color while the darnel turns a noxious black.

The Greek tells us that this is a type of weed called darnel.

poisonous

caries fungus that can kill the wheat

This sort of thing was done widely enough that there were Roman laws against it.

See an enemy of some sort has sown weeds in with the good seeds of wheat that the householder sowed in his field.

It’s not like its dandelions.

Greek gives us the clue that these are more than likely seeds of darnel. Darnel is a plant that is not only poisonous in its own right, it also regularly carries a fungus that can be death to wheat. Additionally, it also looks a great deal like wheat and it is almost impossible to tell the difference before the grains mature. At that point, the wheat turns a golden-brown color while the darnel turns a noxious black.

To sow darnel seeds in and amongst the wheat carried the potential to harm the planter financially by ruining his harvest, but if done in a widespread enough fashion, it could also jeopardize the food supply and even poison someone if the darnel wasn’t adequately separated from the wheat. These sorts of sabotage were so common, however, that there were Roman laws addressing the problem and laying out punishments for sowing darnel and other weeds in another’s crop. So while this isn’t on par with a truly devastating terror attack, in in the first century it was something that was taken extremely seriously.

Unlike many of his parables, Jesus offers an explanation to his disciples on this one. The sower is the Son of Man, the field is the world and the crop that comes from the good seed are the children of the kingdom. The one that sowed the bad seed is the enemy, the devil, and the crop that springs forth from that seed are the children of the evil one. The harvest is the end of the age and the reapers are the angels. The good crop will be reaped and spared while the weeds will be thrown into the fire.

Easy peasey lemon squeezey, right? That’s all we need, let’s go home!

Not quite. Even though Jesus provides his disciples, and us, with a framework for understanding the parable, there are still layers to get through.

1) This parable serves as a warning to us both as the Church and as individual believers that there are things, and maybe even people, can grow in our midst and can appear healthy and good, but might be choking the very life out of the good that God has planted for his kingdom.

We all know people like that, right, people that can’t seem to get their act together, that are always letting toxic people into their lives.

They don’t think that the people are toxic. In fact, they often think, at least at the outset that they are great.

But we all do the same thing, don’t we? We make decisions that we think are good and healthy but end up being bad for us.

College relationship

2) See the problem is that we are not able to tell what is good from what is bad.

Sometimes hind sight is the only thing that will show us the truth

Harvest time the darnel turns black

How many things in history are there to show us that we make poor decisions in the moment that lead to our own destruction

How many stories in the Bible?

David

Supposed to be in the field with the army

The New International Version Chapter 11

In the spring, at the time when kings go off to war, David sent Joab out with the king’s men and the whole Israelite army. They destroyed the Ammonites and besieged Rabbah. But David remained in Jerusalem.

Already not doing what he is supposed to.

Continues to make a series of worse and worse choices, but in the moment he doesn’t see how they are going to destroy him and everything that he has worked for.

But that is what happens.

But David still isn’t able to see it until Nathan comes and tells him, well, a parable. Only then can David see what he has done, how what he has done is evil.

But it still destroys so much. And in the end actually leads to the splitting of the Kingdom and even the eventual destruction of Israel, Judah, and even the temple itself.

Now David didn’t mean for any of this to happen. He didn’t see the poison that he was letting into his own life and the life and the nation, but it still happened.

And it was only in hindsight and with the input of Nathan, God’s prophet, that David was able to see what he had done.

But sometimes if we go in and start rooting around in our lives trying to root out what is evil, we will pull out the good instead.

There is a great lie abroad in the world today

I’d say it is new, but it isn’t. It is the same old lie.

It is the lie that says that we can do it, that we have the ability to figure out what is good and what is not.

Saw an article this week about the “False Gospel of You Be You.”

Until the last few decades, we were, globally and cross-culturally, able to acknowledge that there were some things that were simply wrong. It was wrong to murder. It was wrong to rape. It was wrong to steal. It was wrong to oppress the least of the these. Now certainly these things still happen, after all we live in a world twisted and tortured by sin. But there was still almost universal acknowledgment that some things were beyond the bounds of acceptability. Isn’t this the ultimate idolatry, foregoing the mark that has been provided for us, assuming that the mark that we set is more fair, more just, more loving, more compassionate, more true, more righteous, just more. Jesus couldn’t actually mean what he says about turning the other cheek, could he? I’m sure not, I’ll set a standard that is more realistic. Jesus didn’t mean what he said about forgiving those that do evil, I’ll set a standard that is more just. Jesus certainly didn’t mean it when he spoke out against wealth and greed, right? I’ll set a standard that is more fair. Certainly, Jesus’ teachings about sexuality and marriage don’t apply, right? I mean we don’t get married at 13 anymore and it isn’t realistic and people might get their feelings hurt so let me set a new standard that is more loving.

The ancient Hebrew wisdom tradition would claim that these universals were still derived from God, even when they are found in a people that doesn’t know God. After all, the wisdom teachers tell us, God is the Creator of the universe and He wove his Truth into the fabric of creation in such a way that through careful observation and thought one could determine at least some of God’s truth independent of further revelation from him. This is not unlike what John is saying when he says that the Word was present and active in Creation and that all things came into being through the Word.

But from the very beginning humans have tried to buck that objective mark and have endeavored to set their own. The very last verse of Judges () states it: we all do what is right in our own eyes if we do not recognize the King: Jesus. Isn’t this the ultimate idolatry, foregoing the mark that has been provided for us, assuming that the mark that we set is more fair, more just, more loving, more compassionate, more true, more righteous, just more. Jesus couldn’t actually mean what he says about turning the other cheek, could he? I’m sure not, I’ll set a standard that is more realistic. Jesus didn’t mean what he said about forgiving those that do evil, I’ll set a standard that is more just. Jesus certainly didn’t mean it when he spoke out against wealth and greed, right? I’ll set a standard that is more fair. Certainly, Jesus’ teachings about sexuality and marriage don’t apply, right? I mean we don’t get married at 13 anymore and it isn’t realistic and people might get their feelings hurt so let me set a new standard that is more loving.

It is important to note that this was not a minority within the German Protestant Church. This was the majority of the Church. The majority of those in Germany that claimed Christ as savior, that proclaimed his death and resurrection, that went to service every Sunday, that claimed the bible. These were the people that were packing halls and supporting a church and a theology that preached among other things:

· the removal of all pastors unsympathetic with Nazism

· the expulsion of members of Jewish descent and other undesirables who might be formed into a separate church

· the removal of the Old Testament from the Bible

· the removal of "non-German" elements from religious services

· the adoption of a more "heroic" and "positive" interpretation of Jesus, who in pro-Aryan fashion should be portrayed to be battling mightily against corrupt Jewish influences

In the face of this a group of pastors of theologians, unwilling to bow to Hitler and the Nazi party, came together in what was to be known at the confessing movement or confessing church. As part of this they drafted the Barmen Declaration of Faith, a statement of ecclesial and theological independence. Included in this group were such minds as Dietrich Bonhoeffer and Karl Barth. This amazing document, rooted in Lutheran and Reformed theology, served as a rallying point for all those in the Church in Germany that did not wish to bow to the idol of Nazism, Power, and Authority.

In full discloser, we must admit and own the fact that very few of the Baptists in Germany opposed the regime in the way that Barth, Bonhoffer, and the Confessing movement did. Lulled into a sense of security by a promise, basically kept, that the state would stop persecutions of Baptists, most Baptists in Germany gave at least tacit approval to the Nazi regime.

I offer this as a 20th century illustration that there are still idols that can lead the Church astray. To many in Germany what was being offered to them looked good. They were being offered, once again, a privileged place in society, power, and authority. All of the moral ambiguity of the Weimar years was to be swept away and order and decency would be restored to Germany once again. This looked like wheat.

But in Truth it was Darnel; it was poison. All they were asked for in return for what they wanted was to surrender ecclesial and moral authority. They had to turn their backs on people that weren’t really all that much like them. After all, Jews, Romani, and Jehovah Witnesses didn’t really come to church all that often. And so, many German Christians sacrificed the Gospel on the altar to the Idol of political expediency and social power. The weeds choked out the wheat.

I give thanks for the witness of the true wheat, of those in the Confessing Movement that stood tall and allowed their true nature as products of good and true seed to be seen. The witness of the Confessing Church even now inspires believers in China and Burma and other places where the state seeks to control the Church. Barth and Bonhoeffer have, together, probably had more influence on the church in the second half of the 20th century and into the 21st than any other single theologian. When it would have been easy to see the Church die in Germany after the war, it hasn’t, although like many of the quasi established churches in Europe, the German Church is facing difficulties. But the current chancellor is the daughter of an East German Pastor who found the strength to stand up to the Stasi and others in the East German state, in no small part motivated by the confessing churches resistance.

What is it that looks good to us today, but which is not of God and will poison us if we give it the chance? Where are the weeds that are springing up in our very midst, threatening to choke the life out of the wheat? Please don’t take from my example that it is always or only political idols that we should be wary of. Just in the last couple of decades our own denomination was shaken apart by some who turned a certain view of biblical interpretation into an idol. There are those that this very morning, are bowing to the idol presented by prosperity preachers, those who would have you believe that God simply wants your best life for you and that if you are faithful God will provide all you need, assuming you name it and claim it.

There are those in the Church that are still beholden to the awful idol of Racial Bigotry and prejudice. And there are those that in the name of love and acceptance have decided that the Church should hence forth remain silent on matters of ethics, unless of course we all agree with every jot and tittle of their every position.

This is why the ideal of a free church in a free state is so important, for it is only in freedom that we can choose to worship our creator and our redeemer. Coercion, of any kind, simply lends itself to idolatry.

It is not only the idols that find themselves into the Church, however, that we should be worried about. There are also the idols that wend their way into our individual hearts and that serve to poison us and turn us from God.

I’d like us to note that it is not the plants growing in the field that gets to choose what is good and kept and what is false and burned up. It is the workers, on the order and authority of the land owner, that will be making that call, separating the wheat and the weeds. There is a mark that we should measure ourselves against, a plumbline. That mark, that measure, is not set by us and isn’t decided comparatively, us comparing ourselves one to another. No, this mark is objective, outside of ourselves, and set by God.

But we live in a time in which an understanding that such an objective measurement, in fact even the notion of objective truth, is called into question. All knowledge is, we are told, relative, including and especially moral knowledge. When we see great tragedies occur, we are to ignore them and allow them to continue, after all, it is just their culture and who are we to judge.

Let me be clear, much damage has been done in the name of colonialism and us forcing our European culture onto people groups all over the world, and I certainly think that we must be careful. But the selling of Yazidi and Christian women into sexual slavery by ISIS is an objective moral wrong, as is the mutilation of young girls in the name of “tradition” and “culture.” And the wholesale slaughter of twins or others that are born in ways that violate tribal taboos in Madagascar is wrong no matter how you slice it. Until the last few decades, we were, globally and cross-culturally, able to acknowledge that there were some things that were simply wrong. It was wrong to murder. It was wrong to rape. It was wrong to steal. It was wrong to oppress the least of the these. Now certainly these things still happen, after all we live in a world twisted and tortured by sin. But there was still almost universal acknowledgment that some things were beyond the bounds of acceptability.

everyone did as they saw fit.

The New International Version. (2011). (). Grand Rapids, MI: Zondervan. we all do what is right in our own eyes if we do not recognize the King: Jesus. Isn’t this the ultimate idolatry, foregoing the mark that has been provided for us, assuming that the mark that we set is more fair, more just, more loving, more compassionate, more true, more righteous, just more. Jesus couldn’t actually mean what he says about turning the other cheek, could he? I’m sure not, I’ll set a standard that is more realistic. Jesus didn’t mean what he said about forgiving those that do evil, I’ll set a standard that is more just. Jesus certainly didn’t mean it when he spoke out against wealth and greed, right? I’ll set a standard that is more fair. Certainly, Jesus’ teachings about sexuality and marriage don’t apply, right? I mean we don’t get married at 13 anymore and it isn’t realistic and people might get their feelings hurt so let me set a new standard that is more loving.

When we do this, and let’s be honest, we all have done it at some point, we are setting ourselves as the one that gets to set the measure. We are saying that we are our own God and that we are the ultimate arbiter of what is moral and not, what is just and not, what is righteous and not. I have come more and more to believe that this is the root of all sin, this hubris, this idolatry. Name me a sin and I will bet you it is an outworking of this idolatry of self.

ONLY GOD

Only GOD

Only God

What then are we to do?

Parables are to spur us to action, right?

One of the essential characteristics of them

But perhaps the action that we are being called to is an action of inaction.

Jesus is calling us not to get out into the field and start weeding. He knows that we will make a hash of it.

I’m not saying that we just blunder through life without thought or discernment. No, those of us that are believers should understand that there is poison out there and we should do our best to avoid it.

We do that when we allow the plumbline of God to reign, we we allow God to reign in our lives, allow him to be King, say to him that “I am second, father, and you are first. I surrender to you and to your standard.”

Now, of course we will not meet it. We can’t meet it on our own. There are times that we are still going to make a hash of things. That is why we so desperately need him.

WE need to not do anything.

WE need to give up the idolatry of self that lies to us, that says that we can do it.

WE need HIM

We NEED the KING! To turn the fields of our lives, our church, our community, over to him. When we get out there and think that we need to start mucking about, determining what needs to grow and what needs to come up, we are going to mess it up. And we are showing that we don’t have faith in Him to take care of it.

SO, let us be aware that the weeds are present, that the enemy is fighting the Kingdom. But let us also turn over the field, the filed of the world, the field of the Church, and the field of our own heart, let us turn them over to God. Let us pray that God do his work in weeding these fields and in bringing in the harvest. And let us be mindful that we don’t plant any of the bad seeds ourselves. I think we are getting enough help in that area from the enemy, let’s not contribute!

If this morning, you would like to turn the fields over to God, to give up the lie that you have the right to make the determination about what is wheat and what is weed, if you would like to unite with this church family, or make a public decision of faith, either for the first time or as a renewal, or wish to publically declare that God is doing some work in your field, join me at the front as we sing…..

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