Sermon for the 7th Sunday after Trinity. The Wheat and the Weeds.

Romans 7: 21- end, & 8: 1-2

21So I find this law at work:Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me.22For in my inner being I delight in God’s law; 23 but I see another law at work in me, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin at work within me. 24 What a wretched man I am! Who will rescue me from this body that is subject to death? 25 Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!

So then, I myself in my mind am a slave to God’s law, but in my sinful nature a slave to the law of sin. Therefore, there is now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus, 2 because through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.

Matthew 13: 24 - 45

24 Jesus told them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. 26 When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared.

27 “The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’

28 “‘An enemy did this,’ he replied.

“The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’

29 “‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’”

36 Then he left the crowd and went into the house. His disciples came to him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.”

37 He answered, “The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. 38 The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the people of the kingdom. The weeds are the people of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels.40 “As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. 42 They will throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears, let them hear.

Do you have any enemies?

In our reading from Matthew we heard the story of a farmer whose field of wheat is sown with weeds – by an enemy. The farmer says to leave them there till harvest, for risk of pulling up the good with the bad.

Sometimes we have to wait for God to separate out the bad from the good in our lives, or in our world, as He is intending to separate out the two come harvest time.

The Parable of the Wheat and the Weeds begins like a simple moral tale.

Jesus, however, takes the story in a different direction.

When the disciples ask him what it means they may well have been hoping to hear about how the enemy got his comeuppance.

Instead the focus of the story shifts to the wheat and the weeds.

Jesus is the farmer, the devil is the enemy, the wheat is the people of the Kingdom of Heaven, and the weeds are the people of the evil one.

In the harvest at the end of the age the wheat and the weeds are separated, the weeds to the blazing fire where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth, and the wheat to the Kingdom of light where they will shine like the sun.

I would have thought that’s not the ending we, or the disciples, wanted.

What about the enemy? What happened to him?

The story was better when it was about the enemy, and we were not under the threat of judgment.

Are we the wheat, or the weeds?

We like stories that point the finger at others, we don’t like it so much when the finger may be pointing at us.

So often people want to conscript God, to sign Him up for their agenda, for God to be angry with those they are angry with – go on God, smite them!

It can be alarming to find that God has His own agenda, and has no intention of taking up ours.

I am reminded of the shock that Joshua got near Jericho.

Joshua was an Old Testament character, the leader of the armies of Israel, one day near Jericho he saw a man standing in front of him with a drawn sword in his hand.

Joshua asked him, “Are you for us or for our enemies?”

“Neither,” came the reply, “but as commander of the army of the Lord I have now come.” Then Joshua fell facedown to the ground in reverence, and asked him, “What message does my Lord have for his servant?”

The commander of the Lord’s army replied, “Take off your sandals, for the place where you are standing is holy.”

As we have someone described as a man, who Joshua worships as God and calls 'Lord', many Christians understand this to be a Christophany – an Old Testament appearance of Jesus.

Instead of demanding God take our side, like Joshua we should fall face down in reverence and obedience.

Take off your sandals, you are not going anywhere, this ground is holy.

Now, if you are feeling under pressure because the focus has moved to you rather than the enemy the usual thing to do is to assume the people under threat, the wicked weeds, are someone else, and that you are safely with the righteous.

Newspapers are excellent at this, they will express outrage at the wicked weeds on our behalf, they know we like it, and that it helps the papers sell... so outrage at the perfidious politicians of the left or of the right, at benefits cheats or tax dodgers, at the feckless young or the belligerent old, all depending on who you think the weeds are, and which paper you buy.

But you cannot read the bible like you read a newspaper, if you think a bible story is entirely about someone else, then you have missed the point.

So are you wheat, or a weed?

Do you, as Jesus taught, love God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind, and do you love your neighbour as yourself?

Have you forgiven those who have sinned against you? Do you love your enemy? Do you bless those that curse you, and do good to those who hate you?

Do you pray for those who persecute you? Do you judge others?

Do you deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow Christ?

On reflection it would seem I may well be a weed. You would have thought that being a Vicar I could be just a little self-righteous.

“Although I want to do good, evil is right there with me...”

That's from our first reading, Paul acknowledging the weeds we allow to grow, and that we even sow.

He asks who will rescue him, then exclaims, “Thanks be to God, who delivers me through Jesus Christ our Lord!”

The teller of the parable, the commander of the army of the Lord, the Lord Himself, the author of life, the narrator who speaks life into being, He is our salvation.

In the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus we see the forgiveness of God.

At Calvary it looked for all the world like the enemy had triumphed, but because of Easter morning we can see sin and death have not overcome life and goodness, and that victory is offered to us all.

Recognising our failure to be holy we can accept as a gift the forgiveness offered by Jesus, and shine like the sun in the Kingdom of his Father.

As Paul writes in Romans 5, “...since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.”

It’s like this, we have all let the weeds grow and sown more, but we didn’t want to see it so we hid in shame, or angrily pointed at others.

The perfect light of Jesus then throws into contrast our dark imperfections, but also reveals the way of our salvation.

We need not live in shame, or self self righteous anger, by God’s grace we can be golden wheat growing in God’s field.

Amen.