Wheat or Weeds?

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“Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, ‘Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn’” (Matthew 13:30).

Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ!

A man and his wife had just moved from an apartment in a large city to a new home out in the country. It was springtime and he was eager to get outdoors and work in the large flower garden the former owners had made back of the house. But everything was pushing up at once—tulips, thistles, blades of grass, hyacinths, weeds, and dandelions! And then there were those curious, fuzzy leaves that were coming up all over the garden.

The garden had to be weeded. But there was a hitch—which ones were the weeds? The obvious ones were no problem. But what about those with the fuzzy leaves? So he asked his neighbor. “Oh, they’re weeds!” the neighbor answered. His wife said, “No, I think they’re some kind of flower.”

But the man thought, “There are just too many of them. Besides, they’re kind of ugly—they’re probably just weeds!” So he pulled and pulled and started to clean out the garden and all the fuzzy leaves. Unfortunately, as anyone who’s ever weeded a garden knows, no matter how careful he was he still ended up pulling a few of the plants that he wanted to save.

Just before he was finished a sudden rain shower came up. He got busy with other things and ended up leaving one little patch of fuzzy leaves on the end—where the most beautiful, brilliant yellow daisies bloomed in late summer. Moral of the story: You must be careful when you’re pulling weeds. And as Jesus points out in our text, you also must be careful how you react to weed-like behavior. Just because something looks like a weed, it doesn’t mean it is.

As a Christian, I must confess that there are times when I get frustrated and discouraged by evil in the world. And since that evil is carried out by people, I get angry with the people who do such evil. Like the terrorists who turn themselves into bombs, or the “churches” that bend doctrine and practice to the whims of social justice warriors, judges who legislate from the bench, government officials that fail to speak up for the poor, weak, helpless, and hopeless.  

There are even times when I get frustrated at people who profess faith in Christ, who claim to be heirs of His kingdom, but who do some very weed-like things. Maybe you feel that way too. We may want to take matters into our own hands. We may want to lash out or passive-aggressively make them aware they aren’t welcome around us.

Can you relate? Is that the way you feel? If so, you’re in the right place! Jesus’ parable of the wheat and the weeds is intended for our hearing, so listen up! Not only does Christ intend that hearing His parable will ease our frustration, but much more, He also intends that His Word would yield kingdom heirs, more heirs of the kingdom than if He simply stamped out all evil right now.

Last week, in the parable of the sower, we saw that God’s Word is the seed that works in people’s hearts, bringing them to faith in Christ. But one of the obstacles to a fertile faith is weedy soil. Jesus explained that the cares of this world and greed for wealth choke off the good plants.

The parable of the wheat and the weeds is a history of the world from creation to Judgment Day. God plants good seed that becomes the good plants, heirs of His kingdom. Unfortunately, the enemy of God, the devil, has also been at work in the world sowing weeds. Having failed in his attempted coup of heaven, Satan has launched a counterattack. Not able to touch God Himself, Satan lashes out at the Lord’s highest creation—man. Not able to defeat Christ—the Seed of the Woman, Satan seeks to defile Christ’s bride—the Church.

But remember, though the devil is powerful and dangerous to us, his power is limited. The devil can’t create but can only destroy. Deception and intimidation are the main weapons in his arsenal. His twisted sense of joy comes not from watching his weeds grow but from watching the wheat die. So he has sown his bad seed—sin—into the world.

Sin is lawlessness, rebellion against God. And just like the weeds that plagued those who work the soil ever since the fall of our first parents, sin has infested this world. The whole creation is in bondage and groans inwardly as it awaits redemption because of that first seed of sin that was sown. We are born in bondage to sin, death, and the devil because that seed was sown.

Just look around and it’s easy to see. Obvious examples include idolatry, murder, abortion, sexual sins, child abuse, substance abuse, greed, slander, and gossip. I’m sure we could go on for hours decrying all the evil that is out there in the world and how things need to change. We might even leave here feeling good about ourselves, about how in tune we are spiritually, how much we care, and how we are so much farther along in our own personal growth than others seem to be.

But that would be a distraction from the real reason why we are here. We are not here to change society, to weed out the evil; we are here to be changed ourselves by God’s Law and Gospel. We are here to learn about the weeds that have been sown into our own lives, and how the Lord deals with the evil in us with His Word, bringing us to repentance. We are here to learn how to deal gently, lovingly, and patiently with the weeds that have been sown in others.

Like the sins I’ve already mentioned, some weeds are obvious. But the weeds in this parable are most likely darnel, which has grass-like foliage and spikes resembling that of wheat and barley. In fact, darnel looks so much like good grain that it’s hard to distinguish it until the time the heads develop. By then it’s much too late to take care of the weeds without harming the intended crop itself.

God works through His Word and Sacraments to plant good wheat in His kingdom of grace (the Church), but the devil is still hard at work even there planting weeds. And it’s hard to tell them apart! Hypocrites continue to exist within the Church, and because only God can see into a person’s heart, they may go undetected and even rise to positions of responsibility and oversight.

And, because Christians are at the same time sinner and saint, we sometimes do weed-like things out of weakness, too. No wonder people often blame God or the church with the actions of individual people or associate an outward structure or form of polity as the Church instead of recognizing the marks of the Church as God’s Word and Sacraments.

But Jesus’ parable helps us understand why things are the way they are. Things are the way they are because this present age is a period of grace. The wheat and the weeds are intermingled in the world and in the visible church. To pull one may pull out the other. That’s why we are to be careful with others in the world, and must especially be careful with how we deal with one another as brothers and sisters in Christ. In our efforts to root out what we think to be the weeds, we could end up damaging a lot of wheat. We could end up damaging or tearing out someone else’s faith or we could cause damage to the Church at large.

We are called to look in faith to the Sower. He came to fulfill all righteousness and be the perfect sacrifice for our sins. Through His Word and Sacraments, Christ is active in making us wheat and heirs of His kingdom of glory. In Baptism, He clothes us in His righteousness. In His Body and Blood we receive forgiveness and are strengthened in faith unto life everlasting.

We are called to be patient, confident the harvest will come. We are not to take matters into our own hands. Church history provides many examples of this terrible mistake, each of which caused a whole lot of unnecessary damage to the Church and its individual members.

This does not mean that we should ignore false doctrine or openly impenitent sinners. We are to patiently seek reconciliation with a brother who has sinned against us, but when a professing Christian is publicly living in sin we are to call them to account, praying they will recognize the error of their ways. Yet, with respect to sins of weakness on the part of fellow believers, “love covers over a multitude of sins.” Love is patient, kind, selfless, and keeps no record of wrongs.

God is using this time of grace to work in our lives. What is more, God is using this time to work in other people’s lives. Each of us has a lot of weed-like behavior that still must be removed, but Christ has died for all those sins. Knowing this, helps us patiently expect the way things will be. The harvest is coming. Our loving Savior will send His angels on the Last Day to gather the harvest. We are called to trust that He, not we, will do the sorting. Those who have not believed in Christ Jesus will face the torments of hell.

But Jesus doesn’t want that to happen to anyone. That’s why He closes this parable: “He who has ears, let him hear.” Our loving Savior doesn’t want this parable to go in one ear and out the other. So He calls us to trust that faith in Jesus Christ will distinguish us from the sons of the devil. He calls us to trust that through Christ, we will “shine like the sun in the kingdom of [our] Father.” 

He who is the Sower and the Lord of the harvest calls you to trust that He will save you and bring you to the heavenly kingdom of His Father. So, as you are confronted with the evidence of evil all around you, don’t lose heart. Our Lord calls you patiently to trust Him as He patiently reaches out to others. He has begun a good work in you. He is faithful and will bring it to completion on the day of the harvest. Even now, for Jesus’ sake, you are forgiven of all of your sins.

In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

Unless otherwise indicated, all Scripture quotations are from the Holy Bible, English Standard Version, copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.