This week, we pick up Matthew’s Gospel right where we left off, and Jesus continues to use nature images – this time, to further describe the growth of God’s Kingdom in our lives and in the world. Again there are three images, but they all make the same basic point: God is patient and His kingdom spreads gradually, almost imperceptibly, but it does indeed grow and flourish.
Let’s take a closer look at these three images and how they should inform the way that we think about the growth of the Kingdom in our own hearts, and within the world at large.
First, Jesus compares the growth of the Kingdom to a field of wheat that is infested with weeds. He explains to His disciples that the weeds are the children of the Evil One, the wheat, the children of the Kingdom. Still, the weeds are not plucked out on sight – the weeds and wheat are left to grow together until the harvest at the end of time. Then and only then will Jesus Himself judge which ones shall be burned in the fire and which shall shine like the sun.
Those who doubt the Kingdom of God are quick to point to the existence of evil as proof that their skepticism is warranted. “How,” they ask, “could the Kingdom of God be real and be growing in our midst, if there are still Hitlers and Stalins and Pol Pots and Saddam Husseins in the world?” Even those of us who do believe in the Kingdom are sometimes left to wonder why God allows evil to continue to grow alongside the good.
And we ask this not only because of what we see in the world around us – the evil that we read about in the papers or witness in the streets – we ask this because of what we see within ourselves: a mix of weeds and wheat in our own decisions and actions. “Why” we ask ourselves “do I always seem to be confessing the same sins, struggling with the same temptations? Why doesn’t God answer my prayer to be rid of such evils once and for all?”
Jesus’ parable today makes clear that it is part of God’s mysterious plan that good and evil be allowed to grow together until the end when Jesus Himself will sort the weeds and the wheat. And Jesus makes clear that this is because, despite our thinking to the contrary, we simply would not be able to tell the weeds from the wheat well enough. We’d end up pulling up good wheat along with the weeds.
We have to learn from this parable that Jesus has patience with the seeds He has planted in human hearts. He wants to give them the full chance to become the good wheat He planted, whereas we are quicker to judge and condemn and label. People we would simply write off as weeds are given the opportunity to bear the fruit they were intended to bear . . . and if we’re honest, we’ve all been moved by stories of people who, after years of violence and sin, have turned their lives around and found Jesus Christ.
This lesson should help us have patience with ourselves as well. None of us are purely weed or purely wheat, and we won’t be marked as one or the other until the harvest, when the full course of our life has been run. While we certainly do our best to weed out evil from our lives and from the life of the world, we have to recognize that in His deeper wisdom, Jesus sometimes chooses to allow an evil to remain in our lives while wheat grows alongside it.
The two shorter parables that Jesus also speaks to the crowd bear out similar themes. Jesus compares the Kingdom of God to a mustard seed, the smallest of seeds that when full grown produces a large tree that gives shelter to all the birds of the sky.
Here too we are given an image of God’s patience and the Kingdom’s gradual but definitive growth. “Why” we might ask “did God make the seeds of His Kingdom so small and fragile? Why didn’t He plant His Kingdom in the world in much bigger and stronger batches of grace? This way, the Kingdom would be evident from the start and would grow more quickly.”
But no – it is part of God’s mysterious plan that the Kingdom of God starts small and grows slowly while hidden away from human perception. Jesus Himself takes on flesh and like all humans is nine months in the womb – then He matures as a person for thirty “hidden years” in Mary and Joseph’s home at Nazareth.
So too, in our lives and in the life of the world, the seeds of the Kingdom start small and fragile. God invites us to share in cultivating the graces He has given us, and watching them grow. Like all good things in life – a great meal, a fine wine, a beautiful piece of art – the Kingdom can’t be rushed: it takes time to grow. Its growth may be silent and hidden, but we must trust that God is in fact causing the Kingdom to grow in us and in the world – and when it is mature it will provide a home for all the peoples of the world.
Finally, Jesus compares the Kingdom of God to the yeast that a woman mixes with wheat flour to make dough. It takes only a small measure of yeast to make much larger amounts of wheat flour rise because the yeast is strong and works from within the batch to leaven it.
The Kingdom of God works in quite the same way. First, it doesn’t take an abundance of the Kingdom to produce amazing results. I think we’re sometimes held back from doing more good in the world, from growing in holiness more, because we somehow think that only the Mother Theresas of the world are really able to accomplish such things.
No, the Kingdom grows and spreads, it changes us and the world we live in not mainly through monumental acts, but by little bits of yeast: small everyday decisions that each and every one of us can make to do the good. It’s these little decisions, these little moments of grace that make a life of holiness and ultimately change us completely.
And just like the yeast in the flour, we make these choices for the good in the midst of the world . . . not merely among people who have already risen with Christ in Baptism, but among any number of skeptics and agnostics. Our good living in their midst not only changes us, it influences others from within and ultimately helps them to rise as well.
Friends, all three of these parables should fill us with great hope and confidence. Despite our fears to the contrary, despite the proof we see that evil still grows and thrives, despite the presence of an occasional weed in the soil of our own souls, the Kingdom of God is in fact planted in our hearts and growing in our midst. We have the assurance of our Lord that He is the Master of the Harvest, that the Evil One’s plot will not succeed, and that the harvest of the Kingdom will indeed produce a unfathomable yield. In the words of our opening prayer, it is only for us to remain “watchful in prayer,” to remain “true to Christ’s teaching,” until God’s “glory is revealed in us.”
First, Jesus compares the growth of the Kingdom to a field of wheat that is infested with weeds. He explains to His disciples that the weeds are the children of the Evil One, the wheat, the children of the Kingdom. Still, the weeds are not plucked out on sight – the weeds and wheat are left to grow together until the harvest at the end of time. Then and only then will Jesus Himself judge which ones shall be burned in the fire and which shall shine like the sun.
Those who doubt the Kingdom of God are quick to point to the existence of evil as proof that their skepticism is warranted. “How,” they ask, “could the Kingdom of God be real and be growing in our midst, if there are still Hitlers and Stalins and Pol Pots and Saddam Husseins in the world?” Even those of us who do believe in the Kingdom are sometimes left to wonder why God allows evil to continue to grow alongside the good.And we ask this not only because of what we see in the world around us – the evil that we read about in the papers or witness in the streets – we ask this because of what we see within ourselves: a mix of weeds and wheat in our own decisions and actions. “Why” we ask ourselves “do I always seem to be confessing the same sins, struggling with the same temptations? Why doesn’t God answer my prayer to be rid of such evils once and for all?”
Jesus’ parable today makes clear that it is part of God’s mysterious plan that good and evil be allowed to grow together until the end when Jesus Himself will sort the weeds and the wheat. And Jesus makes clear that this is because, despite our thinking to the contrary, we simply would not be able to tell the weeds from the wheat well enough. We’d end up pulling up good wheat along with the weeds.
We have to learn from this parable that Jesus has patience with the seeds He has planted in human hearts. He wants to give them the full chance to become the good wheat He planted, whereas we are quicker to judge and condemn and label. People we would simply write off as weeds are given the opportunity to bear the fruit they were intended to bear . . . and if we’re honest, we’ve all been moved by stories of people who, after years of violence and sin, have turned their lives around and found Jesus Christ.
This lesson should help us have patience with ourselves as well. None of us are purely weed or purely wheat, and we won’t be marked as one or the other until the harvest, when the full course of our life has been run. While we certainly do our best to weed out evil from our lives and from the life of the world, we have to recognize that in His deeper wisdom, Jesus sometimes chooses to allow an evil to remain in our lives while wheat grows alongside it.
Perhaps it is a lesser sin or evil that we struggle with, and continuing to struggle against it keeps us from falling into a worse sin, indeed the worst sin: the sin of pride. Whatever the reason, this parable of the weeds and the wheat makes clear that we should have the same patience Jesus has, seeing that evil does still exist, but knowing that it does not keep the good from growing as well, and that evil’s fate has already been determined: it will be conquered in the end.
The two shorter parables that Jesus also speaks to the crowd bear out similar themes. Jesus compares the Kingdom of God to a mustard seed, the smallest of seeds that when full grown produces a large tree that gives shelter to all the birds of the sky.
Here too we are given an image of God’s patience and the Kingdom’s gradual but definitive growth. “Why” we might ask “did God make the seeds of His Kingdom so small and fragile? Why didn’t He plant His Kingdom in the world in much bigger and stronger batches of grace? This way, the Kingdom would be evident from the start and would grow more quickly.”
But no – it is part of God’s mysterious plan that the Kingdom of God starts small and grows slowly while hidden away from human perception. Jesus Himself takes on flesh and like all humans is nine months in the womb – then He matures as a person for thirty “hidden years” in Mary and Joseph’s home at Nazareth.
So too, in our lives and in the life of the world, the seeds of the Kingdom start small and fragile. God invites us to share in cultivating the graces He has given us, and watching them grow. Like all good things in life – a great meal, a fine wine, a beautiful piece of art – the Kingdom can’t be rushed: it takes time to grow. Its growth may be silent and hidden, but we must trust that God is in fact causing the Kingdom to grow in us and in the world – and when it is mature it will provide a home for all the peoples of the world.
Finally, Jesus compares the Kingdom of God to the yeast that a woman mixes with wheat flour to make dough. It takes only a small measure of yeast to make much larger amounts of wheat flour rise because the yeast is strong and works from within the batch to leaven it.
The Kingdom of God works in quite the same way. First, it doesn’t take an abundance of the Kingdom to produce amazing results. I think we’re sometimes held back from doing more good in the world, from growing in holiness more, because we somehow think that only the Mother Theresas of the world are really able to accomplish such things.
No, the Kingdom grows and spreads, it changes us and the world we live in not mainly through monumental acts, but by little bits of yeast: small everyday decisions that each and every one of us can make to do the good. It’s these little decisions, these little moments of grace that make a life of holiness and ultimately change us completely.
And just like the yeast in the flour, we make these choices for the good in the midst of the world . . . not merely among people who have already risen with Christ in Baptism, but among any number of skeptics and agnostics. Our good living in their midst not only changes us, it influences others from within and ultimately helps them to rise as well.
Friends, all three of these parables should fill us with great hope and confidence. Despite our fears to the contrary, despite the proof we see that evil still grows and thrives, despite the presence of an occasional weed in the soil of our own souls, the Kingdom of God is in fact planted in our hearts and growing in our midst. We have the assurance of our Lord that He is the Master of the Harvest, that the Evil One’s plot will not succeed, and that the harvest of the Kingdom will indeed produce a unfathomable yield. In the words of our opening prayer, it is only for us to remain “watchful in prayer,” to remain “true to Christ’s teaching,” until God’s “glory is revealed in us.”
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