Loading...“Bad things come in threes; you’d better watch out!” or maybe you’ve waited for the other shoe to drop. You may have plaintively asked, or heard asked: “Why do bad things happen to good people?”
People of faith have wrestled with this question throughout the ages:
in some of the psalms, by Job (and his friends), in other sacred writings, through prayers of lament and intercession, in a hospital room or through bedside conversations.
Clergy folk of every denomination and faith group are asked this question. Some end up with pat or trite answers, others stumble for words, and still others shrug their shoulders.
Theologians call this a question of theodicy: God and evil and the relationship between the two.
Whatever answer you end up with, this is not an easy conversation or experience.
The truth of the matter is,
evil is all around us.
It is real.
Yet, there is no supreme evil being (called “Devil” or “Satan”), as that would make there to be two powerful beings competing against each other – a heresy called Manichaeism that the church rejected generations ago. The characters “Devil” or “Satan” are used as literary and storytelling devices to personify the reality of evil in our world.
Nor is evil “part of God’s plan”,
part of some workout scheme to “toughen you up”,
but not give you more than you can handle.
This would make God the source of evil in our world.
And, God is the source of goodness and life and love.
~~~~~~~~~~~
It is a tangled mess trying to understand evil in the world that arises out of chaos. Jesus knows that evil is around and that his followers experience it, just as they do suffering, loss, and frustration.
Yet, evil is in a class all its own – as the intent behind evil is to do harm.
So, as Jesus often does, he tells a story, a parable.
And he begins like this: “The kingdom of heaven may be compared to...”
He could’ve said, it’s “something akin to”, or “like”, or “similar to but not exactly the same as....”
The parables that Jesus tells give us a glimpse of what God’s vision is – the kingdom of heaven – for our world right now, as we’re living in it, not as a reward in the afterlife.
The parable that Jesus tells here uses, like many stories, imagery from farming – the everyday life stuff for the original hearers. Jesus tells this story using wheat and weeds (aka tares, aka darnel). In other words, from a botany point of view, Jesus is telling a story about similar looking kinds of grasses.
The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who planted good seed in the field. But, then, in the night when everyone was asleep, the farmer’s enemy came and snuck into the fields to plant weeds (that look remarkably like wheat!). Days and weeks go by and the plants start coming up. Then they start to develop seed heads and the farmer’s field hands notice that they are not all wheat!
WHAT SHOULD WE DO?!?!
Pull up the weeds?
The farmer, knowing the plants, said, ”No, their roots are intertwined,
so
if you pull out the weeds, you’ll also pull out the wheat, the plants that we want to keep. We’ll wait unit the harvest and then sort out the wheat and weeds.”
One of the interesting parts of this story to me is the phrase that the New Revised Standard Version renders “An enemy has done this”, but that, in the Greek, is better read “his enemy has done this” (“his”, meaning the farmer’s). Of course, we have to remember that this is a parable and we cannot make it into an allegory.
Yet, one of the truths that emerges out of the mess and confusion of this story is that God does not will or want evil for us in any shape, form, or fashion.
Our tragedies are not part of God’s plan –
the lost employment,
addiction that robs a loved one of life,
congregations divided,
cancer that returns,
war that forces many to flee as refugees,
a world that turns its back on people in need.
It’s pretty clear that there is brokenness, sin, and evil in the world.
What’s sometimes surprising to realize is that those things are often closely intertwined with what is good, life-giving, and hopeful.
The weeds and the wheat together,
sometimes looking similar until –suddenly—they aren’t;
the good parts and the bad parts of life linked up;
the hopeful and the fearful right next to each others;
and in ourselves, the kind and compassionate thoughts and actions right alongside the petty and mean parts.
~~~~~~~~~~~~
This enigmatic, confusing, and even scary (did we mention the fire?) parable gives us a vision of hope, a glimpse of God’s kingdom:
even though “weeds” are part of life and community, family, congregation, and each one of us, they do not fully define us.
God is at work in the world all the time in and through us.
We are, as part of our own baptismal vocation and life, to be working against the evil, fear, and despair in the world.
We may not be able to solve all the problems out there,
or bring about world peace,
but we can take care of our neighbors and situations
that are right around us.
And, still, the final writing of the story is not ours to pen.
The evil of crucifixion of death that Jesus experienced is proof that – indeed – evil is in our world and that it is real.
But also, that evil was not stronger than God’s love.
The chaos, despair, and fear in our world, nation, neighborhood, and even ourselves, are not the last word.
God’s love and life and hope are.
The enemy who comes and sneakily plants weeds (which look so much like the good seeds!) in the fields of wheat may be crafty and sly and even powerful,
but our Lord is more powerful, more gracious, more merciful, more life-giving, and more loving still.
Go from this place into the world, confident in God’s judgment of mercy and life. Nurture the wheat that is all around and live in the hope that we’ve been given!
Amen
