josephholubsermons


 

Lent  Midweek
February 24, 2010
Matthew 13:24-30

The Gardening Practices of Discipleship

Jesus tells a parable about a prohibited form of gardening: He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; ²⁵but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. ²⁶So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. ²⁷And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, “Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?” ²⁸He answered, “An enemy has done this.” The servants said to him, “Then do you want us to go and gather them?” ²⁹But he replied, “No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. ³⁰Let both of them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.” ’  - Matthew 13-24-30

One of Jesus’ main teaching methods was the use of story and parable.  The kingdom of God (“kingdom of heaven” as it’s referred to in Matthew’s gospel) is frequently described by Jesus in parable form. The kingdom of God (heaven) is a term that means what life in this world would be like if God sat in the chairs of authority and not the kings, Caesars and religious hierarchies. 

This parable flies in the face of exclusive expressions of Christian religion.  I don’t know if it’s the tendency of the whole religious enterprise or something inherent in human nature or a combination of both and much more, but exclusive expressions of Christian religion, in general, seem to abound and flourish. 

Christianity, especially since it was embraced by Constantine’s in 313 CE, has often become oppressive in the name of God to “weed out” those it has deemed have departed too far beyond boundaries of what is considered orthodox, acceptable and tolerable.  History is littered with church sponsored  persecutions, incidents of torture and even executions in its “weeding out” endeavors. 

One of the earliest persons ever executed as a heretic was named Priscillian of Avila in the year 385 CE.  Priscillian was an extremely strict ascetic renouncing many of life’s normal indulgences, including the renunciation of marriage.   However, he had many followers, including women, who were accepted into the fellowship as equals to men.  He had a growing and loyal following that threatened the authority of the church of that time. His opponents appealed to the Pope – a trial was held – some additional trumped up charges were brought against him, and he was beheaded in 385 CE.   

Of course, we all know about the Spanish inquisition, but you may not be aware that the inquisition movement initiated by the church to “weed out”  heresies and false teachings began in 1184 and in a series of four inquisitions stretched to 1821.  (1184, 1230, 1478, 1536)  The Spanish Inquisition was a particularly brutal period in the history of Christianity with countless Muslims, Jews and “wayward” Christians brutalized by torture and violence-all in the name of God. 

Since the Reformation Christianity has exploded into countless denominational expressions lining up behind dividing lines and boundaries of right beliefs, doctrines and practices.  In the centuries following the Reformation there were trials and persecutions by both Catholics and Protestants across Europe as each side asserted itself against other expressions as the one true expression of Christianity.  Theologian and author Graham Ward wrote, “(The mentality of) true religion was embedded in a culture of violent hatreds; the gospel of love was with threats not only of hell’s fires only, but earthly fires also and instruments of torture.”[i] 

The institutional church of our day has tragically come to be known, especially by those outside of it, as an institution obsessed with boundaries.  It has spent much of its time monitoring others to see what they are doing and believing and how they are behaving, busy creating formulas to determine who’s in and who’s out, whose lost and whose saved, whose true and whose false. 

Rather than working to transform culture, Christian expressions have often mirrored the biases and prejudices of culture and put the stamp of religious legitimation on them.  One of my favorite all-time quotes is from contemporary writer Ann Lamott who writes, “You can safely assume you've created God in your own image when it turns out God hates all the same people you do.”[ii]

This parable of Jesus makes it pretty clear that “weeding” in the garden of the kingdom of God is not to be included in the gardening chores of discipleship . It is just not one of our things.  We can’t handle it.  We are not good at it.  We mess it up every time and any time we try to do it.  Weeding in the garden of the kingdom of God is something to be left up to God.

In Matthew’s day this parable had profound implications.  Matthew’s community was a divided community.  There were at least  two sets of tensions that characterized their community life together. 
     The first tension/conflict was between the followers of Jesus who desired to maintain their ties to the Jewish community and the followers of Jesus who did not. 
     The second tension/conflict was between the Jewish Jesus followers who saw themselves as the true Jewish community and wanted to keep it Jewish exclusively, and the Jesus followers committed to reaching out to the Gentile world.  This was a tension/conflict between Christian Jews and Christian Gentiles.  I mean what a mess!  How many lines, boundaries and barriers can we draw in the name of God and religion?    

So this story appears in Matthew’s gospel as a teaching from Jesus to defuse the conflict and encourage his community to remain a mixed body of followers.  In other words, frontload inclusion, backload your conflicts!

This parable points beyond itself to Jesus’ entire ministry and call to love passionately and radically, inclusively and compassionately – living with the heart of the prophets who championed social justice.  Jesus embodied the love of God and called upon his disciples to embodied it in their lives and their communities above everything else.

We see in the gospels whenever the ruling elites and hierarchies became upset and enraged at Jesus, it was almost always over some sacred religiously legitimized boundary that he had stepped over and erased to embrace the marginalized and dehumanized  people on the other side.     

Jesus embodied grace and we see that for him grace is God’s default setting.  But of course, pure grace was a threat to boundary drawing, exclusive religion.  In the end, all the way to his cross, grace and love were Jesus way, and grace, inclusive love, and compassion are always bigger than any religion can ever contain or comprehend.

As disciples of Jesus we are called to embody and emulate, not the boundary drawing exclusive practices of religion, but the inclusive love of God as expressed in the life of Jesus.  Amen.