Only God Knows the Difference

 Jesus was a storyteller, and he taught and preached using stories – parables they are called.  His stories emerged out of the fabric ordinary life. He told stories about lost sheep, lost coins and lost children; about travelers on dangerous roads; about great banquets, about seeds and soil; about hidden treasures, merchants and pearls; about nets and fish and so much more. 

 His stories made a point that, most of the time, he left up to his listeners to figure out, but his point always had to do with the way the kingdom of God works.  His stories were not fables that had a moral, but were analogies describing God’s operative kingdom in the world – how God works in the world and how we fit in to the scheme of things.

 Last week we heard Jesus tell the story about a sower of seeds sowing seeds in a variety of soils:  hardened path, rocky ground, briar patch and fertile soil.  Today he continues the agricultural analogy,  but this time it’s not different kinds of soil, but different kinds of seeds and sowers. 

Jesus said, “The kingdom of God is like this.  One beautiful morning, a farmer went out to sew his seed in his field. He finished his work, was satisfied with his planting, and went home.  Later that night, with low lying clouds and no moon or stars, his nasty neighbor snuck quietly into his field, looked all around to make sure that no one was watching and the nasty neighbor then planted weeds.  Yes, weeds.”

Now, I must pause for a critical footnote.  The word for “weeds” is a Greek word that needs to be explained since it literally unlocks the power and meaning of the story.  The Greek word for weeds is “zizania” which is a very particular type of weed that looks just like wheat as it is growing up.  You can hardly tell the difference.  Today it is called “darnel” wheat; it looks like wheat, it appears like wheat but it is not wheat.  It’s an imposter weed!  Now, let’s get back to the story. 

“The weeds (“zizania”or “darnel”) and the wheat grew up together.  Months passed before the hired servants noticed something was wrong and asked the owner:  ‘Did you not use good seed in your field?  We’ve got weeds, zizania, that awful imposter growing out there!’ Do you want us to go into the field, and try to discern the difference and pull up those bad weeds right now?’  ‘No, no, no,’ was the owner’s reply.  ‘Let the weeds and wheat grow together.  If you pull up the weeds, you will only pull the wheat as well.  Let them grow together until the harvest time; then the harvesters will come in and cut the field.  They will first gather in the weeds, bind it up into bundles, and burn it.  Then they will gather up the wheat and bring it to my storeroom.’” 

This story dramatically illustrates at least two critical things about the kingdom of God.

First, in the world the weeds and wheat grow very close together, and even become intertwined and are often indistinguishable from one another. 

In Jesus day there was a group of very religious folks who really thought they could discern the difference between the wheat and the weeds.  They weren’t bad people.  They took God’s law very seriously, and were committed to living their lives according to their understanding of God’s law.  But there was no single group of folks that annoyed Jesus more, or Jesus’ admonished more that this group.  They were called Pharisees and they were the super religious people of Jesus’ day and time, and they were infected with the idea they could discern between the wheat and the weeds. 

They had disdain for Jesus and his followers because, in their view, Jesus chose, as his disciples, those that the Pharisees thought were nothing more that nasty weeds in the kingdom of God.

The contemporary Christian Church seems to have caught the same infection.  Christians spend far too much time casting suspicious and judgmental eyes upon others.  Christians, right and left, are strutting around these days in the garments of self-righteousness suggesting that those who disagree with them are the weeds in the garden of life, while they themselves are the expressions of the authentic grain.

In the 19^th century Protestant Revivalism swept across America.  This movement had a profound influence upon our society and culture.  When you got up off your knees at a revival meeting after committing your life to Christ your commitment was interpreted both as a spiritual change and vocational decision.  At many of the revival meetings representatives of voluntary societies for social reform were there to sign you up to do work for God’s kingdom:  societies that were advocating everything from anti-slavery, women’s rights, compulsory public education, more humane treatment of prisoners, and prisoner rehabilitation to name a few.  In other words, when you were changed and rearranged spiritually, you were also changed and rearranged in your interactions with your culture.   It didn't matter whether you were Methodist or Baptist, Calvinist or Armenian, Reformed, Episcopal or Lutheran. The slogan that emerged to unite Christians to work for a new world was: "Doctrine Divides/Service Unites."  Many Christians of diverse faith backgrounds joined hands to champion causes of justice they perceived to be work of the kingdom of God.

That slogan is equally true today, but contrary to the 19^th century revivalism we seem to be living too much of time in the first half of the slogan, as Christians are taking it upon themselves to do wholesale weed pulling in the kingdom of God by writing people off over an assortment of issues ranging from doctrinal beliefs to political issues.   

Wouldn’t it be something if we could put doctrinal disagreements on the back burner and truly focus on the hard work of joining hands to address the great issues of our time that are root causes of so much of the suffering on this planet: the desperate plight of poor people and poor nations; diseases such as HIV/AIDS, and environmental issues that will have long term implications for God’s created order. 

The same is true in the wider diverse world, not just the Christian world.  It’s a rush-to-judgment world with so many doing the futile work of trying to discern the darnel from the wheat. 

That takes us to the second thing.  It is God who is in charge of discernment between the wheat and the weeds; God who is in charge of judgment and separation; God who is in charge of the harvest.

I was watching a baseball game on T.V. a couple of weeks ago and there was a close play at home plate.  The outfielder made a fantastic throw, and the runner was called out.  The runner thought he was safe, and he jumped up and got right in the umpire’s face, screaming his protest.  The manager came sprinting out of the dugout, pulling the player away, and then he continued the heated and animated dissent.  First, he went nose to nose with the umpire!  Then the manager choreographed his protest by assertively pointing at home plate; then he was back in the umpire’s face; finally the manager kicked dirt all over home plate.   The whole time the umpire was fairly calm, more or less just taking it, but when the manager kicked dirt all over home plate the umpire made his move, the only move that really mattered in the whole fracas - the familiar forward motion of the arm and hand pointing to the locker room – a universal sign that every baseball fan knows, “You’re outta here!”

The only opinion that counted in that conversation, if you want to call it that, was the umpire’s.  Nothing else really mattered.  The player and the manager could protest all they wanted; disagree all they wanted; think they were right and the umpire wrong all they wanted – but the only opinion that mattered was the umpire’s.  The players don’t get to call the game, the umpire does.  And God has made it pretty clear that in His kingdom, whether we like it or not, or whether we act that way or not, God is the umpire and we are the players, and it is God that gets to call the game – not us.

One last thing really important thing:  What is true about the weeds and wheat growing together in the field of the outer world is also true of the inner world of each one of us.  Perhaps a personal lack of recognition and confession of this truth lies at the root of many of our world’s problems?  I don’t know what it’s like for you and your inner world, but when I look at the inner garden of my life I see both wheat and weeds growing side by side.

I see the wheat of humility, but I also see the weeds of self-righteousness and false pride growing nearby.

I see the wheat of concern and compassion for those who suffer, but I also see the darnel of apathy and indifference.

I see the wheat of generosity, but I also see the zizania of self-indulgence.

I see the wheat of true honesty growing next to the weeds of deceit and hypocrisy.

I see the wheat of forgiveness intermingled with the weeds of hot anger that withholds forgiveness.

I see the wheat of confession of my sin growing among a patch of weedy rationalizations and excuses.

If I’m honest about the garden of my own life, this is what makes Jesus’ explanation of the Last Judgment so frightening.  In confessing that I’m both wheat and weeds I know that I cannot sufficiently weed my garden to satisfy the divine demands of the Last Judgment.  And if I think I can I am only deluding myself.  The harder I try to weed my own garden, the more prolifically the weeds will grow!  The ultimate point of the parable is at the Last Judgment every single one of us deserves the furnace of fire. 

So what are we to do? To whom can we turn?  We turn to the Divine Weed Puller, our Lord Jesus Christ, and we throw ourselves upon His mercy and His mercy alone – and nothing else.  You see, it is on the cross that He has already weeded the garden – yours, mine and everyone else’s. Our only hope is grace; the forgiveness of sin that flows into our gardens in the blood of His cross that removes the weeds - for us.  The apostle Paul put fancy theological words to it in Romans 3:23-24: “…since we all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God; but we are now justified by His grace as gift… through faith.”

Jesus’ cross stands in the middle of the wheat field: the wheat field of the outer world and the wheat field of your inner world.  Through his body and blood, by grace through faith, Jesus Christ removes the weeds.  When you allow your garden to be flooded with that grace, there is now the opportunity for that grace to spill over into the outer world, even to those you might consider to be nasty weeds of God’s kingdom.  Then, and only then, will you see the futility of trying to be a weed-puller and surrendering that job God to pull the weeds by His grace because only God knows the difference.