Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43 Hear the Son of Man’s words growing as wheat among weeds!

As a kid, we will take advantage of any opportunity to eat frosting. It could be a frosted cookie, cupcake, cake, cinnamon roll, donut, etc. If one day you were invited to decorate some baked goods with frosting for an event the next day, and during the night someone came and salted all the frosting, you would be upset. The salt would ruin the dessert. The problem with salted frosting is that you cannot recognize it until you have taken a big bite of it because it looks just like sugar.

If we could prevent salted frosting from being served, we would. No one wants to eat salty frosting, but to prevent a salty surprise, the frosting must be tasted. However, taking even a small taste of a finished dessert leaves a mark and may keep someone from trusting it is good to eat. Jesus made a similar point in our Gospel reading from Matthew 13 with his parable of the weeds. Jesus described a scene where a man sowed wheat seeds in his field, but during the night his enemy planted weeds among them. Later, after both had grown up together, the deception was revealed. In response to the deception, we read in Matthew 13, 27 “The owner’s servants came to him and said, ‘Sir, didn’t you sow good seed in your field? Where then did the weeds come from?’ 28 “‘An enemy did this,’ he replied. “The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ 29 “‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 30 Let both grow together until the harvest. At that time I will tell the harvesters: First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned; then gather the wheat and bring it into my barn.’” In this parable, Jesus explains what it will be like on Judgment Day. On that day, it will be revealed who is wheat or a Christian and who is a weed or an unbeliever. At this future date, the believers and unbelievers will be separated, but for now both live together.

Weeds and wheat will live together until Judgment Day. With this parable, Jesus describes the reality of the world until he returns on Judgment Day. There will be no widespread rapture or removal of either believers or unbelievers from the world until Judgment Day when both will go to their eternal destination of heaven or hell. This truth leads to conflict and judgment by both believers and unbelievers because our sinful nature leads us to fight against combining like trying to mix oil and water. We all act like label makers printing out snap judgments of wheat or weed, bad or good, and sticking them on one another’s foreheads to join with those like us and separate from those who are different from us. A world with either group removed would look like my lawn after all the weeds are pulled, which looks like a block of Swiss cheese. At least, with the weeds, the whole lawn is green rather than having large patches of bare ground.

We are not called to rid the world of unbelievers. We put ourselves in place of God by judging others. Unlike God, we cannot see into a person’s heart. Our snap judgments are based on the past and present, not the future. We can think of it this way, if King Saul had been taken early in his life when his trust was in the Lord, we would be confident of his place in heaven, but he died later in life after turning from God, trying to kill the future King David, disobeying the prophet Samuel, seeking the counsel of a witch and selfishly falling on his sword to end his life. Or take, the Apostle Paul, formerly known as Saul after King Saul. If Saul was taken early, he would have died in unbelief raging against Jesus and Christianity, but God graciously preserved his life, changed his heart and the rest of his life he was known as Paul, who battled with the Gospel for the hearts of his own people the Jews and for Gentiles, even proclaiming Jesus to Caesar, and was put to death for the Gospel. When we live as though our job were pulling weeds by ridding our lives or even the world of unbelievers, we are not following Jesus, but listening to our own selfish, fearful hearts and running toward judgment.

Jesus called us to be wheat. Our origin story is found in God. We were given life and have been called to be the people of the one true God as we read in our Old Testament reading from Isaiah 44, 6 “This is what the LORD says—Israel’s King and Redeemer, the LORD Almighty: I am the first and I am the last; apart from me there is no God.” God would not have us spend our time weeding out unbelievers. Instead, we have been planted in this world to follow our King and Redeemer. God rules all things for the good of his people. The source of evil is the devil and sinful humanity who together are descended from Adam and Eve who listened to the devil. When humanity rebelled against God, who is the first and the last, he acted in gracious love to offer his one and only Son Jesus to redeem us from our sins. The promise of redemption for the whole world is recorded in John 3, 16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. The LORD Almighty gave his Son to pay the debt of sin for all people both believers and unbelievers. For all who believe, God gives eternal life and a sobering humility to see they were changed by God from weeds to wheat. Through our Savior Jesus, we are wheat and hear his words describing our eternal future in Matthew 13, 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears, let them hear.

Jesus taught that we all will remain until he returns. The world needs everyone in it to function. Both a believer and an unbelievers can be a cashier, engineer, teacher, counselor, nurse, doctor, homemaker, serve in the military, get married, raise a family, buy a house, etc. The world is a mix of believers and unbelievers like frosting is a mix of butter and sugar. As believers, we may think that preventing the frosting from getting salted, we need to separate out the unbelievers, but that is for God to do on Judgment Day. Our role is to remain as wheat by hearing the words of Jesus with ears of faith, as we read in our Psalm for today, Psalm 19, 9 The fear of the Lord is pure, enduring forever. The decrees of the Lord are firm, and all of them are righteous. 10 They are more precious than gold, than much pure gold; they are sweeter than honey, than honey from the honeycomb. 11 By them your servant is warned; in keeping them there is great reward. 12 But who can discern their own errors? Forgive my hidden faults. 13 Keep your servant also from willful sins; may they not rule over me. Then I will be blameless, innocent of great transgression. Until Judgment Day, the Word of God, both law and gospel, are precious and sweet as our sins are exposed calling us to repent and assuring us of Jesus’ forgiveness, and then in the freedom of forgiveness, we pursue righteousness by keeping God’s decrees. And for the unbelievers around us, we do not know their future, but we can fight for it. In our New Testament reading from Romans 1, we hear a description of unbelievers, 20 For since the creation of the world God’s invisible qualities—his eternal power and divine nature—have been clearly seen, being understood from what has been made, so that people are without excuse. 21 For although they knew God, they neither glorified him as God nor gave thanks to him, but their thinking became futile and their foolish hearts were darkened. As we fight for the souls of those who appear to be weeds, our weapons are not physical, but spiritual. The devil is invisible as if working at night, so we fight the devil with words unleashing the Holy Spirit to do battle in the hearts of people. We might think that it would be easier if we could do miracles like Jesus to prove God’s existence, but these words of Psalm 19 teach us where to point when speaking with unbelievers, 1 The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands. 2 Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they reveal knowledge. 3 They have no speech, they use no words; no sound is heard from them. 4 Yet their voice goes out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world. Use the message of God’s creation to start a conversation with someone whose heart denies the eternal power and divine nature of God. And from there share the love of God to provide air, water, food and shelter for those who do good and those who do evil. Finally, share law and gospel, expose the products of sin as evil, hurt, death and hell, and share Jesus’ sacrifice for our sins, his resurrection, his forgiveness and his promise to bring us to heaven to shine like the sun in the kingdom of our Father, our King and Redeemer, the LORD Almighty, praying for the Holy Spirit to change hearts from weeds to wheat.

As a kid, we will take advantage of any opportunity to eat frosting. It someone came and salted the frosting we were looking forward to eating; it would be ruined. When Jesus told the parable of the weeds, he explained how in the world there are both believers and unbelievers. Our temptation as believers is to try to weed out the unbelievers, but that is for God to do on Judgment Day. Until Judgment Day, we are called to share Jesus trusting God’s word to change the hearts of unbelievers to believe and look forward to shining as the sun in the kingdom of our Father, we will continue to hear the Son of Man’s words growing as wheat among weeds. Amen.

        

Gunnar Ledermann, Pastor Divine Peace Church