“Jesus told them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away.’” Matthew 13:24-25 (NIV).
This parable is a farming story–one of many that Jesus taught. It follows one of Jesus’ most famous farming parable–the Parable of the Sower–about the farmer who scattered seed widely and discovered some of the seed landed on the good soil and bore much fruit. And other seed landed on rocky, weed-filled, packed-down soil and didn’t produce much fruit.
This parable in Matthew 13:24-30; 36-43 is a realistic teaching–that whenever we try to sow the seeds for God’s word and share His love, there is always an enemy trying to undermine our efforts. This parable is about weeds that grow up amongst the wheat. We all know about weeds, which grow naturally and take little effort, and cause problems. But Jesus points past the weeds to an enemy, who intentionally plants weeds.
THE ENEMY
Who is this enemy? “The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the people of the kingdom. The weeds are the people of the evil one, and the enemy who sows them is the devil. The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels.” Matthew 13:38-39 (NIV). We have an enemy and his name is Satan. And he is real and he is actively attempting to undo what Jesus and His followers are doing for the Kingdom of God. As we sow the seed of God’s word (something every follower of Jesus should be involved in), as we sow seeds for love, faith, hope, forgiveness, prayer, patience, and justice in our world, the enemy is sowing seeds of hatred, anger, despair and frustration.
Satan will use whatever is available to bring anxiety and frustration to grow his harvest of anger, despair, discontent, and frustration wherever he can.
But one key fact we need to remember is that Satan's cause is a losing one. The war is over, Jesus defeated Satan upon the cross once and for all, and all we have is the mop-up operation. He does exist, but he ultimately will fail and be defeated.
FALSE WHEAT
Here is the interesting twist in this parable. Because the parable is not just teaching us about the enemy of the Gospel we face. The parable is also showing us one of his favorite strategies that is very clever and tricky. When the farmer sows the good seed, the enemy doesn’t try to dig it up. He doesn’t try to burn down the crop. He doesn’t poison the wheat, or steal it. Instead, he plants weeds in the midst of the wheat. Weeds that look, at first, just like the wheat. The Bible calls this false wheat, this weed as “tares” or “darnel”. This fake wheat looks just like real wheat until it bears seed, then it droops and is easy to distinguish from the real wheat. But by then, the false wheat roots have intertwined with the roots of the wheat so that if you pull the weed you would also uproot the wheat.
“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?’ ‘An enemy did this,’ he replied. The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ ‘No,’ he answered, ‘because while you are pulling the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them. 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.’” Matthew 13:27-30 (NIV). Even though the farmer’s servants want to go and destroy the weeds, the farmer wisely holds them off of that plan. Because pulling up one would pull up the other also. Instead, the farmer’s plan is to let them both grow up together until the harvest. Then at harvest, they can collect the weeds and burn them before they harvest the wheat.
This parable teaches us that we can’t do it all. We can’t fix the world, everyone’s problems–what do we do? We are encouraged to be patient and wait for the final harvest. We have to trust God’s ways and God’s purposes–sometimes it is only afterwards can we see God’s plan being worked out in our lives and in the world.
WHAT DO WE DO ABOUT ALL THE WEEDS?
We have an enemy. We are in a battle. We will need God to give us patience, faith and hope. But what about all the evil? What is our direction? In the middle of our very complicated world, what we must do is–keep planting seeds. We need to focus on planting wheat. All will get sorted out in the end. When it comes time for the harvest, our task is to simply make sure that there is plenty of wheat to gather.
Also, in our world, it is easy to get discouraged, as we see what seems to be out-of-control growing weeds. But Jesus reminds us repeatedly that the seeds we plant will bear fruit. The weeds will not win and the wheat will prevail ultimately.
A FINAL WORD:
It is great news that our world has a Master Gardener who expertly knows exactly what He is doing. He promises all will be sorted out in the end, by the only One who is truly capable of sorting it out. So, we are freed up to joyfully sow the seeds of God’s Kingdom in this world. We can sow those seeds of God’s mercy, grace and love in our homes, and in our communities. And then trust God to bring the harvest.
The evil in the world? The enemy will keep on sowing the seeds of evil. But we can’t worry about that, and we don’t have to.
