Growing Together in Fields of Grace

Matthew 13:24-43


Our passage of scripture this morning places us right in the thick of Jesus’s Ministry. He has been going about teaching his disciples, speaking in the synagogues, addressing the Pharisees questions, walking through grain fields, teaching when questions arise. As I prepared for this sermon one thing that struck me as new was how Jesus was ever ready for “teachable moments.” This reminded me of my Uncle Stan, on of the more patient persons I know. Stan spent 12 years as the Dean of the Lifeworks partnership at Mars Hill College. One part of his job was working with students in the Bonner scholarship program, a scholarship that required community service projects. My brother was an upperclassman at Mars Hill and the recipient of one of the scholarships. As am upperclassman he was in a leadership role and the driver of one of the vans. The freshman class of Bonner scholars had arrived on campus and they were having their orientation retreat. They had completed a service project in the morning, had broken for lunch and were to meet back at a designated time and place for their afternoon community service project. My brother took his group of anxious freshmen back to campus to see their dorms and such and they ended up sitting around, talking, cutting up and getting to the after lunch meeting destination VERY late. Stan stood their waiting. He was driving another van but gave the keys to another person able to drive and got in the passengers seat of the van Kris was driving where he quietly as they drove to the next destination explained to my brother the responsibilities of a leader, of making sure that his group remained together, of making sure that they were on time. He pointed out that there were people depending on them to get a job done today at a certain time and the tardiness could really affect them. My brother, ashamed that he had disappointed his uncle, began apologizing profusely. My Uncles response, “no, no, no, let’s just consider this a teachable moment. Thus was the first of many teachable moments. I wonder if Stan didn’t learn this teachable moment technique from his studies of the life of Jesus; for in reading through Matthew we find Jesus walking through grain fields, being asked questions, using the moment and the setting to teach a new lesson about “the Way”---about the Kingdom. Right at the end of chapter 12 he gets word that his mother and brothers want to speak to him. He says: “who are my mother and brother?” He then says, as he points to his disciples, “For whoever does the will of my Father in Heaven is my brother and sister and mother.” Jesus uses this moment to teach the crowd something else about “The Way.” People who are followers of Christ treat each other as family. They take care of each other; they take this journey called life together. Imagine what that might mean to the person whose family has rejected them, or to the orphan, or to the widow. Don’t worry my friends, you follow God’s way that I am showing you, you accept all of this love that’s being offered to you and you have inherited yourself a family. Does that mean Jesus has rejected his biological family? Does that mean those of us who are part of a strong family are supposed to reject our families in order to follow Jesus? No! Jesus is very clear to us about the responsibility we have for our parents, the responsibility parents have for their children. Jesus shows us on the cross that he has not rejected his family when he looks down from the cross at his mother and his beloved friend John and says: John, your mother, Mama, your son. As he is dying he makes sure he gives instruction for his mother and his friend to be taken care of. Why a whole sermon could be written just on that little nugget right there. But…..we have only just begun.

It is at that point that we enter into chapter 13, where our text is found today. Jesus has left the house where he is staying with his disciples. As soon as he walks out the door a crowd begins to gather, anxious to hear more about this Kingdom way of living. There are so many that Jesus has to get on a boat so everyone can see and hear. From the boat he begins to tell stories. What! Don’t you mean he preaches? No, he begins to tell stories. What! He doesn’t start reading from the scriptures? He doesn’t start telling them all about God and salvation? He doesn’t hand them tracts pointing them to the Roman Road? He doesn’t paint a gruesome picture of hell? What he talks about planting and farmers, and helpers, and seeds and harvesting, and cooking? Well, if you are wondering this, you are not alone for the disciples wondered this as well…..and they ask him. See, here is another lesson, a teachable moment for the disciples. Jesus explains to them that while they have been with him all along and witnessed all these miraculous things, the people out there, they haven’t. Would they even begin to understand if he spoke to them in the language of The Way, in Religionese. I’m reminded of the first time I had the opportunity to preach as a lay speaker. I was so excited and invited one of my best friends and her 8 year old daughter to come. My friend is not a Christian but I knew that she cared enough about me that she would come support me in this new endeavor. She was excited for me. After the service she was there waiting with a huge hug telling me how proud of me she was. Later, as we talked more about the experience she shared with me that as we told the congregation that we were singing hymn # whatever, her daughter said “What’s a hymn book.” When I said “turn in your bibles to…..her daughter said mama what’s a bible?” I grew up going to church so it had never occurred to me in my 40 years there would be anyone who didn’t know what a bible was or what a hymn book is. Those of us who grow up “in the know.” Don’t think about that very much and what seems to us to be perfectly clear is very muddy and confusing to those who aren’t Christians. Basically Jesus says “if I start talking to them the way I talk to you, their ears are going to shut, their hearts are going to shut. I have to connect with them through what they understand. This crowd understands agriculture, this crowd understands cooking. Tell the stories. The stories are the vehicle through which we connect others to this saving message of the extravagant love of Jesus. Wow yet another sermon in and of itself. Yet, we are only part way there.

After Jesus explains this to the disciples he goes back to the crowd and begins telling more stories. This series of stories is about what the kingdom of heaven really is. It is in this series of stories that our focal passage is placed. Hear it again……The kingdom of heaven in 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. When the wheat sprouted and formed heads,, the weeds also appeared. 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 man root up 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. Skipping down a little ways after Jesus finished speaking to the crowd, he went back into the house where his disciples came to him and said “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.
Do you see that. This reminds me of Sunday afternoons at my grandparents’ house. We returned from church to a home cooked meal my grandmother had prepared and put in the oven before church, with timer set and food ready when we got home. We would sit around the table and the kids would get to listen to the grownups rehash the Sunday school lesson and the sermon from the morning. They would share with each other what they got out of it, what they heard, what they understood, what they didn’t understand. The discussion would move to the living room or the front porch after the meal was done. It is a great memory. Here the disciples are doing the same thing. They were eager to understand completely, not afraid to ask. Jesus goes on to explain it to them: The one who sowed the good seed is the son of Man. The field is the world and the good seed stands for the sons of the kingdom. The weeds are the sons 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. As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. The son of Man will send out his angels and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. They will throw them into the fiery furnace where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear. There is much to glean from this story.

Let me first explain about the weed. The word here in Greek is a word for a specific weed that looks just like wheat. It is almost impossible in the early stages of growth to tell the difference between the two. When the farmhand notices there are weeds he questions what kind of seed the farmer planted and if he planted pure seed why are there weeds? Isn’t that the never ending question? Why is there bad here? The answer someone snuck in and put it there. Well let me get rid of it. No, you might ruin the whole crop. Have you ever sent a child to weed a flower garden? What happens…..the whole garden, flowers and all disappear. Let them coexist. Let me be the judge of what is good and what is bad at harvest time…..the end.

It is tempting to want everyone to think and believe the same. After all our way is the right way. Isn’t it. I am reminded of the cafeteria line at Campbell University. On one side of the cafeteria are those who are in the Baptist Student Union. The other side are those who are not, the heathens. If a member of the Baptist Student Union went through the other line, their faith was called into question. I kid you not. The belief was that if we mixed with those who were not Christians (not in the BSU) then we would become corrupt ourselves. We stayed to ourselves. We ate together, went to church together, did activities together and roomed together. Let me tell you what opportunities were missed living in such a segregated way. We missed opportunities to share our stories. We missed opportunities to learn from others. We missed out on relationships. I have since become facebook friends with some of those “heathens” and oh how I wish I had taken time to get to know them in person back then. I know now what I missed out on. How do we show people the love of Christ when we won’t even eat with them? That isn’t love. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. There are tons of debates going on in the world about who is going to make it to heaven. Will the Buddhist be there, will the Methodists be there, will the Muslim be there, and will the Baptist be there. Who am I to make that decision? Who am I to be the judge. To me, Jesus is saying here you need to live together in this great field of grace I have created for you. In the end good gains victory over evil, let me be the judge. Do we really limit the power of God by thinking that we have to remain with “like kind” to remain pure. How do you suppose others learn about the love of God? By going to church? By having someone knock on their door? By listening to Christian radio? No, others learn about the love of God because someone who has experienced the love of God has chosen to remain in the field with them and to share the stories of their lives with them, and has shown them. The going to church, the listening to Christian radio, the going to Bible studies, that is what follows.

My uncle shared something on facebook that I read right before coming in to deliver this word to you today. I found it very relevant. Isaiah 58:9-10 reads.
Then you will call, and the LORD will answer;
you will cry for help, and he will say: Here am I.
“If you do away with the yoke of oppression,
with the pointing finger and malicious talk,
10 and if you spend yourselves in behalf of the hungry
and satisfy the needs of the oppressed,
then your light will rise in the darkness,
and your night will become like the noonday.


So my challenge to you this week is to:

1. Look for those teachable moments.
2. Resist the temptation to do finger pointing
3. Tell your story
4. Enter relationship with someone outside your comfortable circle, someone different then you.

Jesus didn’t go door to door. Jesus lived his life and the crowds came to him because they saw something different in him that they wanted to learn about. Live a life that draws people’s interest in what is different about you, and then Share your stories.