6-11-17 Growing up with the weeds!

Scripture:  Matthew 13:24-30; 36-43

Can you imagine being the most beautiful, colorful, tastey, ripe, amazing, delicious fruit there is. But as you grow, you notice there are more and more weeds growing up around you. What should you do? They are blocking some of your sunshine, drinking up some of your water, using up some of your nutrients. What should you do? They are keeping your ‘fruit-ness’ from being noticed, they ‘ugly up’ your garden neighborhood. What should you do with those…well…those weeds? According to Webster’s dictionary a weed is: “a plant that is not valued where it is growing and is usually of vigorous growth; especially :  one that tends to overgrow or choke out more desirable plants.”

What should you do? Before you answer that, let me give you more background to your particular situation. There was a very loving, caring, creative gardener who picked you out among many to be the special fruit plant that you are. He planted you in the exact place, at the exact time, with the exact surroundings that were right for just you. Things were going so well at first. Your growth was amazing and people marveled at how beautiful you were. But then another gardener came along who despised ALL fruit, who wanted to do away with fruit but was prevented from burning the field or cutting the fruit down. So he got creative and when no one noticed he snuck into the garden under the cover of darkness and planted weed everywhere. In a very short time there was hardly a beautiful vibrant fruit that wasn’t now surrounded by ugly dense life threatening weeds.

          Having that additional information, what should you do? If it were me I would ask my wife to take care of it – she is the queen of weeding. She loves pulling weeds because she loves how beautiful it looks when the weeds are gone. You might ask the gardener to do something about it. You might pray about it.

SO, What Should You Do? WWJD = Ask What Would Jesus Do?

Matt 13:24-30; 36-43

Jesus told them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away. 26 When the wheat sprouted and formed heads, then the weeds also appeared.  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 root up 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.'"

It doesn’t sound like sound logical farming. Most of us would pull the weeds.  By the way. Who planted the weeds? “An enemy?” Yes, but not just AN enemy – it was “his” enemy – the enemy of the one who sowed the good seed. The land owner sowed good seed and His Enemy sowed the weed seed. Why would his enemy do that? Suppose for a moment that the enemy used to be a friend, or even an employee of the land owner. What if the employee thought too much of himself and started acting like he was the boss and eventually the land owner had to fire him. The kind of rage that can come from a fireing can be very intense and aggressive. I had to fire someone who came back that night with their spouse and wiped out all information on a computer and slandered me on the internet. So, it is possible in this story that the person became an enemy because he tried taking over the business and got fired and now he is out for revenge and retaliation.

It is awesome that Jesus teaches these things in parables. In fact, it says in verse 34-35 Jesus spoke all these things to the crowd in parables; he did not say anything to them without using a parable. So was fulfilled what was spoken through the prophet: "I will open my mouth in parables, I will utter things hidden since the creation of the world."

Since we are not in the same culture and time as Jesus it would be awesome if he would sometimes explain his parables. Oh wait, you have to skip past the next few verses and he does just that. This is a Matthew Sandwich Cookie and we need to leave the cream center of the cookie alone for a moment.

36 Then he left the crowd and went into the house. His disciples came to him and said, "Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field." 37 He answered, "The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. (Jesus/God) 38 The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the sons of the kingdom. (Christians) The weeds are the sons of the evil one, (non-Christians) 39 and the enemy who sows them is the devil. (Satan) The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels. 40 As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. 41 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. 42 They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. He who has ears, let him hear.

          Who are thrown out to be burned? The weeds = the sons of the evil one. I was a son of the evil one, you were a son of the evil one – that changed when you invited Jesus to become your land owner and not allow Satan to feed you lies anymore exactly like he did to Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden. There are still many weeds in our surrounding garden. God leaves them there in hopes that those who bear fruit will show the weeds how they can be changed and become beautiful fruit bearing plants as well. As much as the weeds make our garden ugly and seem to impair our growth – we were once like them and a fruit bearing plant showed us how we could be changed – not how we could change but how the gardener – Jesus – could change us. Which is exactly why Matthew put the delicious cream in the center of his cookie for us to feast on.

Matthew Sandwich Cookie – The story & the meaning of the story outside and the cream filling has different but related stories.

31 He told them another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and planted in his field. 32 Though it is the smallest of all your seeds, yet when it grows, it is the largest of garden plants and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and perch in its branches."

33 He told them still another parable: "The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed into a large amount of flour until it worked all through the dough."

          The outside of our cookie tells us the weeds and wheat will grow together – the cream center tells us that God’s kingdom will grow and grow and grow which happens everytime a weed becomes a stalk of wheat – a fruit bearing plant. We must do our part in showing the weeds the way – Jesus said only he is THE WAY!