Sunday Sermons

July 17 , 2005 — Ninth Sunday after Pentacost

Moira Anne Guertin Merrill, In-Care Student
Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43

The Wheat, the Weeds and the Truth

On my first day of seminary I was told that: 
Preaching is truth through personality.  Truth through personality.

As I stand before you for the first time,
Imagine for a moment: You will be hearingGod’s truth –the truth of God-Through my personality. 
That’s scary stuff. For you AND for me…

Which is why I think you should know…we all share that blessing…that responsibility…We all carry God’s truth within us. 

Truth comes to us in several ways, and through several personalities.
 God himself is embodied in three personalities.
Three entities within one being- the Father, Son and Holy Spirit.
 We believe in one God who miraculously comes to us
In different ways and at different times and yet- is always with us. 

We know that God is here today- Truth through personality.  Mine and yours…
So- if truth comes in so many forms and through so many venues-
how do we recognize it when we hear it?  It’s all in your perception…

Divine truth is certainly not something that we can see or touch or understand in black and white terms.
It may come to us in ways that we don’t expect and at times that we are not ready for it.
In this life we will never fully understand God’s plan or ultimate truth…
but we must always be ready to listen.

In preparing for today, I read the parable in Matthew several times.  
I understood why the farmer let the weeds grow alongside his crops.
It made sense to me that if he had tried to pull the weeds While the crops were still growing he would risk damaging the wheat.  It did seem necessary to wait until the harvest to separate the weeds from the wheat.
If you look at all of the parables in the Bible,
You will notice that the parable that we heard today- Is the only one that Jesus actually explains to his disciples.  After hearing this story the disciples approached Jesus saying: “Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.” 

And Jesus does just that.  He tells them:
The field represents the world. The wheat represents the children of God
The harvest time is the end of age when the righteous will be gathered…and brought to Heaven.  
Now, there is scholarly debate about whether Jesus actually explained the parable or if the explanation was Matthew’s. But, either way- the explanation is right there in the Bible. So, as I first began to prepare this sermon;
I thought :  it’s all right there:  “The righteous will go to Heaven.  AMEN.
Whether it was Jesus or whether it was Matthew that actually said it-
My work was done for me.  An explanation had already been given.

But then, I thought:
If preaching is supposed to be truth through personality
and today’s Gospel lesson has already been explained…
Does this mean that even God isn’t quite ready for my personality?

I wasn’t willing to buy that…It’s all in your perception…so, upon further reflection I thought: 
Maybe God is challenging me to dig deeper…Maybe I need to be looking for a little more truth And worry a little less about personality…
What is the truth?  What does God want us to do?
What can we learn today from a story about a farmer and his crops two thousand years ago?

There is truth to be found in the parable…The righteous will go to Heaven…But perhaps we need to dig deeper…Clearly we understand from this story
that it is not our job to cast away people that we think are weeds…
But perhaps it isn’t about just allowing the weeds to share our garden. 
Perhaps we need to dig deeper…

Maybe as Christians we need to embrace the weeds
and to celebrate the differences among all of us…

After the harvest, and after separating the wheat from the weeds;
I would guess that the farmer in the parable used the wheat to bake bread.
The weeds were burned in a fire.
But what if that was the fire upon which the bread was baked?

Perhaps the truth is that the weeds were just as necessary to make the bread…
When I first heard it put that way it certainly made me think twice about the weeds…

Really, some might go as far as to say that Jesus was a weed…
He had radical ideas and he acted on them.  He was politically and socially disruptive, He was different from his peers. Jesus certainly stood out in the society in which he lived.
Because of his beliefs, his actions, his ministry, He was ultimately put to death.
And yet…Today, everything that we believe;  Everything that we trust and hope and know to be true in our hearts-
Is based on the life and ministry of Jesus…The life and ministry of a social outcast, a non-conformist…A weed in the garden…It’s all in your perception…
Perhaps there are judgments to be made and differences to be determined at the ultimate harvest time…but that is up to God…

In the meantime, please remember: God’s truth is in each of us…
and the truth is that it takes more than wheat
to bake the bread we all share…