Merciful Patience

When we hear this parable we often think of God separating the “good” people from the “bad” people at the end of time. While this is one interpretation of this parable, I want to shed light on another one that turns our eyes away from judgement of others and their sinful actions and turns the lens back upon our own heart and disposition.

Think of this parable as Jesus talking to you about your own heart. The Lord has planted a field full of good seed in your heart. These seeds may have come from your time growing up in your family, from good friends and neighbors who walked with you as disciples of the Lord, your parish community that witnessed the love of God in real and tangible ways, or from your own personal journey of faith in the Lord. Whatever the seeds that have been planted, we can be assured that the Lord is active in our lives and He plants good seed in the field of our hearts.

John’s gospel calls Satan the ruler of this world. When we see the enemy in this light, his tactic of destroying all that is eternal becomes more clear. Satan sows weeds in our hearts through the things that are temporal, the things that will not last into eternity. He gets us to focus on these things and to eventually become attached to them, even lifting them up to the level of idol worship in many cases. The ruler of the world wants us to adore the things of this world, because this leads us to turn away from the worship of the one true God.

As Christians, when we look out upon the world today we can see the hold that the enemy has over humanity. This can lead us to become afraid or discouraged to say the least. This too can be twisted by the enemy. When we see the weeds in others we are tempted to then judge them as “bad” weeds, which usually then in turn provides the framework for us to judge ourselves to the the “good” wheat. A final judgement on any one of God’s children is not ours to make. What we are called to do is judge the actions of others and to love them anyway. This is how God looks upon us, with merciful patience. He sees the weeds of our hearts. He knows they are growing alongside the wheat, and yet he waits for the harvest, which is the perfect time for separating the weeds and the wheat.

When we look deeper in the heart of the Master of this parable, we can see the Heart of our Father in Heaven. God loves every single seed that he plants in our hearts. He wants to see each and every stalk of wheat grow to fruition so that the harvest will be abundant. By letting the weeds grow alongside the wheat, he is allowing the wheat to grow and mature to its fullness. The danger of pulling up the weeds too soon is that the wheat will be pulled up along with it. This is a testament to the fact that every single seed, every good thing that has been planted in our hearts matters. It is the desire of the Lord for every goodness in us to bear fruit for the harvest, nothing is wasted.

If you look at it from the perspective of the Master, this requires a lot of patience. He sees the weeds, He knows the weeds are not good, and yet He waits to separate them out. If you think about it, the weeds growing along with the wheat are taking up a portion of the good soil, nutrients, and sunlight that is needed for the wheat to grow to its fullness. While this may seem cruel for the Master to let this happen, consider the fact that by doing so the wheat is becoming stronger, it is made to fight for what it needs to be fruitful.

In this parable, Jesus is teaching us that our Father is patient with the weeds that are growing in our hearts. God watches and waits, and in doing so He allows the wheat to gain strength along the way. This brings about the best harvest.

The harvest in our hearts is a removal of the weeds of our attachments to this world. It is a separation from all the things that keep us from the love of God dwelling richly in our hearts. The harvests are always done at the proper time, known only by God. This requires our patience and a tremendous amount of humility. We wait because the Lord first waits for us. We are patient because He is first patient with us. We are merciful because He is first merciful to us.

In our lives this process of separating the weeds from the wheat will happen over and over again, as many times as we allow the Lord to do so in us. If we wait until our final hour, this separation will be more painful than ever. But by allowing the Lord to do this in us and through us throughout our lives, we are preparing for our final harvest at the end of our life.

By becoming aware of this process in our own hearts, we become more aware of the same process going on in the hearts of our neighbor. When we see the weeds in others, we are called to bear those with merciful patience. We are called to trust that the harvest will come at the proper time for them. The Master gives us a share in seeing the weeds that are in the hearts of our neighbor, not in order for us to condemn, judge, or try to pull the weeds, but in order for us to learn His ways and to follow Him more closely. What tempts us to judgement is also an opportunity to be merciful and patient, all in order to bring about the fullness of the wheat harvest in the heart of our neighbor.