Living with Weeds

Lord, may we trust your word of grace to love and nurture us in your kingdom. Amen

How good are you at telling good plants from weeds? Some of you I know are very good gardeners. You can march into the yard and quickly identify the intruders, pull them from the soil without hesitation, and toss them into a pile to be disposed of. From there I do not know what you do with them. Does it go into a burn pile, or do ordinary household weeds go into compost or a yard waste bin? I wonder how much gardening Jesus did in his life. Did his mom make him weed their kitchen garden? Even if she did, his parables about farming sound more like they were written by a carpenter than a farmer. Perhaps being raised by a carpenter gave Jesus the mental freedom to imagine things that could happen in a field that someone raised on a farm would shake their head at. Last week he imagined a sower tossing seed all over the place, next week he will talk about a mustard seed, and today we have someone sowing good seed in the field, only to have the enemy come along and sow weeds among the wheat. Skipping to the end of the parable, the weeds will come to a bad end. They will be gathered out of the field and burned.

More than the other Gospel writers, Matthew talks about judgement, mentioning weeping and gnashing of teeth six different times. For those of us who like to focus on the good in the Scriptures, this weeping and gnashing of teeth is uncomfortable. We want to think that in the end, God’s grace will be ultimately irresistible to all people, but that does not deal with the very real pain and flat out evil that is inflicted on so many people in the here and now. Only God is great enough to be able to hold justice and mercy fully together. For us there will always be a longing for those who harm us to get their just desserts. That is why we must always keep in mind who it is that does the judging at the end of the parable. It is the Son of Man who sends his angels and gathers out all causes of sin and all evildoers.

Meanwhile, someone “sowed good seed in his field, but while everybody was asleep an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?’ He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The slaves said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he replied, ‘No, for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of them grow together until the harvest.”

Jesus explained this to his disciples when they came to him and asked him about the weeds in the field. Note they did not ask him to explain the wheat along with the weeds. In their minds the wheat is normal. It is the weeds that throw them. Where you put your focus is important. Jesus backs up and starts with the sower. “The one who sows is the Son of Man; the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom.” So far, so good. God in Christ plants and nurtures good seed. But then an enemy sows weeds that are the children of the evil one, and its hard to tell them from the wheat!

The crowds who first heard the parable would have shook their heads at the householder saying to leave the weeds alone. They likely would have understood the weeds to be darnel, which is a plant that looks like wheat, that hides out in wheat, but that is poisons in the end. Farmers in Jesus’ day would uproot it when they found it, so they did not risk having it get mixed into the wheat at harvest time. The crowds would hear Jesus saying that the householder does not want to take a chance on pulling up any of the good wheat as taking too much risk to protect a too little of the good wheat. But this is a parable. Jesus is saying look at the field. The wheat and the weeds do not always look that different. Are you sure you can tell the difference?

I heard a story of a woman named Solitaire. (1) She was born in the 1960’s to hippie parents and named after a character in a James Bond novel. In 1985, a few months after graduating from high school, Solitaire had a stroke. Her mother rushed her to the hospital. But instead of receiving medical attention, the nursing staff accused her of being on drugs. Whether it was because of her name or her age, she “looked” like bad seed to them. While the staff argued with Solitaire’s mother, the young woman collapsed and went into a coma. When she came out of it three days later, the doctors admitted that she had a stroke, but the neurologist treating her was convinced that she had taken something to cause the stroke. When her toxicology screen came back clean, the neurologist accused her of being on birth control pills, because in some younger women birth control pills can cause blood clots. Solitaire was feeling terrified and too weak to defend herself.

At this point Sister Maura, the principal of the Catholic high school Solitaire had attended, walked in the door. Solitaire describes Sister Maura as a big woman with a deep, commanding voice and a very strong presence. Sister Maura walked into the hospital room, took a look at the situation and started yelling. She backed the neurologist up against a wall, grabbed his white coat collar and made it clear that her student wouldn't be abused under her watch. After a few minutes the doctor muttered something, slumped back against the wall, and then left the room very quickly. Then Sister Maura quietly turned around, sat down in a chair next to the bed, took out a rosary and began to pray. After that the staff treated Solitaire with more respect, like a patient instead of a suspect.

Solitaire looked like a weed. In reality, she was a tender wheat sprout. Fortunately, Sister Maura made sure she was allowed to continue growing.

Because this parable is interpreted by Jesus for the disciples, we often think of it as referring to the church. Can you look at the person next to you and say who is wheat and who is weed? That by the way is one of the reasons we have the passing of the peace. More than blessing our friends, it is an ancient ritual for blessing even those we don’t like. But Jesus says the parable is bigger even than the church. Jesus says the field is the world. The admonishment to not act judgmentally toward others extends to everyone inside and outside of these walls. Who can you think of that feels like they are just taking up space in the garden of life? Leave the judgment up to God. It is not your job. To save the world or to save the church is a gift of God’s grace and mercy.

Because I cannot resist a good story, I have another parable of the wheat and the weeds for you from Barbara Brown Taylor.

One afternoon in the middle of the growing season, a bunch of farmhands decided to surprise their boss and weed his favorite wheat field. No sooner had they begun to work, however, than they began to argue—first about which of the wheat-looking things were weeds and then about the rest of the weeds. Did the Queen Anne’s lace pose a real threat to the wheat, or could it stay for decoration? And the blackberries? They would be ripe in just a week or two, but they were, after all, weeds—or were they? And the honeysuckle—it seemed a shame to pull up anything that smelled so sweet.

About the time they had gotten around to debating the purple asters, the boss showed up and ordered them out of his field. Dejected, they did as they were told. Back at the barn he took their machetes away from them, poured them some lemonade, and made them sit down where they could watch the way the light moved across the field. At first, all they could see were the weeds and what a messy field it was, what a discredit to them and their profession, but as the summer wore on they marveled at the profusion of growth—tall wheat surrounded by tall goldenrod, ragweed, and brown-eyed Susans. The tares and the poison ivy flourished alongside the Cherokee roses and the milkweed, and it was a mess, but a glorious mess, and when it had all bloomed and ripened and gone to seed the reapers came.
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Carefully, gently, expertly, they gathered the wheat and made the rest into bricks for the oven where the bread was baked. And the fire that the weeds made was excellent, and the flour that the wheat made was excellent, and when the harvest was over the owner called them all together—the farmhands, the reapers, and all the neighbors—and broke bread with them, bread that was the final distillation of that whole messy, gorgeous, mixed-up field, and they all agreed that it was like no bread any of them had ever tasted before and that it was very, very good. Let those who have ears to hear, hear. (2)

1 Autumn Barnes, Too weak to advocate for herself, a young woman is saved by a nun Heard on All Things Considered. https://www.npr.org/2026/07/15/nx-s1-5891054/too-weak-to-advocate-for-herself-young-woman-saved-by-nun accessed 7/16/26.
2 Taylor, Barbara Brown. The Seeds of Heaven: Sermons on the Gospel of Matthew (pp. 49-50). Presbyterian Publishing Corporation. Kindle Edition.