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| THE 9TH SUNDAY AFTER PENTECOST 17 July, 2005 The Rev. Robert C. Granfeldt |
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Preparing my sermon for this morning has been a real struggle – and not because I’m
just coming off vacation – or, at least, not just because of that! Nor was it that I didn’t
know what I wanted to say – I’ve known from the moment I first read the lessons! No,
the problem was how to say it – how to put perhaps the most difficult, most mature,
most sophisticated of all Jesus’ teachings – and how to say it in a way I haven’t, before.
So if what I have to say doesn’t “work” for you, just chalk it up to vacation lag, or the
weather – or, maybe, to the difficulty of the topic!
Because this morning’s Gospel amounts to one of the most profound statements
about, and descriptions of, God that we can imagine.
This morning we have a parable from the Gospel according to Matthew. But with this
parable, Matthew breaks the rules regarding parables by turning it into an allegory, and
by having Jesus explain the “hidden “ meaning. You’ll recall, I hope, as I’ve said
before, there are no “hidden” meanings to parables: that they are teaching tools, not
mysteries – simple, plain stories with a single point, that are never widely allegorical,
and that are always about God or the Kingdom of God. And when a Parable seems to
break the rules, the parable has been corrupted from what Jesus originally said!
So this morning we need, as we often do, to look at the bare bones of the parable as
Jesus must have told it.
A man sows good seed in his field. But when the seed sprouts and the wheat grows up,
weeds grow up with it. When asked by his men if they should go dig up the weeds, he
tells them no.
To try to dig up the weeds would destroy the wheat. Wait until the harvest, he tells
them. Then we can separate the wheat and the weeds, and just burn the weeds.
Contrary to what Matthew would tell us, the parable is not about the devil. It’s not
about sinners. It’s not about the last judgment. It’s about wheat and weeds. And what
does it tell us?
It makes a very simple observation. That is, that in all of life, in the creation itself, in
fact, weeds grow up with the wheat.
Good comes with the bad. Always. It’s what St. Paul refers to in our reading from
Romans, today, too – about the mix of glory and suffering in life, of hope and futility, of
growth and decay.
Now that may seem so obvious as to go without saying, but it’s not, not really. There
have always been religions – and even factions within our own, Christian religion – that
deny the reality of suffering and evil. That’s what Christian Science is all about, for
example. And there has always been a kind of “Pollyanna-ish” tendency in the Church,
as well, that insists, “God’s in his heaven, all’s right with the world.” So it really does
need saying.
But our parable goes beyond that to something profound. Remember I’ve told you the
parables of Jesus were always, ultimately, about God or the Kingdom? Well, so it is with
today’s parable. And what it says is so incredibly profound that it’s difficult to
understand, much less believe. But it’s so.
The man plants seed. It’s good seed. The seed sprouts and his wheat grows. But with
the wheat, weed seeds sprout and weeds grow. The man looks at it and sees that there
is nothing he can do about it. So he just lets the wheat and the weeds grow, side by
side – the good and the bad. Only at the end can the separation occur, when the good
will be gathered up, and the bad will be discarded. The man can’t do anything about it.
And so it is, too, that God plants good seed – his creation. And with the good seed he
establishes, there also occurs bad seed – imperfection and evil. And like the man in
the story, there is nothing God can do about it.
Oh, but how silly! How ridiculous! God can do anything! How can we think such a thing?
Well, actually, contrary to what we’ve heard all our life, it’s not true to say “God can do
anything.” Not really. For example, you’ve all heard that old, sophomoric question, “If
God is ‘almighty’, can he make something that’s so big he can’t move it?” Think about
it. Actually, that question doesn’t hold up because it’s got some internal contradictions
in it, but it points to some valid observations, involving things that God cannot do – he
really can’t.
For instance, God cannot do evil. Why not? Because he is God, and evil is “not-God,”
or “un-God.” And God can’t hate his creation or anything in it! Why not? Because God
is love, and hate, if not the opposite of love, is at least love’s denial.
The short way to say it is, God must be God; He cannot not be God. So anything we can
say that God is, he is by necessity. And the opposite of that thing, or the lack of that
thing, is something that God cannot be, cannot do! And yet we can also say that God is
radically free! He is free to be and to do and to say and to think anything at all within his
identity as God.
And it is God’s radical freedom that today’s gospel is about. God is free. When God
creates, he creates out of himself, so that what he creates is “like” him. Not identical
with him, certainly, because the creation is not God, but like God. God’s creation
“reflects” its creator, though that reflection necessarily be imperfect, incomplete,
broken, fallen – with weeds amongst the wheat!
God’s creation, therefore, is free – like God is free. We are free – like God is free. We,
unlike God, may misuse our freedom, abuse it, corrupt it, pervert it. But we are free,
nevertheless, free even to deny freedom, free even to sin.
And God, because he is radically free, cannot deny our freedom. To do so would be for
God to be unlike himself; it would be for him to be un-God.
So God, like the man in the parable, looks on as the weeds grow up with the good
seed. Unable to interfere. Unable to change the reality of his own creation.
Now some people find this image – this news – about God a rather bleak picture –
lacking in comfort. But what it really does is continue and expand the image of God
Jesus gives us in what is probably the best-known and most loved parable of all – the
Parable of the Prodigal Son, in Luke’s Gospel! The good father portrayed there is one
who raises up his child in the way that he should go, and then sets him free. A good
father is one who loves his child even as that child moves out on his own, exercising
his freedom, making mistakes, sometimes abusing his own freedom; perhaps, in his
freedom, even turning his back on the Daddy who loves him. The good father loves his
child, nevertheless, even as he sets him free, and he never interferes.
The Abba – the God whom Jesus called Daddy – looks on his children the same way,
watching them with delight, with caring, with love as they exercise their freedom –
watching them with an absolute commitment to the freedom of his children. And when,
inevitably, bad things happen, tragedy strikes, as a result of his children exercising
their freedom, our Abba stands by his children, supports them in their pain, lives their
pain with them, and, if they allow him, transforms their pain, eventually, into triumph.
But…, he never interferes, because he cannot!
Every moment of every day tragedy strikes in this world we live in – here, amongst us,
or out there in the wider world. God does not cause the tragedy. Nor does God
“permit” it – because to say that would be to imply that God could have averted it, if he
had wanted to, but chose not to. But he couldn’t. God, like the rest of us, and like the
man in Jesus’ parable, watches it happen, unable to intervene – unable to violate the
human freedom that resulted in tragedy. At any time of tragedy, all we can do is pray
that the people involved will be aware of their Abba standing with them, supporting
them, loving them, and seeing them through the pain.
Because God is God, He cannot protect us from the failings, the sin, the pain of life.
But because he is our Abba, he can and he does, love us through it all, holding us to
himself, and seeing us through the pain, the loss, carrying us when we can’t stand by
ourselves, and introducing us to the invincible power of his Love!
In Jesus Christ’s Name, Amen.
just coming off vacation – or, at least, not just because of that! Nor was it that I didn’t
know what I wanted to say – I’ve known from the moment I first read the lessons! No,
the problem was how to say it – how to put perhaps the most difficult, most mature,
most sophisticated of all Jesus’ teachings – and how to say it in a way I haven’t, before.
So if what I have to say doesn’t “work” for you, just chalk it up to vacation lag, or the
weather – or, maybe, to the difficulty of the topic!
Because this morning’s Gospel amounts to one of the most profound statements
about, and descriptions of, God that we can imagine.
This morning we have a parable from the Gospel according to Matthew. But with this
parable, Matthew breaks the rules regarding parables by turning it into an allegory, and
by having Jesus explain the “hidden “ meaning. You’ll recall, I hope, as I’ve said
before, there are no “hidden” meanings to parables: that they are teaching tools, not
mysteries – simple, plain stories with a single point, that are never widely allegorical,
and that are always about God or the Kingdom of God. And when a Parable seems to
break the rules, the parable has been corrupted from what Jesus originally said!
So this morning we need, as we often do, to look at the bare bones of the parable as
Jesus must have told it.
A man sows good seed in his field. But when the seed sprouts and the wheat grows up,
weeds grow up with it. When asked by his men if they should go dig up the weeds, he
tells them no.
To try to dig up the weeds would destroy the wheat. Wait until the harvest, he tells
them. Then we can separate the wheat and the weeds, and just burn the weeds.
Contrary to what Matthew would tell us, the parable is not about the devil. It’s not
about sinners. It’s not about the last judgment. It’s about wheat and weeds. And what
does it tell us?
It makes a very simple observation. That is, that in all of life, in the creation itself, in
fact, weeds grow up with the wheat.
Good comes with the bad. Always. It’s what St. Paul refers to in our reading from
Romans, today, too – about the mix of glory and suffering in life, of hope and futility, of
growth and decay.
Now that may seem so obvious as to go without saying, but it’s not, not really. There
have always been religions – and even factions within our own, Christian religion – that
deny the reality of suffering and evil. That’s what Christian Science is all about, for
example. And there has always been a kind of “Pollyanna-ish” tendency in the Church,
as well, that insists, “God’s in his heaven, all’s right with the world.” So it really does
need saying.
But our parable goes beyond that to something profound. Remember I’ve told you the
parables of Jesus were always, ultimately, about God or the Kingdom? Well, so it is with
today’s parable. And what it says is so incredibly profound that it’s difficult to
understand, much less believe. But it’s so.
The man plants seed. It’s good seed. The seed sprouts and his wheat grows. But with
the wheat, weed seeds sprout and weeds grow. The man looks at it and sees that there
is nothing he can do about it. So he just lets the wheat and the weeds grow, side by
side – the good and the bad. Only at the end can the separation occur, when the good
will be gathered up, and the bad will be discarded. The man can’t do anything about it.
And so it is, too, that God plants good seed – his creation. And with the good seed he
establishes, there also occurs bad seed – imperfection and evil. And like the man in
the story, there is nothing God can do about it.
Oh, but how silly! How ridiculous! God can do anything! How can we think such a thing?
Well, actually, contrary to what we’ve heard all our life, it’s not true to say “God can do
anything.” Not really. For example, you’ve all heard that old, sophomoric question, “If
God is ‘almighty’, can he make something that’s so big he can’t move it?” Think about
it. Actually, that question doesn’t hold up because it’s got some internal contradictions
in it, but it points to some valid observations, involving things that God cannot do – he
really can’t.
For instance, God cannot do evil. Why not? Because he is God, and evil is “not-God,”
or “un-God.” And God can’t hate his creation or anything in it! Why not? Because God
is love, and hate, if not the opposite of love, is at least love’s denial.
The short way to say it is, God must be God; He cannot not be God. So anything we can
say that God is, he is by necessity. And the opposite of that thing, or the lack of that
thing, is something that God cannot be, cannot do! And yet we can also say that God is
radically free! He is free to be and to do and to say and to think anything at all within his
identity as God.
And it is God’s radical freedom that today’s gospel is about. God is free. When God
creates, he creates out of himself, so that what he creates is “like” him. Not identical
with him, certainly, because the creation is not God, but like God. God’s creation
“reflects” its creator, though that reflection necessarily be imperfect, incomplete,
broken, fallen – with weeds amongst the wheat!
God’s creation, therefore, is free – like God is free. We are free – like God is free. We,
unlike God, may misuse our freedom, abuse it, corrupt it, pervert it. But we are free,
nevertheless, free even to deny freedom, free even to sin.
And God, because he is radically free, cannot deny our freedom. To do so would be for
God to be unlike himself; it would be for him to be un-God.
So God, like the man in the parable, looks on as the weeds grow up with the good
seed. Unable to interfere. Unable to change the reality of his own creation.
Now some people find this image – this news – about God a rather bleak picture –
lacking in comfort. But what it really does is continue and expand the image of God
Jesus gives us in what is probably the best-known and most loved parable of all – the
Parable of the Prodigal Son, in Luke’s Gospel! The good father portrayed there is one
who raises up his child in the way that he should go, and then sets him free. A good
father is one who loves his child even as that child moves out on his own, exercising
his freedom, making mistakes, sometimes abusing his own freedom; perhaps, in his
freedom, even turning his back on the Daddy who loves him. The good father loves his
child, nevertheless, even as he sets him free, and he never interferes.
The Abba – the God whom Jesus called Daddy – looks on his children the same way,
watching them with delight, with caring, with love as they exercise their freedom –
watching them with an absolute commitment to the freedom of his children. And when,
inevitably, bad things happen, tragedy strikes, as a result of his children exercising
their freedom, our Abba stands by his children, supports them in their pain, lives their
pain with them, and, if they allow him, transforms their pain, eventually, into triumph.
But…, he never interferes, because he cannot!
Every moment of every day tragedy strikes in this world we live in – here, amongst us,
or out there in the wider world. God does not cause the tragedy. Nor does God
“permit” it – because to say that would be to imply that God could have averted it, if he
had wanted to, but chose not to. But he couldn’t. God, like the rest of us, and like the
man in Jesus’ parable, watches it happen, unable to intervene – unable to violate the
human freedom that resulted in tragedy. At any time of tragedy, all we can do is pray
that the people involved will be aware of their Abba standing with them, supporting
them, loving them, and seeing them through the pain.
Because God is God, He cannot protect us from the failings, the sin, the pain of life.
But because he is our Abba, he can and he does, love us through it all, holding us to
himself, and seeing us through the pain, the loss, carrying us when we can’t stand by
ourselves, and introducing us to the invincible power of his Love!
In Jesus Christ’s Name, Amen.
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| Calvary Episcopal Church, Rockdale |
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