A parable that describes God’s kingdom

Today we learn about another parable; it is the Parable of the Weeds Among the Wheat. You can read this Gospel in Matthew 13:24-43.

“[Jesus} proposed another parable to [the crowds]. “The kingdom of heaven may be likened to a man who sowed good seed in his field. 25 While everyone was asleep his enemy came and sowed weeds all through the wheat, and then went off. 26 When the crop grew and bore fruit, the weeds appeared as well. 27 The slaves of the householder came to him and said, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where have the weeds come from?’ 28 He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’

His slaves said to him. ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’ 29 He replied, ‘No, if you pull up the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. 30 Let them grow together until the harvest; then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters, “First collect the weed and tie them in bundles for burning; but gather the wheat into my barn.” 31 He proposed another parable to them. “The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed that a person took and sowed in a field. 32 It is the smallest of all the seeds, yet when full-grown it is the largest of plants. It becomes a large bush, and the ‘birds of the sky come and dwell in its branches’

33 He spoke to them another parable. “The kingdom of heaven is like yeast that a woman took and mixed with three measures of wheat flour until the whole batch was leavened.” 34 All these things Jesus spoke to the crowds in parables. He spoke to them in parables, 35 to fulfill what had been said through the prophet; “I will open my mouth in parables, I will announce what has lain hidden from the foundation of the world.”

36 Then, dismissing the crowds, he went into the house. His disciples approached him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.” 37 He said in reply, “He who sows good seed is the Son of Man, 38 his field is the world, the good seed the children of the kingdom. The weeds are the children of the evil one, 39 and the enemy who sows them is the devil.

The harvest is the end of the age, and the harvesters are angels. 40 Just as weeds are collected and burned [up] with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all who cause others to sin and all evildoers. 42 They will throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears ought to hear.”

My main mission in writing a Sunday Gospel article is to help interpret or decipher what the Lord Jesus Christ teaches us like this parable, after all many Christians really want to hear what these parables are all about. But since the Lord himself explains towards the end of the parable what they really meant, it makes our job a bit easier, though we must find something in between the lines. While it is true that some teachings of the Lord is purposely hidden, however some of them are given freely by the Holy Spirit.

As we were told, the sower is Jesus and the field is the entire world, while the good seed are the children born into this world. But the enemy, which is Satan sows his children among the good seed… they are the weeds. This is exactly a picture of what is happening on earth today… the good people living together with the bad ones. So the slaves suggested to the Sower that they would pull all the bad weeds. But Jesus says no to the idea as if you pull the bad seed, you might pull the good ones also.

So the Lord suggests that they wait until the harvest time and then the harvesters who are really his Angels would separate the weeds from the wheat. This parable teaches us to be patient. As human as we are, when someone sows weeds in our field, chances are, we would like to exact instantaneous, swift or immediate revenge on those who do us harm. However our patience will be rewarded when harvest time comes because you can easily identify the weeds from the wheat. This is what I call Divine Justice, it may not come right away, but I guarantee you it certainly will come.

That we have weeds in our fields is something that our Lord Jesus already knows as he experienced this himself. In fact when he only had twelve Apostles, one of them even betrayed him. So in a prophetic way, the same thing has happened to the Catholic Church, which eventually split up with the Orthodoxy and, five hundred years ago, it further split into a thousand churches where Catholic doctrine is no longer identifiable.

Even today, we do have schisms within the Catholic Church because of too much freedom to think and interpret Church Doctrine. This is why I no longer get shocked when I hear a priest say something that is controversial, he shouldn’t even be saying it in public. But the Lord has kept his promise that the Gates of Hell shall never prevail against the Catholic Church.