A Parable of Weeds Explained
A church's lifetime is often hundreds or thousands of years. People come and go while the church remains, which frequently leads us to think the Church's ways are eternal, like God's.
The Parable of the Weeds Explained
Matthew 13:36-43
36 Then he left the crowd and went into the house. His disciples came to him and said, “Explain to us the parable of the weeds in the field.”
37 He answered, “The one who sowed the good seed is the Son of Man. 38 The field is the world, and the good seed stands for the people of the kingdom. The weeds are the people 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 “As the weeds are pulled up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of the age. 41 The Son of Man will send out his angels, and they will weed out of his kingdom everything that causes sin and all who do evil. 42 They will throw them into the blazing furnace, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. 43 Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears, let them hear.
The Fall wind carried a wet heaviness with it this late in the year as the Sun raced to set early in the day. The leaves were past red, gold, and orange and had rusted into earth tones. The branches bore less of them with each passing moment as the wind raced me to my destination.
I felt the ground fall behind me as I rode my bike, hearing the thump, thump, of my wheels against the uneven pavement. A sudden, unrelenting pain in my knee brought me to a stop–an old injury. Racing up and down the winding Missouri hills in the damp air had triggered an arthritic enemy.
Reaching into my back pocket, I pulled out a small bag of ibuprofen I kept to defeat possessing demons in my knees. I leaned down to grab my water bottle but cursed softly. “Damn.”
I had forgotten to fill it up at the last gas station outside Mt. Vernon. Pride had gotten to me once again—sloth had prevented me from waking up early enough to wash out a second bottle for this hundred-and-twenty-mile ride from Republic to Joplin and back. I placed the bag back in my jersey pocket and kept riding—muttering at my stupidity.
I had a goal this year. I had to finish one hundred rides of at least two hundred kilometers. I was at ninety-five. This ride would count as ninety-six.
The pain seemed to lessen. I chose to slow down and pace myself, determined to finish this ride. Yet, the pain was racing behind me. I could feel it catching me.
I looked back every so often—it was closing the gap. After three miles, it had pulled up alongside. It laughed at me as I slowed down to a crawl. I could no longer outrun it. My grip on the handlebars tightened. My bike betrayed me. I hated it. It was too heavy. Why had I not lowered its weight this year?
Every mile became slower. I had been averaging a high seventeen-mile-per-hour pace. I wasn’t Lance-quality, but good for a fat old man. All cyclists who don’t compete in the Tour are technically fat. Yet, we wear the Italian jerseys as if we’re svelte anyway—vain silly peacocks on two wheels, every one of us, male or female. Five miles later, I was averaging eight miles per hour. I was twelve miles from the finish and wasn’t going to finish.
I started to talk to imaginary people. I always do on these long rides. I started narrating my story to them. I said, “I don’t know if you’ve been on a long ride where you’ve started to fail, but it’s usually not all at once. It’s a slow grind down, physically and mentally, until there is little left of you but a stub–a painful, broken, bleeding stub.” All in my mind. I didn’t have the breath to say it out loud.
Desperate, I looked for salvation from any front. I couldn’t get a ride and finish. Every mile I had completed so far today might as well be trash–I should have stayed in bed. I had wasted my entire day. I cursed into the wind. The route owner would mark my card with the hateful letters “DNF” (Did Not Finish.)
I was straddling my bike in the center of an odd t-shaped intersection five miles north of Marionville. Billings was three more miles in front of me. Was that way East? I think that is East? My brain was bonking, shutting down from lack of sugar. Republic was nine miles past that. Turning south to Marionville was a highway of death–semis, 4x4 trucks, and high school students.
The road to Billings had two paths: the death road I mentioned earlier, which turned north and east at this T-intersection, and then…then the other road. I shook my head, the helmet weighing my head down. I started talking to myself. You know how in Westerns, you have the ominous zoom effect, where the road begins to look like it’s hundreds of miles away, and music is playing in the background? I heard all of that and more.
Hills–extremely steep, grinding hills which would rip my leg off and leave me hobbling and permanently crippled loomed ahead in my mind. They must be at least two miles high if not five. There was no way I could traverse the Himalayas with this knee.
If I made it through those hills, I would never ride my bike again. Well, I would probably not ride for at least a few weeks as I recuperated, which would be soul-crushing. Would I have time to finish the last four rides of the season before December 31st? The weather this time of year is unpredictable. I had to finish these rides. My life depended on these rides. I had centered everything around these rides.
I had to conquer these hills—I would make it to the last nine miles. These were my nine miles. They were gentle, rolling hills that stretched lovingly into Republic. They were calling me. I stepped onto the pedal to push off, and my knee stabbed me in the back. Dirty, traitorous knee. Who did it think it was? I ought to shoot it right off.
I just needed some water. I needed my ibuprofen. Could I cry enough tears to swallow my pills?
I looked over to the side of me as I leaned on my handlebars for moral support. My bike was my best friend now that my knee had betrayed me. I hoped it hadn’t heard the terrible things that had passed from my lips earlier.
A small white church stood just a hundred feet from me on my left. At the back end of the building, I could see a nozzle sticking out of the building. A red faucet–holy water!
I plucked up my courage and peddled like a guitarist with a broken wrist over to the faucet. I filled up my bottle, grabbed the pills from my pocket, and gloriously swallowed them as if they were my holy eucharist.
As the water was still splashing against the ground in this chilly weather, making my waterproof booties wet, I saw the priest sitting next to his garden. I guessed he was a priest. His clothing was ragged.
I reached down to turn off the water.
“I’m sorry. I just needed some water.”
“I’ve provided water to many people who were in need. Come sit down. It will take a while before your pills take effect.”
I looked him over. He was ragged, but he seemed sane. I was dressed in Lycra and wool in forty degrees, riding 125 miles and stealing water from a church. Sanity was probably on his side.
He may be strange, but his eyes were intriguing. I felt known—like he was family. I stepped over my bike, leaned it against the church, and then walked over to him. With their plastic road cleats, my shoes made a clopping sound against the concrete footpath he had built.
The garden was bright and colorful and full of plants. The plants were so interesting. I didn’t recognize half of them, but to be fair, I’m not a botanist. I’m a lawyer who spends most of his days cooped up in an office.
The flowers were blooming like Spring, but grayish weeds choked the garden. I sat beside him, hoping I didn’t stink too much in my damp Merino wool jersey.
“What do you think of my garden?” The ragged man asked it simply. There was a warmth radiating from the man or the garden. It was hard to tell where the light was coming from.
“It’s full of life when everything else is dead. Even the weeds are growing well, though they look sick.”
“Yes. That’s the paradox of tilling soil and sowing it with the specially curated seeds I have grown. They fertilize the ground when I’ve planted them into the soil.”
“You don’t need fertilizer?” I was shocked. I leaned forward. The perfume from the garden was intoxicating. It filled up the entire courtyard.
“No. My plants fertilize.” The ragged man clasped his hands together as he talked about his garden. He spent a few minutes sharing a couple of stories.
I struggled to stay focused, though, as I interrupted him. “I want to have seeds like yours. I’ve never gardened a day, but this is amazing.” I could feel my eyebrows raising. “But I would pull out the weeds,” I said with disdain. I couldn’t understand how the ragged man didn’t see it as clearly as I did.
“I would like to pull out the weeds, too. However, it hasn’t been time yet. I’ve been waiting for the right signs to appear.” The ragged man looked up at the sky and the soiled leaves as if the signs were there. Then he looked at me. He plucked out a white hair from my beard and held it up.
“Look at that. I was just the tops of the fields to be white. Your beard will work. Now that you are here, we can harvest the garden. You will see something most people won’t see until the end of time.”
“Why have you waited so long? Are you not strong enough? Did you not have helpers?” I started rubbing my chin. Partly because it stung but partly because I was confused by this man who appeared so rational that I was the one who felt insane. How could his words sound crazy, yet he looked so levelheaded?
“Strength and time are not problems for me. I do have helpers. I’m sorry you didn’t see them when you arrived. My helpers often are hidden among your kind.” Several small animals appeared at the edge of the garden. Badgers, rabbits, moles, groundhogs, and sparrows all lined up. They seemed well-groomed for animals, and all of them looked at the ragged man with great expectation. They chirped, sang, mewed, or purred. There was a harmony I couldn’t recognize, but it seemed almost angelically sweet.
“These rodents and birds are your helpers?” He was jesting with me. Where was the princess? I looked around for a blue dress and a singing girl.
“Yes. I know that may seem silly to you. Right now,” the ragged man leaned closer to look at my eyes, “many things seem foolish to you. You chase things that don’t matter and ignore things that do. Do you think one hundred rides in a year will prove anything about you? Will other people know anything about who you are?”
“I didn’t mention my rides to you.”
“It’s okay. Your bike whispered to me when you were drinking the ibuprofen.” Then he laughed–a belly laugh.
“I ride because it will make me a better person.”
“Does it?”
I reviewed my life. I rode alone. I never talked to any of the people I met along my routes. I never showed kindness to the gas station clerks I bought food from or who signed my randonneur cards. I was singularly focused. Complete the ride. Go home. Sit in the hot tub. Drink three beers. Go to work. Ride. Hot tube. Drink. Ride.
I looked at the garden, and the light seemed to warm up around me. Around the ragged man. How was that possible?
“Am I pointless?” I fell over; my posture was worse than it had been on the bike as I rode into this intersection in pain.
He patted my back gently. “No. Your eyes aren’t open yet. I think, though, they will be soon.”
I smiled uncomfortably. Did I take ibuprofen or pain pills left over from my knee surgery? What color were those pills again?
The ragged man continued. “My plants are so determined to help the weeds thrive that they have held on too long to the weeds in the garden, and my helpers cannot harvest. Their love for the gray light is killing the garden and future growth. I need an awakening in my garden. My plants have grown confused, and they believe the weeds are part of the garden. Instead of telling the weeds to leave, they have tried to find a place for the weeds. The weeds can only grow here because the soil is so rich—everything grows here.”
”Don’t the weeds deserve a place to grow too?” Suddenly, I realized I didn’t deserve to be in this ragged man’s garden–I didn’t deserve to be the dirt under his fingernails. I wasn’t worthy to be a weed in his garden.
”The weeds could become flowers, yet they have given up their true purpose. Do you see the little bugs crawling on the weeds–then moving onto my flowers?”
“Yes,” I replied. The insects were small, but their teeth were almost their entire body. “How can plants be deceived?”
”In my garden, plants sometimes decide to tolerate the insects. My flowers begin to think the weeds are necessary. Instead of turning towards me, they believe the gray light from the weeds will work. It’s why I have been sitting here so patiently on the step–the weeds chose the inner gray light you see inside them now. They chose fate rather than mercy–judgment drowned hope. They will never turn to me, their true gardener.”
I sat there, looking at the ragged man. For the briefest of moments (that didn’t last as long as the width of an emotion), I saw an image of something that tore me asunder. A sweeping vista appeared of this glorious man residing on a throne in authority over a great court surrounded by creatures I couldn’t begin to describe. Before I could blink, the glimpse into the other world was gone. In front of me, the ragged man sat, twirling a white lily between his fingers.
The ragged man patted me on the hand with sympathy. “Look now. You need to see this.”
The animals then hurried into the garden and began to pull out the weeds. The beautiful plants started to cry out, trying to grab hold of the weeds—to protect the weeds that had been cutting into them and attempting to pull them down.
The beautiful flowers tried to whip at the rabbits or strangle the badger. One orchid even tried to knock the sparrows out of the sky. However, no matter what they did, they had no strength against the animals. The animals even trimmed the plants and removed diseased leaves that weeds or insects had tainted.
The badgers made quick work of the insects–they seemed to enjoy biting them. Yet they never swallowed them. They always walked to the garden's edge to spit the tiny bodies out of the profuse perimeters. Soon, the weeds were gone, and the garden was open again.
The plants mourned the weeds, weeping colors from their blooms. Yet underneath the weeds, new beautiful plants and flowers I had never seen started growing and rising. The weeds had been smothering these from coming up.
I looked at the ragged man and the church and then back at the animals as if they were more real than me and that I was the imagined being. I felt like the gray weed here in this garden of light.
I watched as the animals carried the weeds, bundled them, and then threw them into a fire they started—no smoke came from the fire, and no ash fell from the sky. The night air came in early, but the garden remained warm. The sun was still up, but the rest of the world was growing dim and cold. What was a world where there was light but no warmth?
“Who are you?” I demanded of the ragged man, clinging to his dirt-stained garment.
“Who do you say I am?” asked the ragged man casually.
I blinked several times before I found myself sitting upright, riding my bike. I couldn’t remember how I had gotten here. It was jarring. Did I just imagine the last several miles?
I was just four miles outside Republic–somehow on the last stretch of the rolling hills southwest of town. In front of me lay smooth as-glass black asphalt. Was the garden just a fever dream of a cyclist close to bonking, or had I witnessed something grander that opened my eyes? Why did the garden and ragged man feel more alive than I did? I reached into my back jersey pocket and pulled out a beautiful lily, white but with a red cross down the center.
“Who do you say I am?” echoed in my mind.
i love this 🥲🙏🏻