Matthew 13:24-30;36-43
Click or touch “Firestarter”
To listen to Nick read the one-minute introduction.
There is a basic point in “The Parable of the Wheat and the Tares.” It is difficult to distinguish between weeds and wheat. Lest there be any wheat killed by “friendly fire,” Jesus invites us to hold back. Discernment about good and evil is a gift we need from the Spirit; yet Jesus admonishes us not to judge. There is a time and place for judgment and for the eternal separation of the good from the bad, but it is not now, and it is not for us to judge; this is reserved for God at the end of time.
There is still time for you and me! This suggests another interpretation: “tare-like” qualities in a person can be transformed into wheat! Yet another point of the parable: it discourages living in someone else’s head, instead of in your own. Self-examination, rather than the examination of others, is what will have what is “tare-ible” in you, become wheat for Christ’s bread.
Bible Breaths
What are these?
Weeds and wheat till the harvest v. 29
Wheat gathered into Your barn v. 30
Son of Man sowing good seed v. 37
Righteous shining like the sun v. 43
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for the version for children and families.
This is the eighth of thirteen weeks in Pentecost, Year A.
See “Solar and Sacred Seasons” in the menu above.
Sundays are dedicated to the Gospels from
The Revised Common Lectionary.
Image courtesy of http://www.gerhardy.id.au
We wait upon the Lord with openness and honesty, as all the complexities of our lives–their wheat and weeds–are redeemed by Love.
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Wheat gathered into Your barn v. 30
Lord, since we are in the end times now, gather all those who have rejected the wheat part of themselves because of their focus on the weeds, and bring them into the joyful fellowship of your heavenly barn, even as I pray right now.
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