Today we are confronted with two more parables that deal with farming. Last Sunday it was about sowing the seed. Today the first two parables is about plants and the third is about yeast.
The first speaks of darnel and wheat and how they look similar to each other when young but then they act differently when mature. The parallel here in our region here (at least in Singapore) would be the two grasses we find in undeveloped areas: elephant grass and lallang. Both look similar when young but the latter catches fire easily when mature. Obviously we would prefer to have the less dangerous grass. In the gospel, wheat is a food plant and darnel is actually toxic to humans.
The second parable speaks of mustard, which has really small seeds but can grow into rather sturdy plants. We actually eat quite a bit of their leaves and stems as the vegetable mustard green. The third talks about the small amount of yeast added to a dough and it permeates all of the dough.
The common thread here is growth. How does growth occur? Today, science can explain and describe the processes that give rise to growth, but at the time of Jesus, there were no microscopes and laboratories to explain the growth. People simply accepted the fact that there is growth. The last two parables explain to us that the kingdom of God will grow but we don’t know how. The fact is that the Kingdom will grow. It is then not difficult to attribute the growth to God Himself.
The first parable tells us that besides the kingdom, there is something else that grows. This other thing that grows is the opposite of what the kingdom is. Many would say that this other thing belongs to Satan. I would add that sometimes it is we ourselves who oppose the growth of the kingdom. Our pride and egos can be obstacles to the kingdom as well. There is a saying: the road to hell is paved with good intentions.
When we evangelise, we are doing a good thing. However, we must not have the idea that we are the cause of the growth of the kingdom. God gives growth to the kingdom. When we serve God we should discern regularly, asking if what I am doing is for the right motives. The discernment might not be clear at the early stages of our service, but as time passes, we should be able to discern. We should be humble enough to ask God to help us to weed out all wrong motives in our service of God.
We might have gone for courses to help us serve God better. However, we must regularly discern if what we have learned was for the service of God or was in fact to feed our own ego. We might have started to visit the less fortunate because we genuinely cared for them. Along the way we might have allowed our egos to taint our motives. After all, when someone praises us for doing good work, we feel good. If we do not discern and purify out motives, we might find ourselves visiting others so that we might be recognised for our efforts. We have allowed the darnel to overtake the wheat in the field. In our quiet time this week, let us ask God to help us do some weeding. We should weed out the darnel in our lives and allow the Lord to give growth to the wheat.
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