NOTES for Mat 13:24-43
The parable of the weeds tells us about something that is so difficult to follow in everyday life. We see that the Lord advises us to be cautious and to refrain from hasty judgment. Yet again and again we feel ourselves to be “like gods, knowing good and evil” and passing judgment on human destinies.
It is very easy to cry, “Out with the bad grass from the field,” and begin to root out everything that is bad or seems bad to us. (And quite often it only seems so, nothing more.) The owner of the field fears that weeding might damage the good ears of grain, but such difficulties do not frighten us. More than that, we are happy to trample even half the crop, provided that we can spite the weeds. At the same time, however, we do not want to consider that what looks like a weed today may prove to be a useful plant tomorrow. In the world of living nature, of course, such transformations are exceptional, but we live among people, and our fellow human beings are capable of even greater changes.
The weeds, however, are sown not only among those around us, but also in our own hearts. And it is pointless to uproot the weeds around us while leaving untouched those that grow from within us. Before we know it, they will be over our heads, or we ourselves will even become weeds.
Then an almost unnoticeable seed is cast into the soil where both the ears of grain and the weeds grow. And strangely, the weeds cannot choke it, although at first they can hide it from view because it is so small. Yet what seems insignificant often proves to be the most important thing. For what grows from this seed, rising higher than all the trees, will separate the wheat from the weeds.