Who hasn’t said, or at least thought, “When I get to heaven, I’m going to ask God why (fill in the blank) …”?
Well, I recently added a question to my list. It’s not theological or profound, and it certainly won’t be relevant in heaven, but I’d really like to know why God allows weeds to grow so much more robustly than plants we actually want to grow.
As I mentioned in my last column, my husband and I are currently trying to turn eight acres of cleared land into pastures. We did all the things one is supposed to do: we had the soil tested, we limed, we fertilized, and we planted a boatload of grass seed.
We emphatically did not plant one single weed seed.
We prayed for rain and God gave it, albeit in His timing, not ours. But even before that, in the midst of a Sahara Desert mini-drought, weeds started popping up all over our dry, crusty fields. Not content to remain alone, those early weeds then invited lots of their friends and family members to join them.
Ever-increasing numbers of weeds and little trees were springing up where there should’ve been luscious grass. I was not pleased.
Weeks after planting the seed, I still couldn’t see any baby grass. My husband insisted there were itty-bitty rows of teensy-weensy blades of grass there, but I thought he was simply suffering from a very uncharacteristic bout of optimism.
Finally, Joe loaded me on the golf cart and drove me to those fields for an up-close inspection, determined to make me see what he was seeing. And okay, I had to admit that I sort of, kind of, saw some grass. When I looked hard and long enough, I saw teensy-weensy grass in scattered itty-bitty rows … interspersed with big patches of nasty weeds and toddler-sized trees.
If I were the betting type and this were a sport, I’d definitely put my money on the weeds and trees to win. That wimpy grass just didn’t get out of the gate fast enough. And yet, Joe continues to believe the grass will triumph in the end.
“Don’t worry,” he keeps telling me. “After the grass gets established, we can start mowing out there and eventually the grass will choke out the weeds.”
All I can say about that is, “Pppfffftttt.” I seem unable to muster faith to match my husband’s in this situation. But whether he’s right or not, and I sincerely hope he is, his prediction did remind me of something in the Bible.
In Matthew 13, Jesus is using parables to explain the kingdom of God. He compares His kingdom to all kinds of things, including a field of wheat planted by a farmer. As the wheat came up, so did the weeds, Jesus said, which upset the farmer’s servants and caused them to suspect an enemy had snuck in and sowed weed seeds in the field. (I know the feeling.)
“Allow both to grow together until the harvest,” the farmer said. “In the time of the harvest I will say to the reapers, ‘First gather up the tares and bind them in bundles to burn them up; but gather the wheat into my barn.’” (Matthew 13:30)
In the world right now, there are lots of “weeds” (unbelievers, according to Jesus’ parable) growing amongst the outnumbered stalks of “wheat” (believers). It may seem the weeds are ruling the day, but it won’t be that way forever.
One day, perhaps soon, God will decide it’s harvest time and the wheat and weeds will be pulled up, separated and sent to very different places.
Just as it was when Jesus told this parable, our eternal destiny depends on what we do with Him. My suggestion and plea: Be a wheat.