Seeds Then Sleep

"He put before them another parable: “The kingdom of heaven may becompared to someone who sowed good seed in his field; but while everybody was asleep, an enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and then went away. So when the plants came up and bore grain, then the weeds appeared as well. And the slaves of the householder came and said to him, ‘Master, did you not sow good seed in your field? Where, then, did these weeds come from?’ He answered, ‘An enemy has done this.’ The slaves said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’ But he replied, ‘No; for in gathering the weeds you would uproot the wheat along with them. Let both of  them grow together until the harvest; and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, Collect the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.’”

I know you are not supposed to respond in any way, but when I get a scam text, a message asking me to respond immediately, or claim a prize or help someone, I send a message, I reply with a single word; I type: evil. Although not the most heinous of crimes or the worst of offenses, I feel it is a good word, a right fit to call out the scammers. Evil.

The chances are good we have all received them. I can’t tell you how many wealthy individuals from Africa have needed my help with money transfers. Sometimes I receive telephone messages on a regular basis from the IRS, the sheriff’s department, or some government agency hoping to avoid prosecuting me. On this last one, the warning all before arrest, had I not watched an enormous amount of Law and Order episodes, I might be worried. But I know there is no such thing as a curtesy call from law  enforcement.

A few years ago, Kathy and I were walking toward Central Park, almost to the Dakota and Strawberry Fields when my father called me. As this was a Friday and we talk on Sundays, I was concerned. I was more concerned when he got on the line. My father had a crisis mode voice when something was awry, and I could tell he was rattled. He would talk in short clips and bursts. A friend of David’s just called him to say they were a terrible car accident, and he needs some money to help with the hospital and the sheriff and the tow truck. Have you heard from David, he asked? No. I had not. And I took a deep breath and said, why were they calling you? Because they found my number on his phone and didn’t know who else to call. I said, just take a moment. I’ll find out and call you back. Fifteen minutes later I was talking to David who was eating lunch in Burlington on his day off. No accident, no hospital, no tow truck, or sheriff. I called my father and told him all was right with David. But everything was not all right with the world.

I have worked in prisons and urban poverty; seen the plight of migrant farmers and famine in Africa; spent long nights in the ICU and long afternoons in psyche wards. After all of this, you know what, I am still hopeful, even convinced in the goodness of humankind and the beauty of the earth. But all of that hope tends to evaporate when I  remember my father’s voice wondering if his grandson was dead so someone could get a few hundred dollars.

I am not sure what it is about the telemarketing scammers, but for some reason the corporate greed of big pharma impacts me less than the person asking me to renew my car warranty every day. Somehow, I feel vulnerable when the phishing emails appear, as if someone had actually broken into my home.

Just this last week our office experienced such a moment. Someone hacked into a staff member’s email, impersonated another staff member, and asked that their direct deposit be changed to a new account. A hacker was trying to steal a paycheck from our staff.

Something similar happened when I was in Watertown. The business manager, Penny Levos, was in my office and frowning at me that I would ask her to transfer money to a different account. She knew that I knew that pastors in Presbyterian Churches don’t do that. But here she had an email from me asking for such.

When we realized it was a hacker, she began to direct me how to secure my computer. As she was speaking, though, she realized, it was her computer that was hacked because she was the one who received the email. I’ll never forget her face. Penny Levos was sweet and kind, but she was also Greek and fierce. I always joked with her that few people knew how tough she was to which she would offer me a rye smile. But there was something that day in her eyes, a blankness that made me fear for the person if caught.

Like you, I have been disappointed with people, let down, hurt, even betrayed. To which I go through the motions of dialing down anger or pushing off sadness. I learned early on in ministry that most problems in churches and life are dealt with best by being very clear about the issue, speaking directly to people, and not falling to the temptation of painting problems with a broad brush. Better to use a b.b. gun than a bazooka.

But where do you go, to whom do you speak when the culprits come in through broad band? I feel like the sleeping farmer in the parable where the enemies come in the light and seek to destroy your crop. It’s enough that they are taking something from me, but when it comes to the internet scams and the telephone there is also a kind of insidious ruin they mean to bring. It is like someone is lying, cheating, stealing, and injuring all at the same time.

I listened to a great pod cast the other day. The show is called reply all and the episode was about trying to find the person at the other end of the computer or phone. Who are these people who scam us? Someone from a call center in India called a staff member of the podcast, which led to months of investigation. In the end what they found was the phone call wasn’t some guy in a basement it was thousands of sites, scams, call centers all around the world. Listening to the story, all of sudden I felt surrounded by a mob of thieves; I felt besieged like the weeds in the parable; they were everywhere.

There is an ominous quality to Matthew’s parable. It feels like the enemy is everywhere, nothing is safe, and there is nothing you can do. There is a sense of being powerless in the parable, a sense very close to my one-word response of “evil.” Even for that, Kathy has scolded me, it makes it worse, she said. You are not supposed to do anything.
Scholars believe Matthew’s parable is an adaptation of Mark’s. In Mark, where there are no enemy sowing weeds, no need to wait to burn the tares, the simple description of the seed growing to fruition is meant to suggest that the kingdom of God is life simply lived. Here Jesus is saying, being humble, being merciful, being just to your neighbors and to strangers, this should be the natural course of life. Being a human being who lives and matures and has a good life is not to be seen as a rarity or as  exotic. This is what is supposed to happen. The kingdom of God is not a miracle; it’s life simply lived.

And then Matthew upends the simplicity, a kind of what if: what if things don’t go as planned, what if the natural unfolding of life proves not the case? What if an enemy  comes and sows weeds amidst your fields? What if someone steals your paycheck or frightens your father? It is as if Matthew is raising the possibility of evil. What if evil comes to you?

We pray that this doesn’t happen each week: deliver us from evil. We do. We know evil is possible. But it is not what we expect for the most part. For the most part we trust what the psalmist says: God will keep us; let us both lie down and sleep and rise again, for the Lord sustains us. And this is the course of so much of our life. Most of life is the parable in Mark: the kingdom of God is life lived in humility and mercy and fairness. Most of life.

As we are nearing the end of our twentieth month of the pandemic, I feel we are living Matthew’s parable more than Mark’s. So much of our ability to lie down and rest and rise again has been changed, disrupted, stolen, and we are like the slaves asking the master, what is it that we should do?

So many parts of my day to day have been cast into a strange ambiguity. How do we have a fellowship hour? I have asked that question a lot lately. How will we, or even should we, gather after worship and have a cup of coffee? If someone asked me that question two years ago, I would think it was some sort of ironic joke. Ummm? Well? You make the coffee and put out the cups? Now though I am stumped.

I am stumped, worried; mostly I am a bit weary. There is a powerlessness to watching the CALI score or hearing of how many people are still being hospitalized because they refused to get the free vaccine. Like you, the masks are old and the constant second guessing of the simplest parts of life is becoming tiresome.

Yet, this week I must confess I found hope, a freedom in our readings. The hope was when I read the direction of the master in Matthew’s adaptation. The master doesn’t panic nor lament. He bids his servants, wait for the season to end. The harvest will be more work than usual, but there will be a harvest. Don’t panic, don’t force the end you seek. Let the weed grow with the wheat. The enemy sowed weeds in this crop. True. But this is not how life is meant to be. Wait for life to return.

It is as if the master in Matthew’s parable is promising life will return to Mark’s version. Life changes, life is challenging, true. But be patient. Life is disrupted, but life returns. I found so much peace in this promise. Today is stewardship Sunday. This year and last year, stewardship Sunday was different. It just is. We are living more in Matthew’s parable than Mark’s. I won’t say stewardship and the church finances have been easy in the pandemic. There have been moments of concern like the servants finding  weeds with the wheat; there have been gains and losses unlike anything I have seen before. Yet, I find so much peace in Matthew’s parable because I remember the promise of the simple life. The kingdom of God is a simple life where we live humbly, love mercy, and do justice. Pandemic or no pandemic such is the case.

And so, it is with learning to give. The path from giving from what is left over to finding the freedom to giving your life away, finding freedom from the fear greed produces,  being able to offer what we have so others will be free this is what life is about.
The harvest is the harvest in both parables.

We are all looking for a return, a restoration of the life lived with simple peace. I find so much peace in the master’s direction: wait for the season to end. Don’t panic; don’t make matters worse. Keep to the path.

Thank you to all who have pledged. Thank you. This is how we keep to the path. The next two years will be a challenge for us as they will be for everyone. The challenges will be challenges; the weeds are weeds. If we are living with Matthew or Mark, we are a church; we are a place to find humility to love mercy to do justice and we will continue to be such a place even with weeds or thieves. We will lie down, and sleep and rise again—the Lord sustains us.

Amen