one step: Matthew 13.4

So the servants said to him, ‘Then do you want us to go and gather them?’  But he said, ‘No, lest in gathering the weeds you root up the wheat along with them. Let both grow together until the harvest, and at harvest time I will tell the reapers, “Gather the weeds first and bind them in bundles to be burned, but gather the wheat into my barn.”

Scripture is clear that our enemy is not flesh and blood, but have you ever had to do life with a flesh and blood person who seemed to have teamed up with the enemy’s purposes in making your life miserable? I know I have. It’s not easy, and that kind of difficulty may cause us to ask God to remove that person from our life.

Often that person is in our life for a season and a purpose. God wastes nothing, so if someone chooses to partner with the enemy to make your life difficult, or if they are just really annoying, God will use that for your good too.

It must be observed, however, that in the parable of Jesus about the weeds (Matthew 13:24-30), the Kingdom of Heaven makes room for weeds and wheat to grow side by side. According to Jesus, weeds are such that they are indistinguishable from the wheat up until a certain point of maturation.

Have you ever thought that you were doing life with a Kingdom person only to find out that their values and their goals were different than your own? Discoveries such as this are seldom without pain attached.

Why would God allow wheat and weeds to grow side by side? Why would God allow us to be hidden by false wheat? Why would the true wheat be hidden in obscurity?

Maybe you are reading this today and wondering if you are the only one attempting to live as a Kingdom person, guided by Jesus and attempting to walk in His ways. Do not lose hope. Though you look around and see weeds, you are in fact planted in a field of wheat.

God allows wheat and weeds to grow side by side because pulling out the weeds prematurely would destroy the wheat (their roots are intertwined). Meaning, if God removed people from your life that weren’t following Him, it would be very bad for you. There is some purpose that God has in mind for you as a neighbor to those that seem like enemies. There is some way that God is using that person or those people in your life for your good in this season.

Hold onto the hope that one day God will bring you out of the field and into the safety of His house. Until then, we must ask the Lord, “God, here I am, a Kingdom person, living in the obscurity of life, surrounded by people who do not know you, do not care to know you, or have rejected you. What would you have me do? How would you have me grow? Might some of the weeds around me simply be wheat that I have mistaken for weeds because they are not yet mature?”

I looked like a weed once because I had not yet matured enough to look like the wheat I was all along. In areas of my life, I still look like an immature plant, easily mistaken for weeds. Too often in my life, I have judged others as against me or against God just because they needed to mature. I needed to grow up and grow closer to Christ to see people where they are for who they are (Lord, help me with this I pray).

Today, take a step.

Maybe today the one step God wants you to take is to ask the Lord who around you needs your help to mature into something that looks like its true wheat-self. Perhaps God wants you to allow Him to show you areas of your life that look like a weed and needs maturing. Maybe today God wants you to receive His power and encouragement to live life amongst weeds. Perhaps the Lord wants you to receive His breath of new life today to empower you to endure until the end.

Whatever the step, ask God to direct it. Take a moment to take that step. Invite Him to speak. He will.

Life is a long road. Walk it with Jesus. Take a step today… just one is fine.

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*Leon, Morris, The Gospel According to Matthew. Pillar New Testament Commentary (Wm. B. Eerdmans, 1992), 348–351, and Keener, C. S., Matthew (Vol. 1, Mt 13:24–35) (InterVarsity Press, 1997).