God Remains in Control

In this Sunday’s Gospel reading, Jesus describes the Kingdom of God through three parables. Let us focus on the first story—that of the good wheat and the weeds—which illustrates the problem of evil in the world and highlights God’s patience. The parable is set in a field. The Master of the field represents God and sows good seed, while the enemy represents Satan and scatters the weeds.

The sacred author, Matthew, addressed his Gospel to Jews who had converted to Christianity. We must remember that this Gospel was written fifty years after the death and resurrection of Jesus. The Christians of that era lived in a world rife with evil—a reality they witnessed even as Christianity itself was growing and flourishing.

Therefore, it was necessary to explain the existence of evil. Matthew does so by recounting a parable of Jesus. The Master of the field sows only good seed; the Evangelist specifies that the seed is of high quality. In other words, every action of Jesus is good. In the first chapter of the Book of Genesis, the refrain “And God saw that it was good” is repeated ten times to remind us that everything God has created is good.

Yet, alongside the Master of the field, there is the enemy, representing the logic of this world—a mindset opposed to the Gospel, opposed to the Good News proclaimed by Christ. At night, while everyone sleeps, the enemy sows weeds that resemble the grain. It is impossible to eradicate them without destroying the wheat, because their roots are intertwined with those of the wheat.

The parable teaches us that when our vigilance wanes and we lose our focus on God, the devil finds a way to enter the field of our hearts and infest them with the logic of the world. It takes only a moment of carelessness to succumb to the morality of the world. Often, we do not even distinguish between the values ​​of the Kingdom and those of the world, because they look so much alike.

The servants approach the Master, suggesting that they should remove the soil, but the Master knows that doing so would be suicidal. He remains calm and tells the servants not to panic. This Gospel passage is a gentle and beautiful reminder that God remains in control.