Homily For The 16TH Sunday In The Ordinary Time Of The Year (A) July 19, 2023.
Patience is waiting and not passively waiting, that is laziness. But to keep going when the going is hard and slow – that is patience.”–St. Augustine
Sunday Readings
My Dearest Friends In Christ,
I warmly welcome you into the presence of God on this 16th Sunday to listen to His Divine Instructions for our Christian living and survival.
The readings of today, especially the Gospel filled with parables, invite us to imitate the patience of God in our earthly life in order to avoid falling prey to the devil as victims of impatience.
God’s Patience May Be Scandalous But...
God’s Patience may be scandalous, but it is filled with wisdom. The Gospel of today presents us with many parables, but most significantly the parable of the weeds among the wheat. Three actors played out in this parable: the master who sowed good seeds in his farm, the devil who sowed the weeds at night, and the disciples who noticed the weeds.
God as the Master of the vineyard has always sown the best seeds in His vineyard – the Church. Nothing bad comes from God. He sows what is good in the hearts of men through his Divine Word. He made man after His likeness and bequeathed on His own the best. God created us to be good, but evil comes from the evil one, who sows weeds in our hearts to suffocate the Truth planted by God.
Tares are weeds that resemble wheat. In the parable, a wheat field had deliberately been polluted by an enemy who intermixed the seeds of the weeds with the wheat. Only after the plants were partly grown did the problem become apparent. The devil’s work is to sow the seeds of confusion: to mix Truth with error, to stifle and suffocate the good morals and values, to make sinful things look beautiful, fashionable, and appealing, so as to deceive believers. Today we live in a world and worship in a church where evil lives alongside the good; the bad elements exerting a bad influence on the good.
The Devil’s Plan Is To Lure Us Into Impatience
The devil has one primary reason for sowing the weeds among the good seeds. It is his intention to lure the Master into impatience, such that in an attempt to uproot the weeds, the wheat will also go with them. The devil is very tactical, but our Master Jesus is an Intelligent Strategist.
We all know that no farmer would ever allow weeds to compete with good seeds for fertilizer. Weeds are unwanted and farmers spend a great deal of money, time, and energy removing them to ensure that the good seeds make a good yield at harvest. This isn’t so with Jesus. Remember, Jesus used this parable as a pedagogical method to teach us about the mysteries of God’s kingdom, so we aren’t talking about agriculture here, but our spiritual life.
Leave The Good and The Bad Until Harvest Time
Many are still wondering why homosexuals, transgenders, bisexuals, armed robbers, lesbians, pro-abortionists, scammers, fraudsters, prostitutes, drunkards, etc should be in the Church. For some, they should not even be allowed entrance into the church building because they pollute the sacred space. If you are still thinking like this, today Jesus answers your question. Let them be until the harvest day, but be careful never to allow them to influence you. While Jesus asked the disciples not to uproot, He instructed us to keep sowing good seeds (living righteous lives) to suffocate the evil weeds. “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not give up.” (Gal 6:9). Bear this in mind, the Church is a community of saints and sinners, where every sinner has the opportunity to become a saint. If you send the armed robber who comes to church away, he may become even more dangerous and endanger your life. Just keep praying for everyone and do not judge.
We Need To Be Vigilant
It took the disciple’s vigilance to detect the presence of weeds among the wheat. The devil sowed seeds that are similar to the wheat, such that, if one is not vigilant, he may hardly notice the difference between the two (eg. corn and millet at an early stage, or tares and wheat). The Bible keeps asking us to be vigilant. (cf. 1 Peter 5:8, Mathew 26:41) The devil often plants the bad seed when we are asleep. “While everyone was asleep his enemy came and sowed weeds.” Are we Christians not asleep when evil thrives among us? Aren’t we parents who are asleep when our children begin to adopt an immoral lifestyle unknown to us? Your son might be bringing in a woman once you go to bed or he leaves the house late at night and you don’t know. Often we are careless or so carefree that we overlook important details, only to get to know them at the 11th hour when every damage has already been done. If you are a driver and you don’t listen to the sudden change in your engine sound, you might risk being stuck in the middle of traffic someday. Watch over your life and the things you do, lest you gradually become obsessed with an immoral lifestyle, or addicted to a sinful habit. “But watch yourselves lest your hearts be weighed down with dissipation and drunkenness and cares of this life, and that day come upon you suddenly like a trap.” (cf. Luke 21:34)
Avoid Any Form Of Violence In Dealing With Evil
Don’t be violent!!. Avoid hasty decisions. The Master resisted the temptation of the devil with His patience. An adage says, “The patient dog eats the fattest bone.” Patience is a virtue we all need to cultivate. Many problems in life are solved through patience and endurance. You can make problems worse and get into deeper trouble if you attempt to be violent or impatient in handling problems around you. It was really a big issue to allow the weeds to grow with the good seed, but the Master has taught us to be wise, to resist the devil, and to avoid hasty judgments.
The last day of judgment will bring all our worries about evil in the world to an end. May our little seed of faith be nurtured to grow like the mustard seed, and like yeast may it lead to greater growth.
May the Holy Spirit continue to assist us in our prayers as we struggle to dominate the vineyard of God with good seeds of holiness, discipline patience, and truth. May He make us vigilant in prayer and patient in our words and deeds.
The Divine Intelligence often contradicts human expectations but that is what makes God truly a Father
I keep you and your family always in my prayers. ©Clem C. Aladi (2024)
