The Enemy in the Field | Trinity Sermons

Hello and welcome to this week's episode of Trinity

Sermons. This week we are continuing our teaching

series called Growing Season, where we're going

back to the farm to see what the farm has to

teach us about faith. If you ask any gardener,

they will probably tell you the worst part of

gardening is all of the weeds. The things that

we didn't plant that pop up and get in the way

of those healthy things that we really do want

growing. We also have weeds in our lives, things

that come up all of a sudden, things that we

really don't want to see. But how should we deal

with those weeds? That's what Rob is going to

unpack for us in today's sermon. Today's reading

is from the Gospel of Matthew, chapter 13, verses

Matthew 13:24–30

24 to 30 and 36 to 43. Jesus told them another

parable. An enemy did this, he replied. The servants

asked him, Do you want us to go and pull them

up? No, he answered, because while you are pulling

the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them.

Let both grow together until the harvest. At

that time, I will tell the harvesters. First,

collect the weeds and tie them in bundles to

be burned. Then gather the wheat and bring it

into my barn. Then he left the crowd and went

into his house. His disciples came to him and

said, explain to us the parable of the weeds

in the field. He answered, the one who sowed

the good seed is the son of man. The field is

the world and the good seed stands for the people

of the kingdom. The weeds are the people of the

evil one and the enemy who sows them is the devil.

The harvest is at the end of the age and the

harvesters are angels. As the weeds are pulled

up and burned in the fire, so it will be at the

end of the age. The Son of Man will send out

His angels, and they will weed out His kingdom,

everything that causes sin and all who do evil.

They will throw them into the blazing furnace,

where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

Then the righteous will shine like the sun in

the kingdom of their Father. Whoever has ears,

let them hear the word of the Lord. A number

of years ago, we purchased a goat. It was a boar

goat. And these are goats that have white bodies,

but they have brown heads and beautiful floppy

ears. And we decided to breed this goat. And

we were very, very excited about that. The prospect

of having, you know, little baby goats, kids

running around the farm was very exciting to

us. And I made sure that I got a special pen

ready for her to give birth. put bedding in there,

a special manger, a special, you know, pail of

water just for her, and kind of had it all set

up. And yeah, after five months, it was a really,

really exciting day when this goat gave birth

to two little baby goats, and it was fantastic.

But what I didn't realize, to my shame, was just

how unbelievably curious baby goats are. And

the next day, one of those little goats somehow

managed to squeeze itself under the gate into

the cow pen, and it was trampled to death. The

day after that, when I came out to the pen, I

was shocked to discover that the other... baby

goat had somehow climbed into that water bucket

I mentioned and drowned itself in about three

inches of water. And I was so, so angry. In fact,

you can ask my family members. They probably

never seen me so angry as I was that day. And

I was angry at myself because I should have known

better. I thought I had everything ready, but

I'd obviously made some pretty big mistakes.

But that's how life goes on the farm, right?

Farming, the farm is a place of growth, but it's

also a place. of loss. And growing up on a farm,

you kind of see it all. I've seen it all. I've

seen a stillborn calf pulled from a cow, only

to have the cow die as well. I've seen a fox

trotting out of my driveway with a chicken in

its mouth. I have seen a field full of soybeans

get rained on and rained on and rained on until

every last bean rotted. the ground. But perhaps

the saddest loss for me that I remember was one

year, it was discovered that among our many barn

cats, one of them had rabies. And so the officials

came and they collected all the cats and had

them all destroyed, including our favorite cat,

Tiptail. who was this gray cat who had just a

little, a bit of white tip on his tail. That

was just devastating as a kid. So tip tail, this

sermon's for you. We're in the middle of a teaching

series called Growing Season. Where we're exploring

the connection between farming and faith. Agriculture

and spirituality. And learning that God is a

great, great farmer. And he is growing something

in us. And he is growing something among us.

But you can't talk honestly about farming without

talking about loss. And the thing is, here's

the thing about losses on a farm. Sometimes losses

that happen on a farm are because somebody was

careless. A gate got left open. A bucket of water

was left in a position where a little goat could

get into it. And when you ask the question, oh

my gosh, how could this happen? Or what went

wrong? You know the answer. The answer was you

went wrong. You made the mistake. You should

have been more careful. But there are other losses

that are actually much harder to explain. Because

at other times, you can do everything right.

And still lose a calf in the middle of the night.

You can plant good seed into good soil. And as

my dad said, the hailstorm still comes and ruins

it all. You know, those losses start to raise

deeper questions in us. Not just, you know, what

went wrong, but questions like, well, where did

this tragedy even come from? Or how did this

happen? Or what do we do now? And it's not just

farmers who have those kind of questions rattling

around in their minds. Chances are you've known

some loss in your life too. A job loss. financial

loss, maybe loss of health, or maybe you've lost

a loved one yourself. And the thing is, it wasn't

because of anything you did, right? Or it wasn't

because of any mistake that you made. You did

everything you knew to do. You were faithful,

you prayed, and yet still something went wrong.

And now you're left asking all of these questions.

Jesus tells a parable this morning about a farmer

who sowed good seed into a good field and he

did everything right. But when the wheat began

to grow, a whole crop of weeds appeared too.

And so the servants came to him and asked, they

said, master, didn't you sow good seed in your

field? Where did all this mess come from then?

And this actually is one of the most honest questions,

I think, in the whole Bible. If the seed is good,

what went wrong, right? If the field was good,

why the tragedy? And if the farmer was faithful,

why did the crop still suffer loss? This is one

of the oldest questions that human beings have

asked. Why do bad things happen? And philosophers

might call it, you know, the problem of evil.

Theologians call it theodicy. You know, if God

is good and if we are faithful, why is there

still so much trouble in the field, in my life?

Or in the world? Why so much pain? Why so much

suffering? It is a very deep question. And there

have been books and essays written trying to

answer it. But here's the interesting thing.

When Jesus is asked this question, his answer

is actually blunt and short. Jesus' answer is,

an enemy has done this. It was an enemy. There's...

An enemy out there. And that's the explanation.

And it actually tells us. Something quite essential.

About the world. According to Jesus. And that

is this. Evil is real. And there is an enemy.

There is someone at work. Against you. There

is someone at work. Against God. The purposes

of God. The field. Is not evil. The seed is not

bad. The farmer is not incompetent. You're not

to blame. It's just that there's an enemy and

he's evil. And it's very interesting for us to

remember that because so often when things go

wrong, our first instinct is to find someone

to blame, right? Who failed? Who sinned? Who

screwed up that caused all this? And even in

this story, it seems like the servants almost

blame the farmer. They're like, hey, you were

supposed to sow good seed. You know, did you

screw up? No. That's often how we think that

there's got to be human error. But Jesus knows

that you can't explain all loss that way. You

can't explain suffering. It's not just as easy

as finding out who to blame. The presence of

the weeds doesn't mean that the farmer failed.

I mean, can you imagine a child getting sick

or a marriage falling apart or someone's dream

that gets shattered? And one of the cruelest

things you could possibly do is stand over top

of that wreckage and say, well, you must have

done something wrong. And, you know, it reminds

me of what Job's friends did in the Old Testament,

the story of Job. Actually, Job was a farmer.

He had sheep and camel and oxen and donkeys and

all that stuff. But one day, fire fell from heaven

and burned up all the sheep. And the Chaldeans

swept in and stole all the camels and so on and

so on. But then, worst of all, Job's... own children

died too, and his family fell apart. And in the

aftermath of that, you know what? People assumed

Job must have done something wrong, right? They

said things like, well, Job, those who plow iniquity

and sow trouble, they reap the same. Or they

said, hey, well, if your children sinned against

God, then he gave them over to the penalty of

their sin. In other words, Job, it must either

be your fault or it must be your children's fault.

But actually the whole book of Job is exactly

to make the point just the opposite of that.

It wasn't Job's fault. Job was righteous. Job

was good. Job was faithful. He did everything

right. And yet still look what happened. The

world is not the way that it should be. And the

field has been invaded. And there's an enemy

at work against your life and against the life

of God. And you may think, oh, that sounds so

old -fashioned or that sounds so superstitious

and fine. But just know that Christianity doesn't

just smile at suffering and say, oh, well, you

got to take the good with the bad. No, it gives

us permission to name evil as evil and to say

an enemy has done this. But if Jesus' first point

is that evil is real, his second point is that

evil is sneaky. And the enemy works under cover

of darkness and he works through imitation. I

mean, wouldn't life be great if evil was really,

really easy to spot? I think of this line from

1 Peter. Your adversary, the devil, is roaring

like a lion. He's prowling around. You know,

wouldn't that be, it's kind of hard to miss a

roaring lion. And I suppose sometimes the enemy

does roar like that, but in this parable, the

enemy does not roar. The enemy sneaks. The enemy

doesn't burn the field to the ground. He doesn't

go trample through the field in the middle of

broad daylight. No, he comes at night and he

sows weeds among the wheat and then he goes away

and it's quiet and it's hidden and it takes forever

for people to actually realize what has happened.

And the reason it takes so long and the reason

nobody notices is because the Weed that Jesus

is describing here is a weed darnel, and it's

a mimic weed. It looks very much like wheat in

its early stages, right? If you put it in the

same field with wheat and you just let it grow

there, it blends right in. Eventually, the difference

becomes clear. When it comes to the harvest,

one of them forms wheat heads and the other does

not, right? But here is the point. Here's the

point. Evil often imitates the thing that it

wants to destroy. The enemy doesn't work always

by making evil look evil. Sometimes he makes

evil look good. He makes weeds look like wheat.

He can make someone look like a strong leader,

but underneath they're just a power -hungry manipulator.

He can make someone look like they're your friend,

but behind your back they're... and saying all

sorts of horrible things about you. He can make

someone look like they're helping the church,

but actually what they're really doing is slowly

tearing the church apart. It's not easy to tell

which is which. You've got... To look at the

fruit, actually. Not just the appearance. In

fact, Jesus once said, beware of people who come

to you in sheep's clothing. Another agricultural

image, right? But inwardly, they are ravenous

wolves. You will know them by their fruits. Not

by their leaves, not by their stems. You'll know

them by their fruit. And so, as people, you and

me, who live in a world full of good and evil,

full of wheat and weeds, need discernment to

tell the difference. Not paranoia, right? Not

scanning the pews to find out who's good and

who's evil and who's a weed and who's wheat,

but discernment. The ability to see what fruit

is actually growing in that person's life because

that's how I can tell who they are. That's the

clue, the fruit. And let me just add this. And

this matters especially, I think, for the church

because the enemy rarely attacks a church through

obviously wicked people or sinister plans. No,

instead, what the enemy does is he grows things

among us, things that look spiritual, but in

fact, And those things choke out the love and

they choke out the honesty and grace of a church.

That's how the enemy works. The enemy works through

imitation and he imitates what he wants to destroy.

Right? So be discerning. That brings us to the

third part of this story. The enemy is real.

Yes. He works by imitation. Yes. But the servants.

They want a quick fix. They want to sort this

problem out right away. And you can understand

why. They see weeds and they're like, hey, do

you want us to go in and just like start pulling

them out? Should we just go in and start cleaning

up the field? And at first, that sounds like

a pretty good idea. If there are weeds, pull

them out. If there is evil, you should deal with

it. But the farmer says, no, don't do it. Don't

do it. For in gathering the weeds. You're going

to uproot the wheat along with them. Now, the

farmer's not being a wimp here. The farmer is

not scared of his enemy or saying, oh, evil doesn't

matter, just let it grow. No, he is saying, you

can't. You're just not capable of making the

final determination between wheat and weeds and

between good and evil. You can't do it without

causing real, real damage. And that, I think,

is because while the servants can see the weeds,

they definitely cannot see the roots. They see

what's above the surface. They don't see what's

below the surface. And if they charge in there

and start ripping out everything that looks wrong,

then they will end up destroying the very wheat

that they are trying to save. All those roots

are tangled together underneath the soil. Man,

oh man, and Christian history tells us over and

over again how the church has been tempted to

try to create this very pure field for God. And

so we go hunting for the weeds. And we're convinced

that if we just remove all the wrong people,

then everything would be safe. But human beings

are not good at final judgment. They get it wrong

again and again and again. And when we try to

sort things out too soon on our own, we end up

pulling out the wheat with the weeds. Now you

might say, well then, aren't we supposed to confront

evil? Aren't we supposed to fight back against

the enemy? And the answer is yes, we are definitely

called to resist evil. We definitely have to

protect the vulnerable from evil. We definitely

have to speak truth where there are lies. But

there is a big difference in assuming that it

is our job to do the final sorting of the wheat.

And to think that somehow that's our job. No,

no, that is not our job. Our job is not to figure

out what is good and evil. We're not called to

play God. The church is called to be faithful.

We're not called to finally sorting it out, but

to be faithful in truth and love and holiness.

We're not the harvesters, though. We are not

the final judges of who is in and who is out.

Even Paul says, he says, judge nothing before

the appointed time. Wait until the Lord comes.

Only God can bring to light what is hidden and

sort out the field without destroying the good

wheat. So the servants, yeah, they want to fix

the field real fast. And the farmer says, wait

for the harvest. And by the way, The harvest

doesn't depend on you. It belongs to God. But

here is another reason why those servants can't

just race in there and start pulling out all

the weeds. And that's because not all the weeds

are out there, right? Some of them are in here,

right? And so we should not talk as if the problem

of evil. is always somewhere else or someone

else. Because when I look honestly at my life

in the field of my own heart, I find wheat and

weeds growing a lot closer together than I like

to admit. I can love God and I can still want

control. I can serve faithfully, but I can still

crave recognition. I can preach grace. But I

can still be impatient with people's weaknesses.

Alexander Solzhenitsyn, who survived the brutal

Soviet forced labor camps, the gulags, he saw

more loss and more suffering than most. And yet

even he realized that the line separating good

and evil passes not through states, nor between

classes, nor between political parties, but right

through every human heart. And you know what

he's talking about. You know what's going on

in your own heart. You know that you want to

love, but there's hate in there too. And you

want to forgive, but resentment keeps growing.

You want to trust God, but there's fear, right?

You want to follow Jesus, but there's plenty

of things going on in your heart that look nothing

like Jesus. And so in other words, humility.

toward other people begins with honesty about

ourselves. Before I point out the weeds in my

neighbor, I need to ask him, search my own heart.

God, Lord, I see things growing in me that just

don't belong there. Fear and pride and impatience

or lust or whatever it may be. God, just, God,

pull me closer to you and do the work in my heart

first. And God is not surprised, by the way,

what he finds growing. In your heart, he sees

the wheat, the good stuff, and he sees the weeds

and he sees the roots. And yet he's committed

to saving what he has planted. But how? How is

this mixed field ever going to be saved? How

can my divided heart ever be saved? Well, here's

how. Here's how. Jesus. And Jesus does not stand

at the edge of this field, at the edge of this

world. No, no. He enters into it and he walks

right in to the weeds, right into the loss. You

see, Jesus actually knows what it's like to have

people that he loves kind of hurt him and walk

away. Judas betrayed him. Peter denied him. The

crowds turned back. He knows the pain of living

in a mixed world. field of good and evil and

the tangle of wheat and weeds. And so on the

cross, Jesus took that whole weedy field onto

himself. He took the thorns into his head, the

nails through his hands. And like those little

goats, Jesus was trampled. Jesus was drowned

by death. And on Good Friday, you know what?

It looked like the enemy had won. It looked like

the weeds had overwhelmed the wheat. It was a

total crop failure. But on the third day, Jesus

rises again. And the resurrection is God's announcement.

Guess what? The enemy does not. own the field

and sin does not get the final word and loss

does not get the final word and death does not

get the final word. And one day Jesus will return

and he will gather the harvest and he finally,

he will set the field right. Now, just before

I end, I want to be honest about some language

you heard in that reading that probably scared

the out of you, right? Jesus says the weeds will

be gathered and thrown into the blazing furnace

where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

We could do a whole sermon just on this image

and it's very hard language and it might make

us squirm. It might make us uncomfortable and

I'm not going to pretend that it doesn't do that.

But just notice again, who is doing this judging?

The son of man will send out his angels and they,

will weed out of his kingdom everything that

causes sin and all who do evil. Jesus himself.

Jesus and his angels will be the ones who finally

determine what is a wheat and what is a weed,

what is good and what is evil. And that actually

should comfort us, not scare us because the judge

of the harvest is the same savior who died in

the field. And he is not cruel. We know that

he is not careless. He is not eager to destroy

anyone. He knows about every wound and every

loss. and every hurt, every person in this room

who has been harmed in some way, every tear that

has fallen into the soil, he knows all about

that. And in the end, he will make it right.

The hands that will sort through the wheat still

bear the nail marks on them. And that is the

reason why we can face judgment without despair.

Okay, and one day it's true. The righteous will

shine like the sun in the kingdom of their father.

The harvest is coming. And that's not, you know,

wishful thinking. That is the promise made by

the same God who planted the field in the first

place. He's not going to abandon the field to

the enemy. So until that day comes, what do we

do? We keep farming. We keep sowing good seed.

We keep watching for fruit. We keep resisting

the enemy and we keep trusting the great farmer.

That's what farmers do. You heard my dad, right?

After a hard loss, you get up the next morning

and you go back into the field. And it's not

because the loss didn't hurt. Of course it hurt.

But this field, this world is still worth tending.

If you've experienced loss, if you have weeds

planted, Where you thought you planted wheat

and you're saying, what went wrong? What do I

do now? This parable doesn't answer every question

you may have, but it tells us enough. The seed

is good, but the enemy is real. The field is

mixed, but the harvest is coming. And until that

day, stay humble, stay watchful and faithful

and hopeful. Thanks be to God. Amen. Thanks for

tuning in to this week's episode of Trinity Sermons.

This sermon was recorded at Trinity Church Streetsville

in Mississauga, Ontario on July 12, 2026.