Waiting is Not Indifference

Discerning the Spirits and Growing in Grace

Photo by thomas vermeersch on Unsplash

The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either—but right through every human heart.
Alexander Solzhenitsyn

But you, Lord, are gracious and full of compassion, •
slow to anger and full of kindness and truth.
Psalm 86

So much is unfolding that must
complete its gesture…
so much is in bud.
Denise Levertov (as below)

A LITURGY OF READING AND PRAYER FOR TRINITY 7

Opening Prayer

Breathe and pray 3 times slowly:
Teach me your way, Lord, and I will walk in your truth.

1^st Readings

Psalm 86.11 -end

Teach me your way, O Lord, and I will walk in your truth; •
knit my heart to you, that I may fear your name.

I will thank you, O Lord my God, with all my heart, •
and glorify your name for evermore;

For great is your steadfast love towards me, •
for you have delivered my soul from the depths of the grave.

O God, the proud rise up against me
and a ruthless horde seek after my life; •
they have not set you before their eyes.

But you, Lord, are gracious and full of compassion, •
slow to anger and full of kindness and truth.

Turn to me and have mercy upon me; •
give your strength to your servant
and save the child of your handmaid.

Show me a token of your favour,
that those who hate me may see it and be ashamed; •
because you, O Lord, have helped and comforted me.

Matthew 13.24-30, 36-43

He put before them another parable: ‘The kingdom of heaven may be compared 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.” ’

Then he left the crowds and went into the house. And his disciples approached him, saying, ‘Explain to us the parable of the weeds of the field.’

He answered, ‘The one who sows the good seed is the Son of Man; the field is the world, and the good seed are the children of the kingdom; the weeds are the children of the evil one, and the enemy who sowed them is the devil; the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are angels.Just as the weeds are collected and burned up with fire, so will it be at the end of the age. The Son of Man will send his angels, and they will collect out of his kingdom all causes of sin and all evildoers, and they will throw them into the furnace of fire, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father. Let anyone with ears listen!

REFLECTION

So. If you wanted to make a caricature of Christianity, it’s all here: angels and devils, children of the kingdom and children of the enemy, furnaces of fire and shining suns; gnashing of teeth and happy harvest; the evil and the righteous. Sigh. Could do without it, to be honest. But, like all Jesus’ parables, it’s worth wrestling with.

The weeds in that story are not just a nuisance but toxic. And Jesus doesn’t mince his words, they are evil. The judgement is unequivocal. There are people in all generations, institutions, tendencies, influences, powerful men - enemies of human flourishing - who ruthlessly pursue their own ends to the detriment of both humanity and the earth. That’s never been more obvious. Let’s not mince our words either. That’s evil. Those who seem rather determined to deliberately plant poisonous things in our common soil need to be named for what they are.

But since it can often feel as wide-spread and as worrying as that field of wheat and weed all mixed up, I’m glad that God’s got an ultimate plan. Although I wince at the references to hell fire and the gnashing of teeth, I rejoice in the hope that one day the evil in our world will be bundled up and cast into an eternal fire. Whatever that actually means, it means that God’s love will have the last word. Living in that truth will inspire and support our best intentions now.

Meanwhile, here in our 2026 fields, it’s a bit more complicated than that.

On the surface, this all looks all rather black and white: good guys and bad guys. But the point of the parable seems to be almost the opposite - because the weeds Jesus talks about apparently look very like wheat until the grain appears. So one of the messages here is, surely, beware hasty judgements. Our zeal for purity will often destroy a great deal that is wheat. In a culture of polarisation, rapid denunciation, political tribalism the instinct is alway ‘Shall we uproot them?’ Jesus says, ‘No. Wait.’ Best way to deal with this problem is to learn to discern good from evil along the way - knowing that we are all that field, growing both the best and the worst.

Solzhenitsyn has famously written:

The line separating good and evil passes not through states, nor between classes, nor between political parties either—but right through every human heart.

But refusing to uproot the weeds ourselves doesn’t mean becoming passive. Waiting is not indifference. Even as we trust God with the final judgment, so, like the psalmist, we never cease crying out for God’s justice. Walter Brueggemann says of the psalms of lament, complaint and protest, that they do not just ask but insist that God create new social possibility, measure up to God’s own claim of fidelity:

But you, O Lord, are a God merciful and gracious,
slow to anger and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.
Turn to us, and have mercy on us.

In prayer, we must find our holy longing for the goodness of God to prevail - in our own lives and in the life of the world. If that prayer contains the humility to know that the proud and ruthless are also inside me, that the enemy is both within and without, then perhaps we come as near as we can to good discernment and to expressing the right sort of real-life protest.

In the meanwhile, rather than anxiously pulling weeds, might we become faithfully fruitful instead? Instead of being pre-occupied with who is right and who is wrong, might we become the most nourishing wheat we can be, for a hungry world?

What does the Lord your God require of you but to do justice, to love mercy, and to walk humbly with your God?
Micah 6.8

Ponder. Pray. Practice.

Where have you mistaken wheat for weeds—or weeds for wheat? How do you distinguish the two?

Where is God simply asking you to become faithful enough to bear fruit? What would help you do that?

How might you ponder and pray with this in the coming week?

Contemplative Corner

Contemplative prayer and living is a very good way to sink our best roots into the soil of God’s steadfast love and faithfulness.

Find some time for silent letting go this week whether by sitting in prayer, walking in nature, or slowing right down to cherish every detail of what you might be doing or who you might be with. Find ways to dwell in Love.

Widening the Circle

Giving thanks for the grace received today, in prayer or in life, take some time to pray for the people and places on your heart today: especially for discernment in your own life to recognise the life of the Love in you and intention to grow the fruits of the Spirit.

The Lord’s Prayer
for Trinity

Source of All Life, may your name be kept holy.
Your Kingdom, the compassion and justice of Christ, come.
Your Will, in the strength of the Holy Spirit, be done
on earth as in heaven.

Nourish us with your wisdom and truth. Set us free, even as we set others free.
Deliver us from our static certainties and heavy heartedness,
Enliven us this day with your music.
and lead us into your dance…

For you are Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer - now and forever. Amen.

Julie Dunstan

2nd Readings

The Beginners
Denise Levertov

Dedicated to the memory of Karen Silkwood and Eliot Gralla

“From too much love of living,
Hope and desire set free,
Even the weariest river
Winds somewhere to the sea —“

But we have only begun
To love the earth.

We have only begun
To imagine the fullness of life.

How could we tire of hope?
— so much is in bud.

How can desire fail?
— we have only begun

to imagine justice and mercy,
only begun to envision

how it might be
to live as siblings with beast and flower,
not as oppressors.

Surely our river
cannot already be hastening
into the sea of nonbeing?

Surely it cannot
drag, in the silt,
all that is innocent?

Not yet, not yet —
there is too much broken
that must be mended,

too much hurt we have done to each other
that cannot yet be forgiven.

We have only begun to know
the power that is in us if we would join
our solitudes in the communion of struggle.

So much is unfolding that must
complete its gesture,

so much is in bud.

I Want to Live in That Garden

What if, tonight, we all went to bed
and thought of our best version of our self.
It wouldn’t be true, of course. Not
in this moment, and not tomorrow.
Not mid-week. Not next week.
Not even next year. But if we could picture it,
it would be a goal we could live toward.

It would be, perhaps, like the garden beds
I prepared today—hoeing in fertilizer,
last year’s grass clippings, leaves.
When I was done, the rows still looked like dirt,
but such fine dirt it was for planting.

I believe in our resilience.
What is best in us is eager to grow,
like the sunflower sprouts
volunteering again this year.
What if tonight, we imagined the roots
of our goodness. What if tonight,
we planted only those seeds.

Blessing

May we receive and plant the seeds of the Spirit.

May we sink our roots deep in God’s soil and bear Love’s fruit.

May we grow together in humility and discernment.

May we cry out, with all those who suffer, for the justice and mercy of God - for evil to finally be overcome.

May we trust that Love in the end, will prevail.

And the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God and the fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us all now and evermore. Amen.

Music:

Just a gentle piece. Imagine fields of goodness, rippling in the sun.

Note to reader: Thanks for joining me at the Streams. I’ve persisted with a liturgical format in order to invite you to slow down, to breathe, to receive, to pray. I hope you will find somewhere to do this. If not here, where? x