Sometimes I catch myself fantasizing about who I would like to cut out of my life.  I don’t fantasize about their death, just their disappearance.  I mean, not in a kidnapped-and-taken-to-Siberia kind of way, but in a, “Oh, you’re moving? That’s too bad” kind of way. Gone from my air space.  Gone from my face vision.  Gone from my Facebook feed.

I’m not saying this is right, or good, or that it has anything to do with what is sacred.

I’m just saying…I’m just saying.

Of course, we have to make boundary choices with people.  Some people have physically harmed us, and now we need to live under a different roof.  Some people have proven untrustworthy in our difficult moments, and we need to limit how much we let them in.  Some people are just out and out toxic, and we need to steer clear of them for awhile.

But.

Jesus tells us to be careful about how freely and easily we make these decisions, “The kingdom of heaven is like a man who sowed good seed in his field….”

Okay, pause.  About to come at us is a parable about God bringing His presence and goodness into the world now.  But notice where Jesus goes next, “But while everyone was sleeping, his enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat, and went away….”

Whoa.  Immediately you can hear Jesus addressing the questions that people have had for thousands of years.  Where does evil come from?  If God is good—and is sowing goodness—why all the cancer/racism/child abuse/war/walls/greed/etc.?

All we get from Jesus is, “An enemy did this.”  Now we’re jumping to all kinds of conclusions, sure that we know who or what the enemy is: Republicans, or Democrats, or Christians, or Muslims, or demons, or genetics, or…we are pros at making these lists.  Jesus doesn’t seem interested in answering any of these questions, justifying any of these labels.  

He just goes on: “The servants asked him, ‘Do you want us to go and pull them up?’”

Should we go and rip out all those people we are sure are the enemy, are corrupt, are impure, are sinners, are bigots?  Religious people have been dying—no, literally dying—to do this ever since there have been religious people, “We’ll go behead them, hang them, shame them, excommunicate them, shoot them, nuke them.”

To which Jesus answers, “No.”

No.

Why?  Jesus thought we’d never ask, “Because while you are pulling up the weeds, you may uproot the wheat with them.”  (Both wheat and “weeds” looked similar as they grew in First Century Palestine.)

Let that sink in a minute.  Read it again.  Go meditate in a corner. Jesus seems concerned that if people who follow Him, who believe in Him, who name themselves after Him (Christian) go around trying to figure out who is the weed, and then start trying to get rid of them, they are going to do more harm than good.

Why?  Because Jesus says we’re terrible at knowing the difference.

Good people with good intentions do a lot of damage attempting to separate the good from the evil.

According to Jesus.

Now here’s the kicker.  This is what Jesus says we should do instead, “Let both grow together until the harvest.”  Let it alone.  Leave it be.  Stop trying to figure it out, stop being the arbiter of who is good and who is not.

The word “let” here is the Greek word apheis.  It is a word Jesus throws around a lot.  It is in the prayer He taught His disciples to pray and in the response He gave to His enemies while they hung Him suffocating on a Roman cross.  

Apheis means “forgive”.

Forgive.

There is nothing that challenges your ego and defense mechanisms and over-inflated sense of self-righteousness more.

After we’ve done our personal work of dying to our own junk/defensiveness/contempt/hatred, our next step with those that we struggle with is to forgive.  

Before the conflict is resolved.

With those that we wish would move.  Forgive.  With those we wish would be voted out.  Forgive.  With those we wish would see things our (righteous) way. 

Forgive.

This is how God’s goodness begins to grow in the world.

So, in the words of Jesus, “let both grow.”

You and them.

Because growing is going to take both of us a very long time.