W&W: Side by Side

~~~ Jeremiah 7: 1-11 ~~~ Psalm 84 ~~~ Matthew 13: 24-30 ~~~

Sometimes we fool ourselves into imagining things the way

we want them to be and not the truth of how they are.

Just because one is a God fearing person who goes to church regularly

does not give this person the 'carte blanche' to go out the rest of the week

and act without love.

Jeremiah is addressing this very problem today,

Reform your ways and your deeds,
so that I may remain with you in this place.

Only if you thoroughly reform your ways and your deeds...

...will I remain with you in this place...

...But here you are...come to stand before me
in this house which bears my name, and say:
"We are safe; we can commit all these abominations again?"

Just because we have THE most merciful God does not mean that

we can continue merrily along in our sinful ways. It is true that

God is kind and merciful, but he is not blind. It is true that we are

weak frail humans, but that does not excuse us from reforming our ways.

Walking through the door into the house of God is not the same as

changing our bad habits. The truth is we are not safe from our own

short comings just because we are in the church.

We cannot come into the house of God to barter with him.

We cannot come to pretend we are better just because we are in his house.

I too see what is being done, says the LORD.

So we gather together, the good and those who deceive themselves,

in the house of the Lord. The 'wheat and the weeds' side by side.

'Master, did you not sow good seed in your field?'

No matter how wonderful God is...no matter how good he wants us to be...

in the end he will never take away our free will.

If God wanted only the good and righteous people to live in this world

he certainly has the power to make that a reality.

But instead, we have seen so often he allows the 'weeds' to exist

along side of the 'wheat'. We may not like what appears as

God's lack of intervention, but it must be that way.

In the gospel today he does not send the workers

into the field to pull up the weeds.

Instead He allows the weeds to grow until the time of the harvest.

At the time of the harvest 'his will' will be made evident.

"...Let them grow together until harvest;
then at harvest time I will say to the harvesters,
'First collect the weeds and tie them in bundles for burning;
but gather the wheat into my barn.'"

We will each face our individual day of harvest at the time of our death.

I am sure you and I want to be brought into the barn

for safe keeping with the Lord.

The heavenly house of the Lord is reserved for the pure of heart.

The 'weeds' will no longer be able to pretend.

God sees our true self.

God sees beyond what the human eye can see.

There is no other God with this capacity to love and forgive.

As we know, God's ways are not our ways.

We will either be truly surprised at who we meet in heaven or

 it will not matter.

I suspect the later will be the case.

God is love so all that can exist in heaven is love.

We can only imagine...