Lectio
“And consider now, if in addition to what we have already recounted, you can otherwise take the good seed to be the children of the kingdom, because whatsoever good things are sown in the human soul, these are the offspring of the kingdom of God and have been sown by God the Word who was in the beginning with God, so that wholesome words about anything are children of the kingdom.
But while men are asleep who do not act according to the command of Jesus, ‘Watch and pray that ye enter not into temptation,’ the devil on the watch sows what are called tares — that is, evil opinions — over and among what are called by some natural conceptions, even the good seeds which are from the Word.”
— Origen of Alexandria, Commentary on the Gospel of Matthew
Meditatio
In my hardness of heart, I hear the voice of my enemy. I hear the voice of the one who haunts me, who despises me, and who would destroy me. But then I realize that it is my own voice.
This is my anger, my wrath, and my hatred. This is my pride, my envy, and my covetousness. What I despise in others is exactly that which I despise in me, yet I hide it from me, I deny it in me, and I reject it in me.
But truth will out. When frightened or threatened, truth will out, refusing to live in the shadows forever. The darkness cannot hold the darkness because the light persists, drawing the faithful into itself, transforming them in itself, until they become the very light that exposes them.
And so the Lord allows me to hear the voice of my enemy spilling forth from my lips, and He allows me to feel the sting of truth: that the weeds of evil grow not only in the fields of the world, but in my own heart alongside the wheat of His goodness. And it is not for me to pluck them out, but to pray that His angels will sort through the harvest, leaving only that which is desirable to the Lord who teaches me that the evil I see in others is a reflection of the evil that hides inside me.
Oratio
Your Harvest
my heart
Your field
my soul
Your harvest
till the soil
with love
uproot all that is not love
in Your time
in Your way
burn it away
let the ashes of sin
become the dust
beneath Your feet
until only love remains
rooted in love
reaching toward Love
Contemplatio
The wheat and the tares grow together in you, as they do in every heart, and it is not yours to sort them. Let the harvest belong to Him, in His time and in His way. Rest here a while longer, offering no resistance to His presence, and let Him do with you what only He can do.
Related Scripture
“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.”‘”
— Matthew 13:24-30 (NRSVCE)
For Further Reading
If you enjoyed this post, you may also like The Cramped Prison of Self: Karl Rahner on Hell, Freedom, and the Vastness of God’s Love, which meets the same inward reckoning from another angle — not the evil we project onto others, but the self we barricade ourselves inside of when we refuse to be known.
Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity.
Wrestling With God.
Returning To Love.
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