Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father

 

 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears, let him hear!"

 

- Matthew 13:36-43 

 

In chapter 13 of Matthew's Gospel, Jesus has introduced parables in His preaching to the multitudes (beginning with the reading from Tuesday last week).  He taught the parable of the Sower, then gave an explanation for why He speaks in parables to the disciples, as well as an explanation of the parable of the Sower.  Then He taught the parable of the Wheat and the Tares.  On Saturday, Jesus taught the parables of the Mustard Seed and the Leaven, saying:  "The kingdom of heaven is like a mustard seed, which a man took and sowed in his field, which indeed is the least of all the seeds; but when it is grown it is greater than the herbs and becomes a tree, so that the birds of the air come and nest in its branches."  Another parable He spoke to them:  "The kingdom of heaven is like leaven, which a woman took and hid in three measures of meal till it was all leavened."  All of these things Jesus spoke to the multitude in parables; and without a parable He did not speak to them, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet, saying:  "I will open My mouth in parables; I will utter things kept secret from the foundation of the world."

 

 Then Jesus sent the multitude away and went into the house.  And His disciples came to Him, saying, "Explain to us the parable of the tares of the field."  He answered and said to them:  "He who sows the good seed is the Son of Man.  The field is the world, the good seeds are the sons of the kingdom, but the tares are the sons of the wicked one.  The enemy who sowed them is the devil, the harvest is the end of the age, and the reapers are the angels.  Therefore as the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so it will be at the end of this age.  The Son of Man will send out His angels, and they will gather out of His kingdom all things that offend, and those who practice lawlessness, and will cast them into the furnace of fire.  There will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.  Then the righteous will shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father.  He who has ears, let him hear!"  In the reading from Friday, we reported my study Bible's lengthy note on this parable.  One thing we can note clearly about this parable is the way Jesus refers to seeds as that which produce the ultimate fruits that identify what kind of plant grows.  That is, since He explains this as a parable about human beings, we understand sons here to refer to the children, or fruits, that spring from the seed.  What that implies for each one of us is that whichever kind of "seed" we allow to be planted within ourselves (that is, in Scriptural language, the ground of the heart), what is produced for us becomes identity.  If the "bad seed" is implanted in ourselves, we grow to become sons of the wicked one, in Jesus' language.  The good seeds of the Son of Man grow sons of the kingdom.  We are ultimately malleable, in Jesus' imagery, and what we take in determines who we become.  Let us be aware that the language implies inheritance, and those who are members of a particular house:  sons is meant for all of us, of any gender, as it gives us a sense of identity or name of a house to which we belong and which we carry with ourselves.  The idea of identity is similar to what we find in the teaching of St. Paul on sexual immorality.  Just as Jesus says here that the seed we take in and harbor determines whether we are sons of the kingdom or sons of the wicked one, so St. Paul teaches that with what or whom we associate in the body also creates identity for us (see 1 Corinthians 6:12-20).   In this context, we must recognize that we are united with Christ in Baptism.  So there is a sense of the plasticity or malleability of identity that is important in these teachings.  Our identity is not rooted in some permanent sort of fixture that never changes, and neither should our sense of inheritance be so either.  The Gospels stress repeatedly that it is not enough to be descended from illustrious forbears to take on the identity of those righteous people; what is essential is that we be like them, we do as they did.  Using similar imagery from agriculture, John the Baptist preached to the multitudes:  "Therefore bear fruits worthy of repentance, and do not begin to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones. And even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees. Therefore every tree which does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire."  In our modern lives there is a great deal of emphasis and interest in ancestry and genetic codes.  This gives us a type of orientation that would seem to imply that identity is not malleable or changeable, but fixed.  But in the viewpoint of Scripture, even the body is subject to that with which we interact, the things with which we choose to feed ourselves, whether we speak of something physical, emotional, spiritual, mental.  We need to understand that what we choose to dwell upon or spend time upon can become a part of identity, forming and shaping the self.  What we choose to admire or idolize makes a difference.  Let us take seriously this repeated understanding that we grow to be "like" that with which we feed ourselves, what we take in and focus on, and consider how a garden or farm needs constant work, pruning, uprooting of what we don't want, and vigilance to remain in its most beautiful and healthy state.