Proper 11

In the very earliest days of the settlement of the Arizona territory, the Bishop of Los Angeles sent a missionary out to Phoenix to try to establish a church there. After two years, the priest returned to tell the bishop that he could not establish a congregation in Phoenix.

“Why not?” asked the bishop. “Are there no people there?”

“Well, yes, there are people there,” said the priest. “But those who live there during the winter have no need of heaven and those who live in Arizona during the summer have no fear of hell.”

Heaven and hell. It’s the subject of today’s Gospel, which says that one day there will be a final judgment when God separates those whom He calls wheat and those whom He calls weeds. The one will be brought into the kingdom of their Father and the other will be thrown into the fiery furnace.

The idea of a final Judgment Day followed by an eternal heaven or hell seems alien to our permissive society. Ours is a “three strikes and you’re out” culture. But if you whine a bit, we’ll give you four or five strikes. We curve the grades on the Scholastic Aptitude Test so that the outcome will look better. Many schools have several valedictorians rather than one because we don’t like to have winners and losers. In such a society, it sounds strange to hear about a final Judgment Day and eternal punishment and weeping and gnashing of teeth.

In today’s Gospel, Jesus tells a simple parable to illustrate the truth about Judgment Day. This story was designed to be familiar to people who depended on agriculture for a living. A farmer planted good wheat seed in a field. But under cover of night, an enemy came in and planted weeds. At first no one noticed.

There was a common weed in Palestine called bearded darnel, which was a common curse of farmers. In its early stages it looked just like wheat. But when both had “headed out” or produced seeds up top, the two could be distinguished by color. Then the darnel had to be separated from the good grain because its seeds were slightly poisonous. The farm hands came to the owner and asked, “Do you want us to pull the weeds?”

“No,” said the owner. “If you try, you might damage the grain in the process. Let the weeds alone. At harvest time we will separate the two.”

A time is coming when a great separation will take place. Judgment Day is coming.

There are four truths declared here about Judgment Day. First, the enemy is real. Jesus says, “An enemy came and sowed weeds among the wheat.” Jesus tells us plainly that the enemy is the devil, Satan.

Some modern Christians consider themselves too sophisticated to believe in a devil. And surely, we all know that there is no creature with horns and a pitchfork. But the Bible declares that there is an intelligent, active spiritual presence in this world opposing God. This Satan and his followers were angels who rebelled against the rule of God and were cast out of heaven. Satan tries to connect with the original sin in all of us, attempting to separate us from God and make this world resemble hell.

The second truth is that God is patient and kind. In Jesus’ parable, the owner of the farm does not clean out the weeds right away. God is amazingly patient with us! Listen to this word from 2 Peter 3:9: “The Lord is not slow about his promise, as some think of slowness, but is patient with you, not wanting any to perish, but all to come to repentance.” God will never allow someone to be condemned to hell unjustly or undeservedly. And God gives people many chances to turn their lives around and claim Jesus Christ as Lord.

Third, it is God who judges in the end, not us. No person is authorized to compose a list of those who are going to hell. To say, “You’re going to hell” is judgmental and presumptuous. Jesus warned, “Judge not, lest you also be judged.”  It’s not for us to do – it’s way above our pay grade.

Author Archibald Hunter once wrote a limerick concerning today’s parable: “There is so much good in the worst of us, and so much bad in the best of us, that it hardly becomes any of us, to talk about the rest of us.”

If we ever decide in advance that somebody is unreachable for Christ, we have ceased to be a church. We are then a club, not worthy of the name of Christ.

Listen to the types of people who became Christians and joined the New Testament church at Corinth: fornicators, idolaters, adulterers, prostitutes, thieves, the greedy, drunkards, and blasphemers. Under the lordship of Christ, they changed. Christ loves us enough to accept us as we are, but he loves us too much to leave us as we are.

Fourth, Judgment Day is coming. Pastor Pierce Harris put it this way: “Someday you will look up and see the Divine Storekeeper coming down the long stairway of the stars, rattling his keys and calling out, ‘It’s closing time, folks, it’s closing time!’” Lots of modern Christians have problems with the doctrine of a final judgment and eternal punishment. Many ask, “How could a loving God consign anyone to an eternal hell?” Let’s allow the scripture to respond to that question.

Hell was not prepared for people. It was prepared for the devil and his angels. So, for a person to go to hell is to go against God’s plan. God does not desire that a single person be lost. Judgment and hell are the fate of persons who choose to live apart from God. Hell is the chosen place of the person who loves self more than God, who loves this world more than God’s world.       Final judgment is that moment at the end of life on earth when God looks sorrowfully at the rebellious person and says, “I won’t contend with you anymore. Your choice will be honored.” The doctrines of a final judgment and an eternal heaven and hell are hard doctrines. But without them, God’s justice and hatred of sin are compromised, and our freedom of choice is denied. Real love forces choices between good and evil.

There is only one way to bypass judgment and to be assured of spending eternity in heaven. It is to repent and to believe the good news that “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, to the end that all that believe in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life.” If you turn your life around and trust in Jesus Christ as your Savior and Lord, you will bypass judgment and heaven will be God’s gift to you.

There’s a story about a fellow who died and found himself before the pearly gates. Saint Peter met him and told him he needed 100 points to get in. The man said, “Well, I was married to the same woman for 50 years and never cheated on her.”

“That’s wonderful,” said St. Peter. “That’s worth three points.”

“Three points? Well, I attended church all my life and supported its ministry with my tithe and by serving on the vestry and doing just about everything they asked me to do.”

“Terrific!” replied St. Peter. “That’s certainly worth a point.”

“One point? Good gravy! Well, I also volunteered with Habitat for Humanity and worked in a homeless shelter.”

“Fantastic!” said St. Peter, “That’s good for two more points.”

“Two points?” the man cried. “At this rate the only way I can get into heaven is by the sheer grace of God!”

St. Peter answered, “Grace of God – that counts for 100 points. Come on in.”

Yes, there will be a final judgment. God’s justice and our freedom of choice demand it. Every person will spend eternity in heaven or hell. Yet our passport to heaven is simple. It’s just a matter of saying to God sincerely, “I am a sinner for whom Jesus died and I claim him by faith as Savior and Lord.”

If you haven’t taken that step in faith, I invite you to do it today.