"At heart, this parable isn’t about the nature of evil and provides little material for constructing a coherent theodicy (if there even is such a thing). Rather, I think this parable is about ambiguity. Yes, the sower planted with good seeds. Yes, there are now weeds strewn among the wheat that puts the ideal harvest the sower had imagined at risk. Ideally, the servants could just rip out the weeds, but the sower knows that to tear out the weeds now risks ruining the maturing wheat as well. And so the sower must wait, living with both the wheat and the weeds until the day of harvest when they may be separated in due time.
How often do we not also face similar dilemmas? If not with wheat and weeds (although there may be a few gardeners in your congregation who sympathize with the sower!), then with a multitude of other difficult choices:
like between getting a job to support the family or staying at home to spend more time with the family;
or between supporting someone who consistently struggles at work and pulls the quality of your team down or firing that person;
or between choosing the best school you’ve been accepted to or one that is more affordable;
or between two different treatment options in responding to a grave illness;
or between staying in your current call where things are comfortable or choosing to move on to newer, but unknown, pastures;
or between giving into peer pressure because it just plain sucks to be left out or choosing to stick to your values and risk isolation;
or….
like between getting a job to support the family or staying at home to spend more time with the family;
or between supporting someone who consistently struggles at work and pulls the quality of your team down or firing that person;
or between choosing the best school you’ve been accepted to or one that is more affordable;
or between two different treatment options in responding to a grave illness;
or between staying in your current call where things are comfortable or choosing to move on to newer, but unknown, pastures;
or between giving into peer pressure because it just plain sucks to be left out or choosing to stick to your values and risk isolation;
or….
Do you see what I mean, dear Partner? Our lives are littered with situations where there is no clear or easy answer. And yet we rarely talk about these things in church. Maybe we don’t know what to say. Or maybe we ourselves aren’t quite sure how the faith relates to this. But I hear in this parable Jesus’ promise that in ambiguous, challenging situations we have the promise that, in the end, God will sort things out."
http://www.davidlose.net/2014/07/pentecost-6-a-on-wheat-weeds-and-ambiguity/
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