[AI translation] In general, my experience, as I study the books on preaching, the literature on preaching, and as I look back on decades of ministry, is that this word is relatively rarely taught in the pulpit. I myself would like to talk about it only because I used to explain a parable of Jesus in this way on the last Sundays, and this is the next one.Our human curiosity would hope that from this parable of Jesus we will finally get an answer to a fascinating question: where does evil, evil come from in this world? We will not get an answer to this question, because it is so theoretical. Besides, the Bible never answers theoretical, speculative questions, only practical ones. Here it is only a question of evil - is. Even Jesus, when asked how it is that at night, while people were sleeping, the enemy came and threw concretions. But where he came from, who he is, where he disappeared to, we hear not a word about here, nor in the later explanation of the biblical parable, Yet all he says is that this enemy is the devil. But what he is, what he looks like, where he came from, and why he can exist in this world - again theoretical questions - we search in vain for answers. The fact is that there is a manifestation of spiritual power which is the enemy of all good, which threatens the good, the pure - especially the best, the truest, the purest - and which is incessantly throwing up concolios.
There is no field in the world, no flower garden, in which only pure wheat and flowers grow, but there is always the concolor among them. Good and bad, true and false: always, everywhere, they grow together, intermingled in all the "fields" of this world. This is why, even in the best-intentioned human endeavours that seek to ennoble human life, to raise it to a higher level, there are always aspirations and conflicts that threaten human life and well-being. That is why, although for two thousand years the gospel seeds of God's love have been falling in the fields of the world, there is still so much hatred, malice, disobedience, warfare, in the souls of individual Christians, as in the great fields of the whole history of Christianity.
Or perhaps look into the small world of your own soul: do you not see the same thing there, that the concolor and the pure wheat grow together, the good and the bad are mixed together? Have you, who read the Bible daily, or listen to the Word, and partake of the blessings of the purest divine sowing, never been dismayed to find in yourself, the Bible-believing, praying man, so much pride, conceit, anger, uncleanness of temper? How the beautiful seed-sowing of God is mocked by that other seed-sowing; how all sorts of sinful thoughts and impulses can creep into the life of even the humblest believer - how concord and wheat can fit together - is almost a tear to cry over.
Witness every mother and father. How eagerly they strive to educate the little child to breathe in a pure atmosphere. He prays by his little bedside in the evenings, perhaps telling Bible stories. The parents sow the good seed, and yet something else begins to grow in the soil of that little soul - the opposite of what the parents sowed. Emotions, thoughts, intentions, feelings that are almost frightening. Where is that nasty concolio in that little soul? Where from? Well, from influences against which the parents are helpless. And of this reality, this situation, Jesus says: "While men sleep, the enemy comes and drives away the tares among the pure wheat." At such times, many parents say in amazement: "I don't know what happened to this child, it's as if the devil had got into him... I know it's just a figure of speech, but it says a lot: it expresses the reality of what Jesus is talking about here.
Do you know that at this very moment, while the Word is being spoken from this pulpit, the good seed, the pure seed, is falling, at this very moment, the other dark power is also sowing its poisonous seeds in your soul and in mine! In this second, too, a double sowing is taking place. Let me give you an example. I choose this parable because it is best understood that where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more, all the more. So it's about God accepting us as we are - like the prodigal son, as muddy and miserable as he arrived. That is, that God's forgiving grace for sin is no longer an obstacle because Jesus has suffered God's wrath for all sin. So this, in the purest gospel sense, is what happens. But the enemy is not idle either, scattering a seed or two. A thought comes out of it; a thought that if God is so merciful, then it doesn't matter if I have one less or one more sin on my soul, he will forgive me, because it is so good! Well, then I won't take it so seriously, so severely, I can fit this or that sin, it will fit into that great grace!... You feel that somehow this is how the most precious and beautiful thing becomes: God's grace becomes a cloak for evil? - as the Apostle Peter says. The most beautiful thing: The grace of God, free grace, becomes filthy drunkenness! Just a little thought blossoms in you, and lo and behold, the beautiful seed is spoiled, mocked by the power that sows the concretes...
Jesus speaks of the concolor and the wheat as two different types of people. He is saying directly that in the context of the Christian churches, here in this church, the concoction of wheat and the concoction of concretions are mixed together. Here too, there are Judaisers and true disciples, there are true Christ-followers and there are paper Christians. There are saints and hypocrites. Here, as among us, there are Pharisees and serious converts. Here, too, there are those who come here because they have a genuine, earnest longing in their souls for the Word of God, and there are those who come here because after worship, someone's dress, face, and look can be a good gossip topic with someone else. Stubble and wheat side by side. I deliberately did not say that there are believers and unbelievers here. Jesus didn't say it that way either. He did not say that the wheat is for believers and the tares are for unbelievers, but he said that the wheat is for the sons of the kingdom of God and the tares are for the sons of the wicked. That is not the same as saying believers and unbelievers. Unfortunately, it is a well-known fact that many times a non-believer, with his humanity, his love for humanity, his honest trustworthiness, would much rather be classified as a son of the kingdom of God than a believer whose lips are dripping with devotion, but whose actions are such that he is simply unbearable to those around him.
It is astonishing how Jesus uses the word "evil" to describe people. Never the unbelievers, or the God-deniers, but always the believers: those who are all talk, who keep saying 'Lord, Lord', who claim to have cast out demons, healed the sick in His name, but Jesus says: I never knew you, you have not done the will of my Father. He will say: Depart from me, ye workers of iniquity, for I know you not. The same words are used in Greek and in Hungarian, when he speaks of the sons of wickedness. Let us be careful of this distinction between "believers" and "unbelievers"! Not all believers are sons of the kingdom of God, oh how not! There are there a good many unbelievers among the sons of the kingdom of God; and not all unbelievers are among the sons of the wicked, but how very much they are not! There are there believers also in abundance...
It is quite understandable, is it not, why Jesus does not allow His servants to pluck the tares out of the wheat? We have heard in the parable that such overzealousness to weed out the concretes has given rise to, you know, the things that have happened in history: the crusades, the religious wars, the persecutions of heretics, the inquisitions, all things that, unfortunately, Christians only realised how contrary to Jesus' will they were when they had to be ashamed of themselves before the world. But it is just as contrary to the spirit and will of Jesus to want to exclude someone from the church, to purify the society around Jesus, and to say: How dare such a person come to the Lord's table?! Is not such and such a person ashamed? When we judge lightly the living and the dead, the wheat and the tares, Jesus says, 'Leave it, it is none of your business, it will be seen who was the wheat and who was the tares; until then let both grow until the harvest - the angels will do the rest.
Tell me seriously: as we are sitting here, who can decide who is the wheat and who is the concoction?. Because you might know someone so well that you could say with a clear conscience that they are a concoction, and they would say the same thing about your field. And you, who object to the concolor in the other, have at least as many seeds of Satan in you as in the other. Therefore, from this point of view, who is the concolor - who is the wheat, be once selfish, that is, do not care for the other, from this point of view, care only for yourself and look to yourself. Yes, decide very soon which you are; for we are in for a great surprise at harvest time! A famous man has said - I don't know who - that there are three things that will amaze me there in heaven: one is that there will be people there that I never thought would be there; the second is that there will not be people there that I always thought would be there; the third, the thing that will amaze me the most, is if I myself am there!
Expect to be in for some great surprises on harvest day. Imagine, if we wanted to clear the concolio out of here and keep a small core of elite believers - who would stay? You and me? We would certainly deprive a lot of people of the blessings of pure seed sowing. You know the story of Stephen the Martyr who was stoned to death by evil murderers. Would it not have been a pity for these wretched wretches if God had struck them down with lightning! But what a pity it would have been! For among the wicked murderers was the later apostle Paul, and then he would have been plucked up with the rest. What would you have said, who were converted five or ten years ago, if you had been cut off in former times, when Satan's seed was still in full bloom in you; or if God had done the sifting today, clearing the hollow, allowing no time for growth... Shall we not beg, Lord, not yet, give me a little more time, that I may prove that I am not a concele, but the result of Thy seed-sowing? If you were to weed me out prematurely, hell would be full of tender wheat, promising a good crop - then you and I would in all likelihood be there now and not here.
Anyway, the scribes say that in the Holy Land, the concolor and the wheat are so similar that you can only tell the difference when it starts to ripen. So never say concave to anyone - it might just be a late stalk of wheat: even if it's late, it will bring its own harvest! Never give up on anyone, for God never gives up on you. Remember that it is not only the mysterious sower of the night who sows the concolor, but also the other, the great sower who sows the good seed! Never see man as he is - but as God wills and can make him. So in hope and love, that lets the concolor and the pure wheat grow together until the harvest. Then there will be a big surprise, a big sorting. It will happen in a very different way than we could have imagined, because God is much more merciful to others and more strict with me. Always think of it this way: when you think of others, think of God's mercy, and when you think of yourself, think of God's severity! The real, final, great clarification will be made by Him, and then will be revealed even the joyful fact that the enemy of the night, though he could disturb, could not thwart God's sowing. And then the righteous will shine in the kingdom of their Father. Until then, let us strive and help one another to be there among the righteous!
Amen.
Date: 25 February 1968.