My dear brothers and sisters, Have you ever looked at the world around you—or maybe even just looked at your own life—and felt a sudden, ov...
Have you ever looked at the world around you—or maybe even just looked at your own life—and felt a sudden, overwhelming urge to just start ripping things out?
Kagabi while I was preparing this homily, I realized that mukha ata nagpapaalala si Bosing sa akin. Because these past few days I'd been grumpy and impatient most of the time. Pero sabi ko, no problem coz for sure those who will come today at Mass, some of them are also impatient and malas nila they have come particularly at this moment that I am presiding. 😉
We see a world fractured by division, injustice, and everyday unkindness. We look at our communities, our workplaces, and sometimes even our own families, and we see things that frustrate us. We see the "weeds." And if we are completely honest with ourselves, when we look deep into our own hearts, we find a messy mixture there too. We find beautiful moments of generosity, love, and faith—our wheat. But right next to it, we find patches of selfishness, resentment, and impatience—our weeds.
Our human instinct, just like the servants in today’s Gospel, is to react immediately. "Master, do you want us to go and pull them up?" We want instant judgment. We want a clean field right now. We want to fix everything immediately, cut off the people who hurt us, and purge every flaw with a heavy hand.
But God’s ways are beautifully, frustratingly, and savingly different from ours. Today, the Liturgy invites us to step back and look at how God deals with the messiness of our lives through three simple words: Presence, Patience, and Process.
First, let us look at God’s Presence.
The Gospel tells us that the field is the world, and the good seed represents the children of the Kingdom. Notice that the Master does not abandon the field just because an enemy sneaked in and sowed weeds. He stays. He remains active, attentive, and deeply invested in the growth of the wheat.
In our second reading, Saint Paul reminds us of a beautiful reality about God's presence in our everyday mess: "The Spirit comes to the aid of our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought."
When you are overwhelmed by the imperfections of your life, when you feel like your worries are choking out your faith, God does not stand at a distance waiting for you to get your life perfectly sorted out before He shows up. He is present right now, groaning with us, breathing grace into our weakness, and sustaining us when we don't even have the words to ask for help.
QUESTION: How often do we fail to recognize His presence because we are too busy staring at the weeds around us?
This leads us directly to the second word: God’s Patience.
Our first reading from the Book of Wisdom says something profound: "But though you are master of might, you judge with clemency, and with much lenience you govern us." Think about that. Human power usually wants to show off by executing immediate force. If someone offends us, we want instant vindication. But God, who holds absolute power over the universe, shows His strength through leniency.
When the servants demand to rip out the weeds, the Master stops them: "No, if you pull up the weeds you might uproot the wheat along with them. Let them grow together until harvest."
Why? Because God is patient. God is not in a rush to condemn. He knows that in the spiritual life, something miraculous can happen that can never happen in botany: a weed can turn into wheat. A sinner can become a saint. Matthew was a tax collector; he became an Apostle. Paul was a persecutor; he became the great missionary of grace. I WAS A SINNER...AND IM STILL A SINNER NOW....HAHAHAHA
If God had an executioner’s clock instead of a Father’s heart, where would you and I be today? How many times has God looked at the weeds in our lives and said, "Wait. Give them time. Let them grow. My grace is still working on them"?
PERO TAYO WAGAS KUNG MAKASABING TUMBAHIN NA YAN, TANGALIN NA YAN, PALITAN NA YAN. WE DON'T WANT TO GROW THROUGH CHALLENGES. WE WANT TO GROW IN AN EASY WAY. KUNG PWEDE PA NGA MAGSHORTCUT E. BY GETTING RID OF THOSE SAGABAL SA ATING BUHAY.
And that brings us to our final word: Process.
Growth takes time. The Kingdom of Heaven, Jesus says, is like a tiny mustard seed that slowly becomes a large bush. It is like yeast that slowly, invisibly ferments a whole batch of dough.
True transformation is an organic, sometimes slow, and often quiet process. We live in a world of instant gratification—instant downloads, fast food, overnight success. But holiness does not happen in an instant. It is a daily process of choosing love over bitterness, forgiveness over retaliation, and trust over anxiety.
God allows the wheat and the weeds to live together because the very struggle of growing alongside the weeds is what tests, strengthens, and matures the wheat. It forces us to rely less on our own strength and more on the grace of the Holy Spirit.
My dear friends, as we prepare to receive the Eucharist today, let us carry these truths into our lives. Let us stop trying to violently pull up everyone else's weeds, and instead focus on nurturing the good seed God has placed within us.
Let us sit quietly with a few reflective questions:
Where am I being called to show the same patience to others—and to myself—that God continuously shows to me?
Am I letting the "weeds" of worry, anger, or judgment consume my energy, or am I focusing on growing the good "wheat" of kindness and faith?
Can I trust the slow process of God's grace working in my life, even when I cannot see immediate results?
Let us pray for the grace to accept that we are a work in progress, held firmly in the loving Presence, protected by the infinite Patience, and transformed by the gentle Process of a God who refuses to give up on us.
Amen.
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