How to live with Tares

Have you ever been in a situation that felt like it was “impossible”? At work or at school or even at home, there is some person or circumstance that causes you to feel like things will never get better?
The bible talks about “tares and wheat” and as a matter of fact that was my randomly picked bible verse for today and we know that tares are representative of what is NOT good and wheat is representative of what IS good.
“Did you not sew good seed” it asks us…and I recognize that this means that our nature is good, and just like the good seed of wheat, we as a people are God’s perfect children.

I thought about this and how even though the tares and the wheat are growing in the same field and are even harvested together, they come from different “seeds”. The tares… they do not define who we are.

So then how do we “live with the tares” if we are in a situation where we feel surrounded by them. I thought about this as I re-read the bible story in order to get my inspiration because I think the bible is how God is talking to us every day.

Having grown up working in the field, I know that in spite of the tares, the wheat still gets all the sun it needs, and all the rain it needs and all the nutrition it needs. The tares do not control the environment at all do they? The wheat does not have to rely on the tares for anything actually.

The tares are not “the wheat” and all the wheat cannot be deprived of a means of survival. The gardener knows the difference and even though there may be no outward sign of it during the growing season, the gardener at the right time, puts the wheat in the barn and burns the tares.

The wheat just has to keep growing and continuing to express all the qualities of wheat. It cannot help but be wheat because that is the seed that was planted.
When we are in a situation that feels like we are surrounded by tares, we can know, first, that evil is NOT a part of us, and that none of that ‘environment” touches us or dictates the outcome of our life. We can flourish, in spite of the tares.
We can also trust that in the right season, the gardener will harvest what is good, and burn what is bad. There is no reason for the gardener to keep the tares and every reason to keep the wheat.

Good will always be good, and no amount of evil can ever turn itself into good. Good, or “the wheat” is the only reality for the gardener and we can be conscious that good is the only thing that the gardener has planted and wishes to harvest.

We can take comfort in knowing that we can do what we were made to do, and that expectancy will help us to enjoy the process, and appreciate the beauty and order surrounding us, in the midst of seeming disorder.
We do not have to be the gardener, we do not have to be bigger or better than the tares, we can just know that who we are, exactly as we were made, is visible and is recognized and maintains value.