the sarcasm of Jesus growing seeds with weeds

It seems almost customary on special occasions to make a plea for ‘fine weather’ or have a word or two ‘upstairs’.  There are still one or two people who expect the vicar to have a special hotline for such things as the weather.  Well, I no more control the weather, i’m sorry to say, than I do the movements of the earth.  It’s always amused me that those who are arranging some event or other seem to expect some sort of special treatment, but if the required weather is not quite what others might want, whose request should take priority! – I would quite like it to be cool and breezy with very little sun next weekend for Ras y Wyddfa but I suspect others will disagree.  That is of course assuming that the weather patterns are controlled in some way rather than just being, well, the weather!  So we have a conflict of interests.  Is that what our faith comes down to?  Well in many ways it is what we have made it, and this is linked to the way we gather our food, rather, I should say how we grow our food.  Biblical attitudes to weather patterns were also based upon an agrarian life.  With the added interference of God.  Weather conditions and harvest good = The people have done God’s will.  Weather conditions and harvest poor = The people had neglected God’s will.  Jesus taught within this tradition with perhaps just a hint of sarcasm, notice that his parable teachings were just a reflection of how things are.  Seeds in good soil grow, seeds on the rocks have little root, weeds choke other plants, if you try to grow seed on the path, the birds will eat it etc.  These things are for Jesus reflections of our spiritual lives, and as obvious as the growth of seed in the soil.  Of course the point is not about whether the plants grow or not, but whether we allow the cares of the world to choke out all the spiritual depth that we might have once had, or cut short any growth in our belief because we’ve not made the time to ground our beliefs in our daily life, or that we’ve been so busy that we’ve ignored the offerings and the opportunities have passed us by.  Perhaps though through patient attention to ourselves and to the needs of our souls we have allowed the teachings of Jesus to take hold of us and become our roots so that we are grounded in love and compassion.  Because then, whatever the weather is doing, the spirit is more important than the flesh and we begin to achieve our potential as truly human.