Sermon: A Parable Girl Summer
This sermon was originally preached on July 19, 2026 at the Episcopal Church of the Redeemer in Greensboro, GA where I am serving as a summer supply priest for four weeks. The lectionary texts for the day were taken from Proper 11A - Track 2: Isaiah 44:6-8; Psalm 86:11-17, Romans 8:12-25; Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43.The audio for my sermon can be heard below.
A Parable Girl Summer
We are in the dog days of summer...
They are hot;
They are long;
They are overflowing with parables.
In 2019, singer-songwriter Megan Thee Stallion coined the term “Hot Girl Summer.” It was an invitation to live your best life, free to define yourself without anyone telling you who you should be. The fundamentals of a “hot girl summer” are Confidence, Presentation, Socializing, and Visibility.
This wasn't just a TikTok trend. It was everywhere.
Rappers were talking about it.
Reality TV personalities were talking about it.
Brands were talking about it.
'Hot Girl Summer' became shorthand for a vision of the good life.
But this summer is different.
A very unexpected group of women came along and ruined “Hot Girl Summer” this year by inspiring an alternative way of living. They are the Dominican Sisters of Mary, Mother of the Eucharist in Ann Arbor, MI. Their Open Mic podcast debuted in January and it has gone viral. In one episode, Sister Miriam asked Sister Mary Bethany if she had a favorite game; her reply came with whimsy and joy: ultimate frisbee. Their infectious zest for life, love for God, and genuine joy in relationships, has led TikTok to dub this as a “Nun Girl Summer.”
A Nun Girl Summer offers a different vision of the good life by prioritizing:
Contentment over Confidence
Presence over Presentation
Prayer over Socializing
Hiddenness over Visibility
What’s fascinating is that young people have become convinced that the current fabric of culture isn’t leading to enduring happiness. Some Gen Z and Millennial women are booking trips to convents instead of beach houses. Rather than taking religious vows, others are borrowing something Christians have practiced for centuries: a rule of life.
A Nun Girl Summer means:
Protecting your peace.
Embracing silence.
Living by rhythms.
Choosing depth.
Seeking joy.
Adherents to these “rules” are searching for a better version of the true, beautiful, and good life. Scripture has a name for that…Jesus calls it “the Kingdom of God.”
And every summer, our lectionary gives us a stretch of Gospel readings that share a theme. I like to think of our current year as “A Parable Girl Summer.”
Parables allow us to see God more clearly.
Fleming Rutledge says that parables are like multifaceted gemstones. We must faithfully turn them over in our hands to view them from every angle. As we do that, we catch glimpses and visions of God with greater clarity.
This morning is another Sunday in our Parable Girl Summer. We are in the thick of Matthew’s gospel with another parable about sowing seeds.
If last week was about the sower,
this week is about the landowner.
If last week was about varying terrain,
this week is about the enemy sowing revenge.
If last week was about good news sprouting,
this week is about waiting on the Lord.
This parable centers on a wealthy landowner who has planted good seed in his field. This detail is important: before any bad seed is sown by the enemy, the owner’s seeds are good because the owner is good. Everything moves along swimmingly until the wheat reaches a certain point in the growth cycle and his slaves recognize something is wrong: false wheat is growing alongside true wheat. The slaves recognize the false wheat as darnel and immediately flag it for the landowner.
Clearly, an enemy came in while everyone was sleeping and sowed weed seeds next to good seeds. The slaves are distraught.
Why would this be so awful? I’m so glad you asked.
What makes darnel such a threat is its toxicity. In fact, its Latin name (Lolium temulentum) comes from a word meaning “drunk.” If the seeds are ingested, they can cause dizziness and nausea, and a large enough dose can even be fatal.
The practice of an enemy maliciously planting weed seeds was known as revenge-sowing. Though a common practice, the Romans had a law prohibiting citizens from revenge-sowing.
In early growth, wheat and darnel look extremely similar, but eventually, wheat will droop because the grains on the head are too heavy while the darnel shoots stand straight up. At that point you are faced with a catch-22: If you rip up the false wheat too early you risk uprooting your good crop, too, because the roots are intertwined. If you wait until the harvest, the darnel would very likely contaminate the wheat, ruining both crop and field.
The revenge-sowing-enemy almost always won.
The slaves know this and they are prepared to risk everything to save the crop, but the landowner tells them to wait.
Wait as they watch thriving weeds flourish next to good seeds.
Wait as the toxic plant infiltrates a verdant field.
Wait while their hard work is overgrown by the fruit of misdeeds.
Not an altogether easy task to watch your diligent labor spoiled.
But the landowner knows best.
He knows that at harvest time, when the wheat has reached full maturity, the true wheat can be separated from its synthetic replica. Miraculously, the wheat will be separated and gathered in the owner’s barn. This, says Jesus, is what the Kingdom of God is like.
In their desire to understand, the disciples ask Jesus about the parable when they have him alone. He explains briefly. It is one of the few times where Jesus bluntly identifies parabolic roles and their real life correlation. Here is the cast of characters in order of appearance:
The Sower of good seed is Son of Man.
The Sower of weed seed is the Devil.
The field is the world.
The good seeds are the children of the kingdom.
The weed seeds are the children of the devil.
The harvest is the end of the age.
The reapers are the angels.
The fire is judgment.
With images of reaping and burning, it would be easy to hear this as a parable of judgment. The point, however, is not the presence of weed-seeds-and-evil-deeds co-mingled with kingdom crop, but rather the hope we have in the goodness of the sower.
In the midst of a world seeking answers in all the wrong things and all the wrong places, Christ calls us to trust in him by watchingforhim, waitingonhim, and workingwithhim. In a world of god-delusions and god-confusions, Christ beckons us to live with gospel-vision in light of God's provision.
Turning the gemstone slightly, we find a similar story in Isaiah 44.
Our passage comes as part of YHWH’s pronouncement of blessing upon Israel. This blessing is sandwiched between YHWH’s judgment of Israel for her faithlessness and his disgust of god-delusions and god-confusions, otherwise known as idol worship.
In these three verses, the Holy One proclaims who he is while simultaneously directing rhetorical questions about and to false gods, graven images, and idols. I say rhetorical not because God thinks the answers unimportant but because idols are lifeless and therefore cannot reply. The Holy One asks…
Who is like me?
Who is there besides me?
Who has announced from of old things to come?
The short answer is obviously: no one! But the longer answer is that these questions are asked by the LORD, the King of Israel, Israel’s Redeemer, the LORD of Hosts. This is the same holy One whom Isaiah saw when the hem of his robe filled the Temple. And they are asked of a people who know this to be true of God and yet still choose to place their trust in horses, chariots, military might, human kings, AmericanExpress black cards, politicians, the College Football Playoff, and any other status symbol or powerful platform.
Israel knows who her God is because they have seen his mighty hand and outstretched arm again…and again…and again. His words are trustworthy and true because all of his promises are yes and amen.
God is not askinginnocentquestions.
These questions are the bridge between Israel’s blessing and his denunciation of idol worship because they are an idolatrous people.
We are an idolatrous people.
Idol worship doesn’t have to be as big and dramatic as the Golden Calf, mind you. In fact, idol worship is far more subtle and seductive than that. It isn’t just a matter of misaligned action but rather of misappropriated affection.It’s a heart condition…with which we all are afflicted.
As we turn the gemstone again, we find Psalm 86 making the same point.
The psalmist exclaims: Give me an undivided heart!
On the wishlist of moral qualities, I doubt any of us would have added, “an undivided heart.” Like the Tin Man, the psalmist needs a fully-aligned and fully-alive heart to become who he was created to be. Remember, this psalmist is David, the one described in Scripture as being “a man after God’s own heart.” Perhaps aligning our hearts with God’s heart is what the Christian life is all about…
His request for an undivided heart carried its own admission that our hearts are, in fact, divided. There is a reason the hymn, Come Thou Fount, identifies our hearts as being “prone to wander.” St. Augustine famously wrote, “Our hearts are restless until they find their rest in Thee.”
We have a heart condition and only God can give us an undivided heart. God does this through and by his own steadfast love for us, allowing us to love him wholeheartedly in return. Despite our waywardness, our great God is slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness.
And this brings us to another turn of the gemstone as we encounter Paul’s comments in Romans 8.
This is the crescendo of the first half of his letter. For seven chapters he has labored in the act of throat-clearing so he can finally tell his readers the good news of their adoption in Christ.
Paul also identifies the malady afflicting all people. Instead of wayward hearts, he describes “sinsick souls.” He tells us that the wages of sin is death, that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God, and that we were enemies to God when we sinned against him.
But God, in his infinite wisdom, inscrutable ways, vast mercy, and steadfast faithfulness does not treat us or view us based on our unworthiness. Rather, the Father sees us through the worthiness, faithfulness, and righteousness of his son, Jesus. On the merits of Christ alone, crucified and resurrected, God has adopted us into his family. Not as the proverbial “red-headed step-child,” but as co-heirs with Christ, daughters and sons of glory.
We need not fear our great God.
We need not be afraid when we sin against him.
We have not been given the spirit of fear but of adoption.
And it is by that Spirit we can cry out “Abba, Father!”
Paul is not referencing the Swedish pop band behind Mamma Mia!, by the way. Abba is an intimate word for the Father. It is essentially calling the Father daddy.
Such is the great privilege we have been given as adopted co-heirs of the kingdom. We don’t come to a grueling task master, disinterested clock maker, or cosmic kill joy when we confess our sins or profess our faith. No, we boldly approach the throne of grace where our heavenly Father sits. He invites us to address him intimately because we are his children…his people…his sheep…and he is our God.
Creation groans for the revelation of the children of glory – or the children of the kingdom as Matthew puts it in our parable. We groan as we await the fullness of our adoption, the culmination and fruition of redemption at the last day. You may not realize you’re groaning, but when you say, “Things shouldn’t be like this” or “How long, o Lord…?” you are groaning.
We cry out knowing the Holy Spirit is our interpreter and intercessor, thus inviting us to hope. We hope for what we do not see, says Paul, and we hope for it with patience.
The foundation of that ongoing, unending, unrelenting hope is God. While some trust in horses and chariots, we hope and trust in the name of the LORD our God. We trust in…
Christ’s worthiness despite our unworthiness;
His faithfulness despite our unfaithfulness;
His righteousness despite our restlessness;
His patience despite our impatience.
We have finally made it back to Matthew 13.
Through the landscape of god-delusions, wayward hearts, sinsick souls, and our adoption into the household of God through the work of Christ, we find ourselves patiently waiting with hope for God’s good work to be completed.
Andrew McGowan writes, “God has done well at the beginning of all things, and will again at the end.” Put another way, he who began a good work in you will carry it on to completion. This is the basis of our faith.
Faith is trusting that God is who he says he is and that he will do all he has promised. God’s promises are yes and amen because our promise-making God is our promise-keeping God.
And because we can trust in him to do what he says and to finish what he started, even with the wheat and weeds, we live by faith in the light of the Kingdom. And when you know that the Kingdom belongs to Jesus, that it rests on his worthiness, his faithfulness, his steadfastness, and his patience – and not our own – then there is only one rule of life: watch, wait, and work.A Parable Girl Summer surpasses a Nun Girl Summer with a clear vision of the true, good, and beautiful life.
1.Watch for God.
In your heart, in your home, in this house of prayer. Watch him nudge you in the right direction or reveal to you an area of your life you haven’t given over to him. Watch vigilantly so you don’t quit before the miracle happens.
2. Wait with expectation.
This kind of waiting is neither passive nor performative. We wait because we know God will show up. He may not show up when we want him to, but he shows up precisely when he means to. His timing is always perfect.
3. Work for his Kingdom.
God does not need our help and yet he invites us to join him anyway. As we work ahead of the harvest, we have not been left as orphans or to twiddle our thumbs. We have been given a generous and gracious gift: to share the good news of the Good Sower with everyone we meet. To let every son of Adam and daughter of Eve know that they too can be sons and daughters of glory.
Weeds and misdeeds will ultimately pass away, but the seeds which God has planted will grow and mature. All we have to do is watch, wait, and join him in his redeeming work. Yes and Amen.