Patience and the Wheat and the Tares

Elder Talmage wrote this about the parable of the wheat and the tares: “One cardinal lesson of the parable, apart from the representation of actual conditions present and future, is that of patience, long-suffering, and toleration—each an attribute of Deity and a trait of character that all men should cultivate.”  The Lord in the parable is patient in that despite the prodding of His servants, He understands the need to wait for the harvest He desires: “Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them” (Matt. 13:29).  The Lord doesn’t pull out the tares as soon as He sees them or root out wickedness as soon as it crops up.  We are often like the servants—we see an injustice in the world and we want the Lord to fix it immediately.  We don’t just want justice; we want justice now on our time.  These servants remind us of the reaction of James and John when a village of Samaritans “did not receive” the Savior: “When his disciples James and John saw this, they said, Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven, and consume them, even as Elias did?” (Luke 9:53-54).  The sons of Zebedee wanted immediate punishment for those who rejected Him, but the Savior desires to give us all the chances that He can. 

               This same lesson is taught in the allegory of the olive tree.  Eight times He lamented, “It grieveth me” that He should “lose this tree” or “lose them” or “lose the trees” (Jacob 5:7, 11, 13, 32, 46, 47, 51, 66).  He contemplated hewing down the trees of the vineyard when they were corrupted but mourned the thought of their loss and said, “I will spare it a little longer” (Jacob 5:51).  He waited and dunged and pruned and grafted and did everything He could to make the vineyard successful.  Ultimately the vineyard would be burned, He could not delay forever, but He put off the destruction as long as possible while trying to save the vineyard.  He had extreme patience and love and did everything He could to delay having to lose some of the trees.  We know that ultimately the tares will be bound and burned at the Second Coming, but if He can help save them beforehand He will.  Several times elsewhere in the Book of Mormon we are taught that the Lord will punish the wicked “when the fulness of his wrath shall come” and Moroni taught that “the fulness of his wrath cometh upon them when they are ripened in iniquity” (Ether 2:9).  This means that He doesn’t punish at the first sign of wickedness, but rather He seeks to save before justice must be meted out: “For the Son of man is not come to destroy men’s lives, but to save them” (Luke 9:56). 

               Perhaps the story of Jonah teaches this lesson the most powerfully. He sorrowed that the Lord would show mercy to the people of Ninevah: “Therefore I fled before unto Tarshish: for I knew that thou art a gracious God, and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness, and repentest thee of the evil” (Jonah 4:2).  Jonah wanted justice to come upon the people of Ninevah for their wickedness, but the Lord was patient and sought first to save them.  Ultimately “the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and all that do wickedly, shall be stubble,” but before that day we must seek to have the patience and long-suffering that the Lord has as we face injustice and seek to share the gospel amidst wickedness (Malachi 4:1).