There was once a farmer who had a good horse. One morning the horse got out of the gate and ran off. The neighbors came over and said, “That’s terrible. You’ve lost your horse. What bad luck.” The farmer just looked at them and said, “Maybe. We’ll see.” A couple of days later the horse came back, and it brought three wild horses with it. The neighbors were excited. “Look at that! Now you’ve got four horses. What good luck!” The farmer said, “Maybe. We’ll see.” The next week the farmer’s son was trying to train one of the new horses. The horse threw him, and the boy broke his leg. The neighbors shook their heads. “That’s awful. Now your son can’t help you on the farm. What bad luck.” The farmer said, “Maybe. We’ll see.” Not long after that, the army came through the area looking for young men to take off to war. They went house to house. When they got to the farmer’s place and saw the boy’s broken leg, they left him behind. The neighbors said, “You’re so lucky your son doesn’t have to go. What good fortune.” The farmer said, “Maybe. We’ll see.”
That’s a commonly told story that’s been around since before the days of Jesus. It illustrates the point that just because something bad happens, it doesn’t mean it will stay bad. Often, in the stories of our own lives, good overwhelms evil.
In Matthew chapter 13, in the story of the wheat and the weeds, Jesus shares a parable about good and evil. A few verses later in the Gospel, Jesus explains the parable. He said that the field is the world, the wheat are children of God, the weeds are from the devil, and the harvest is about the end times. The weeds are burned up, representing a casting into hell. The wheat is taken into the barn, representing heaven and living with God for all eternity.
So here we are in the world, and we’ve got weeds and wheat. The weeds that Jesus is referencing in this parable are called darnel. Darnel looks just like wheat when it sprouts up at first, and even the grains look similar before they are fully ripe. The darnel competes with the wheat for water, nutrients, and sunshine. But darnel doesn’t produce anything that can be eaten. The grain from darnel is actually toxic. So this darnel weed goes the extra mile to represent evil in this world.
This parable brings up the question, why does God let the enemy — we’re talking about Satan here — plant weeds in a perfectly good field? Why does God permit evil at all? Wouldn’t an all-loving, all-powerful God stop evil in the first place? Evil brings suffering. Is suffering really necessary? One would guess that an all-powerful God could solve this problem, and we would have no suffering whatsoever. So why doesn’t he get on it and stop the evil?
Most of us are not strangers to suffering. I have my own stories of suffering. I had a serious case of asthma. It was pretty bad, largely because the medications were not yet developed to control or prevent the asthma. There were a couple of times that I came close to dying. I guess I was lucky, because I know some people do die from asthma. And I have wondered if the asthma was really necessary. Do we really have to suffer like this? Couldn’t God just get rid of the asthma, and all other illnesses?
At the heart of this question — why can’t God get rid of suffering? — this question is about the problem of evil, and this topic has been around for as long as people have made observations. St. Augustine, born in the year 354, made this claim about the problem of evil. He said that God is so omnipotent, he can bring good out of the evil.
One example that demonstrates this very well is the Passion of Christ: his suffering, his death. Christians say that the greatest evil to ever happen on this earth was the killing of Jesus. I suppose it was the biggest darnel plant to ever exist. It was very evil to kill Jesus. However, Christians also say that the most good ever came from this terrible evil. Jesus won his victory over death, over Satan. His sacrifice set us free. It redeems us. Through the cross, we receive all of our graces, all of our sacraments. Even the body and blood, soul and divinity of Jesus comes to us because of the sacrifice that Jesus made for us. From the greatest evil came the greatest good.
This problem of evil was also addressed by St. Thomas Aquinas. Eight centuries after Augustine, St. Thomas Aquinas built on the work of Augustine. Here’s what Aquinas wrote: as Augustine says, God is so powerful that he can even make good out of evil. Aquinas concludes: hence many good things would be taken away if God permitted no evil to exist.
Now, in my limited and little brain, I’m not sure how God is going to bring any good out of the tremendous suffering I experienced with my asthma, the hour upon hour of struggling to get air. So painful. But I have made the choice to trust that this can happen, that God could bring tremendous good out of that terrible suffering. I made the choice because I have observed many other goods in my life and in the lives of others that resulted directly from the bad things happening. I believe that if we’re paying attention, we will notice our lives flow much like the farmer’s story.
One simple example that I think many people recognize is the losing of a job. When the company I worked for decided to close the satellite offices and centralize everyone into the Bay Area of California, it meant a lot of loss for me and my wife. No matter what, we were going to have to say goodbye to family and friends. We were going to have to sell our home and head into the great unknown. Ultimately, we decided to move here, which has been wonderful. Once we were moved in, I tried very hard to get an engineering job. That didn’t happen, and at the time it felt like I was munching on a load of darnel. It was a struggle for me. But I have a new job now, and holy smokes, is it much better than I ever could have imagined. I can’t believe it.
It is experiences like this in my own life that make me accept what Augustine and Aquinas claim.
So here’s what I’m driving at. We live in a mixed field. There is real wheat and there is real darnel. The suffering is not imaginary. The asthma was not imaginary. Losing that job and packing up our lives was not imaginary. Evil is not a theory. It is toxic, and it competes hard for the light and the water.
But the farmer in the old story kept saying the same quiet thing: “Maybe. We’ll see.” And time after time, what looked like pure loss turned out to be part of something larger. Augustine and Aquinas were pointing at the same reality when they said God is powerful enough to bring good out of evil. The cross is the clearest proof we have. The worst thing that ever happened — the killing of Jesus — became the source of every grace we receive.
I’ve watched this pattern enough in my own life that I’ve decided to trust it. When the hard thing shows up, I try to remember the farmer. I try to remember the cross. And I try to stay open to the good that can still grow, even while the weeds are thick.
This is our season to grow. The harvest will come. Until then, we live in the field with both the wheat and the darnel, trusting God who knows how to turn even the toxic into something good.
If the hard thing is in your body and it will not leave this week, start by saying what it is. Mine was asthma. It was in my lungs. The medications did not yet exist to control it. I came close to dying. That sentence is the fact. “This should not be here” is a different sentence. The first one is enough for today.
Then do not make the neighbor’s call. They said bad luck, then good luck, then bad luck again. The farmer said, “Maybe. We’ll see.” You can say that about the day without pretending the illness is luck. Write what happened. Do not write the ending. The ending is the part you do not have yet.
If a treatment, a rest, or a call to the doctor is the next real step, do that. “We’ll see” is not a reason to skip care. It is a reason not to close the story on the worst hour. Augustine’s claim was that God can bring good out of evil. It was not a claim that the asthma was imaginary, or that the air came back because he wanted it to.
Pray the farmer’s sentence once when the hard hour shows up. Maybe. We’ll see. Then do the one thing the body actually needs. The harvest is not this afternoon. The field still has both.
This is a pastoral reflection, not clinical care and not a substitute for it. If you or someone you love is in immediate danger, call 988 or local emergency services.Drawn from a homily first preached in 2026.