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Jesus told them another story:

The kingdom of heaven is like what happened when a farmer scattered good seed in a field. But while everyone was sleeping, an enemy came and scattered weed seeds in the field and then left.

When the plants started to grow and produce grain, the weeds showed up too. The servants went to the owner and asked, "Sir, didn’t you plant good seed in your field? Where did these weeds come from?"

"An enemy did this," the owner answered.

The servants asked, "Do you want us to go and pull up the weeds?"

"No!" the owner answered. "If you pull up the weeds, you might uproot the wheat with them. Let them grow together until harvest time. Then I will tell the workers to gather the weeds and tie them in bundles to be burned. But I will have them store the wheat in my barn."

~ Matthew 13:24-30

Have you ever tried to "fix" a situation, only to make it worse? Maybe you saw someone doing something wrong and you wanted to point it out right away. Or maybe you felt like things in your life were getting messy and you wanted to "pull the weeds" immediately.

In Matthew 13, Jesus tells a story about a farmer who finds weeds growing right alongside his good wheat. The servants are stressed! They want to start pulling weeds and cleaning things up. But the farmer says something surprising: "No... Let them grow together."

In our world, we are often tempted to judge. We want to decide who is "in" and who is "out," who is "good" and who is "bad." But Jesus reminds us that we aren't the ones in charge of the sorting.

God is the Gardener. He is patient. He knows that if we spend all our time trying to judge others or fix every mess ourselves, we might accidentally hurt the good things growing around us. Our job isn't to be the "weed police." Our job is to grow, to trust God, and to show grace even when things look messy.

When we stop trying to control the field, we find peace. We can trust that God knows what He is doing, even when the weeds are tall.

Is there a situation you’ve been trying to "sort out" or judge lately? How would it feel to hand that over to God today? Text Pastor Vic at 509-919-1897 if you'd like to talk.

PRAYER: "Lord, I’ve been trying to 'pull the weeds' in this situation: __________. Today, I am handing the garden back to You and trusting You with the growth."