Growth Happens

I've been spending some time reflecting on Mark 4: 26-29 recently.

Then Jesus said, "God's kingdom is like seed thrown on a field by a man who then goes to bed and forgets about it. The seed sprouts and grows—he has no idea how it happens. The earth does it all without his help: first a green stem of grass, then a bud, then the ripened grain. When the grain is fully formed, he reaps—harvest time!

I'm a recovering internal processor. I think deeply and reflect on decisions before I make them, but often the people around me have no idea that anything is going on at all until I make a pronouncement. My decision to move to the U.S. came as a surprise to my parents as I wasn't the type of person who talked through decisions (even major life changing ones) out loud. I'm learning to process outside my own head, but it is still a challenge at times.

I love how Jesus says that the seed sprouts and grows, and the farmer has no idea how it happens. Germination takes place at a subterranean level far away from sight. I find it encouraging to realize that even though I may not see it, God is at work in my life right now. I can be as oblivious as the farmer, but even without my help seed turns to stem, bud becomes grain, until one day I notice a change in my life and I reap a harvest.

When a shift occurs in my life it is tempting to label how I am now as right, and who I was in the past as wrong, and it's even more tempting to label other people that way, especially if their shift aligns them closer with me. However just because the plant is now a stem doesn't mean that it was somehow wrong being a seed.

As I walk along a path, my view shifts and changes. This doesn't mean my old view was wrong, just that my horizons and perspectives have shifted.

This growth, this journey, this shift, is happening to all of us all the time, but because so much of it takes place below the surface we are often not aware. God is constantly planting seeds and causing growth, but we are as oblivious as the farmer until harvest time.

I bless the work that God is doing in you.


Probae esti in segetem sunt deteriorum datae fruges, tamen ipsae suaptae enitent - Accius
A good seed, planted even in poor soil will bear rich fruit by its own nature.