God Funds Fields, Not Wishes
It happens more often than I’d like to admit. Tammy and I will be driving through the countryside, the kind of backroads where the fields stretch out wide and the sun casts golden shadows across the pastures. I’ll glance out the window, see a herd of cattle grazing, and my heart immediately starts stirring. Tammy knows that look on my face. Without missing a beat, she’ll sigh and say, “Eddie, don’t you go there.”
And every time, I laugh and reply, “Honey, I can’t help it… I want cows!”
That’s when she shakes her head with that half-smile of hers and says firmly, “Not a chance, Edward.”
She knows why I say it. See, I was raised on a large cattle ranch in Washington State. My childhood wasn’t just filled with cows it was defined by them. Our ranch was alive with 200 milk cows, 200 beef cattle, 400 hogs, flocks of sheep, two giant chicken barns, more than 20 horses, combines for harvesting grain, tractors for working the land, and balers rolling up the summer hay. It was a place buzzing with life, labor, and lessons.
One of those lessons has stuck with me more than almost anything else.
I remember watching a curious pattern unfold between my father and his hired hands. He would send men out to prepare the fields for seeding. After hours of work, they would return asking for supplies seed, equipment, fertilizer, minerals.
To one man, my father would say yes and provide everything he asked for. But to the very next man who asked for the exact same supplies he would say no.
As a boy, I couldn’t understand it. I assumed my father’s decisions were based on the men themselves. Maybe he liked one worker more than another? But that didn’t sit right with me. Finally, I asked him, “Dad, why would you give to one man and not the other?”
He smiled the kind of smile that told me I was about to learn something I’d never forget. “Son, I wasn’t saying yes or no to the man I was saying yes or no to his field.”
If a field was still full of rocks, weeds, and debris, then no matter how much seed or fertilizer he poured into it, the harvest wouldn’t last. But when a man had taken the time to clear his field and make it ready then my father would supply him with everything he needed.
My father tied this wisdom to the teachings of Jesus in Mark 4:
“Some fell on stony ground, where it had not much earth; and immediately it sprang up, because it had no depth of earth: but when the sun was up, it was scorched; and because it had no root, it withered away.” (KJV)
I watched this principle play out on the ranch. When wheat seed fell among rocks, it sprouted fast. At first, it seemed like a blessing. But when the summer heat came, the stones held the heat through the night, scorching the wheat. It ripened too quickly, like a baby born prematurely, and the harvest was ruined.
Rocks are natural to a field. No one puts them there they just exist. But they must be removed if the harvest is to survive.
That day, my father leaned down and said words that changed me: “Eddie, you are God’s field. It’s your job to remove the rocks and debris from your life. If you choose to live with a field full of debris, you will never experience God’s best, no matter how much you ask Him or even beg Him.”
He was right. Many of us come to Christ “between a rock and a hard place.” Our lives feel scorched by the heat of struggle, failure, or brokenness. But the harvest of our lives depends on whether we remove the rocks or leave them in place.
My father promised me something, and I believe it’s true for you, too: “If you will be faithful to keep your life free of rocks and debris, God will continually resource the field of your life and produce a great harvest.”
So yes, I still laugh and say, “I want cows.” But what I want even more is a field my life that’s ready for God’s best seed.
Reflection Question: What “rocks” in your field are keeping you from God’s best? What debris do you need to clear so your life can produce the harvest He’s waiting to give you?