When Sin Looks Beautiful: A Reflection on Sin, Grace, and God’s Pruning

Billy Goats Weed & The Battle for the Soul

As the sun dipped low over Scotts Head, I was captivated by the beauty before me, fields set against the ocean, covered in lilac flowers. The wind pulled them in all directions.

“Isn’t it just beautiful?” I exclaimed.

Shortly after, I was corrected.“The purple flowers? They’re a horrible weed, really hard to get rid of.”

Surely this can’t be true, I thought, as I quickly googled it. But my FIL was right, it was the dreaded Billy Goat’s Weed.

So notorious is this weed that an online weeding group had quite the entertaining comment section, with one couple sharing how, after years of poison and failed methods, the only way they managed to remove them was by pulling each one out by hand.

“It painstakingly took days,” they said, “down on hands and knees.”

What I had thought was a beautiful field was apparently fast becoming an unusable one that needed serious attention and management.

And then it hit me.

This is sin.

Temptation is always a noxious weed presented ever so beautifully.

When you glance at it, entertain its whimsical promises, it’s easy to miss the reality that it spoils and destroys.

At first, it may seem fulfilling. Offering satisfaction, reward, even delight. But beneath it all lies rot. Just like the weeds poison the soil, so to temptation wrecks havoc on the soul.

And then we lament. We have tasted and seen that it is not good.

Guilt comes in (this is good, conviction is not without the presence of guilt). Then shame piles on (not good, once convicted and repentant, we rest in grace).

And the next part hurts.

As a faithful and loving Father disciplines the children He so loves (Hebrews 12:5–6), so does our Heavenly Father.

He starts pruning. He exposes the weeds in our hearts, the worldly affairs that are weighing us down from the race we ought to run.

We have to fess up to the lies told, apologise for the pain caused, rectify the harm done, and endure the consequences of our choices.

And as we do, we must steady ourselves on the eternal promises: that this is not the end, that this is just the beginning, and that all these moments are part of the faithful work of an Advocate who is transforming us into the image of Jesus.

We are watered in His goodness, washed by His Word. We are strengthened and supported by the saints.

So we look upwards - past the weeds that might look pretty but, up close, are toxic and bent on destruction.

And we look forward to truly living, on Mount Zion, where there will be a banquet feast on mountaintops filled with beauty and splendour; flowers afresh in all their glory .... and not a Billy Goat’s Weed in sight.