Gather or Scatter

There’s No Middle Ground in the Kingdom—or in the Garden

By Josh Singleton | Founder and Lead Cultivator, The Neighborhood Garden Project

We live in a culture addicted to neutrality. It’s safer to remain uncommitted, easier to say, "I'm spiritual, but not religious," or, "I believe in God, but I'm still figuring things out." Neutrality gives us the illusion of control. It lets us enjoy the benefits of proximity to goodness without the cost of allegiance to it. But Jesus offers no such middle ground.

"Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." (Matthew 12:30)

These words aren’t a threat. They’re a line drawn in love. A line that doesn’t bend with culture or preference. Jesus is revealing a sobering reality: to not walk with Him is to walk against Him. There is no spiritual fence to sit on. The Kingdom doesn’t allow passive spectators. In the spiritual realm, neutrality is defiance in disguise.

This isn’t about being with Him or with someone or something else—it’s about being either aligned with Him or in direct opposition. There’s no spiritual middle lane. To refrain from choosing Him is to oppose Him. To delay allegiance is to resist the King. And the longer we delay, the deeper our roots grow in compromise.

Culturally, we’ve built entire systems around avoiding discomfort. We opt for delay when decisions feel too heavy. We use phrases like "holding space" and "deconstructing"—not as tools for healing but as permission to indefinitely postpone obedience. We call it wisdom, when it’s often fear in a better outfit. We’re not resistant, we say—we’re just waiting. But waiting too long to surrender becomes resistance itself. Jesus never said, "Whoever is unsure about me is safe." He said, "Whoever is not with me is against me."

This truth confronts our cultural reflex to keep options open. But the Kingdom isn’t one option among many. It is the only path to life. And Jesus knows that pretending there’s a third way only leads to more scattering. More confusion. More fruitless striving.

And yet, in the same breath that Jesus makes this dividing line clear, Paul later writes this breathtaking truth:

"If God is for us, who can be against us?" (Romans 8:31)

This is not a contradiction. It’s a confirmation. For those who are with Christ—fully, not casually—the covering is absolute. The resistance may still come, but it cannot prevail. The opposition may still rise, but it cannot uproot what is rooted in Him.

The promise of Romans 8:31 does not belong to the neutral. It belongs to the aligned. To the ones who have said yes with their lives, not just their language.

But here’s where the invitation often gets misunderstood: Many people choose God not out of joyful surrender, but out of fear of His wrath. They are driven by a desire to avoid judgment, not by the hope of intimacy. Their faith becomes a strategy for survival rather than a response to beauty. But fear may wake us up, it cannot walk us home. True alignment doesn’t flow from the trembling fear of punishment—it flows from awe. From wonder. From the unshakable realization that life with God is not about what we’re running from, but Who we’re running toward.

The Kingdom is not a bunker from wrath. It is a banquet of restoration. It is not a safehouse—it is a house of belonging. And that belonging births boldness, not just boundaries. We were never meant to walk with God as survivors clutching mercy—we were meant to walk as sons and daughters receiving inheritance.

When we choose God because we see what’s possible—not just what’s dangerous—we begin to walk in fullness, not fear. The Kingdom cannot be fully known by those who serve God to avoid hell—it is revealed to those who are compelled by His goodness, stunned by His kindness, and drawn into transformation by His love. We move from tiptoeing around judgment to dancing in joy. From hiding in shame to sowing with hope. That inheritance is only received when we move beyond neutrality and fear, and into full participation, not because we’re afraid to perish, but because we dare to believe we were made for more.

In the soil, this principle is always at work. A garden cannot be passively managed. If we neglect to remove the weeds, they don’t stay still—they spread. If we fail to plant, the ground doesn’t remain neutral—it is overtaken. What was once cultivated becomes chaotic. That’s not decay by force; it’s the quiet consequence of indifference.

The garden has no space for theoretical stewardship. Everything is affected by presence or absence. A plot that is “almost” tended is still untended. A bed left in limbo becomes harder to redeem than one that was never started. And so it is with people.

Some come to the garden curious but uncommitted. They want the atmosphere without the alignment. They desire the fruit without the rootwork. But the garden cannot be harvested casually. It responds to rhythm, presence, sweat, and submission. Without alignment—without full participation—the garden may comfort, but it cannot transform.

We’ve seen what happens when neutrality lingers in a plot: it becomes a monument to indecision. Seeds are never sown. Weeds begin to return. The soil, once broken open, starts to compact. Over time, it takes more work to reclaim than it would have taken to surrender.

But the opposite is also true. When someone comes not out of fear but out of joy—when they step into the soil not to escape something, but to discover Someone—something beautiful begins to grow. There is a difference between tilling the soil with anxiety and tilling it with expectancy. One digs to avoid disaster. The other digs because they believe something good is coming.

Joyful surrender in the garden looks like laughter between the rows, worship in the weeding, and wonder in the waiting. It looks like eyes lifted to heaven not in dread, but in delight. It’s the belief that fruit will come, not just because we deserve it, but because we are participating in something bigger than ourselves. This kind of surrender doesn’t feel like giving up—it feels like waking up.

That’s why we say: we don’t ask anyone to come. Because showing up must come from a deeper yes. Neutrality might open the gate, but only surrender takes root—joyful, eager, full-hearted surrender—will keep them in the soil. The garden has no use for maybe. It waits for yes, or it slowly closes itself back up.

If we don’t align, we scatter. If we don’t root, we drift. If we don’t gather with Him, we unintentionally undo what He is building.

But when we are with Him—truly with Him—not only does the work multiply, but joy begins to overflow. Even one faithful gardener becomes a harvester of peace. Presence multiplies. Alignment bears fruit that lasts.

Let the garden be a mirror. Let it show us what neutrality really does. Let it convict us gently, and awaken us fully. And let it invite us—not to admire the harvest, but to step into it with both hands, both feet, and a fully surrendered heart. Not because we must—but because we get to.

And this alignment—that deep, joy-filled yes—becomes more than just a personal posture. It becomes a filter for everything we do and everyone who desires to walk alongside us in our assignment. We don’t have to say no to anyone. Our consistent yes to God does the filtering. Alignment with Him naturally reveals who is willing to walk the path—and who is not yet ready. Alignment doesn’t exclude—it clarifies. It reveals who is ready, who is willing, and who is truly walking with Him. The gate may be open, but the garden responds to yes. And that yes has always been enough to separate wheat from chaff, root from weed, follower from wanderer. We’re not in the business of gatekeeping—we are in the business of obeying. And obedience brings its own discernment, its own order, and its own fruit.