Harvesting What You Plant
Monday November 4, 2013
The Lord will indeed give what is good, and our land will yield its harvest. Psalm 85:12 (NIV)
This is harvest season. Harvest celebrations took place in Canada in October and will soon take place in United States in November. Many people have turkey and cranberries as part of their Thanksgiving Dinner. Many cranberries are grown and harvested in the Pacific Northwest and along the British Columbia coast. British Columbia is also famous for fruit harvested in the Okanagan Valley -- peaches and apples and plums … wonderful fruit. Fruit that is picked ripe is the sweetest, whether it is melons in Asia or tomatoes here in North America picked fresh from the vine. God talks a lot about harvest in the Bible. One of the first things He tells us is that we will harvest whatever we sow. When a person puts bean and squash seeds in the ground, they expect beans and squash to grow. They don’t look for apples and corn to grow from bean and squash seeds.
This principle is not only true with earth and seeds. It’s true of our spiritual life as well. If we fill our minds and hearts with negativity and violence, resentment and bitterness, then we will act poorly in response to certain situations.
Here’s what I’ve observed. People gather a crop from what they plant. If they plant evil and trouble, that’s what they will harvest. Job 4:8 (NIRV)It’s sad to watch the line-up of new shows on television with titles such as “Revenge” and “Betrayal”. Whether it is soap operas or lyrics of many songs, if we focus on broken relationships and hard times, we will grow to be those who expect only brokenness and hard times.
God’s word warns us of this danger and invites us to a better way. Let’s be people who plant well and whose lives are rooted in what is good and life-giving.
Blessed is the one who does not walk in step with the wicked or stand in the way that sinners take or sit in the company of mockers, but whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night. That person is like a tree planted by streams of water, which yields its fruit in season and whose leaf does not wither—whatever they do prospers. Psalm 1:1-3 (NIV)
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