Harvest Happens

You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit.
Galatians 6:7b-8 NLT

How do we go about throwing seeds of corruptible behavior all week long and expect to reap holiness and righteousness? Why is it that we can sow doubt and discord and expect to harvest faith and peace? Do we watch reality TV all week and then expect God to give us all our answers during the commercial break?

Sometimes we get tired, but further on in this chapter, Paul writes, "So let’s not get tired of doing what is good. At just the right time we will reap a harvest of blessing if we don’t give up." Keep planting the right stuff. The harvest will happen.

Prayer:

Father,
           You alone are God and worthy of all praise. Thank You for the principles You have set before us that never fail. Continue to work the furrowed fields of our hearts so that we can reap a good harvest from Your Word. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen.

It's Time

Then I saw a white cloud, and seated on the cloud was someone like the Son of Man. He had a gold crown on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand. Then another angel came from the Temple and shouted to the one sitting on the cloud, “Swing the sickle, for the time of harvest has come; the crop on earth is ripe.” So the one sitting on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the whole earth was harvested.
Revelation 14:14-16

Within one seed is the potential for a plantation. Can you cultivate and nourish what you've already sown or is it time to dig up and replant? Hosea 10:12 reads, I said, ‘Plant the good seeds of righteousness, and you will harvest a crop of love. Plow up the hard ground of your hearts, for now is the time to seek the Lord, that he may come and shower righteousness upon you.’

There is some time left, not a lot, but enough if you start now. The time is coming. You want to be ready.

Prayer:

Father,
           You are the Author and Finisher of our faith. Alpha and Omega, Beginning and the End. You knew the end from the beginning and made provision for our salvation in spite of our wicked ways. We do not want the harvest described in Hosea 10:13-14 for those who chose not to plant good seed. Open our hearts and minds to heed Your Word, Father. Shine Your light on us so we can see exactly what needs to be dug up and replanted. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen

Doing it Right

Don’t be misled—you cannot mock the justice of God. You will always harvest what you plant. Those who live only to satisfy their own sinful nature will harvest decay and death from that sinful nature. But those who live to please the Spirit will harvest everlasting life from the Spirit.
Galatians 6:7-8 NLT

The story goes that there was once a Christian farmer who vowed to do everything right so he would get a bumper crop. He tilled the ground and prepared the soil. The rows were laid out perfectly straight. He provided water for irrigation to combat the heat and drought conditions. He went to church. He prayed. He fasted. He BELIEVED for that bumper crop. And even though he did all those right things, it didn't happen. Why? Because he never planted the seed...

What is it that we're waiting for God to produce? We're praying. We're fasting. We're believing... Have we sown the seed? Let's ask God what we should be planting...  

Prayer:

Father,

           Open our eyes of understanding to give what we need in order to reap the harvest that YOU desire in our lives. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen

Friends' Favorite - Seed Sown, Seed Grown

It's resurrection, resurrection, always resurrection, that undergirds what I do and say, the way I live. If there's no resurrection, "We eat, we drink, the next day we die," and that's all there is to it. But don't fool yourselves. Don't let yourselves be poisoned by this anti-resurrection loose talk.
1st Corinthians 15:32b-33a The Message

Continuing...Some skeptic is sure to ask, "Show me how resurrection works. Give me a diagram; draw me a picture. What does this 'resurrection body' look like?" If you look at this question closely, you realize how absurd it is. There are no diagrams for this kind of thing. We do have a parallel experience in gardening. You plant a "dead" seed; soon there is a flourishing plant. There is no visual likeness between seed and plant. You could never guess what a tomato would look like by looking at a tomato seed. What we plant in the soil and what grows out of it don't look anything alike. The dead body that we bury in the ground and the resurrection body that comes from it will be dramatically different.

You will notice that the variety of bodies is stunning. Just as there are different kinds of seeds, there are different kinds of bodies—humans, animals, birds, fish—each unprecedented in its form. You get a hint at the diversity of resurrection glory by looking at the diversity of bodies not only on earth but in the skies—sun, moon, stars—all these varieties of beauty and brightness. And we're only looking at pre-resurrection "seeds"—who can imagine what the resurrection "plants" will be like!

This image of planting a dead seed and raising a live plant is a mere sketch at best, but perhaps it will help in approaching the mystery of the resurrection body—but only if you keep in mind that when we're raised, we're raised for good, alive forever! The corpse that's planted is no beauty, but when it's raised, it's glorious. Put in the ground weak, it comes up powerful. The seed sown is natural; the seed grown is supernatural—same seed, same body, but what a difference from when it goes down in physical mortality to when it is raised up in spiritual immortality!

I need to emphasize, friends, that our natural, earthy lives don't in themselves lead us by their very nature into the kingdom of God. Their very "nature" is to die, so how could they "naturally" end up in the Life kingdom?

But let me tell you something wonderful, a mystery I'll probably never fully understand. We're not all going to die—but we are all going to be changed. You hear a blast to end all blasts from a trumpet, and in the time that you look up and blink your eyes—it's over. On signal from that trumpet from heaven, the dead will be up and out of their graves, beyond the reach of death, never to die again. At the same moment and in the same way, we'll all be changed. In the resurrection scheme of things, this has to happen: everything perishable taken off the shelves and replaced by the imperishable, this mortal replaced by the immortal.

With all this going for us, my dear, dear friends, stand your ground. And don't hold back. Throw yourselves into the work of the Master, confident that nothing you do for him is a waste of time or effort. 1st Corinthians 15: Verses 35-44, 50-54a, 58 The Message

1st Thessalonians 4:18 tells us to encourage one another with these words. THIS is NOT all there is...

Prayer:

Father,
           Forgive us for getting caught up in the cares of the world. Help us to stay focused on the prize - Heaven and eternity with You. Help us to bring as many with us as we can. Be with those who have lost loved ones and are still grieving. Strengthen them, Father. Let them be encouraged with Your Words. We look to You the Author and Finisher of our lives. In Jesus' Name we pray. Amen