By Machelle McDowell
What are you harvesting this Fall?
Fall brings us into a new season of our lives. We leave behind Summer and hotter temperatures, t-shirts, baseball, and cook-outs, only to be replaced with cooler air, sweaters, football, and bonfires!
We transition into a new phase of life!
We begin to see a noticeable change in our surroundings. The green line of trees that capture my attention as I look out my kitchen window is now dotted with a burst of color in random places.
If we are honest, our pasts are quite colorful as the autumn leaves appearing on our trees right now. Unfortunately, not as pretty. Most of us are quite ready for a new season to burst forth and bring about a change.
God shares a horn of plenty when it comes to good things for those who love Him, for those who are called according to his purpose.
Paul speaks of this in Romans 8. He also speaks of how we cannot live to please God by pleasing our fleshly desires. He goes as far to say that when our minds are set on the flesh, it leads to death, but if our minds are set on pleasing God it leads to life and peace. Romans 8:1- There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus. What a truth to rely on as we head into a new era of our lives.
This time of year brings about harvest for our farmers! A farmer loves this season. Why? It is one in which they witness the fruit of their labor. As Christians our harvest should be that of love, Joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. These characteristics bear witness to the fruit of a Godly harvest.
Unfortunately, we don’t witness these things abundantly in the storehouses of our hearts. Instead we find an over abundance of anger, bitterness, resentment, depression, jealousy, selfishness, conceit, and pride. These rotten fruits prevent us from from being who God has called us to be and from plowing the world in search of the lost soul in need of harvest. We must weed them out of our lives! They are toxic.
Harvesting is the most labor intense activity of the growing season! Producing good fruit in our lives takes work! Living our lives in a way that is pleasing to God will reap a cornucopia of good things in our hearts and minds.
The beauty of a spiritual harvest is that it just doesn’t take place in the Fall of the year! This is an everyday experience for the Christian. John 4:35 instructs us to open our eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest! The world is filled with lost souls in need of the Savior!
The harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few. Let us begin this new season in our lives focusing on weeding out the thistles that keep us from being a laborer that fills God’s storehouse!
“Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap but by the seeds that you plant.” Robert Stevenson