About twice a year I cut the vicarage hedge. This autumn I’m doing it in three sections. After each one, I need a good lie down and the next morning I ache all over. Henry Mitchell once said “Almost any garden, if you see it at just the right moment, can be confused with paradise.” Not mine, Henry! Or maybe I just keep seeing mine at the wrong moment.
But some people absolutely love gardening - especially those who have allotments. The entrance to Preston Park allotments is right by our front gate so we see dozens of keen gardeners going there every week. These people can talk for England about potato blight, pruning, planting, protective polytunnels and picking plums. They get untold pleasure showing off tomatoes the size of tennis balls and pumpkins the size of space hoppers.
Most of us though, have nothing really to do from the actual production of the food we eat. We might hear on the radio that the price bread is going up because of an unusually severe winter in the American Midwest – but that’s about it. So the whole idea of harvest, for many of us, just doesn’t press our buttons in the way it does for those who live off the land or who spend their recreation time on it.
A Harvest of Food
But in an agricultural economy, like in Bible times, harvest is the most important time of the year. The three major Jewish feasts centre on the three harvest seasons in the Middle East. The Passover in April is when barley is harvested. Pentecost (about 7 weeks later) celebrates the wheat harvest. And the feast of Tabernacles (late September or early October) occurs at the time of the fruit harvest.
In the Bible the harvest was a time of reckoning, the moment of truth. If the grain, oil and wine were abundant then the nation would reap with joy, and the people would prosper and be secure. But if the yield was poor the nation would go through a downturn, much as we are in the UK today. Everyone would have to tighten their belt and watch the pennies for that year. And if the harvest failed for several years in a row the nation would plunge into prolonged and serious recession. The only reaper people would talk about then would be the grim reaper. Bad harvests were a threat to health, life, and a nation’s survival.
We tend to just accept good yields and bad yields as something of a lottery. If it’s good, fine. If it’s bad, never mind. But for the people of God, in a covenant relationship with him, the harvest was like a divine speech on the state of the nation.
Our Psalm is a celebration song for good harvests. it says:
The land yields its harvest; God, our God, blesses us.
May God bless us still, so that all the ends of the earth will fear him.
But even if harvest might feel for some of us like a bit of a curiosity it is a really important time for us because it is the one time in the year when we set aside everything else and simply say “Thank you.” Thank you Lord for your plentiful provision, for all you pour out on us, for the abundance of your blessing, your mercies and your kindness.”
Good parents teach their children to say thank you. Sometimes it was easier to get mine to recite the works of Shakespeare than train them to say please and thank you, but they all got there in the end. God, who is our heavenly Father, wants to teach us to say thank you as well.
Why are we sometimes so slow to give thanks to God? Do you remember when Jesus healed ten lepers and only one came back to thank Jesus? Nine didn’t. Why did only one return to say thank you? Here are nine possible reasons:
One waited to see if the cure was real.
One decided that he had probably never had leprosy in the first place.
One said he would see Jesus about it later.
One said he probably would have got better anyway.
One gave all the credit to the priests who pronounced him cured.
One said, "Oh, well, Jesus didn't really do anything."
One felt tired from all the emotion so he made an excuse and went home.
One said, "To be honest, I think I was already much improved."
And one just had so much else to do - so it slipped his mind.
Lord, make us a grateful people! Here’s a prayer I came across this week:
· I clutch my blanket and groan when the alarm clock rings, but thank you, Lord, that I can hear.
· I keep my eyes closed against the morning light as long as possible, but thank you, Lord, that I can see.
· The first hour of my day is chaotic, I can’t find my socks, the toast is burned, tempers are short, the bathroom’s still locked and the children are so loud but thank you, Lord, for my family.
· The breakfast table never looks like a hotel buffet or those pictures in magazines but thank you, Lord, for the food we have to eat.
· The routine of my job is monotonous and my colleagues are a nightmare (it’s not me who wrote the prayer!) but, thank you, Lord, for the opportunity to work.
· When I wish my life was different to what it is, thank you, Lord, for life itself.
A Harvest of Souls
So that’s why we celebrate harvest; to say thanks to God for his amazing provision.
But the Bible talks about another kind of harvest and whenever Jesus spoke this word he used it figuratively. Here’s what he says in Matthew 9.35-38.
Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.”
Gardeners, allotment tenants and farmers look into the mud at slug pellets hoping to get some decent looking spuds in a few months’ time.
But Jesus looks up at vast crowds of precious people expecting that the destinies of thousands will be transformed for all eternity.
I like runner beans and courgettes – and I thank God for them, especially at lunchtime - but Jesus has a bigger vision. It’s just food. Jesus said “I have food that you know nothing about.” And it’s interesting what Jesus says he is looking for.
Think about how many people you know who are spiritually curious. Who are motivated to seek the kingdom of God. It’s not that many is it? So we might expect Jesus to say “The harvest is scarce. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send rain onto his field.”
But the harvest is not scarce, according to Jesus. It’s plentiful. From Jesus perspective, there’s been plenty of rain, the soil is fertile, the sun has shone, there have been few pests and right now the fields are white for harvest.
I went up and down Lime Road and Myrtle Road on Wednesday meeting people and giving them Alpha invitations. About a quarter were out. But in two hours I had three really good conversations about the Lord with genuinely interested people. That’s secular, post-Christian Britain. That’s just two roads. The harvest is plentiful.
One person I met was in a right state because she had just heard some traumatic news on the phone the moment I arrived. So we got talking and she shared with me the trouble she was in. I said “would you like me to pray with you right now?” She said “Oh, yes please.” So right there and then I just asked the Holy Spirit to move and I prayed into the situation as best I could, and I watched her calm down and just… settle.
When Jesus saw the crowds, that’s what he saw. They were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. That’s why he had compassion on them.
· So many people just don’t know where they’re going in life. They need a shepherd to lead them.
· So many people are exhausted from looking in vain for meaning in their lives. They need a shepherd who will take them to a place of restful pasture.
· So many people are fearful of the shadow of death. They need a shepherd to protect them.
· So many people are broken hearted and hurt. They need a shepherd to bind up their wounds.
· So many people are lonely and lost. They need a shepherd to call them by name.
So Jesus says “The harvest is plentiful. The problem is that the workers are few. So ask God to send out workers into his harvest field.”
What this means is that intercessory prayer is the means of attaining a goal that will certainly be reached. We pray that God will send out workers and that the harvest will be reaped not because the outcome is uncertain if we don’t pray, but because God has appointed prayer as the means by which the world will be reached for Christ.
A Harvest of Righteousness
The Bible also speaks of a third kind of harvest. Galatians 6.7-8 (in the Message version) says:
Don't be misled: No one makes a fool of God. What a person plants, he will harvest. The person who plants selfishness, ignoring the needs of others -ignoring God! - harvests a crop of weeds. All he'll have to show for his life is weeds! But the one who plants in response to God, letting God's Spirit do the growth work in him, harvests a crop of real life, eternal life.
God is looking for a harvest in your life and only you can determine the outcome. Basically God is saying here that you will get out of life exactly what you put into it. But if you always do what you've always done - you'll always get what you've always got.
On the allotment, if you plant cucumbers you’ll never get beetroot. And thank God for that!
If you sow responsiveness to God, if you are open to his work in your heart, he will bring about a harvest of blessing in your life. He will mould every aspect of your character into the likeness of Christ, he will increase your generosity, he will multiply your joy, and deepen your faith. And the opposite is true.
Ending
Finally this thought: who blesses the earth to give the harvest of crops? Answer; God does. Who blesses the work of evangelisation to give the harvest of souls? God does. And who blesses your life to produce a harvest of righteousness? Once again, God does.
In each case God is the Lord of the harvest. But in each case God’s blessing is dependent on what we plant.
Just as you’re never going to get a harvest without first ploughing the earth, sowing seed and watering the ground, you’ll never see God move significantly in changing hearts and lives without an investment of prayer. You just won’t.
And just as you’ll only see God move significantly in changing hearts and lives by praying for it, God's Spirit only brings about growth and health in your spirit if you open your heart to God and love him with all your heart, all your mind, all your soul and all your strength.
Sermon preached at All Saints' Preston on Tees, 19th September 2010
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