The Next Harvest

Revelation 14:14-20

I grew up a city boy, but my roots go back to farmers, both mom and dad had grown up on farms, and mom’s dad, still owned his farm in Murray, Texas, when I was a small child.  I loved that farm, it had red dirt, and that dirt got all over your clothes, the water supply was a stock tank where the cows drank, and even as a small child that just did not seem right.  Granddad had four girls and four sons, and as he got older, in his sixty’s, the girls wanted him off that farm, off the red dirt that grew cotton, oats and Milo, and so he began to stay a while with each of the girls, and I would often talk to him about farming.

One of my fondest memories was growing beets in my garden at 3738 Liberty Drive in Corpus Christ, Texas.  My beets seemed to love that black clay we called a yard, and mother had taught me how to add the leaves from our trees and the grass that I cut to my garden area, so that the clay would break down and become more like soil.  Granddad was coming for his two weeks stay and my crop of beets were looking good.  I had the nicest beets but I had a problem, it became clear that I had grown more beets than we could eat or give away.  That’s when Granddad told me I needed to harvest my crop and go to market, and that’s what he and I did.  We pulled and washed the beets, then we tied them into small bundles and were off to see Mrs. Barnet at the small mercantile she owned at the end of the street.  As I walked home with my Granddad, I had made a dollar and some change off my harvest, and that was one of the best days of my young life, I was rich, because Granddad was so proud of me, and all I could think of was the next harvest.

Man has been working the ground from the time of Adam, and the sickle was the tool used to cut the harvest of grain or grapes, we have this account from Jesus, “But when the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come.” (Mark 4:29).  Remember that John was one of the three apostles that saw Jesus being transfigured in Mark 9:2-3, and now John once more sees the glorified Christ, but this time he has a sharp sickle in his hand.  As a small child, I sowed beet seeds, why, because I wanted to harvest beets. The two harvests that John is describing, are the results of man sowing rebellion against God, and reaping judgment of a life of sin; what John is seeing is the harvest of sin from the earth.  I need to be reminded that anything that is not of faith is sin.  The apostle Paul tells us in Galatians 6:7, 8, “Do not be deceived: God is not mocked, for whatever one sows, that will he also reap.  For the one who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life.”

From a child I was told that obedience brings about blessing, and rebellion causes judgment, and I learned to believe that to be truth, because that was the law my mother and dad enforced in our home.  I always had a choice, each morning was a new day, and each day I could obey and receive blessing, or I could rebel and receive my dad’s wrath.  God from the beginning has been very clear about blessing and curses, the nations and the people in them will be judged on what they sowed.

Jesus said, what does it profit a person to gain the whole world and lose his soul.  Satan is making each of us the same offer he makes Jesus, if you will only bow down and worship me, I will give you the whole world.  It is a shell game, and like all shell games the prize is never under the shell you pick; the prize is to run your own life, “Do it your way.”  God tells us that you will reap corruption, but the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life with Jesus Christ.

From the Back Porch,

Bob Rice