Thought for the Day - Monday 13 July

Thought for the Day – Monday 13^th July

‘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. So let’s not allow ourselves to get fatigued doing good. At the right time we will harvest a good crop if we don’t give up, or quit. Right now, therefore, every time we get the chance, let us work for the benefit of all, starting with the people closest to us in the community of faith.’ (Galatians 6: 7-10)

More advice on sowing those seeds of love today!

I remember years ago when we were living down in Alloway where we had a huge garden with a lovely little stream running along the bottom of it with mature trees overhanging the garden and a little bridge across the stream, that I decided that I would create a shrub bed down at the bottom of the garden full of colour to contrast with the trees and the bridge and the stream. So I dug it all out and shaped it the way I wanted it and then set about finding colourful shrubs to plant. Along with all the different foliage shrubs I wanted little splashes of colour here and there and so one of the plants I chose for that was a poppy. So I planted out the border and even if I say so myself it looked really wonderful, particularly as our house at that time had a cellar which meant as I worked away in the kitchen I was actually looking down on my lovely border.

Well, the first year it was fine just as I had planned - the plants which were supposed to die away in the autumn did and then re-appeared the next year. However, the second year as the plants emerged from their winter sleep there seemed to be rather too many splashes of colour throughout my border and not all in the places I had originally sown them! You see that one poppy which I had planted had obviously sown it seeds everywhere in the shrub bed and I had splashes of red causing real clashes of colour in places I never intended and it seemed as if the poppies were taking over! Perhaps, as a relatively new gardener, I should have researched more the growing habits of poppies!

However, it could not be denied that I certainly had not reaped what I had sown – although I did sow!

So how do we reap what we sow? And, can there even be a guarantee that we will reap what we sow?

My experience with the garden taught me something about sowing and reaping. We always think planning and hard work and effort and all the love we put into things will guarantee reward and success and love in return and most times I am sure it does but I think this experience taught me that perhaps that is not always the case. I was certainly rewarded for all my hard work, love and devotion in that first year – but then the next year I ended up having to do loads more work to try and relocate all those poppies around the garden and get that reward of my shrub bed looking as I had intended it to be.

So in relation to gardening maybe there is no guarantee that we will reap what we sow.

However, on a spiritual level there is!

Paul is telling us that in relation to our lives we will reap what we sow and not just in this life but in the life beyond too.

The rewards, or otherwise, associated with Christian discipleship may not be tangible ones but they are there nonetheless. So if we sow seeds of loving others, seeds of offering our service, seeds of pursuing good although we may not be able to measure any reward for our actions here on earth we will in the life beyond. Likewise if we sow seeds of wrongdoing or injustice they may appear to go unpunished here on earth but the time will come when the harvest will be reaped.  

We have a choice – we can sow as we wish – God will not stop us sowing – but we have to remember that the time will come when the harvest of our sowing will be reaped!

Prayer

Loving Lord,

Open our eyes and ears to the presence of your Holy Spirit. May the seeds of your Word scattered among us fall on fertile soil. May they take root in our hearts and lives, and produce an abundant harvest of good words and deeds. May we heed the words of Paul and in response to God always choose to sow seeds of good, of love and of service and never stop sowing those seeds. In Jesus name we pray. Amen