Reaping a Harvest: Faith, Patience, and Opportunity

When?

The front of a T-shirt I have asks that question. The shirt was a bonus for pre-ordering a book by that same title.

At the cleaners (with that t-shirt on) the lady across the counter asked, “So what’s with when?” I went on to explain the circumstances but the single word stuck inside.

I ask it often.  When does good done pay off?

Does my action make any difference? Bible classes? Blog posts? Video programs.

As I ponder life’s “when,” I have to stop.

Farmers know the answer. It is in seasons. A cotton farmer knows that seed planted in spring gets harvested in autumn. It has to wait.

Only foolish farmer would drop the seed in the ground, stand over it, and shout “GROW!” No amount of shouting produces a crop. It is planting and tending and waiting.

Paul knew spiritual patience was more than a virtue. It is a necessity.

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. Therefore, as we have the opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.” (Galatians 6:9–10)

The words stand out, laughing at my restlessness. Weary. Season. Opportunity.

What do we make out of these instructions?

Weary

The “when” question breeds weariness. Why keep writing? Caring? Obeying? Nothing comes of it within a week. I grow weary because the “when” doesn’t arrive on my predetermined timetable.

• It’s supposed to…
• It should…
• I thought…

Those tuckered-out words brood in the corner as tired souls question.

But that’s because I don’t remember the seasons of life.

Seasons

Life has its seasons. As Solomon reminds us:

“There is a time for everything, and a season for every activity under the heavens: a time to be born and a time to die, a time to plant and a time to uproot,” (Ecclesiastes 3:1–2)

When results don’t happen, the season is not right. The heat of summer is for cultivating and weed-pulling. Not exactly exciting times and activities. When life heats up and gets confused, it is the season for cultivating and protecting. Only when the season is right, do results come.

Opportunity

Paul repeats himself. The proper time arrives for a harvest. It comes because someone seized the opportunity at the right time. Both “proper time” and “opportunity are “seasons.”

Do good as the opportunity presents itself. Plant the seed in the planting season and you reap in the reaping season.

Years ago, something strange happened. One summer, I sat in a stifling house teaching a Bible study. Five lessons. Five afternoons of sweat. The woman across the coffee table showed little interest. Her eyes did not sparkle and her questions lacked penetration. I kept it up, got to the last lesson, and asked, “Do you want to obey Christ the way the New Testament teaches?” The “no” was polite but sure. I thanked her for her time, closed my Bible, picked up my visuals, and left.

Seven years later, I sat at my desk and the phone rang. On the other end of the phone was a voice familiar but strange. The woman went on to explain. “I am the one you studied with 7 years ago. I called to tell you I was baptized last Sunday and what you did helped me.” Her “no” was “not yet.”

As the phone rested on the cradle, I sat stunned. Seven years ago something that did not seem important led to destiny.

Opportunity created the proper season. Missed opportunity would mean missed harvest.

We must impose that perspective on our souls that tap out our spiritual itchiness. We want to set the spiritual microwave to 30 seconds and have it done when the tone sounds. Heaven has no microwaves, magic wands, or simplistic formulas.

It has only opportunities and seasons.

What counts in life is not seeing a crop come from the good we do but faith that the crop will come with the Lord’s help.

Too many people seek promotions, bonuses, and raises. They are immediate. What they cannot see takes longer, like seeing a daughter you raised loving and raising her own kids. It takes a lifetime.

A Greek proverb says:

“A society grows great when old men plant trees in whose shade they will never sit.”

The truth has weathered well.

John Chapman was an infant when the ink on the Declaration of Independence was drying. But as this nation began its expansion, he did something that remains to this day.

He went through the Midwest planting seeds. The seeds sprouted into apple trees. The trees bore fruit for generations. A boy could pick an apple from a tree in Ohio because of Chapman. An apple pie cooled on a Pennsylvania window sill. The apples came because Chapman stopped by the road to plant a seed.

His entire life was about planting seeds. So when Johnny Appleseed died in 1845, men laid his body in the earth. But his life continued in the scores of growing orchards. And for decades bushels of apples fed boys, workmen, and bakers.

When a man plants a seed for the future, he is not lost when he dies. Others enjoy the fruit in their lives.