The Wonder of Harvest

Daily Gratitude Year 5-Day 235: Today, I am grateful for the wonder of the harvest.

The pumpkin harvest is in full swing. Other crops that started as hard, dead and lifeless seeds have soaked in the soil, rains and summer sun and found full life. There is a grandeur in summer that is full of goodness and delight. 

Summer is followed by fall. We are teetering between the two. Fall brings the harvest. I hope I never outgrow the wonder of a seed that fulfills its promise and potential. 

"God is able to perform, provide, help, save, stop, turn... He is able to do what you can not." -Max Lucado

Remember the faith of a mustard seed?

Jesus said, “How can I describe the Kingdom of God? What story should I use to illustrate it? It is like a mustard seed planted in the ground. It is the smallest of all seeds, but it becomes the largest of all garden plants; it grows long branches, and birds can make nests in its shade.” -Mark 4:30-32

And this account of the same lesson:

“You don’t have enough faith,” Jesus told them. “I tell you the truth, if you had faith even as small as a mustard seed, you could say to this mountain, ‘Move from here to there,’ and it would move. Nothing would be impossible.” -Matthew 17:20

Three out of four gospels record this parable, so it is obviously one to ponder and embrace.

There are days we feel tiny and insignificant. Yet, scripture is full of examples of the tiny, the countless or overlooked that seem to matter to God in a big way. If he numbers the stars and calls them by name, is it any wonder that he tends the tiny mustard seed until it reaches its full potential? How much more he cares for us? 

I continue to consider the magnitude that we are the only creation that cost Him his breath... and then Jesus paid the price to reclaim all that sin had managed to taint with darkness and grief. He never asked us to fix our past, only confess it. He takes care of the debt we could not pay. He asks us to believe and move forward in a new way. Changed by a personal encounter with grace and once again breathing fresh air. He is light, life and our future. 

He is able to do what we cannot do on our own. He can bring from us from a sense of lifelessness into full life and glorious bloom. Some are granted a longer growing season, but each one of us receives the gift of this day. Each one of us is still learning and growing until we reach our own harvest season. 

Today, I am grateful for the wonder of the harvest.