Old Testament law required that strangers, widows and
orphans should be cared for, and including them in harvest celebrations. It was
an important sign for them of how much they were cherished in the community.
Harvest has never been an individual celebration. It has been fundamental to
people for generations, to communities, to futures. In Deuteronomy the writer
describes the whole community coming together to celebrate. Slaves took their
place alongside landowners. Everyone was invited to the party because everyone
had reason to give thanks for the harvest just as in more rural times in
Britain. None of them would go hungry through the coming year.
For many people, harvest services are a throw-back to the
past when they marked a definite point in the year in the cycle of food
production. We have become blasé about food. We can buy tomatoes and bananas
all year from Tescos. After all, there is not much now about our food or indeed
our lifestyle that is seasonal. So-called seasonal vegetables and plants are
with us all year round. We no longer get up with the light and go to bed when
it gets dark. We can work and play, go shopping and enjoy ourselves more or
less any time we want, all year round. Some celebrations begin long before it
seems appropriate: even now shops are already beginning to stock Christmas
items. But while we may have lost sight of natural endings and natural
beginnings harvest can still be a time for shared celebration and for us to
remember that we do have a harvest both of growing things and our lives.
Some of us inspired by Greenbelt Angels try to embrace LOAF principles, Local, Organic, Animal Friendly, Fairly Traded. In my
last job the churches had a stall in the Farmers Market selling LOAF products. In
my garden this year like last, I have planted many vegetables. Its been a very
bad year ! Some like the potatoes, onions and raspberries despite the rain have
been a great success. Some like the carrots and parsnips, brassicas have been a
failure. So it is with all harvests. We thank God for what is good and reflect
during winter months of dwindling light and frosty mornings of our hopes for
the spring and what we will sow in the New Year.
So perhaps harvest is a good time to take stock and give
thanks, and to recognise that we cannot celebrate in isolation from our
neighbours around the world and people in Mali. As we remember the harvest this
year, let’s remember too our offering could make all the difference to some of
the world’s poorest countries and as we know from the prophet Amos, God judges
us by the way we treat the poor.
To harvest you have to sow seeds and so to the Sower. Who is
the Sower? Is it God, Jesus, or us or a mixture of all 3? The Seed-this traditionally is seen as the Word of God or the
good news. The thorns-again this along with the birds are seen as the cares of the world. The plants are God's world. How the Sower sows is the main point of story!!!!
When the poor Palestinian farmer went out to sow his seed,
he did so in a kind of mindless fashion, chucking it into small corners of
rocks and crevices, in poor soil, amongst weeds and finally some was thrown on
good soil. Indeed it would seem he did so not heeding the consequences of his
actions. He went out to sow seed, in the field, on the paths, on rocks among
thorns whether birds were present or not. The implication seems to be that we
should also be sowing the gospel, the good seed everywhere we not just where we
would expect it to grow, certainly not just in church buildings or church
meetings but in the pub, the club, at the school gate, in the office, at the
football match. It’s not our problem to worry about the yield. Our job is just
to sow. Like the mustard seed large plants can grow from small beginnings.
We have all sown the gospel. Some of it has produced good growth/good
harvest. Some has produced bad fruit. What have we sown and harvested this
year? The Spirit of God encourages us to go places we don’t want to go- the
rocky soil. But we have a heavenly mandate, a vision. We are not tied down by
ordinary human prejudices or the behaviour of people around us. We are called
to sow and harvest good news, love, peace, justice even though this is no easy
task.
So what harvest are we gathering? What are we harvesting as a world, as a society, as individuals?
