I think October is the most exciting month of the year! The beautiful autumn leaves bursting with color, as they prepare to fall to the earth, the crisp, cool mornings, the fields full of corn being harvested, the sights and smells of October give our senses an overload.
What wonder! What beauty!
October is the month when the harvest is in full swing. Farmers are gathering their crops, those who have labored through the spring and summer months are busy gathering the fruit of their labors.
The pumpkins and squashes are ripening, the potatoes need to be dug. Many households are busy canning and preparing the harvest for the long winter months that lay ahead.
What exciting days!
I am reminded of the year that we (The Pifer Family) decided to plant about 4 acres of potatoes.
I’ll never forget the incredible work that went into that project. First, we secured a field, and then dad plowed the whole thing with his little Farmall Cub tractor, and if I remember right, a little fertilizer was added as well.
Then, we bought what seemed like tons of seed potatoes, and we sliced each one and then set out about the task of placing them about 12 inches or so apart in rows, it seemed like forever (especially when you are about 13 years old)
Once the field was sown, we had little to do but wait. Occasionally we went over and made sure the bugs were not attacking what we had sown, but apart form that, we just waited.
The summer sped by, and finally, the days of harvest came. We began to dig potatoes, and more potatoes, and still more! I don’t know how many we took in that year, but it was a lot!
As we dug potatoes, we found out that some were rotten, but as we gathered them in, we had no time to separate them, we just picked everything and then sorted later.
We had potatoes! We sold potatoes, we gave potatoes away, we had potatoes with every meal!
That story reminds me of another harvest that is about to take place, a harvest of infinitely greater value than a thousand acre potato patch, it is “The Harvest!”
God has been planting His seed for a great many years now, and the fields are white and ready to be picked. Jesus gave some pretty good indicators as to when that would take place, and as we watch with eager anticipation of that great Day, we see the world stage is set, and the people and places are getting ready.
You can almost hear the harvesters getting ready, sharpening their sickles, getting ready for the call.
I hope you are waiting with eager anticipation of that great Day. If thoughts of that Day of Harvest frighten you, perhaps you are not ready.
When the time comes for Jesus to return, all fruit will be gathered, ready or not, and then, just like our great potato harvest, each will be sorted, those that are rotten, will be tossed out, but those that are ripe, will be gathered together to be used by God in that remarkable place called Heaven.
I can’t wait! How about you? Are you ready for the Harvest?
I looked, and there before me was a white cloud, and seated on the cloud was one “like a son of man” with a crown of gold on his head and a sharp sickle in his hand.
Then another angel came out of the temple and called in a loud voice to him who was sitting on the cloud, “Take your sickle and reap, because the time to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is ripe.” So he who was seated on the cloud swung his sickle over the earth, and the earth was harvested.