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How's The Farming in Your Life?

by Jerry Ousley  
4/26/2008 / Christian Living


I've never been much of a farmer. As a matter of fact I don't like pulling weeds, watering plants and I don't think they've ever succeeded in designing a hoe that fits my hands. I suppose if it came right down to necessity that I'd reconsider this point of view; I do like to eat awfully well. If it meant going hungry or putting food on the table for my family I guess I'd have to get over my dislike of gardening and farming and just deal with it.

When I was a kid I'd do most anything to get out of hoeing the garden. I remember one garden my parents planted. The rows were very short but it was on a long, narrow stretch of ground and there were a lot of those short rows and getting from one end to the other seemed nearly impossible. So if I could find a good excuse to get out of it I would.

I know this may sound silly but I do remember one time planting a single grain of corn in the woods. I kept a good eye on that single corn stalk and believe it or not it came up, grew and yielded a couple of small ears of corn. I was proud of that, I suppose because it was all mine.

Living our lives for the Lord is a lot like farming. Actually there are several instances in the Bible where the Lord used farming as an example. Our tools are a little different however. Instead of ground, we plant in our souls; instead of water and sunshine, we have the Word of God and our worship of Him along with our own faith.

God wants us to be fruitful and productive in our lives. To do these we've got to do three things and we've got to do them regularly, not haphazardly, or we'll wind up with a scrawny garden for God.

After the good news of Jesus Christ has been implanted in our lives, in order to grow, first of all we've got to make sure that the seed gets plenty of water and sunshine. The moisture causes plants to get the daily nourishment they need to grow. Of course we can't control the sunshine but we've got to make sure that the plant we are growing is in a position to get the maximum exposure that it can. These things are like the Word of God. We must have a daily dosage of God's Word or we just will not grow. Did you know that the average Christian today has never read the Bible all the way through? It's true. We find time to read the newspaper, books for entertainment and other things but we don't read God's Word. We've got to begin doing that even if it's just a few verses a day.

Secondly, farming takes a lot of work. Farmers have to till the ground, make sure their crops are weeded, maintain their farm equipment and on and on. We've got a lot of work to do too. As we read God's Word He will show us things that need to be taken care of in our lives. There's always something. Growing in Jesus Christ is a constant job. Sometimes our job requires us to endure cold weather as well as a hot, boiling down sun. We all have trials in our lives; times when we think we can't make it. But we can if we'll just stick it out and trust in God.

Finally a good farmer has to wait. There's a period of time during the summer when the crops are planted and weeded and all he can do is wait until harvest time (this isn't to say that the farmer has nothing to do in the summer because there's always something that needs to be done on the farm). Waiting is a very hard job. It may not seem like it on the surface but to sit around and just wait can be very trying. If you're like me you hate to wait. But sometimes we have too. We have some waiting to do spiritually as well. Paul told us in Ephesians 6:13, "Therefore take up the whole armor of God, that you may be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand." The last phrase of that verse: to stand means to wait. After we've done everything we are supposed to then we've got to wait. Waiting on God doesn't mean that He's slow or that He'll get to it when He can; sometimes the wait is for us. It gives us patience. Waiting is an art. Waiting on God is even more of an art. But when we wait good things come to us in the end. So, how's the farming in your life going?

Jerry D. Ousley is the author of ?Soul Challenge?, ?Soul Journey?, ?Ordeal?, ?The Spirit Bread Daily Devotional and his first novel ?The Shoe Tree.? Visit our website at spiritbread.com to download these and more completely free of charge.

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