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The Unforeseen Harvest

In his poem Marmion, Sir Walter Scott said something profound: “Oh what a tangled web we weave when first we practice to deceive.”

As we grow up in our respective communities, most people want to be seen in a favorable light. Some just want to be noticed. In some way they want to be accepted by their peers. However the case may be, people have a tendency to change their behavior or do compromising things to gain the acceptance of their peer groups or even society. You’ve seen it before. You’ve seen people do weird things. A tattooed body, or dye their hair green or blue, knowing they weren’t born with that color hair. They may paint their nails a bright color. They may cut their hair short on one side, and the other side may be cut in layers. They may dye their skin to match their clothes. You’ve seen tattooed people, and you ask them why they are so covered, they respond that they like them. But when you run out of canvas, where do you turn to? The Bible tells us not to tattoo ourselves, not to make marks on our flesh. Think about this, to change your attitude to change your behavior to suit someone else or some situation, because you want to be validated or accepted.

Some may just want to be accepted just by their peer group, whether old young, schooled or unschooled. Whatever individuals or groups or situations you’re in, you want to change who you are to fit in. No one wants to be the odd ball. So we’ll do what it takes not to be. Sometimes we’ll go beyond who we are. We do things so people will accept who we are and what we stand for. We don’t want to be the odd ball, the one that stands out and people point a finger at, the nerd. There are those who would go along with a lie to keep you from feeling different about them. There are some who would go along with the program, so as not to be the one who stands out against. Understand this: many aren’t always aware of the repercussions of their actions. They are not aware of what they are doing. All those things build up and add up, and cause people to have other issues. If you let something fester long enough what happens to it? It goes bad and begins to effect other aspects of who and what you are. When it comes time that all those things have added up and we don’t alleviate ourselves of them, they come at the most inopportune time.

When you do things, you reap what you sow. It will bring up underlining things later on, in your life, or in some situation where you are doing good. Do you know reaping doesn’t have a watch? However, it does have memory, perfect sequences of time to do what it does. You may not get it then, but you will get it later. You bothered this individual, year after year, over and over. You dog them out for so long. Guess what, you don’t bother them but you hurt them, bringing about a pain in that individual, and you don’t get it straight. Low and behold, your life goes great, everything is great. But its the seeds you’ve sown previously that are still out there. Does a seed come up as soon as its planted? No. It dies first, and brings forth new life. So when you lie on someone for years and years, never getting it straight, you’ve planted those seeds of lies. Lies need support. Then a situation comes up in your life where you need a person to tell the truth. Then all of a sudden reaping has memory. Your harvest from that lie is a lying harvest. One thing we don’t catch as human beings is that there are consequences for everything, which have a domino effect. It just doesn’t effect one thing, it effects several things, in your life. Its important to note that while these unexpected events in your life are going on, you too have caused hurt and pain in someone else. Its the promise we break and the choices we make that determines our end. 

Even today, some of us may have things in our lives we’ve forgotten about. Those things we’ve put on the back burner of our mind. Or had some things very hurtful, that have caused us or someone else to have pain. You might just tell yourself, “put it in the back of your mind, and it will resolve itself.” How many times have you done that and it worries you? It never stays in the back, it comes to the front. Why does that happen so much for a Child of God who never got things corrected? He will bring it to your remembrance until you get it corrected. Old wounds don’t heal? Why? Because if you keep nursing it, it will never resolve itself. What do I mean by nursing? What did I tell you about a lie? It needs support. When you hurt someone, that hurt you caused hurts them, but it sticks in your craw. People have been damaged and wounded by others. Those wounds and damages cause you not to think right. When a Child of God has damaged someone else, their prayers are tainted? Why? Its tainted with pain, anguish and hurt that you haven’t gotten corrected. So when you pray you offer God pain and anguish that you caused someone else. He won’t hear you. Come to Him with a pure heart. Some have been wounded to the point where they can’t pray right or think right. When your prayers are tainted with pain and revenge. 

15 Moreover if thy brother shall trespass against thee, go and tell him his fault between thee and him alone: if he shall hear thee, thou hast gained thy brother. 16 But if he will not hear thee, then take with thee one or two more, that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established.


Matthew 18:15-16 

We must be about loving our brothers; showing love. We can’t point the finger at someone and say “that’s what you get.” We have to be on guard with how we talk and what we say. We have to give an account of every idle word we speak. The Word says let your words be few and seasoned with grace. But if you refuse to get something corrected with you brother, and you try to seek out God, He will not be pleased. Your brother is your first responsibility. To love, nourish, encourage, to help grow to the potential where they should go. Don’t get to the point where God has to chase you down to get you to do what He says.  We need to understand hurting our brothers and sisters in Christ should be the farthest things from our hearts. Christians are good for talking love, but never showing it. Some of the greatest wars were fought by people who said they were Christian. Everyone is not a Christian, and just because they say they are doesn’t make it so. When the tire meets the road, you’ll know those who are true, because the river of life will flow out of us; the anointing will flow out of us. This walk is not easy, but if there is mess in us, the Lord will take us on a hard walk to get us to be fit as His Child. It gets you out of you, and puts Christ in you fully. As you walk though it, don’t look at it as the Lord whooping you, but He’s creating in you something that never was before. In order to create something good and kind hearted like Him, He has to take you through that. Sometimes we become problems to Him because we always stand in His way. The Lord told us to do something, but we won’t do it. We must remember that as humans we have a mandate on all of us, and that is to love one another, even in spite of ourselves. If we don’t we’ll only wind up hurting ourselves and our relationship with Christ. 

A soft answer turneth away wrath: but grievous words stir up anger. 2 The tongue of the wise useth knowledge aright: but the mouth of fools poureth out foolishness. 3 The eyes of the Lord are in every place, beholding the evil and the good.

Proverbs 15:1-3

What does love have that hatred can never have? Caring. Hatred does not care. When you love you care, when you care, you don’t want to hurt a person or see them fail. You want to see them succeed and you do your best even when you don’t succeed. Because love never fails. While you’re helping them, all the while God has your back.

Don’t leave a seed of bitterness, hatred or anger. The harvest that you will come up with, you’ll not want to receive.

5 For we through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith.6 For in Jesus Christ neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision; but faith which worketh by love.7 Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth? 8 This persuasion cometh not of him that calleth you. 9 A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. 10 I have confidence in you through the Lord, that ye will be none otherwise minded: but he that troubleth you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be. 11 And I, brethren, if I yet preach circumcision, why do I yet suffer persecution? then is the offence of the cross ceased. 12 I would they were even cut off which trouble you. 13 For, brethren, ye have been called unto liberty; only use not liberty for an occasion to the flesh, but by love serve one another. 14 For all the law is fulfilled in one word, even in this; Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself. 15 But if ye bite and devour one another, take heed that ye be not consumed one of another.

Galatians 5:7-15

A little bit of leaven, leavens the whole lump. A little bit of the sin nature it just doesn’t effect one particular thing, but every aspect of your life.

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The Seeds of Your Past Can Choke out Your Future

You’ve seen vines that grow around trees and on windows? Those vines come from a little, bitty seed, which grows like wild fire. They’ll cover stuff, choke out stuff, in so much that they even kill a trees. They’ll smother the branches and choke out the leaves, and kill the tree. Those kind of seeds will choke our your future and if you have that kind of see in your life, it will choke out your future.

The word Seed in Greek is Sperma, where we get the English word sperm. We all know what sperm is. The Bible tells us the origin of our seed; of us. But the Greek work Sperma means offspring.

Ecclesiastes 11:1-3

Cast thy bread upon the waters: for thou shalt find it after many days. Give a portion to seven, and also to eight; for thou knowest not what evil shall be upon the earth. If the clouds be full of rain, they empty themselves upon the earth: and if the tree fall toward the south, or toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth, there it shall be.

A tree can’t pick itself up and say it doesn’t want to lay where it fell. Like dominoes, when you set one off, all of them go off. This is how some things are in our lives. We set our lives up like dominoes. Whatever is in our past will knock down our future. We’ll wind up doing stupid stuff, and our future was based upon something we set up in the past. As we set things up in the past and we go beyond the past, we set up things like dominoes right behind us. Then we get to the point where we say we’ve made it! Were doing good. We have the car, house, wife, or husband, land, or job that we wanted. Everything is laid out just the way we wanted, and you sit back and say this is cool. Then all of a sudden, something comes out of nowhere that topples your life. When you take a deeper look, there were things in the past that have dominoed its self to the present that have caused me to loose. We look at these things and say “no I’ve cleared up my path.” Know this, whatever is in your past will become your future if its not taken care of.

Ecclesiastes 11:4

4 He that observeth the wind shall not sow; and he that regardeth the clouds shall not reap.

If you’re so busy worried about something else that has nothing to do with what is needed now, time flies by.

Ecclesiastes 11:5-10

As thou knowest not what is the way of the spirit, nor how the bones do grow in the womb of her that is with child: even so thou knowest not the works of God who maketh all. In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good. Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun: But if a man live many years, and rejoice in them all; yet let him remember the days of darkness; for they shall be many. All that cometh is vanity. Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth; and let thy heart cheer thee in the days of thy youth, and walk in the ways of thine heart, and in the sight of thine eyes: but know thou, that for all these things God will bring thee into judgment. Therefore remove sorrow from thy heart, and put away evil from thy flesh: for childhood and youth are vanity.

 

The Bible tells us that when I was a child, I spoke as a child, I acted as a child, but when I became a man I put away childish things. We look at some of the young men today; getting girls pregnant. Then they say that they can’t afford a child. Well, did they think about that in the past? The child is back here, and the girl is young, and the boy is young. The boy says I still have my life to live. Why do an adult act while you’re a child? As you get older, and she gets older, you get set in your ways and do your own thing. You want to see your child, but the mother withholds you, and asks for money for the child. Now he did it when he was young and irresponsible. Now that he is older and somewhat responsible, all that is in his life. So she goes and gets a DNA test to show that he is the father. Domino effect. Now you’re working a good job making a lot of money. Then someone takes half your check to give to the mother and the baby. Domino fact. The court now has garnished your wages. Now you say she doesn’t deserve your money, that you’ve worked hard to get that. Too late to say that because you’ve set the seed in the past, which caused you set affects in your life. Another situation; you do investments, make a little money as a young person; saved aside. Someone convinces you to spend your money on frivolous things. You put your money toward that, which sucks the money from your pocket. Now all of a sudden someone wants to cosign or borrow money from you; a good friend. In the process, they defraud on the loan, they don’t pay it, and because your name is on the loan, they come after you because you cosigned. So you’re directly responsible because you have a job and the other friend doesn’t. So now they garnish your wages. Now you’re stuck with the child support and a loan you helped cosign. That should tell you one thing. Don’t set up seeds in your past to control what happens to your life in the future. Don’t start off bad habits…smoking, drugs because your friends said it was cool. Because you want to be cool, you starting taking up smoking. A little weed here, smoking a little there. Next thing you know, you’re smoking weed on a regular basis. Now the money you have coming in is spent on a habit; your money is slowing dissipating. Bad habits can cause you to loose your future.

A lot of people allow different kinds of things in their life, not understanding that it can cause them to loose their future. We look at Israel. We look at their life and structure. Some of the things Israel did in their past, hampered their future. When Israel was in Egypt, they cried and pleaded to where they got to the point where they cried on a regular basis. The Lord sent them a deliver; Moses. Isn’t it something how you can remember your past, the things your thought were fun and awesome? But the Israelites in Egypt were making bricks from straw to build buildings, working the slime pits, working the straw in, doing everything designated for someone who was a slaves. They were being whipped and tortured to help build things for that dynasty. Its amazing when they cried out, God gave Moses, who said he was coming to set the people free. Moses a deliver? “What you call its,” son? That boy is our deliverer? People couldn’t believe it. As the people were walking to their place of destiny being free, isn’t it amazing how when they got in the dessert, and there was no water, no food, they started complaining. Now mind you, there was no food or water barely in Egypt, but they recalled they had a better time in Egypt. Isn’t it something the things of your past your were trying to get free from, your require to be in your present? We become Children of God, and then when things get hard in your walk, you think about how it was when you were in the world. I partied, I did what I wanted to do, but you complained then that you didn’t want to do all that. Now you get salvation and say I’m bored, this Christian life was boring. But what did you do in the world? Sat in the house all day.

Get yourself active in the house of God before you complain that being in the house of God is boring. Well you say you don’t know what do. Get active. Once you do, you’ll find something that you desire to do and God will enhance that. But most people like to complain. Don’t let the past, your past things you did, the things you were doing in the past, build up and cause your future to be jacked completely up. You can’t allow that to happen. Right now, as you set right now, get everything cleaned up. Even if you have to go to your old friends and apologize, apologize, because you don’t want to be the one who holds back their future. So now you are free and can grow to be what God called you to be, so that mess won’t come back later and bite you. I’ve been dominoed so many times from things, that I should be flat. This is how we are letting our past become our future. So we need to find those seeds, dig them up, and destroy them, because they will surely grow up and choke up your life.

Mark 4:22-29

For there is nothing hid, which shall not be manifested; neither was any thing kept secret, but that it should come abroad. If any man have ears to hear, let him hear. And he said unto them, Take heed what ye hear: with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you: and unto you that hear shall more be given. For he that hath, to him shall be given: and he that hath not, from him shall be taken even that which he hath. And he said, So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how. For the earth bringeth forth fruit of herself; first the blade, then the ear, after that the full corn in the ear. But when the fruit is brought forth, immediately he putteth in the sickle, because the harvest is come.

Things in your life, if they are negative things, if you feed those things with negative process like thoughts, actions or deeds, as you bring those things into your life, that corn stalk in your life will begin to fill out and grow. As it gets into its maturity it bears fruit. All those things you’ve been feeding into your life, negative things, actions and deeds, will come to a maturity, and when they do, they will blossom out of you. So if you are fed being a liar, crook, thief, judgmental, nasty, lazy; when you get older it will blossom out of you because your nurtured those things. When they rear their head and blossom in front of you, its never in a good time, its always in a wrong time, but these things have become a part of you. So you’re only doing what you do, and what you have grown to do, what you have placed in you to do. Its just as I said earlier about the dominoes that you set up in your life. You’re in front of the dominoes and they are behind you. As a Child of God, don’t let your past become your future that will choke out the real purpose that God has for you. Just like that corn stalk with corn; the fruit on, they will build up. If its good things, your get a bunch of it, and if its bad things you’ll get a bunch of it. Make sure the things you do contribute to a good walk in Christ. Don’t let it be because of something in the past, or something you couldn’t let go of. Remember the Greek word for seed is Sperma, which is the natural offspring of something. Something natural; that you accumulated; that you gave all the time and nurture it needed to grow in your life. Understand this, the Bible tells us, what so ever a man soweth that shall he reap.

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Reaping an Unwanted Harvest

Galatians 5:25-26, 6:1-18

If we live in the Spirit, let us also walk in the Spirit. Let us not be desirous of vain glory, provoking one another, envying one another. Brethren, if a man be overtaken in a fault, ye which are spiritual, restore such an one in the spirit of meekness; considering thyself, lest thou also be tempted. Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ. For if a man think himself to be something, when he is nothing, he deceiveth himself. But let every man prove his own work, and then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone, and not in another. For every man shall bear his own burden. Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto him that teacheth in all good things. Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not. As we have therefore opportunity, let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are of the household of faith. Ye see how large a letter I have written unto you with mine own hand. As many as desire to make a fair shew in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised; only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of Christ. For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the law; but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh. But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision availeth any thing, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God. From henceforth let no man trouble me: for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord Jesus. Brethren, the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen.

 

Galatians 5:7-8 Every man should bear his own burden.

If someone has a problem or burden and we take upon ourselves to listen to it or absorb it, then we will take on that process or that burden that individual is going through. When we do that, whatever results that individual gets from their burden, will also be given to you. When it says in the 8 verse, For he that soweth to his flesh shall of the flesh reap corruption; If we allow ourselves to be affected by what someone says or acts or lives, then of those circumstances, we will reap the reward of those actions or circumstances, thereby reaping an unwanted harvest.

Galatians 6:7 God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap. There is no question about it. If you allow yourself to be dragged into someones else’s mess, then their mess will be your mess. Whether family members, friends, working companions, business partners…we see it all the time. When people get together and start gossiping about someone else, whether it’s their marriage or living style, it usually winds up that they encounter the same thing in their own life and walk. Reaping from something that was not your business, will cause you to fail in God. The harvest that you received from someone else mess, you can’t deny it will be your mess; your harvest. So don’t get mad with God. The reaping that I’m saying is the reaping of sin.

If a brother or sister is going through growing pains of their Christian walk, we who are the Children of God should be more patient and understanding because we have been through. You can bear one another’s burden because you know what it takes to go through. Be there for them. But do not, do not take upon yourself, the sin burden of their walk.

We are not to judge the individual who is reaping the harvest from their mistake. It says in the book of Matthew 7:1-2 Judge not, that ye be not judged. For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

So often are we captivated by someone else’s misery that we tend to forget that anyone can be overtaken in a fault. So do not point your finger, do not criticize, do not ostracize those individuals who are reaping an unwanted harvest. Know this that where your treasure is there will your heart be also (Matthew 6:21).

 

Don’t allow someone else’s bad crops to become your harvest. Don’t reap someone else’s mess.