One of the joys of summertime is fresh garden vegetables. Fresh green beans, sliced tomatoes, cucumbers and sweetcorn; now there is as good a meal as there is! To me, the only thing to make it better would be some fresh fried okra, a pitcher of iced sweet tea and fresh blackberry cobbler!
When vegetables are fresh, they are better. They look better, taste better and are better for you. Fresh picked, that is when they are best. Thinking of such, I fondly recall a summertime experience I enjoyed with each of my three children as they were growing up. Each took his or her turn selling fresh sweetcorn during the months of July and August. Early every morning, I would travel to Belpre or Reedsville, Ohio and arrive just as the farmhands had returned from the fields with fresh-picked corn. I would load a day’s supply for the kids to sell at their roadside stand in downtown Vienna, West Virginia, next to their grandmother’s flower shop. It was a good summer job for the kids, and there was plenty of fresh sweetcorn anytime we wanted it for supper! Selling the corn was easy. It just had to be fresh—fresh every morning.
The Bible says, “Through the Lord’s mercies we are not consumed, because His compassions fail not. They are new every morning; Great is Your faithfulness” (Lamentations 3:22-23). These words were written soon after the fall of Jerusalem (586 B.C.). The Book of Lamentations is the tearstained portrait of a once proud Jerusalem. It is the funeral of a city that was destroyed because of sin (Lamentations 1:9; 3:42; 5:16). However, in the midst of the ruins of the city, there was the affirmation of the Lord’s mercies and compassions. God is good (Lamentations 3:25)! He will not cast off forever but will show compassion according to the multitude of His mercies (Lamentations 3:31-32).
Paul said, “And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we will reap if we do not lose heart” (Galatians 6:9). The figure is that of the farm laborer succumbing in the field under the hot sun. He plows, plants, cultivates, fertilizes, fights the weeds, kills insects and counters drought. Under the hot sun, he is tempted to quit. Successful farming and gardening require constant toil and continued effort no matter how hot it gets in the field or how great the temptation may be to quit.
Similarly, successful (i.e., faithful) Christian living demands “patient continuance in doing good” (Romans 2:7). Sometimes the heat in the field of service is intense. We may think we cannot “plow another row,” but we must remember that “in due season, we shall reap if we do not lose heart” (Galatians 6:9). “Lose heart” means “to be utterly spiritless, to be wearied out, exhausted” (Thayer 166, 195).
The “agriculture” of the Spirit (i.e., well doing, walking in the Spirit, living in the Spirit) takes our total energy and perseverance. The field may be hot, but we must plod onward—sowing, cultivating, watering and weeding. All of the work that is done under the hot July and August sun of life will be worth it for “we shall reap if we do not lose heart.” As Lenski says, “When the blessed harvest season arrives, we shall wonder why we ever thought of getting tired and of relaxing; to have waited a hundred times as long will then seem to us no reason at all for thinking of retiring” (310).
Whenever life goes stale, zeal cools, faith weakens and our spirit is dampened, the mercies and compassions of God are still there. They are new (fresh) every morning. We need to claim them daily (2 Corinthians 4:16) with the prayer. “Turn us back to You, O Lord, and we will be restored; Renew our days as of old” (Lamentations 5:21). Heaven will surely be worth it all!
Works Cited
Lenski, R. C. H. The Interpretation of St. Paul’s Epistles to the Galatians to the Ephesians and to the Philippians. 1937. Minneapolis: Augsburg, 1961.
Thayer, Joseph Henry. Greek-English Lexicon of the New Testament. 1962. Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1973.
