"You visit the earth, and water it, You greatly enrich it; the river of food is full of water: You provided them corn, when You have so prepared the earth. You water her furrows abundantly; You settled the ridges thereof: You make it soft with showers; You bless the springing thereof. You crown the year with your goodness; and your paths drop fatness. They drop upon the pastures of the wilderness: and the hills are girded with joy. The pastures are clothed with flocks; the valleys also are covered over with corn; they shout for joy, they also sing." (Psalm 65:9-13)
The harvest is the crown of the year. If that should fail, the ploughing and sowing the seed, and caring for the rising grain, would all be labor lost.
The harvest is the work of God, and every year, when the reaping time comes round, we ought to let our minds rest on the great harvest that is soon coming: "The harvest is the end of the world; and the reapers are the angels." (Matthew 13:39)
If that did not come, all the labor that the heavenly Husbandman has bestowed on His field would be lost. But the harvest will surely come. The tares will be burned in the fire, and the wheat will be gathered home.
While they were growing together, especially in their first stages, it was very difficult to distinguish between the wheat and the tares. To the ordinary eye, both were the same. But the difference was made manifest in the harvest. While the wheat was bending with its weight of grain, the tares bore nothing. They had taken up as much space in the ground had absorbed the sunshine and the dew, but they gave nothing in return for the blessings received. They cumbered the ground that might have been filled to better advantage.
The lesson is that when the angel reapers gather in God's harvest, it is only those who bear fruit that will be garnered. The rest are bound in bundles for the fire.
The present year has not been a favorable one, in many places, for a rich harvest. This fact should lead all to consider if God is withholding His blessings for some good reason. It is God who sends the sunshine and the rain, which are so essential, in proper measure, for a good harvest. "By the breath of God ice is given: and the breadth of the waters is congealed. Yea, He lades the thick cloud with moisture; He spreads abroadthe cloud of His lightning: And it is turned round about by His guidance, that they may do whatsoever He commands them upon the face of the habitable world: Whether it be for correction, or for His land, or for mercy, that He causes it to come." (Job 37:10-13)
In the days of Israel, God gave them prosperity and abundance, but they did not recognize Him. "She said, I will go after my lovers, that give me my bread and my water, my wool and my flax, my oil and my drink. ... For she did not know that I gave her the corn, and the wine, and the oil, and multiplied unto her silver and gold, which they used for Baal. Therefore will I take back my corn in the time thereof, and my wine in the season thereof, and will pluck away my wool and my flax which should have covered her nakedness." (Hosea 2:5,8-9)
But God did not desire to withdraw His gifts any longer than was needed to teach Israel the lesson that their blessings came from Him, and not from their lovers, that led them into sin, and then enslaved them. Although Israel had to go into the wilderness again for a time, to learn the lesson, God would speak comfort to her in the wilderness. "And I will give her her vineyards from thence." (Hosea 2:15)
There is a great controversy in the land at present over the causes to which England owes her prosperity, and how she may retain it. Men are striving over preferential tariffs and free trade as though in these were the secret of prosperity, while God, who gives the fruits of the earth, is not mentioned. When Israel forgot God, He withdrew His gifts for a time, and if we now fail to recognize that our prosperity is due to Him, He may leave us to find out how much, or how little, the policies of statesmen can do for a country.
Let those who know God give Him the glory due unto His name. We can most truly serve our country, and secure its prosperity, not by political measures, but by personal obedience to God. "If you walk in my statutes, and keep my commandments, and do them, Then I will give you rain in due season, and the land shall yield her increase, and the trees of the field shall yield their fruit. And your threshing shall reach unto the vintage, and the vintage shall reach unto the sowing time: and you shall eat your bread to the fall, and dwell in your land safely." (Leviticus 26:3-5)--Present Truth, September 17, 1903--Psalm 65:9-13.