Listen to this article
It’s springtime — can Easter be far behind?
Springtime opens its magnificent door and April enters as fanfares sound and smiles light somber faces. The Earth turns. The Light comes. The mystery of resurrection reveals itself.
April became the fourth month of the year by the manipulation of Pope Gregory and was assigned an even 30 days. It is beyond question the most beautiful month of the year.
April wears gowns of many colors — transcending the gold and brown of autumn, the black and white of winter, the brilliant hues of July.
April even has the most beautiful name given any month. Rooted in the Latin verb “to open,” all nature seems to come to life as April takes the stage.
April is daffodils, poppies, lilies.
April is fertility — the culmination of nature’s laboratory.
April is a freshness of sky, a gentleness of shower, a softness of sunshine, an easiness of the wind.
April is a lovely lady whose garments are painted with the green of nature and garnished with a thousand springtime hues. There is never a clash of color on the dress that April wears.
April points to a vindication of faith in the fulfillment of God’s promises as revealed in the magnificent mystery of nature’s process.
Who can rationalize the April rebirth of nature?
Who is the mastermind who can define the process that transforms a black, ugly, twisted mass of roots into the roses of springtime?
Where is the scientist who can define the process whereby an egg left in a nest until it becomes what we call “spoiled” suddenly bursts forth in the April song of a robin?
April is uncompromising. It follows the law of the identical harvest.
If the April earth receives seeds of wheat — the harvest will be wheat.
If the April earth receives seeds of oats — the harvest will be oats.
This is the law of the identical harvest.
Mankind is bound by that same uncompromising, irrevocable code.
I have heard it said that everyone should have opportunity to throw off the shackles of disciplined responsibility — that all should have the opportunity to “sow their wild oats.”
What specious thinking. What fallacious doubletalk.
What should be said is that everyone must bear the responsibility to reap their wild oats.
Let us ever be mindful of the law of the identical harvest. We reap exactly what we plant.
Humanity continually finds itself planting — sowing. It is part of our nature. We must ever be mindful of the harvest.
What will a free, democratic society reap when only 60% of its registered voters elect its leaders — or when the institutions of society crumble and decay in the selfishness of non-support — or when our level of understanding of a complex issue is limited to a 30 second television commercial?
What happens to a harvest of vicious gossip, half-truths, lies, or innuendo planted within a church congregation? What is reaped when a church loses sight of its goals — of its identity — of its mission?
The harvest of boundaryless child-rearing is a message of unlove.
The harvest of abandoned restriction is moral immaturity.
The law of the identical harvest illustrates the everlasting fact that freedom is not the right to do whatever we want but the power to do what we ought. Freedom operates in a moral universe. The free person is the moral person.
The theory that there is nothing permanent except change — that there is no objective truth to which each life is accountable — runs counter to the law of the identical harvest.
God is not mocked. We reap what we sow.
Each person conceptualizes God. The meaning given becomes shaded with the kind of planting done.
If you plant seeds of cynicism and distrust — you see God as powerless.
If you fill your life with anxiety and worry, to you, God becomes remote to personal concerns — an absentee.
If you fill your life with hatred and resentment — you perceive God to be revengeful.
If you play life fast and loose — to you, God is some whimsical, nonchalant being reclining on a cloud strumming a harp. He’s not the righteous God in whose world we reap what we sow.
All of us grow in the direction of our reverences.
One who sows carelessness can never reap confidence.
One who sows supersensitivity can never reap happiness.
One who sows distrust will never reap comradeship.
Life is an adventure — not a gamble –but it requires investment while remembering the guarantees of the law of the identical harvest. Life is not a safety deposit box. It requires taking the risk of planting — of sowing. We always get back more than what we put in.
Abraham Maslow said: “The test of any person is — does that person bear fruit — is that person fruitful? That’s the way you tell the difference between the talkers and the doers — between the people who change the world and those who are helpless in it.”
Lloyd Docter said: “Let us plant the memories, the traditions of yesterday; let us water them with our tears and warm them with the sunshine of devotion and service — and may God grant us a rich harvest of souls.”
Paul said: “The point is this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully.”