Stubble...the Wayfarer

Stubble

John 4:35

King James Version (KJV)

³⁵ Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say unto you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest.

Seasons come, and pass. Time to plant comes, and what is planted has sufficient time to grow to maturity and fruition in accordance with the care taken to assure that growth, the nutrients applied, the careful cultivation and weeding that requires constant attention and effort along with the time of rain that waters the crop and the sun that is so needed for growth.

Only the foolhardy refuse to plant during the short allotted time that passes so quickly into what should be that time of growth, waiting until harvest time to plant as winter approaches  when that growth is impossible.

When planting season is properly observed, each crop sprouts and becomes visible to the planter, its development apparent, or lack of development and its cause readily seen.

Properly and lovingly tended, each plant becomes what is intended, a thing of beauty to the planter, each field wonderfully green, wonderfully and properly placed, promising its yield at the appropriate time.

Each menace, each weed, each threatening blight, each threat from insect is met by the caretaker to assure that growth, with determination that the yield not be diminished or stymied when harvest time arrives.

As the field blossoms with the different colors of flower that come only for the plants chosen to be planted, new beauty is seen,  new promise is given of the yield to come.

Flowers fade and color returns to the intended green expected for growth.

This too passes as harvest approaches, with the natural and expected cycle completing itself as that yield becomes ever more apparent, fruition having been reached then awaiting only the harvest itself.

Even as harvest approaches, weeds, blight, and other dangers present themselves, making that harvest less easy for the harvester, less bountiful once reaped until the chaff is separated from the grain, leaving only the intended yield expected at planting and throughout the growth season, for which the arduous labor of tending the crop was expended.

When harvest season arrives, the harvester enters the fields and joyfully  reaps the crop that was sewn.

He does so with a fervor and with purpose, knowing that the harvest time is also limited, else the crop spoil in the field and rot with the onset of winter.

Once gleaned the field contains only remaining stubble, mostly unfit for any purpose other than to be plowed under or burned in place to prepare for the next crop to come.

Amid that stubble, however, for those willing to expend the effort, there is a remnant of the yield, still valuable if the will exists to extract it from that stubble.

Many times, that precious remnant sustains the few willing to search it out and pull it from the field before winter spoils it, or before it can be plowed under in preparation for a new crop that requires the preparation of that plowing.

Eventually, even this time, a time of careful, conscientious gleaning of the remnant passes as well, with any portion of that yield left in the field lying in wait of the oncoming dismissal of a crop now harvested, while preparation is made for the next season of planting and growth, of tending for the new yield to be expected.

If the field is to be productive, if yield is to be expected there is the necessity of preparation at a proper time, of tending as is needed during growth, and a harvest that separates the intended yield from the yield of all that is sprung up in threat against it.

Each field, once harvested, completely or incompletely, contains only stubble, of no further value to the planter or any other.

As the harvest passes, it is imperative that all be gleaned that may be gleaned, else it remain among that stubble.

2 Timothy 1:12

KJV

 ¹²For the which cause I also suffer these things: nevertheless I am not ashamed: for I know whom I have believed, and am persuaded that he is able to keep that which I have committed unto him against that day.

Amen and Amen

the Wayfarer