Good morning,
When
James was writing to the people of his day he was dealing with one of
the same tensions that we still face today. Jesus had promised that he
would be coming back to be the king of the earth and those in the early
church were pretty sure that with all the trouble and pain they were
facing, his coming would be very soon. That was almost two thousand
years ago, and he still hasn’t kept that promise. It helps us to
remember that if he had kept his promise then, we wouldn’t be here now
to be part of the family of God. Now that our present generation is
faced with mounting tensions and fears we need to hear what James said
then, so that we will have a balanced view of what the Lord was telling
us about his soon return. James reminded them that one of the Enemy’s
tricks was to get us to be longing for escape instead of paying
attention to the process of taking care of the harvest. Our king will
surely be coming, but the timing for that return depends on the master
plan for time and eternity and not the challenges that we face in time.
Farmers
know that you need to wait for the right conditions if you are going to
have a valuable harvest. The soil needs to have plenty of water to get
the newly planted seeds to grow and then the proper amount of rain
during the growth stages to have the harvest ready at the right time.
It helps us to remember that the farmers don’t just plant the seeds and
then show up at the harvest to gather the crops. Waiting isn’t a
passive thing. Waiting requires hard work during the growth stages and
courage to trust that the God who was in charge of the rain and weather
will do what is needed for the growing harvest. Now it’s our turn to
pay attention to sowing God’s seeds of the Good News and being content
with the knowledge that someone else may harvest what we have sown. It’s
also important that we trust the Lord to come at the right time to
accomplish what he has planned from eternity past, to produce the
valuable harvest of eternal life for all those who will trust the Lord
of the harvest. His coming is near, it could even be this week. May
the Lord help us to focus on doing what he has given us to do, to live
patiently and courageously each day, so that when the harvest is fully
ready, we will have done our part to making his coming a wonderful
reality.
James 5:7 Dear brothers and sisters, be
patient as you wait for the Lord’s return. Consider the farmers who
patiently wait for the rains in the fall and in the spring. They eagerly
look for the valuable harvest to ripen. 8 You, too, must be patient.
Take courage, for the coming of the Lord is near.
Roy Wisner
