THE HARVEST OF RIGHTEOUSNESS AND LIFE by G. E. Fifield

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, Cal., Kansas City, and New York · Nov 29, 1899

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 25, Nos. 48, 49.

THE HARVEST OF RIGHTEOUSNESS AND LIFE

By G. E. Fifield

By G. E. Fifield, South Lancaster, Mass.

OURS the seed-time. God alone Beholds the seed of what is sown; Beyond our vision, weak and dim, The harvest-time is hid with Him. —J. G. Whittier.

In the spiritual realm there is never a famine so complete as to prevent a harvest. Nothing is surer than that for every sowing there shall come a reaping. What that reaping shall be depends on the sowing. “Be not deceived; God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.”

Character is not a manufactured article, it is rather a true growth from a living germ. Even God can not by arbitrary fiat create righteousness, without reference to the free will of the person in whom it is to exist. If this were possible, doubtless the loving Father would at the very beginning have peopled the whole universe with final and ultimate righteousness, and so never have run the risk of sin, with all its resulting misery and death. As it was, all morally accountable beings came originally from the Creator’s hands, beautiful, pure, and innocent.

In the fertile soil of their hearts the Creator sowed the good seeds of love and truth; for saith Jesus, “He that soweth the good seed is the Son of man.” Uncorrupted and unhindered, this good seed would have rapidly developed into a perfect and progressive righteousness, that in due time would have placed all God’s children beyond the power of temptation, and therefore beyond the danger of sin and death.

How sin first entered the pure heart of the covering cherub, will perhaps forever remain the original question of the mystery of iniquity. It is, however, certain that it did enter there, and that he and his angels sowed its baneful tares of hatred and lust in the heart of the father and mother of our race.

Earth’s terrible harvest of misery and of death is the fearful result of that sowing. But, praise be to God, the Creator did not desert His handiwork when thus corrupted. From the foundation of the world, He, the divine Seed, gave Himself for our salvation. Forsaking the joy and peace of His heavenly life, He identified Himself with all our needs and all our sorrows, so that in all our afflictions He was afflicted. He was the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world. The divine seed of His spotless life of love and truth was sown, even unto death, in the soil of sinning, suffering human hearts. While incarnate as Jesus of Nazareth, He was only doing openly, and in visible form, what He is doing now, and what He has been doing all the time since the sinning earth needed a Saviour. He was sowing the seed of His divine life in human hearts. Not only then, but now, and ever, so near humanity He comes that no life, tho hardened by sin and hedged around by evil, can fully escape that sowing; for His life is the light of men,—“the true light that lighteth every man that cometh into the world.” In the judgment day no man can bring good and sufficient excuse for not having on the robe of righteousness, for the seed of that living garment has been sown in every heart.

But we too must have part with Christ, both in the sowing and the harvest, for it is to us that Paul speaks when he says, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap.” How can this be? What is the seed that we must sow? and what shall the harvest be?

A seed is simply an embryo of a future glorified life, surrounded by possibilities for development. This is scientifically true. But Christ has put within us each the embryo of His own divine life. He has also surrounded that embryotic life with the possibilities and opportunities of development, so that we are without excuse. Each human being here, therefore, is a seed. This is true of the poorest and meanest, for “He lighteth every man,”—he puts the life germ into all. It is true even of the best, for “now are we the sons of God, but it doth not yet appear what we shall be.” The best man is only an undeveloped seed, an embryo of future glory beyond our ken.

Therefore, as our wills are free, and our lives are but seeds, it is for us to do the sowing. If we will, we may sow to the flesh until the poisonous weeds of passion and lust choke out the divine life; and we then, having sown to the flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption.

We may refuse to sow our lives at all, in the effort to keep them for ourselves, either for the here or for the hereafter. But “whoso saveth his life shall lose it.” “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit. He that loveth his life shall lose it; and he that hateth his life in this world shall keep it unto life eternal.”

When we accept Christ as our personal Saviour, “know ye not we are baptized into His death?” We take upon ourselves the pledge to sow our lives as He hath sown His. But, praise to His holy name, we have the promise, “If we have been planted [or sown] together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also in the likeness of His resurrection.” If our lives are only truly yielded up to be sown, He will attend to the harvest of righteousness and life. “Our God is a Sun and a Shield.” The sunshine of His love will warm the germinating seed. The Spirit will water it; yea, saith the Spirit, “I will water it every moment; lest any hurt it, I will keep it night and day.”

Do you shrink from the world’s hatred and scorn? Remember that His life was sown in dishonor—yea, even crucified between thieves—and the promise to us is, if our life be sown in dishonor, it shall be raised in glory. Are our talents and our opportunities so small that in our weakness we feel we have no life to be given, no seed to be sown? Remember, if it be sown in weakness it is raised in power. The Lord gives to every seed, if it only be sown, a body that pleases Him, and to every seed its own body.

When the harvest of righteousness and life is complete, there will be no glorified character over there that is not the true development of a life germ implanted in some soul down here.

Ah, who can tell how great and glorious the harvest will be? Eye hath not seen, ear hath not heard, neither hath it entered into the heart of man that full glory. Each soul whose life has been truly sown, shall reap God’s own ideal for him, of righteousness and life eternal; and as high as the heavens are above the earth, so high are God’s thoughts and ideals above our own. Each trial borne uncomplainingly, each loving service sweetly rendered, even tho it be but the giving a cup of cold water in His name, is a sowing of the life, which shall not fail of its harvest of joy. If we realized this, how often our murmuring would cease! If the husbandman forgot about the harvest, and thought only of the seed-time when he was casting his wealth away, would not life seem to him all labor and all loss, with no adequate returns, no compensating joy? So here, if we lose sight of the harvest, and think only of the present sowing, what wonder we complain of the injustice and the ingratitude of life?

But the harvest shall make just all these apparent injustices of the seed-time. Whenever our lives have been sown in love, not even Satan himself can rob us of the harvest of joy. Jesus’ life went out in utter apparent defeat, in ignominy and shame. But it was truly sown, and we read, “He shall see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied.” This will be true at last of every life which, instead of being kept for self, has been truly sown. When the harvest comes, we shall be satisfied.

“They that sow in tears shall reap in joy.”

Christ’s righteousness in us is, therefore, but the development, according to the laws of spiritual growth, of the germ of the divine life implanted in the soul. It is ours, by our free wills, to yield that seed to Him, learning always to pray, “Not my will, but Thine be done.” This prayer must be the expression of the soul’s inmost longing, as well in the Gethsemane depths as on the transfiguration heights of life, for we must never raise our wills to resist His.

If we thus yield our lives to be sown, Infinite Wisdom and Immortal Love are pledged that each life shall be surrounded by the circumstances best adapted to its growth. We may wonder now at the way we are led. We may sometimes be tempted even to doubt that Love is leading, and almost dream that we are but drifting on life’s ocean, the plaything of its winds and currents. But when the harvest has been gathered in, and we have reached the harvest home, and stand with the King transfigured on life’s mountain-top, then we shall see and know that we have been led all the way just as we would have chosen for ourselves had we too known all.

God is the Fountain of life. The divine law is the law of life, and all its commandments are righteousness. So with Christ’s righteousness wrought out in a human soul, there comes eternal life. “He that hath the Son hath everlasting life.” Sin and death can not be separated. They are cause and effect.

So also righteousness and life are inseparable. The harvest of one is the reaping of the other. That which groweth up within us from this sowing to the Spirit, is the eternal life which we shall live forevermore.

The full glory of this harvest in any life "doth not yet appear;" how then can we for a moment fittingly speak of the full glory of this harvest in all—the glory of the Reaper backed by the shining heavenly host, even their transcendent glory outshone by Him, and dimmed to the faint luster of a sun-illuminated cloud! The mighty trumpet shall wake the righteous dead to immortal life. "The ransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away." Too good to be true it will seem at first. Almost we shall fancy it to be a dream. "When the Lord turned again the captivity of Zion, we were like them that dream. Then was our mouth filled with laughter, and our tongues with singing."

The mighty host of the righteous, redeemed to immortal life, united with their Lord and the heavenly host, ascending to the heavenly city, shall chant, "Open the everlasting gates," and shall enter the mansions prepared for those that love Him.

There will be no complaining with the harvest. Jesus will be satisfied; all will be satisfied when they awake in His likeness.

Dear hearts, sometimes tortured by doubt here in this seed-time world, where can you sow with such assurance as this, since "the harvest-time is hid with Him"?