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Notes from the book, "Sowing and Reaping"
by D. L. Moody
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Life is not casual, but causal.
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God supplies the wants He has created. He feeds the ravens- He clothes the lilies - he will feed with his Spirit the craving spirits of His children. (Matt. 6:27-30)
Every man as he journeys through life is scattering seed at every step. The seed consists of his thoughts, his words, his actions.
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Man is scattering seed at every step.
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Do we long for sympathy in our sorrow and pain? Then we shall have it if we have also weep with those who weep.
A daughter whose sole delight is in her rapid transitions from one scene of expensive brilliancy to another dissipates every care and fills every hour among the frivolities, lives a life in opposition to preparation of the coming judgment. She reaps rather than sows. Her father sows and he reaps in his daughter's life.
A famous painter was weii known for Lhe careful manner in which he went about his work. When someone asked him why he took such pains, he replied;
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The future will be the harvest of the present.
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There is no such thing as a trifle on earth.
We are apt to overlook the results that hinge on small things.
Satan is the arch-enemy of our souls. He says to a young man: "Sow your wild oats. Time enough to be religious when you grow old." The young man yields himself to a life of extravagance and excess, under the false hope that he will obtain solid satisfaction; and it is well if he awakens to the deception before his appetites become tyrants, dragging him down into depths of want and woe.
We need to make the prayer of David - "Create in me a clean heart, O God, and renew a steadfast spirit within me!" (Psalm 51:10)
The reason for deception is, for the most part, neglect. Men do not stop to examine themselves, to lay their hearts and minds bare, as in the sight of God, and judge themselves by His most holy will.
Notice these four things about sowing and reaping: A man expects to reap when he sows; he expects to reap the same kind of seed that he sows; he expects to reap more; and ignorance of the kind of seed makes no difference.
Some harvests ripen almost immediately, but as a rule we find it true in the natural world that there is delay before the seed comes to maturity.
We know what it is to have a failure to the crops, but in the spiritual world no such failure is possible.
God will render to every man according to his deeds. (Psalm 62:12)
The harvest comes as a necessary consequence of the sowing.
Though others may have to reap with you, no one can reap for you.
Sowing to the flesh does not mean siirnly taking due care of the body.
The expression refers to pandering to the lusts of the body, pampering it, providing gratification for its unlawful desires at the expense of the higher part of a man, indulging the animal propensities which in their excess are sinful. Sowing to the flesh is scattering the seeds of selfishness, which always must yield a harvest of corruption.
The works of the flesh: adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry. witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, heresies, envyings, murders, drunkenness, revellings, etc.
Every desire, every action that has not God for its end and object is seed sown to the flesh. If man is sowing for a harvest of money or ambition, he is sowing to the flesh.
Now men make this mistake - they sow to the flesh, and they think they will reap the harvest of the spirit; and on the other hand, they sow to the spirit and are surprised when they do not reap a temporal harvest.
Seed which is sown for a spiritual harvest has no tendency whatever to procure temporal well-being.
Each department has its own appropriate harvest, reserved exclusively to its own method of sowing. Everything reaps its own harvest and reward. And before you covet the enjoyment which another possesses, you must first calculate the cost of which it was procured.
Sowing to the Spirit implies self-denial, resistance of evil, obedience to the Spirit, walking it the Spirit, living in the Spirit, guidance by the Spirit. We sow to the Spirit when we use our abilities and means to advance spiritual things; when we support and encourage those who are extending the influence of the Spirit. We sow to the Spirit when we crucify the flesh, and all its lusts, and when we yield ourselves to Him as we once yielded ourselves to the flesh, "^he fruit of such sowing is love, joy, peace, long sufffering, gentleness, goodness, faith, meekness, temperance. (Gal. 5:22,23) In this world the harvest is growth of character, deeper respect, increasing usefulness to others; in the next world, acceptance with God, everlasting life.
Delay does not mean denial. Too often one generation sows, and another has to reap.
Six years thou shalt sow thy land, and shalt gather in the fruits thereof, but the seventh year thou shalt let it rest and lie still. After 490 years God gave the natron into captivity for 70 years. During this period the land had rest; 70 sabbath years to compensate for the sabbath years of which it had been deprived.
Let us not be weary in well-doing; in due season we shall reap if we faint not.
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"In all labor there is profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty."
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The idea that because a person does a thing in the dark it will never be brought to light is fatal -God says it shall be brought to light.
"Herb yielding seed after his kind, and the tree yielding fruit . . . after his kind" (Gen.1:12) "Do men gather grapes of thorns, or figs of thistles?" (Matt. 7:16) For if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: but if ye through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body, ye shall live" (Rom. 8:13)
If I should tell you that I sowed ten acres of wheat last year and that watermelons came up, or that I sowed cucumbers and gathered turnips, you wouldn't believe it. It is a fixed law that you reap the same kind of seed you sow.
Men expect to reap in the same area that they have studied.
Every man who sells liquor has a drunken son or a drunken brother or some drunken relative.
When Jacob had grown to be an old man, he lived in continual suspicion that his sons were deceiving him. The sin of deceiving his own father bore fruit.
Birds of a feather flock together, blasphemers get together and sharp, shrewd men get together. Jacob found in Laban just such a man as himself.
Jacob deceived his father with the skin of a kid, and his sons deceived him with blood of a kid. Jacob lied to his father, and his sons lied to him.
Be sure your sin will find you out. uncover it. God will uncover it.
Amnon, David's son commits adultery with David's own daughter. Absalom makes a feast for Amnon and has him murdered. David sowed adultery and reaped it in his own family. He sowed murder and reaped it in his own family.
If God did not spare David, do you think He will spare us if we fall into sin and do not confess and turn from our sins?
Maxentine built a false bridge to drown Constantine, but was drowned himself.
Bajazet was carried about by Tamerlane in an iron cage which he intended for Tamerlane.
Maximinus put out the eyes of thousands of Christians; soon after a fearful disease of the eyes broke out among his people, of which he himself died in great agony.
Valens caused about eighty Christians to be sent to sea in a ship and burnt alive; he was defeated by the Goths and fled to a cottage, where he was burnt alive.
Alexander VI was poisoned by the wine he had prepared for another.
Henry III of France was stabbed in the same chamber where he had helped to contrive the cruel massacre of French Protestants.
Marie Antoinette, riding to Notre Dame Cathedral for her bridal, bade the soldiers command all beggars, cripples, and ragged people to leave the line of procession. She could not endure the sight of these miserable ones. Soon after, bound in the executioner's cart, she was riding toward the place of execution amidst crowds who gazed on her with hearts as cold as ice and hard as granite.
When Foulon was asked how the starving populace was to live, he said: "Let them eat grass" Afterward, the mob, maddened with rage, caught him in the streets of Paris, hung him, stuck his head upon a pike, and filled his mouth with grass.
Sow a thought and reap an act. Sow an act, and reap a habit. Sow a habit and reap a character. Sow a character and reap a destiny. And it takes a longer time to reap than it does to sow.
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It takes a long time to build up a character, but you can blast it in a single hour.
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Ignorance of the kind of seed makes no difference.
If I think I am sowing good seed and it happens to
be bad, I shall have a bad harvest; therefore, it
behooves me to see what kind of seed I am sowing.
Suppose I meet a man who is sowing seed, and say:
"Hello, stranger, what are you sowing?"
"Seed."
"What kind of seed?"
"I don't know."
"Don't you know whether it is good or bad?"
"No, I can't tell; but it is seed, that is all I
want to know, and I am sowing it."
You would say that he was a first-class lunatic, wouldn't you? But he wouldn't be half so mad as the man who goes on sowing for time and eternity, and never asks himself what he is sowing or what the harvest will be.
Let a child be idle and Satan will soon lead him into mischief. He must be looked after. Those things that will help to develop character must be selected for him, and hurtful things must be kept out. The best time to sow good seed is before Satan has scattered the tares.
Youth is seed time.
Every sin grows.
What kind of seed are you sowing? Let your mind sweep over your record for the past year.
The farmer is careful in the choice of seed.
You can make this moment a turning point in your life.
Do not wish to grow both wheat and tares. Let there be no half-heartedness. No man can serve two masters.
How can the doctrine of forgiveness be harmonized with the doctrine of retribution? God forgives sin fully and freely for Christ's sake; but He allows certain penalties to remain.
Let no man fancy that the Gospel which proclaims forgiveness can be vulgarized into a mere proclamation of impunity.
If you waste your youth, no repentance will send the shadow back upon the dial, or recover the ground lost by idleness.
Perhaps God does not remove these penalties of sin so that He may intend them to be used as tokens of His chastening.
Young men pretend that it is necessary to see both sides of life. What foolishness! I am not called upon to put my hand in the fire to see if it will burn.
A steamboat was stranded on the Mississippi river,
and the captain could not get her off. Eventually
a hard-looking fellow came on board and said,
"Captain, I understand you want a pilot to take
you out of this difficulty?"
The Captain said, " Are you a pilot?"
"Well they call me one."
"Do you know where the snags and sand-bars are?"
"NO, sir."
"Well, how do you expect to take me out of here if
you don't know where the snags and sandbars are?"
I know where they ain't!" was the reply.
The proud and the self-confident He knoweth afar off, but the faintest whisper of the contrite sinner commands His attention.
- - -Notes by Scott McCrae
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