Enlarge Your Harvest
(7 Laws of Sowing and Reaping)
When I was in high school, my parents were divorced and I lived with my mom near Chicago, but my dad had a farm in Antigo Wisconsin, So during the summers a couple times I went up there and worked on his farm. Sometimes it was fun when I was driving the tractors, but sometimes it was backbreaking like when I was picking rocks out of the field. And being on the farm all summer, I’d hear my dad talk about the problems of farming, and the pests, and the freezes and droughts, the floods, the energy costs, the land costs, equipment costs the labor costs – but I can’t ever recall him complaining about the cost... of seed. And eventually I came to understand why. My dad looked at his equipment as an expense, because he knew his tractors and equipment were going to depreciate and break down at some point, He looked at fuel as an expense He looked at labor as an expense, although he didn’t pay me very much… pretty small expense, But in his mind, seed was not an expense, It was an investment. He knew his tractors would depreciate and fuel would be consumed and labor would be expended, but SEED was fundamentally different. because seed, once planted, didn’t depreciate, or deteriorate or evaporate. It did just the opposite. It MULTIPLIED. It brought a return, greater than itself. Hopefully a return large enough to cover the expenses of the tractors, the fuel and labor hopefully a return large enough to even produce a profit. Money paid for seed is not an expense but an investment. Undoubtably the most important investment of all. What’s the point? How do you think God tells us, that you and I should think about the money we give to God? God says, Don’t view giving to Me as a debt you owe but as a seed you sow. This morning I want to talk about what the Bible says on sowing and reaping, but I have to make a disclaimer first. Have you ever been surfing through the TV channels, and you come across a TV preacher, and of course he has the puffy hair, and maybe a white suit that you wouldn’t be caught dead in, and he has the Rolex watch, And it seems like they are always talking about money, right? I mean, he does have to make the payments on his Cadillac. But when he talks about money, he always talks about sowing and reaping. If you just sow into my ministry, and send off your check off today, and then God will bless you, 100 fold, and you can have a Cadillac just like me. Well, when I see that, it makes me want to throw up. It makes me embarrassed to be a pastor at times. Why? Because there’s a spirit of manipulation, They try to turn God’s principles into a scheme to get rich, but its just manipulation, and nobody likes to be manipulated. But the truth is, the principles of sowing and reaping are very Biblical, and absolutely true. Just because some cheesy tv preacher tries to use it to get rich, it doesn’t mean the scripture is wrong. So I want to talk about these principles from scripture today, but do it with integrity and without manipulation, We’re going to be talking today about, 7 laws of sowing and reaping. The first law we find in the bible, is that If you sow, you will always have a harvest. But if you don’t, you won’t. 2 Cor 9:6-11 Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. …Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us, your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. Now, when a farmer looks out at his empty field, in early spring he knows, “If I don’t get any crops, I’m going bankrupt.” But he doesn’t worry and complain about it, and go, “Oh, my poor, empty field.” what am I gonna do. No, he doesn’t worry. He just goes out and starts sowing, planting some seed. Now if he only has a little bit of seed, he has a choice. “I can either keep this seed, and hold on to it, hoard it, or I can give it away.” by putting it in the ground. Now, if he holds onto it, that’s all he’s got, but if he gives it away, it gets multiplied back to him. Matthew 25:29 NLT To those who use well what they are given, even more will be given, and they will have an abundance. This is the person who sows seed, and it multiplies, and he has an abundance. But from those who do nothing, even what little they have will be taken away. This person holds on tightly to the seed, doesn’t sow it, it doesn’t produce any more, and so, very quickly its gone. What little he had is gone. It’s the principle, What You Keep, Is All You Have, What You Give, God Multiplies. Now when a farmer looks at his seed, does he say, boy I really like my seed, I like having lots of seed, I don’t want to put my seed in the ground, because if I do, I won’t have as much, so I don’t want to give it away, by putting it into the ground. What if I never get it back, and run short of seed. And besides, there’s other people out there who have a lot more seed than me, they can put their seed in the ground, but I want to hold on tightly to my seed. No, that’s not what farmers do, They understand, when you plant your seed, its an investment, because a harvest is coming, and they’re going to get a lot more from that harvest, then they ever would if they held onto the seed. What You Keep Is All You Have, What You Give God Multiplies. God wants us to understand that when we give our tithe, our 10% of our income that the Bible talks about, then we are planting seeds, and God will bring a harvest. I got a note from a family in our church, who were having some real financial difficulties, But they decided to start tithing, despite already being short… and the note says, “Monday a lady came into my office and handed me some money and said, “I have been needing to give you this” and left quickly. I opened up the folded cash and it was the exact amount for our utility bill due this week! That seed you’re sowing is an investment. not an expense, or a debt, or an obligation, its an investment that is one day going to bring a harvest, God will make sure of that. But he also says that if we don’t plant seed, if we withhold our tithe, then there will be no harvest, No investment, no return. So the first law, is that If you sow, you will always have a harvest. But if you don’t, you won’t. The second law, You reap the same kind of seed that you sow. This should be obvious. If I plant corn seed, I don’t get wheat, if I plant tomatoes, I don’t get onions. If I plant apple seed, I don’t get pears. If I plant pear seed, I don’t get oranges. You reap the same kind of seed that you sow. And this is important because This principle of sowing and reaping applies to every area of life, not just finances. Gal 6:7-9 TNIV People reap what they sow. Those who sow to please their sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; those who sow to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. Let us not become weary in doing good… Most of the sowing and reaping scriptures in the bible do refer to money, but this one shows that the laws of sowing and reaping actually apply to all areas of life. He’s saying that you can choose to do things that will please your selfish nature,, or you can choose to please the Spirit, by doing good for others, but either way, you reap what you sow. This is true of all areas of life, If you sow criticism, you’re going to reap criticism from other people. If you sow kindness to people, you’re gonna reap kindness from others. If you sow seeds of love, you’re going to reap love. If you sow seeds of hate, you’re going to get hate back. If you invest time in developing friends, then you’ll reap friendships. If you sow seeds of gossip, or dishonesty, or deceit, you’re going to reap those things in your life. Whatever you reap, you sow. And you reap the same kind of seed that you sow. That’s why kids grow up with so many of the character traits of their parents. That’s the reason for the old saying, the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree, Its because the parents have been sowing those apple seeds for years, and that seed will bring a harvest, whether good fruit or bad, Whatever I sow, I’m gonna reap in life. And if I sow generously financially, I will reap generously financially. The 3rd Law: You always reap later than you sow. You don’t have to be around a farm too long to learn that both growth and decay take time. You plant in one season, you harvest in the next. This is also true for all areas of life. whether its marriage, kids, friendships, career, your health, You plant seeds in one season, but the harvest comes later, In fact you may continue to reap the harvest for years and years, or even the rest of your life, because the seed continues to multiply. If you think about your health, if you plant seeds of exercise and weight loss, and healthy eating this year, does it just benefit you this year? No, you’ll reap benefits for the rest of your life. You’re planting seeds, and you reap what you sow, but you always reap later than you sow the harvest doesn’t happen instantly. Gal 6:9 TNIV Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. At the proper time, not instantly. Every gardener and every farmer understands that You reap later than you sow there’s an interval of waiting required.
Most of the seed farmers plant takes 4-6 months to get a harvest. They don’t plant a seed, and then after 4 days they’re saying, Where is that harvest, I’m tired of waiting, its been 4 whole days. Impatient farmers don’t last long. Now, lets apply this to us. If you plant seed by starting to tithe, don’t get impatient if you don’t see the harvest in 4 days. Maybe you won’t see it this week or this month, but it just means the seed is still growing, Farmers don’t get impatient after 4-6 days or weeks, when they know a harvest takes 4-6 months. And you didn’t get into your financial mess in a month, so God’s not gonna get you out in a month, just because you’ve finally started sowing seed, the harvest takes a while to come in. So that means, after you start to sow seed, Don’t give up, Stay consistent with your sowing. Stay obedient. Keep your faith in place. Just trust God, and his promise, because the increase will come at the proper time, the harvest will come. What God promises, he will deliver. James 5:7-8 TNIV See how the farmer waits for the land to yield its valuable crop, patiently waiting for the autumn and spring rains. You too, be patient and stand firm. The farmer trusts that the harvest will come, so he waits patiently, and if we obey God and sow some seed, we can absolutely trust God, that he will bring a harvest if we wait. The fourth law: You always reap in proportion to what you sow. In proportion means, You sow a little seed, get a little harvest. You sow a lot of seed, get a big harvest. 2 Corinthians 9:6 Remember this: Whoever sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and whoever sows generously will also reap generously. When it comes planting time, does the farmer sit there and think, You know, things are a little tight this year, my expenses have been higher than I thought, and I had that car repair I hadn’t planned on, and I don’t have much saved yet for my vacation in florida next winter, so you know, I think I’m gonna plant less seed this spring, I was going to plant 500 acres, I think I’ll only plant 100 acres this spring, because things are just too tight, No, a farmer who did that would be foolish, Because if its tight now, he ain’t seen nothing yet… Next fall when he gets a puny harvest from only 100 acres, now he’s gonna be in real trouble financially. It works the same with our giving to God. If you’re feeling tight, that’s not the time to stop sowing seed, if you stop sowing now, then next season there won’t be any harvest at all. Luke 6:38 For with the measure you use, it will be measured to you.” You reap in proportion to what you sow. The fifth law of sowing and reaping, We always reap more than we sow 2 Corinthians 9:10 Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed…
Every farmer knows you gotta sow, in order to reap but he also knows that he will reap far more than he sows. If you plant 2 bushels of wheat, are you going to get back 2 bushels of wheat? No. If you did, you’d go out of business after one season. Farmers know if they plant 2 bushels of wheat, they can expect an average of about 67 bushels back. If you plant 3 bushels of oats, you’ll harvest, on average, 79 bushels of oats back. If you plant 7 1/2 pounds of corn, you will reap 120 bushels of corn back. I still remember the first time Kathy and I planted a garden at our house, We’re at the garden store, looking at tomato plants, and I asked Kathy, how many do you think we should get? She said, I don’t know. we both really like home-grown tomatoes, We looked at the tomato plants, and they’re little wimpy looking things, so we decided, we better get at least about 20 plants, or we’re not gonna have many tomatoes at all. We had no idea what we were getting into. We had more tomatoes than we could imagine. We canned tomatoes. froze tomatoes. gave tomatoes away. made salsa. threw tomatoes at the neighbors dog, And we still ended up with more than we could handle. Because you always reap a lot more than you sow. That’s one of the laws of sowing and reaping, that every farmer understands. And it works exactly the same with what we give to God. In fact, almost every time in the bible, that God tells us to give the first part of our income back to Him and His work, almost every time, he adds a promise, and says, if you do that, “I’ll reward you. I’ll bring an increase, I’ll make it worth your while, I’ll multiply it back to you. Lets continue reading in 2 Cor… Now he who supplies seed to the sower and bread for food will also supply and increase your store of seed… and will enlarge the harvest of your righteousness. You will be made rich in every way so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. God rewards us when we give. And notice God’s promise here: You’ll be made rich in every way, for what purpose? So you can spend it all on a bigger house and nicer cars and better vacations? so that you can be generous on every occasion, and through us your generosity will result in thanksgiving to God. There’s a reason God rewards our giving, and its not so that we can get more stuff, or be more selfish. God’s purpose in rewarding us, is so we can receive God’s blessings, and then use them to be a blessing, to the world around us, so they’ll give thanks to God for you, that’s why God gives you back more than you sow. Let me give you some other examples of this: You’ve heard these verses, but they all relate to how you reap more than you sow. Proverbs 3:9-10 Honor the Lord with your wealth, with the firstfruits of all your crops; then your barns will be filled to overflowing, and your vats will brim over with new wine. Malachi 3:10-12 Bring the whole tithe into the storehouse, that there may be food in my house. Test me in this," says the Lord Almighty, "and see if I will not throw open the floodgates of heaven and pour out so much blessing that there will not be room enough to store it. Jesus says Luke 6:38 Give, and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap. Over and over again in the Bible, we see this law stated, the law of sowing and reaping, that you always reap more than you sow. Again, it’s the principle: What you keep is all you have, but what you give God multiplies. The 6th Law of Sowing and Reaping You may sow secretly, but the harvest is viewed by all. Matthew 6:3-4 Amp But when you give to charity, do not let your left hand know what your right hand is doing, so that your deeds of charity may be in secret; and your Father Who sees in secret will reward you openly. If you drive through the countryside in August, you can look out and see huge fields filled with corn 6 feet high, or soybeans, or other crops, and you look at that and think, Whohh, that’s gonna be a huge harvest. But you know I don’t know if I’ve ever driven around and seen the farmers planting the seed. Even if I saw them in a tractor, I might not know that they were planting seed. Unless you happened to drive by on just the right day, and you knew that’s what you were doing, you’d totally miss that part. its like its done in secret. Nobody sees the farmer plant the seed, but everybody notices the huge harvest. That is another law of life. When we look at all the people around us, rarely do we see all the work, sweat and tears that a person has labored and sacrificed, in order to plant seed. We don’t see that part, But we all see the harvest in their lives. Sometimes we look around, and we’re asking, how come that person is getting blessed so much, not only financial blessings, but their life is full of peace, and joy, and fruitfulness? Look at the way God is blessing them, God, why aren’t you blessing me like that? Its not fair, don’t you love me God, I’ve been a Christian just as long as them, What’s the deal, God? Why are they getting blessed so much. Well, let me say this, there’s never easy answers to those questions, and someone who looks good on the outside, isn’t always as blessed when you look deeper, But if they’re truly being blessed by God, then at least part of the reason is, that they’ve been planting seeds. But we don’t usually see that part. We see the way they’re getting blessed today, but we don’t see the years of faithful cultivating and sowing and cultivating and sowing some more, We don’t see those years of sowing seed, that brought them to the place where they are today. Everybody can see the harvest they’re now reaping, that’s visible and apparent to all, but nobody sees the sacrifice, of sowing seeds week after week, month after month, when nobody else is watching. Finally, the 7th law of the Harvest: You are responsible to sow; God is responsible for the harvest. Mark 4:26-29 TNIV "This is what the kingdom of God is like. A man scatters seed on the ground. Night and day, whether he sleeps or gets up, the seed sprouts and grows, though he does not know how. All by itself the soil produces grain—first the stalk, then the head, then the full kernel in the head. As soon as the grain is ripe, he puts the sickle to it, because the harvest has come." The point is, the farmer doesn’t make that seed grow, he doesn’t even know how it grows. Notice the words “all by itself, the soil produces the grain.” The farmer doesn’t make the seed work, he doesn’t have to know how the seed works, he just knows, that if he sticks it in the ground, adds water, and keeps the weeds away, then he’s gonna end up with a big crop, Same thing with our finances. We sow the seed, but then God is responsible for multiplying it. And we don’t even know how he could do it. It looks impossible to us, We don’t understand how we could give money away, and then end up with a bigger harvest, and more back, That doesn’t make any sense to us. But God runs the whole universe, so he has a thousand ways we’ve never even thought of, to bring in the harvest. He controls everything, so He can bless me by increasing my income or getting me a raise, or a bonus. He can bless me by decreasing my expenses, or by giving me an inheritance, or unexpected gift. He can bless me by protecting my possessions so my car doesn’t break down, the pipes don’t freeze, and the washing machine keeps on going, There's a thousand ways God can bless my finances. Deut 15:10 NIV Give generously to him and do so without a grudging heart; then because of this the Lord your God will bless you in all your work and in everything you put your hand to. Notice the words, all, and everything. He blesses it all, if we do what? give generously. So those are the 7 laws of sowing and reaping. If you sow, you will have a harvest; if you don’t, you won’t. You reap the same kind of seed you sow. You reap later than you sow. You always reap in proportion to what you sow. You reap more than you sow. You may sow secretly, but the harvest is viewed by many. You are responsible to sow; God is responsible for the harvest. Now a couple quick things. Please understand that we are not promoting in this church a give more to get more kind of mentality. As I said earlier, There is an illness in Christianity
that you see promoted on some television shows And it feeds on people’s greed. It’s the kind of mentality where a preacher says, “You give money to this ministry And God will make you rich.” Let me tell you, If your motivation for coming to God, is to get rich, then you don’t understand the first thing about God. Because God left the riches of heaven, and came to earth as a poor baby, who owned nothing, and while he was here, he spent most of his time with the poor. So God does not want children, who only come to him for his money. That’s the first thing I want you to remember. The other important thing I want to say: The laws of sowing and reaping, are not a short cut. Some people try to treat it that way. They’re struggling financially, and they don’t want to do the hard work of setting up a budget, and living within their means, and getting out of debt, That’s too hard, They don’t want to do that, But God is not going to bless your finances, if you’re being foolish in the way you manage your finances. So, for those of you who are struggling financially right now, here’s some good advice, Dave Ramsey is the best known financial expert in the Christian world today. Lets look at what he has to say about managing your finances… STORY: I’ve told the story before about how I left the Navy, and went back to school full time for an MBA. Our daughter Carol was only two months old, so Kathy couldn’t work. So our only income was from the Navy Reserve, I’d go one weekend a month, and I earned $300/month. So that was our total income, $300/mo. Now, we’d always tithed faithfully to the church, but now our total income plunged to $300/mo, and I started thinking, This is such a puny amount, if I give some away, there’s not gonna be anything left. We don’t have enough money to start with, Should I really give the first 10% away? I thought about it, and I started thinking, well, the bible doesn’t say anywhere that if you make a lot, tithe, but if you make peanuts, you don’t have to, It doesn’t say that, So I better keep tithing. I better keep sowing some seed. So I did. Well, the harvest took about 9 months to come in. From September till May I was sowing my 10%, and then at the end of May I landed a summer intern job at a GE Satellite Company in New Jersey. I started the next week, I’d been there a couple weeks in the marketing department, when one day, the CEO of the company is in a staff meeting with his executives, one of them mentions that they hired this intern that went to the naval academy, The CEO immediately sends someone to get me, leaves all his executives waiting there in the conference room, takes me into his office, and starts asking me about my navy experience. It turns out that he went to the Naval Academy about 10 years before I did. He ended up giving me a better job and a big pay increase. Now that may sound to you like a coincidence, but that sounds to me like a harvest. That was one of the best harvests I ever got in my life, because it came at a time I didn’t much seed. You see, Kathy and I were so short of money, we were so desperate we wanted to make sure that God was involved in our financial situation, So we decided that there was one person we would never not pay. And that was God. You see, When you hold onto your seed, that’s all you’ve got, but when you give it to God, he multiplies it. And Kathy and I love God’s laws of sowing and reaping. because they’ve been blessing our finances for 30 years. And I promise you, if you take God at his word, and follow his laws of sowing and reaping, do you know what you’re going to find? God is going to be faithful. in ways that will amaze you. In ways that will make you say “Why did I wait ‘til I was 25 to start?”, “Or Why did I wait ‘til I was 45?” “Why did I wait ‘til I was 55, Why did I wait?” to start sowing and reaping the harvest.
Lets stand for prayer: I pray for all those here now Lord that you will cause your provisions and your blessing to be upon us, and that you will give us your spirit of generosity with all of our resources, our money and our time and our energy, help us to be generous with it all, knowing that we will reap a harvest of much more than we give away. Thank you heavenly Father that You've promised to meet all our needs. that you’ve put in place laws of sowing and reaping. We know that now it's up to us to decide if we'll follow the directions that You've laid out. Thank you God that you never fail a promise that You've made, that You are trustworthy. I pray that, today, many many of us will trust You and start receiving the great harvest you have in store for us. In Jesus' name. Amen.
