Sat on the porch today watching the orange monarchs and yellow cloudless sulphurs flitting around the remnants of my flower and vegetable garden. The zinnias are straining at their stems, reaching for the sun each day, blooming with vivid colors, drawing the bees and butterflies to drink their nectar.

The tomatoes, not willing to give up yet, are producing small but delicious fruit on twisted and broken limbs. I go out to the garden to clean the big pots, put their lids on for the winter, but I cannot just uproot the tomatoes when they are still blooming and producing a harvest. I think the tomatoes have a deep appreciation for God’s earth from which they grow so I’ll nurture them till they quit producing.

The fall harvest is such a beautiful time of year, the vibrant colors of the seasonal fruits and vegetables. I love all the store displays of pumpkins and squash in their myriads of orange and green and yellows. Earth colors have always been my favorite. I think of purple plums, peppers in their reds and greens and yellows and golds, big crowns of green broccoli and snow white cauliflower in caps of pale green, the greens of the granny smith apples, the mixtures of reds on the gala apples’ skin. The fall produce section is so pretty, like a watercolor still life painting. Mother Nature will soon pick up her watercolor palette and dip her brushes in God’s wondrous colors, painting fall cardigans on the leaves, dressing the mountains’ trees in their picturesque patchwork quilts of earth’s colors. I love this time of year and look forward to nature’s illustrations.

God calls us to be good stewards of the earth and we have a responsibility to take care of it. We also need to be laborers for God, sharing our Christianity, bringing others to God through our words and actions. We need to plant seeds of God’s love and nurture them. In life we’re told we reap what we sow. The good choices will be rewarded, the bad choices will bring consequences. “Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. The one who sows to please his sinful nature, from that nature will reap destruction; the one who sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life” (Galatians 6:7-8).

In Matthew 9:36-38, Jesus spoke to his disciples saying, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send our laborers into his harvest.” Jesus talked of a spiritual harvest waiting to be reaped, meaning there are people who need to hear God’s words, who need to know they are cared for by God, to be harvested into his kingdom. “Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up” (Galatians 6:9).

God wants us to plant his seeds of love right where we are. He wants us to labor for him and have a bountiful harvest, sharing our Christianity with others.

“Your harvest is not in view till your prayers rise up to heaven.” — David O Oyedepo