[Steven Britt] Well, I'd like to start out today telling you something that I learned from my grandfather that was kind of the inspiration for this message. My granddaddy was a peanut farmer from North Carolina his whole life. He actually died this year. He died two days after my daughter was born, 86 years old. She was his 12th grandchild. What a blessing. What a long wonderful life he lived. But, you know, I talked to him about a year ago and he was looking back on all the hard things in his life. And he was doing this at a very hard time in his life. You know, 86 years old, it's a hard time of life no matter who you are, I think.

And he was looking back and asking where God was. You know, where was God when his first child died at a month old? Where was God when his youngest son died 46 years old? That was my father, in 2010. Where was God when his wife got Alzheimer's? Where was God when he started losing his eyesight? Yeah, you can see it was a very hard time in his life that he was going through. And his answer, having been a farmer, when he looked at everything he had seen in life, this is what he took away. He said, "Steven, when you take a little bitty seed," and he's held his hand just like this. You know, it's kind of an odd way to do it, but it stuck out in my mind, so I'll do it. "Steven, when you take a little bitty seed, and you plant in the ground, you'll get back a whole bushel, that's where God is. God is in the growth."

That's the title of my message today, "God Is in the Growth." What he recognized throughout his life is that even physical growth, just plants growing outside, is an everyday miracle of God. It's something that man cannot do, right? We can't make anything that grows and lives the way that plants do. Spiritually, this is even more true. Spiritual growth is a miracle from God, and that's what we're going to talk about today. And in fact, given that it's the weekend of Pentecost, I'd like to talk about it in the context of the harvest.

We'll go ahead and take our Bibles and turn to Leviticus 23. Leviticus 23, of course, is where we find the instructions for the Holy Days. And I know we read this quite often, but I'd like to go over it again just to get this connection between the Holy Days and the harvest in our minds. So Leviticus 23:10-11 is where it describes the starting point for counting to Pentecost, the wave sheaf offering. Verse 10, "Speak to the children of Israel, and say to them: ‘When you come into the land which I give you, and reap its harvest, then you shall bring a sheaf of the firstfruits of your harvest to the priest. He shall wave the sheaf before the Lord, to be accepted on your behalf; on the day after the Sabbath, the priest shall wave it.’"

So this occurred on the day after the Sabbath, during the Feast of Unleavened Bread each year. And that's the day that we still count to Pentecost from, so that was seven weeks ago from tomorrow, I guess if you look at it that way.

Skipping down to verse 15, "You shall account for yourselves from the day after the Sabbath, from the day that you brought the sheaf of the wave offering: seven Sabbaths shall be completed. Count fifty days to the day after the seventh Sabbath;” today is that seventh Sabbath, "then you shall offer a new grain offering to the Lord." In verse 17, "You shall bring from your dwellings two loaves of two-tenths of an ephah. And they shall be of fine flour; they shall be baked with leaven. They are the firstfruits to the Lord." So again, we get these firstfruits. So we have firstfruits way back 50 days ago or 49 days ago, rather, at the wave sheaf. And we have more firstfruits now.

What exactly are firstfruits? They are just the first part of the crop that becomes ripe in the field, right? A few plants become ripe before the others. So how is it you have firstfruits month and a half ago and you have more firstfruits now? Well, the wave sheaf occurred at the beginning of Israel's harvest season, right when spring started. It's when the barley crop came in. And so, those firstfruits of the wave sheaf were a sheaf of barley that was cut, it was first becoming ripe. And, you know, you had several other crops, actually, during that whole springtime, and so, you get to the wheat crop.

The wheat crop is the next big grain, it's the next big crop. The firstfruits of the wheat crop in Israel come due right about now. And that's the firstfruits being referred to here in verse 17 in connection with the day of Pentecost. They were brought year by year, and that's how you get firstfruits at one point, and then firstfruits again a month and a half later about.

Now, we're going to look at the physical harvest today and how it teaches God's plan. Well, we know that it teaches God's plan for spiritual harvest. And we're going to look at the spiritual growth that has to take place in order to reap a spiritual harvest. And it's implicit in there, right? To have a harvest, you have to have growth. So, if we're going to have a spiritual harvest, we have to have spiritual growth. And looking at the harvest, we're going to talk about the creation account, the law, the major and minor prophets, the wisdom books, the parables of Jesus Christ, the epistles of Peter and Paul, and the book of Revelation. So hang on to your hats.

Now, the reason that the harvest is found in so many places throughout the Bible is because it's one of the most powerful and extensive analogies that God has used to teach His way. So let's consider today this idea of spiritual growth in the context of the harvest and see what rich things these analogies can teach us as members of the body of Christ as we endeavor to grow spiritually.

So, I've used this term a few times already, spiritual growth. What exactly is spiritual growth? Before I really get started, I'd like to take a few minutes to address that because it's a phrase that's actually not found in the Bible, believe it or not. Spiritual growth is not a phrase you can find in any scripture of the Bible. And, you know, I was reviewing several of the scriptures involving growth and trying to come up with the best definition that I could to share with you to get the ball rolling on this, and this is what I came up with. I won't turn there because it's a short scripture, but 2 Peter 3:18. 2 Peter 3:18 is a familiar verse that says, "Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. So we'll take just a minute to unpack that and think about what that means and what spiritual growth is. And at the end of this little analysis, I'll give you a working definition of spiritual growth.

So, let's talk first about growing in knowledge. Growing in knowledge of what? Well, Peter said, "The knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” So how do we do that? Knowledge… how does knowledge work, if you think about it? If you learn something, you gain knowledge, you've gained facts, okay? You've gained information, and that information constitutes awareness. So if we look at the life and teaching of Jesus Christ, okay? So I've got four points on awareness if you want to label them.

The life and teaching of Jesus Christ makes us aware of a couple of things. It makes us aware of sin, right? And that should lead us to repentance. Awareness of sin should lead us to repentance. Secondly, awareness of righteousness, the righteousness of Jesus Christ in His life and teaching should lead us to good works.

So we've gotten awareness of sin through repentance, awareness of righteousness, good works from looking at the life and teaching of Jesus Christ. Well, if we look at the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ, we become aware of His sacrifice, the forgiveness that we have through that, and that brings us humility. It brings us humility. It's where it should lead us to. Awareness of salvation and eternal life come through Christ's resurrection, and that should give us faith. That's where that should lead us.

So I said all these things we become aware of and where it should lead us, but knowledge only takes us so far. Knowledge doesn't quite take us there, does it? Knowledge put into practice is understanding or wisdom, if you like, and understanding leads us to grace.

Now, we're told to grow in knowledge and to grow in grace. So what does it mean to grow in grace? Let's talk about growing in the grace of Jesus Christ. It means to transform our character to become like Jesus Christ. So change in attitude, a changed perspective. And so it is that grace along with works… sorry, grace working along with knowledge, sorry, grace and works. We talk about that plenty, don't we? Grace working along with knowledge brings those outcomes. That's what brings repentance, it's what brings good works, humility, and faith. It's putting these things into practice, having that whole change of being, right? Ultimately, putting on the nature of God through the Spirit of God.

So this is what we mean, then, by spiritual growth, and this is what I boiled it down to. This is just my own reflection. I've put it this way, spiritual growth is the gradual change in our behavior, perspective, character, and faith to reflect the Spirit of God who dwells in us. The change in behavior, perspective, character, and faith to reflect the Spirit of God that dwells in us. And that's as opposed to the carnal nature. It's becoming a new man, a new creation, being different. If you really want to get into all of this, the best place, in my opinion, you go to is Romans 8:1-17. I won't go there now because I've got a lot of other places to go, but Romans 8:1-17, if you want to get that in your head about the transformation that the Spirit of God automate in your perspective and your behavior.

All right, so I've got five points today about spiritual growth and the harvest. And we'll start with one that might seem pretty obvious. In fact, many of these might seem obvious. But if we dwell on them and think about them, maybe they can impact us in a different way.

So my first point on spiritual growth is that we depend on God for the miracle of spiritual growth. We depend on God for the miracle of spiritual growth. And the physical harvest teaches this to the entire world year after year, and it has done so since ancient times. In fact, if we look back in ancient times, especially in Israel, which we have record of through the Bible, this was the pivotal economic event of the year, right? The harvest. It was the primary source of the nation's wealth. A good harvest meant a good year for everybody, good year for everybody.

In Israel, in particular, every family had a plot of land. It was part of the structure of their nation. So, everyone benefited from the harvest. And you know what? Even if you were someone who wasn't a farm worker or a landowner, even if you were a blacksmith on the corner, you still got paid when everybody else got paid from the harvest. It was still the boom time of the year. Everybody benefited. The rising tide lifts all boats, as they say.

Now, God uses the natural human dependence on the harvest year by year to teach us. And His commandments are intimately tied in. We already looked at actually with the Feast of Pentecost and how the festivals are structured, but the harvest is tied to very closely God's commands. In fact, they talk about bringing offerings, offerings from the harvest. So God says, I give you this big abundant harvest, and you need to give me back something as a result.

Now, the human tendency might be, "Oh, no, I need every bit of that. I got to store all this up, and I can't give God back anything because, you know, I might need that later." Well, let's go to Malachi 3. We'll look at verses 10 through 12, and we'll see just how God uses His commandments with the natural human dependence on the harvest to teach lessons.

So Malachi 3:10 God says, “'Bring all the tithes into the storehouse, that there may be food in My house. And try Me now on this,' says the Lord of hosts, 'if I will not open for you the windows of heaven and pour out for you such a blessing that there will not be room enough to receive it.'" God says, "Trust Me. Give up some of these physical things which I've given you, by the way, and I will bless you even more. I will provide year after year." God says in verse 11, “'I'll rebuke the devourer for your sakes, so that he will not destroy the fruit of your ground, nor shall the vine fail to bear fruit for you in the field,’ says the Lord of hosts; ‘and all nations will call you blessed, for you will be a delightful land,’ says the Lord.” So those tithes and offerings that we make, those are an act of faith and, in fact, one that God repays even above and beyond what we give Him.

Now, today, we're far removed in a practical sense from man's dependence on the harvest, all right? There's always food in Walmart or Kroger or wherever you like to shop. Aldi maybe. But it's still true. The life on this planet can't be sustained without a good harvest every year. It just doesn't work. In fact, some parts of the world still struggle from famine.

In the end times, we know that God will use famine as a tool to remind people, "You depend on Me and My blessing," God's blessing on the harvest. At that time, God will withdraw His blessing in response to man's continual disobedience because we take so much for granted and don't get the picture that we do depend on God. The famine, in those times, will remind everyone that what we have comes from God.

If we think about the examples of famine in the ancient world, you see the impact that that had on every other time in history up until modern times that's maybe a little lost on us. It was a serious and common threat to life in the ancient world. So that dependence on God for the harvest, yeah, that was a really real vivid thing. That was something they struggled with every year, "Are we going to get a harvest this year?" You know, their food storage methods weren't as good as ours. Their distribution systems weren't as good as ours. They didn't have the infrastructure to deal with some of those things the way that we do today. And so we see Abraham had to go to Egypt because of a famine as Genesis 12:10. Isaac had to go down to Egypt because of a famine, Genesis 26:1.

It was famine that allowed Joseph to rise to power in Egypt, Genesis 41. And it was famine that brought his family to live there, where they'd eventually be enslaved, the family of Israel in Genesis 47.

So, all throughout the lives of the patriarchs, we see this lesson played out that mankind depends on the harvests. And of course, in each of those cases, God provided for those men He was working with because of their faith. You know, by faith, God took Abraham into the land. By faith, He took him to Egypt and brought him back, and took him everywhere that he went by faith.

Turn with me, please, to John 15, John 15, where we'll see a little bit of the spiritual counterpart here to depending on God for growth. John 15. We'll look at verses 1 through 8. Jesus said, "I am the true vine, and My Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away; and every branch that bears fruit He prunes, that it may bear more fruit." Verse 4, "Abide in Me and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in Me. I am the vine, you are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, bears much fruit; for without Me you can do nothing."

The source of growth in the spiritual sense is clear. It's absolutely clear. It's through God, through Jesus Christ our Savior. And it's not something that's automatic, either. If we notice here, Christ said, "Without Me, you can do nothing." Well, if “without Me you can do nothing that means that, with Me, you got to be doing something if you think about it. With Me, you got to be doing something.”

Let's keep reading through verse 8. "If anyone does not abide in Me, he is cast out as a branch and is withered; and they gather them and throw them into the fire, and they are burned. If you abide in Me, and my words abide in you, you'll also ask what you desire, and it will be done for you. And by this My Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; so you will be My disciples."

We have to abide in Jesus Christ to let His words abide in us if we want to have this miracle of spiritual growth in our lives. It's something that doesn't come without God's miracle in our lives. And speaking of Christ's words abiding in us, God's words translate into action. God's words translate into action. This brings me to my second point.

The second point is that God expects growth. God expects growth, and we see this here in verse 2, "Every branch in Me that does not bear fruit He takes away." Why? Because it wasn't serving its purpose, it wasn't bearing fruit. So it's taken away. God expects growth. And physically, the exact same thing is true. When you plant a crop, you do so in expectation that you're going to eat later, right? Otherwise, why would you go through all this work if it was a hit or miss kind of thing? It's considered as a disaster actually if what you plant fails to grow. That's what this whole famine thing was about. God certainly works with mankind in expectation of a result, in expectation of growth.

Let's go to Isaiah 55. Isaiah 55:10-11. So when I said that God's words translate into action, this is what I actually had in mind. Isaiah 55:10… And just notice how the harvest analogy works even into this prophecy here and the way Isaiah puts it. Isaiah 55:10, "For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven, and do not return there, but water the earth, and make it bring forth and bud, that it may give seed to the sower and bread to the eater, so shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; it shall not return to Me void, it shall accomplish what I please, and it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it." God expects growth.

Go over to Isaiah 61:10-11. Isaiah 61, it's kind of a similar point there. In 61 10 says, "I will greatly rejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He has clothed me with the garments of salvation,” skipping down to verse 11, "For as the earth brings forth its bud, as the garden causes the things that are sown in it to spring forth, so the Lord God will cause righteousness and praise to spring forth before all the nations." God expects growth, and He is powerful and capable to bring it about. What an amazing God.

This expectation of growth that God has for those of us that He has called is expressed in the parables of Jesus Christ. We'll turn to Luke 13. Luke 13. It couldn't be made more clear than in the parables, as a matter of fact. Luke 13:6-9, a very similar note here to the branch of the vine that doesn't bear fruit. Luke 13:6. "He spoke also this parable: ‘A certain man had a fig tree planted in his vineyard, he came seeking fruit on it and he found none. He said to the keeper of his vineyard, “Look, for three years I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree and find none. Cut it down; why does it use up the ground?”’” Let's plant something here that will grow, that will serve its purpose because that's what the master expects. Verse 8, "But he answered and said to him, 'Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and fertilize it. And if it bears fruit, well. But if not, after that, go ahead, cut it down.’”

Fruit is the whole purpose of a tree just like the whole reason you plant a crop is to harvest a crop. You expect something out of the work that you put into it, and God is no different. And even if at the beginning this sounds a little harsh, “dig up this tree, why should it use up the ground?” It's actually an example of God's patience. God patiently gives us the opportunity to step up and yield spiritual fruit.

Let's go over to Matthew 25, another parable. Matthew 25:14, the parable of the talents. Matthew 25:14 is a familiar parable, "The kingdom of heaven is like a man traveling into a far country, who called his own servants and delivered his goods to them. To one he gave five talents, to another two, to another one, to each according to his ability; and immediately he went on a journey." And we know the parable here. They go out and they trade. They each have their increase except for the one who was given the least, the one who was given one talent. And we'll read about him in verse 24. Verse 24. The master's returned, he's calling them to account. “He who had received the one talent came and said, ‘Lord, I knew you to be a hard man, reaping where you have not sown, and gathering where you have not scattered seed.’" Again, those harvest analogies we sometimes take for granted. "I was afraid, and I went and hid your talent in the ground. Look, there you have what is yours." And was the master pleased? I think we all know that he wasn't.

“His Lord answered and said to him, ‘You wicked and lazy servant, you knew that I reap where I have not sown, and gather where I've not scattered seed. So you ought to have deposited my money with the bankers, and at my coming I would have received back my own with interest.’" At least there would have been some growth. Growth is expected. So we know the outcome of that servant also.

Verse 28, "Therefore take the talent from him, and give it to him who has the ten talents. For to everyone who has, more will be given, and he will have abundance; but from him who does not have, even what he has will be taken. And cast the unprofitable servant into the outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." So again, there is this tendency to focus on that negative outcome there because it's a little terrifying, it's a little terrifying. But to be honest with this servant, it would not have been difficult for him to go and deposit this talent with the bankers, would it? Shouldn't he have returned some increase even if it was just a little bit if he had shown some effort?

The reality is that God expects growth, but those who are diligent and do make the effort will have more given to them. It's a spiritual law in the same way as a physical law. When we plant something physically, we expect it to grow. So if we plant spiritual things, we ought to expect to grow as well. God certainly expects it out of us.

And that brings us to the third point on spiritual growth today, that each individual plant must grow to make a harvest. Each individual plant must grow to make a harvest. And this is where it gets personal. Each of us is like one of these servants who's given some measure of talents, some measure of wealth, spiritual wealth from God. Each of us is a fig tree. Each of us is a branch on the vine that God expects to grow and bear fruit. It's something that can be personalized. So, our mindset should be the same as God's that we should expect ourselves to grow spiritually. We should expect it if we make a sincere, humble effort before God to draw near to Him.

So let's roll this back and unpack it a little bit. So I talked about depending on God in that first point, depending on God. Another way of thinking about dependence on God is having faith in God. Wouldn't you say? Having faith in God. We do what God says because we trust what God says. So when we give God an offering tomorrow on Pentecost, we trust that He'll pour out His blessing on us so much that we can't even receive it. We do what God says because we trust what He promises.

So what does faith have to do with a harvest? Now, if we look at even in the physical sense, it has a lot to do with it, a lot, because you have to put in the work to prepare a field, all right? So think about if you're an Israelite, and I just got my inheritance. Oh, boy, what am I going to do? Well, I'm going to work the land, of course, and I look out and what do I see in front of me? I see this unruly, uncapped mess of a field, right? Can you see the analogy spiritually? When we first come to God, you know, maybe our lives look like an unruly overgrown mess. Maybe there are rocks in the soil of our lives, spiritually. Maybe there are trees and brush that need to be cleared. It takes a certain amount of expectation, in fact, a strong amount of expectation to look out at a field like that and decide, "You know what? This is the year I'm going to clear this field. I'm going to go pick those rocks up out of the ground one by one. I'm going to clear those trees one by one. I'm going to clear the brush, and then I'm going to plow it. I'm going to plant. I'm going to tend it. As the things grow, water it."

It's a long, hard process. In fact, it takes a lot of faith as well as patience because all you see at the start is an empty field or worse, right? If it's the first time. We have to have a vision of what can be and what will be if the right work is put in with faith.

Jesus said that the branches will be pruned, right? We abide in the vine as branches and we will be pruned just like the harvest starts over every year. So what happens? We grow a little bit and we're cut back. We grow a little bit and we're cut back. We have ups and downs, but by faith, just like you look at an empty field every year and you decide, "You know what? I'm going to go plant it, and I'm going to get more. I'm going to get the food for the next year. I expect that.” We can do the same thing spiritually. And we should learn greater faith each time. Just like every time you play at that field, you know what's possible. In fact, that reminds me another conversation with my granddad just about his farming because I talked to him about it all the time. He went on and on about all the tricks you try to do as a farmer trying to optimize your yield for that year. You know, how many bushels per acre can you get? And compete with other farmers and, you know, you learn that you can do more as you go, you learn faith.

So I've talked a lot about faith. And we have a definition of faith in the Bible that we'd like to talk about. It's a memory verse. If it's not a memory verse, it should be. Hebrews 11:1. I won't turn there. Hebrews 11:1 says, "Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen." Evidence of things not seen. This not only relates to our trust and belief that God will accomplish His grand plan for humanity, right? Yes, God is going to bring about a harvest, but it's also personal faith in what God is doing in our lives as the individual plants that together make up that harvest. To bring the overall plan to fruition, every plant must grow. So it is that faith over time accomplishes a certain work in our lives.

Turn with me to James 1. James 1, it talks a little bit about that work. James 1:2-4. So we talked about being pruned, we talked about seeing an empty field every year, about Passover time in our spiritual life. James 1:2, "My brethren, count it all joy when you fall into various trials, knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience." Now, those are two things already mentioned we have to have for a harvest, faith, and patience, "Knowing that the testing of your faith produces patience. And let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing." What does the harvest do? It provides something that you lack, namely, food, faith, and patience through the trials that we face in our spiritual lives.

Faith is a continual labor, the exercise year by year of whether we will follow God's ways and trust Him or not. And this labor of faith, this planting in our own spiritual field, brings about those expected results with the blessing of God. And that's critical, with the blessing of God. And in fact, it's related to our first point, but I'll spell it out here. You're on the fourth point.

The fourth point is that spiritual growth requires input from both God and man. Spiritual growth requires input from both God and man. We're going to go to Genesis 2 for this one. When I started thinking about this, it occurred to me that God's very first lesson to mankind was about growth, and we'll see what I mean here. Genesis 2:4, "This is the history of the heavens and the earth when they were created, in the day that the Lord God made the earth and the heavens, before any plant of the field was on the earth and before any herb of the field had grown. For the Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground."

So why was it that nothing had grown? Two reasons given, two reasons. The Lord God had not caused it to rain on the earth, and there was no man to till the ground. There's lacking input from both God and man, and therefore, there was no growth. There couldn't be.

Let's keep reading in verse 8, "The Lord God planted a garden eastward of Eden,” so, here we see God planting a garden, "and there, He put the man whom He had formed. And out of the ground, the Lord God made every tree to grow that is pleasant to the sight and good for food. The tree of life was also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil."

Skip down to verse 15, "Then the Lord God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend it and keep it." So, we see here that God is able to make things grow without man's input. In fact, He planted a whole garden and prepared it for the man. But He wanted the man involved in that growth. God could have just went on sustaining this garden Himself, couldn't He? I mean, couldn't God tend it better than Adam and Eve could have, to be honest? Yes, of course, He could. But just like a loving father who wants to involve his child in a project, He told Adam and Eve to attend this garden. And so this was their first lesson.

In fact, if we look at the way that God has designed the natural order, the way that plants grow, the way that gardens grow, the way that your fields of your crops grow, the best results come from God and man working together. The best results come from God and man working together. Plants will grow regardless of what we do physically, it's still God's miracle. But that undirected growth has only limited utility to sustain human life, right?

If all the farmers today just stopped planting their crops and trying to work that land, trying to get as many bushels per acre as they could year after year, what would happen? Would we have enough to eat if we just let it go that way for years on end? No, we'd run out. There would be enormous famines. Population would dwindle, it would be horrible. But when man takes an active role in tending a garden, does things the right way, then the blessing of God along with man's labor allows life to flourish in a way that can sustain seven billion people on the earth today, and far more beyond that, that will be sustained in the future.

Now, when it comes to our spiritual growth, just as God wanted man included in the physical process of harvest even more so the spiritual, even more so. In fact, in this analogy, we're not only the plant, we're also the farmer. We're both the farmer and the plant when it comes to spiritual growth. And if we look at this from a couple of different angles, first of all, we know that we can put in our own efforts apart from God, right? If we try to do things our way without God's blessing, where is it going to go? Not too far, not too far. Without God, this abundance, the spiritual growth cannot be produced by our work alone.

On the other hand, God is not willing to do all the work for us. We can't bury the talent. We have to abide in the vine. We have to put in the work. It has to be an active role on God's part. But if we do our part, God is faithful to supply what only He can supply for optimal growth resulting in that miracle of spiritual growth so that we can and do bear spiritual fruit, bear much fruit even as Christ said.

And that brings us to the fifth point. What is all this about? Growth produces value. Growth produces value. Reaping and maturing an abundant spiritual harvest is the climax of God's plan. It's the creation of the most valuable thing in God's eyes.

Come with me to Revelation 14:12-16, Revelation 14. And we’ll read about that climax of God's plan. Revelation 14:12, "Here's the patience of the saints; here are those who keep the commandments of God and the faith of Jesus.” Those who are out there doing something by faith, keeping the commands of God and the faith of Jesus. "Then I heard a voice from heaven saying to me, ‘Write: “Blessed are the dead who die in the Lord from now on.”’ ‘Yes,' says the Spirit, 'that they may rest from their labors, and their works follow them.' Then I looked, and a white cloud, and on the cloud sat One like the Son of Man, having on His head a golden crown, and in His hand a sharp sickle. And another angel came out of the temple, crying with a loud voice to Him who sat on the cloud, 'Thrust in Your sickle and reap, for the time has come for You to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe.’" So He who sat on the cloud thrust in His sickle on the earth and the earth was reaped."

The reason that the spiritual harvest is so important is the same reason that the physical harvest is so important. All of that growth produces something of value. Physically, it's food. Spiritually is another child of God, a new creation born of the Spirit of God. There's nothing more valuable and dear to God than bringing children into His family, nothing.

So where are we right now? We are in the midst of the growth leading up to God's harvest, leading up to that climax. That's where we are. We're a part of that. How exciting is that? We are the plants. We are maturing. We're bearing fruit. We're putting in the effort by faith that God will also do His work.

Given how important this is to God and the expectation of growth that He has that requirement, we have to make sure that we're doing our part. So I want to read to you from the Proverbs. You can turn there if you like, but I'm not going to turn there. I've printed it out, so I can just read it. Proverbs 24:30-34. And think about this with the spiritual analogies of the spiritual harvest and spiritual growth in mind. Proverbs 24:30, "I went by the field of the lazy man, and by the vineyard of the man devoid of understanding; and there it was, all overgrown with thorns; its surface was covered with nettles; its stone wall was broken down. When I saw it, I considered it well; I looked on it and received instruction: a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest; so shall your poverty come like a prowler, and your need like an armed man."

What was the problem here? It wasn't that this person wasn't good enough. This was the field of a lazy man, one devoid of understanding, one who wasn't willing to put in the work because that's what God cares about, is a willing and contrite heart.

Proverbs 20:4. It's a little bit shorter. Proverbs 20:4, "The lazy man will not plow because of winter; he will beg during harvest and have nothing." And how much does that sound like the man who had one talent? The one who wasn't willing to put in the effort, willing to put in the work. And he gets to that point where he's cast out in the outer darkness, weeping and gnashing of teeth, who beg during the harvest and have nothing.

Again, it's not because anyone's not good enough. We're all not good enough. It's a matter of whether we are willing to trust in God because a harvest is a long process. It's a hard process, but God is in the growth. It takes faith and patience because we look out and we see our empty field or this overgrown field. We have to have the vision close to our hearts of what it can be, of what we can be through faith in God, through the miracle of spiritual growth that He puts in our lives when we obey Him. It takes working and laboring in righteousness, complete commitment and hope of that vision, which is the glorious Kingdom of God, everything that we can hope for.

It takes depending on God to provide the increase He has promised and doing what only He is able to do to bring forth the fruit of the word and plant it in us and the fruit of the righteousness that we sow as we follow God's Spirit working in us.

As a final scripture, I'd like to read to you from 2 Corinthians 9. 2 Corinthians 9:8. I'd like to leave you with this thought as Paul wrote it again with these harvest analogies in mind. Maybe this will mean just a little bit more after this message than it would have before. 2 Corinthians 9:8, "God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work." In verse 10, "Now may He who supplies seed to the sower, and bread for food, supply and multiply the seed that you have sown and increase the fruits of your righteousness,” if we work by faith, God will give us the growth.