REAPING.
THE HARVEST TIME OF LIFE.
Suggestion:—The object used is a small sheaf of grain. For this might be substituted fruitage of any kind—apples, peaches, pears, grapes, etc., and after reading the sermon, the parent could apply in the manner suited to the objects used.
MY DEAR LITTLE HARVESTERS: Last Sunday I talked to you of spring-time—the spring-time of the year, and the spring-time of life. To-day I have brought a small sheaf of grain to tell us of the harvest-time. The spring-time is very pleasant, the air is fragrant, the birds are singing, and all nature seems to be rejoicing in its freshness and beauty. The world looks just as new and beautiful as it did thousands and thousands of years ago. Each spring it puts on youth anew.
But when the summer-time comes, when it gets along to the harvest time, along in July and August, then the weather is very warm. The color of the fields has then greatly changed, the blossoms have disappeared from the trees, and we find that everywhere the fruit is beginning to appear. The harvest fields are ripe and are waiting for the husbandmen.
There is just about that same difference in life. Youth is the spring-time. It is full of hope, and full of bright prospects. But, as we grow older, and the cares and responsibilities of life multiply, then we begin to bear the toil and labor which comes with the later years. Then we are like the farmer who enters into the harvest field where hard work has to be done under a very hot and scorching sun.
A man, called a naturalist, who has devoted a large amount of time to the study of plants, tells us that there are about one hundred thousand different kinds of plants. Each kind of plant bears its own seed, and when that particular seed is sown, it always bears its own kind of fruit. Wheat never yields barley, nor do oats ever yield buckwheat. When you plant potatoes, you expect to gather potatoes and not turnips. An apple tree has never grown from an acorn, or a peach tree from a chestnut. Each seed, always and everywhere, bears its own kind. It is on this account that the Bible says, "Be not deceived; God is not mocked: for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also reap." (Gal. vi: 7.)