We Will Reap What We Sow

Well, good morning. I am going to preach today a sermon, not in the series on the Ten Commandments, but I'm going to preach a New Year's Eve sermon, a sermon for the New Years. And the reason I'm going to do that is because it's New Year's Eve and we're all thinking about the New Year. I don't know if you guys are, how many of you are the type to make New Year's resolutions, but often people do. at this time of the year. What changes between December 31st and January 1st? Nothing really. The calendar flips over. But we sort of feel that. We feel this need for a change. We reflect. It's a time that we sort of reflect on the last year. There's sadness because we have all these family gatherings and we gather with friends.

which, by the way, if you're not tonight, you can come to my house and gather with me and my family at 7. But it's a time of holidays, right, where we do gather with friends and spend time together. But there are often notable absences from people who are sick or have passed away. And so it's usually a hopeful time, though, right? We're looking forward to what the new year may bring. And so I want us to... Think about that today. What will the new year be like? Will it be better than the last year? And what will change? Now, our passage today is in Galatians chapter 6. And what we read, what the Apostle Paul is teaching us in this passage is that we're all farmers and that we're sowing seeds, that we're planting.

I want you to consider this morning, as we approach the new year, what kind of seed you are sowing. And here's the thing. There are two different types. There are two worldviews. There are those who sow with their eye to the world, and there are those who sow with their eye to eternity. And the question is, which one are you? Now, I imagine most of you being here on a Sunday morning in church are going to say, That, well, of course, I want to sow to the spirit. I want to sow with my eye to eternity. That's great. That's great. The question we have to ask then is what are we actually sowing? Because what we sow will reap. Now, if you will please stand, let's read together God's word, Galatians 6, verses 6 through 10. The one who is taught the word.

The one who is taught the word is to share all good things with the one who teaches him. Do not be deceived. God is not mocked. For whatever a man sows, this he will also reap. For the one who sows to his flesh will from the flesh reap corruption. But the one who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. Let us not lose heart in doing good, for in due time we will reap if we do not grow weary. So then, while we have opportunity, let us do good to all people, and especially to those who are of the household of faith. This is the word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. You may be seated. So, have you ever considered yourself a farmer? To my knowledge, None of us here are farmers. Some of us are gardeners, right? We like to plant seeds, see things grow. What we learn in this verse is that we all are, in some sense, farmers. We are all planting seeds, which will one day produce some sort of crop. And the analogy of planting is one that we see throughout Scripture. It's frequent, and in this instance,

The song that Paul is speaking about is a person's actions. The idea is that our actions are going to produce some result that is in line with them. This means that everything we do is moving towards a certain result, a certain end. I don't know if any of you have watched the movie Secondhand Lions, but it's these two stodgy old men who fight off salesmen because they have lots of money. And then their grandson comes, and he convinces them, well, rather than scaring them off, you should see what they have. So they say, okay. So they have a seed salesman come, and he sells them all these seeds. And they will work really hard, and they prep the ground, and they're talking about how they can't wait to try their tomatoes and their carrots and their potatoes. And they plant all these seeds, and there's these beautiful rows, and there are stakes at the end with the little sign on, so they know which row has what vegetable.

They're in there weeding, and all of a sudden he's like, this corn looks good. And he looks over and he realizes, wait, that row looks the same as this row. And all of a sudden they realize they were swindled by the salesman, and he'd sold them all types of plants on the package, but what they planted was corn seed. And so the whole garden is corn. And, you know, it doesn't matter what you think you're planting if you plant the wrong thing. What's going to grow is what you planted, right? They thought they were planting beans and corn and tomatoes and potatoes and all that stuff, but what they got was corn because the only seed they planted was corn seed. What you desire, hope, what your goal is, doesn't matter if you plant the wrong seed. You cannot plant corn seeds and get beans. This is a principle of life. It's a law of sowing, that what you plant, you reap. So Paul tells us that there are two types of seeds that we can be planting. We can plant seeds to the flesh or to the spirit. And if we begin to consider what Paul says here, it makes us a little uncomfortable because Paul doesn't give us a whole bunch of options. There's not like a whole bunch of gray in what Paul's saying. We like to live in the gray spaces. But what Paul gives us

is a very dichotomous choice, right? Two things that are opposed to each other, sowing to the flesh or sowing to the spirit. And thus we evaluate all of the seeds that we plant, the actions that we do, the things that we do. Are we sowing to the flesh or are we sowing to the spirit? One of the most interesting biographies I've read is a book by a man named Heiko Obermann. It's Luther. It's about Luther, and the subtitle is Man Between God and the Devil. And Luther's greatness came from the fact that he believed that you had two choices. He was living between God and the devil, that you're either going to serve one or the other. And so he did his best to serve God, and that's his perception of the world.

That dichotomy, right? And that's what Paul is teaching us here. It's flesh versus spirit. We're sowing to one or the other. And so the question isn't what you want to reap, but what are you sowing? And are you living in a way that is going to produce the things that you say you want? Will it produce an eternal reward or will it breed corruption? So first, I want us to take a quick look at the warning. The Lord says, do not be... God is not mocked. Now, why would we be deceived? What is he getting at? Because the next thing he says is, right, do not be deceived. God is not mocked. Whatever man sows, that he will reap. Well, you say, what is the deception that's going on here? Well, the deception is the fact that we live in a corrupted world, a world that's full of injustice. We see people who are wicked.

And they prosper. And others who are godly, and they have hard and terrible trials. We know stories of people, or maybe in our own lives, who have been honest, and their honesty caused them to lose their job and to be punished. And we think, is it really worth it? Isn't this at the heart of much of the book of Job, where Job's friends are saying, well, God punishes wicked. And so the fact that all this is happening to you is because Job, you're a wicked sinner. And Job refuses to admit the fact that he's a sinner because he says, I'm righteous and I've served God and I've done all, like I've served God, I've done what he said. So why is this happening to me? And so we can look at what happened to Job and we say, what good is righteousness? Why should I follow God when I can look at so many people who seem to be serving God and doing the right things and yet...

Hard things happen. They go through trials and they go through great hardships. They get sick. They die of cancer, right? There's all these hard things. And so the deception is we think that sowing seeds to the spirit isn't worth it because there doesn't seem to be a distinction often between the wicked and the righteous. And in fact, often we think that the wicked are prospering while the righteous are not prospering. It's often the way we perceive it. That's what the wicked do, right? The wicked think that this is the life that they have and they're going to get their good things right now. That is to mock God because God is just. And what you reap, what you sow, you will reap. And the thing with sowing is you don't, you know, if you dig a hole and you put your seed in and you cover it up and you wait, you stand there waiting, it's not going to grow that fast, right?

often the consequences of actions are not immediately following what you've done. And so the wicked, the people who are deceived, say that God will not act, that there will be no consequences for their sin, and so they're just going to do it. And it's a denial of God's justice. It's mocking God, thinking that he is slow and that he will not protect his people. And the warning is, God will not be mocked. He is patient. He allows time for repentance. But there will come a day when he will return and he will judge. And so, do not be deceived by the seeming prosperity of wicked men. God will deal with them. They will reap the consequences. And often, we forget about all the examples where God deals with them in this life.

And we just think, oh, they're prosperous and happy and doing their thing. And often it's because we have a skewed image. Men who gratify their flesh and take advantage of others despise justice and they're mocking God. They deny his justice and they think that God will not intervene. They think that they can sow the wind without reaping the whirlwind. Their judgments will come upon them suddenly. Don't think that you can sow to your flesh without consequences coming to you. God sees everything. And though someone may appear to not have reaped in this world, they will be reaping for eternity the seeds that they have sown. Hypocrisy in religion is one of the greatest follies, as well as wickedness, since the God we have to do with can easily see through all of our disguises. And he will certainly deal with us hereafter, not according to our professions, not according to what you say, but according to what you've done. And notice the law of sowing. The scripture says, if you sow the wind, you'll reap the whirlwind, the tornado. This is the other law of sowing, is that what you sow, you will reap in greater bounty. If you sow wickedness, you will sow a greater destruction to your soul. If you sow good things, it will be a greater reward than you can imagine.

And so as we sow, there's these two components that we have to keep in mind, right? One is the earthly and one is the eternal. The earthly and the eternal. What we have to understand is that God has designed the world so that the few short years that we live on this earth, the few short years that we live here will determine what eternity looks like for us. There's one major division, right? The major division is whether you're a Christian or not. That is the defining thing that will determine what your eternity looks like. If you're not a Christian, then all you do is sow to the flesh. And every good thing you have will come in this life. But in the life to come, you will reap the whirlwind. It will be torment and destruction, perdition, if you're a Christian.

Your inheritance is God. You know, there's this idea sometimes we say, well, if you're saved, what do you get? And it's like, well, we have eternal life. And that's great. But you know what's even greater than eternal life? The fact that you get to be in God's presence. That he is your father. The gospel is God. The inheritance is God himself. As being one with him. Being in his presence. That's the major divide. But within that, there are levels of perdition and there are levels of reward in heaven. And so not only do we have this earthly view and this heavenly view and whether you're a Christian or not, as a major divide in the rewards that you will receive or what you reap, but within that, how you live will affect what crown you receive.

They were told that some will be saved as though through fire. Everything they do on earth is burned up, but some it will be gold and rubies and lasting works. We'll get more into that in a little bit. But what I want us to see is that Paul's teaching here goes deeper than simply unsaved and saved. Even in heaven, we'll not all be treated the same. We'll all be happy and we'll all have joy and there won't be envy. And yet, Scripture is clear that there will be greater and lesser rewards. But it's so easy for us to forget this, isn't it? We get so caught up in our daily grind, we can be so short-sighted. You know, if you talk to investors, one of the things that they start telling you about is compound interest, right? It's that, like, you've got to save early, you've got to put it in an account that's going to get compound interest. And then they'll show you that over time how...

your money just grows and grows and grows due to this thing called compound interest. But if you think compound interest is powerful, think about the promises that God gives us of heaven and what following God here on earth will result in in heaven. Investing your life in doing good here and serving God here and loving God here will reap rewards beyond our imagining in heaven. Remember the Sermon on the Mount, Jesus says that where our treasure is, there our heart will be also. And that if we work for treasure that is earthly, it's always in constant danger. It's in danger from wars and markets. It's in danger of robbery. It's in danger of forgetfulness. It's in danger of just...

general destruction, rot, decay, it's going away. When you die, which we know, right? They talk about the ultimate statistic, 10 out of 10 people die. Even when we're really young and we don't think it's near, we will die. And you ain't taking any of that with you. And so the Lord is saying, store up treasure that's heavenly. Store up so seed that is imperishable. and that can not be taken from you. Well, so we have to ask, what is sowing to the flesh? What is sowing to the flesh? Remember that we have two options. There are two fields to plant in, the flesh and the spirit. Sowing to our flesh means that we are cultivating and developing our sinful desires. We sow to the flesh by nurturing and indulging it so that it grows and produces fruit in accordance with our sinful desires. So we need to examine all that we are doing and pursuing and see which field are we working in. Are we thistle farmers? Our sowing to the flesh is when we make provision for our sins, when we sin and neglect to do good. Think about when you sin, when you're tempted.

often there are many steps that we do in order to protect our sinful desire, in order to lead to it, right? So you have a desire to read lustful things on the internet or look at pictures or videos. So you're careful to find a time when you're alone. You're careful to position yourself in such a way that no one can see your computer screen, that no one can know what you're doing. And you take all these careful steps, all the while denying what you're doing, and yet you're sowing seeds of corruption. You're saying, I'm going to do all these things in order to facilitate my sin. We're on New Year's Eve, right? This is a hallmark time for people getting drunk and drinking.

It's fine to have a glass of alcohol, but getting drunk is a sin. And if you're planning to get drunk and you're asking your wife or someone to be a designated driver for you so that you can drink as much as you want, you're sowing to the flesh. You're making provision for your flesh. What do you set before your eyes? If what we have is a constant stream of TV shows, in movies, YouTube shorts, social media. All these things feed us, all these wicked images. They glorify violence. How many of our TV shows just glory in violence? They teach us perverted messages about sex, about sexuality. They train our minds to view specific body types as sexually appealing and what we should be.

focused on, what we should enjoy. They distort our understanding of what it means to be a man, of what it means to be a woman, of what fatherhood looks like. All these things are inputs coming into our minds and our hearts. They're sending us messages. They're teaching. They're sowing thoughts and attitudes which will be borne out in actions. Do you really think you have enough discernment? to cut through all the chaff of the social media that's fed to you. Oh, it's just entertainment. I'm just tired. I just want to sit down and relax and watch this. Well, what I want to tell you is, where do you see a category of just entertainment in this passage? Paul says it's to the flesh or to the spirit. And so you have to evaluate what you're feeding yourself, what you're sowing by those terms.

Is it to the flesh or is it to the spirit? Is this producing in me righteousness and holiness? The same thing can be said about the time we put into watching sports or the time we put into reading about politics. You need to ask yourself, what are you sowing? Ask yourself, what is the fruit of the things that I'm giving my time to? Does it lead to greater godliness, to greater holiness? Does it lead to quarreling? Does it lead to anger? Does it lead to laziness? Does it lead to a lack of unity with my church, with my wife? What good will this do me when I stand before God and I have to give an account of my time to him? Brothers and sisters, we live in such a materialistic age and we're constantly sowing to the flesh, forgetting that we are not merely bodies.

but we have eternal souls. And our future will be impacted by how you live right now. John Stott sums it up like this. Every time we allow our mind to harbor a grudge, isn't it so easy to do that around the holidays and you're with family? And they said this one thing to you a couple years ago, or they did this thing. When we allow our mind to harbor grudges, to nurse grievances, entertain impure fancies, to wallow in our self-pity, we are sowing to our flesh. Every time we linger in bad company, whose insidious influence we know we cannot resist. There are certain people at school, don't go near them. Every time we lie in bed, when we ought to be up praying, Every time we read pornographic literature, every time we take a risk that strains our self-control, we are sowing, sowing, sowing, sowing of the flesh. And it's good for us to remember that when Paul's talking about this sowing and reaping, it comes on the tale of Galatians chapter 5, where Paul says,

The deeds of the flesh are evident, which are immorality, impurity, sensuality, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, outbursts of anger, disputes, dissensions, factions, envying, drunkenness, carousing, and the things like these. This isn't even an exhaustive list. We read through it and we're like, ooh. And he's like, this isn't all the things. It's things like these. There's more. Which I forewarn you, just as I have forewarned you, that those who practice such things are. will not inherit the kingdom of God. And so there's this great warning where he says, look at these things. These are the things of the flesh. And if you're so focused on today and tomorrow and you don't look towards eternity, you aren't worried about your soul, then that's what you're going to be doing. You're going to be living for what pleases you in the moment. Brothers and sisters, God will not be mocked.

He will judge you. That's the negative. That's the warning. If sowing to our flesh means cultivating and developing our sinful desires, then sowing to the Spirit means that we are to cultivate and develop our godly desires and habits. Those are the things we ought not to do. Instead, we ought to be looking towards eternity and to work to sow seeds that are imperishable towards that end. So there's a few things I want us to consider. The first is worship. Worship is one of the most powerful ways that we can sow seeds to the Spirit. We must make being in church a priority of our lives. We should never miss an opportunity to be at church. If the doors are open, we ought to be there. Work, school, working out, being tired are not good excuses for removing ourselves from being taught.

and spending time with other believers. They're just not. Those are things that we're sowing to the flesh. We're so concerned about money that we can't think about the eternity. We have to think about all right now, right? Think about eternity. Think about what you're feeding your soul, your mind. Can I just say, like, we should be on time for Sunday school in church. Like, aside with this. that it shows how much we care. Like it does say something about us, whether we put time into prepping our souls or whether we just, it's last minute hustle and bustle. Why? Because preaching and teaching of God's word will bring forth a great crop. Being with other believers who challenge you and push you to grow in sanctification is of inestimable, inestimable.

value in the production of spiritual fruit in your own life and in the lives of your children. Being in church and part of church helps our children. It's good for them to be seen by other godly men and women and to be corrected by them, to have other men and women teach them the truths of God's word and to speak into their lives. It's such a great joy when you have family worship and your kid speaks up and they say something and you're like, I didn't. Where did you learn? Oh, that was in Sunday school, right? What a joy when they do that. Make being at church one of the ruling priorities of your life. Another way to sow to the Spirit is by personal devotions and family worship. One of the other ruling priorities of your life should be family worship.

It should be a priority. Fathers, you should teach your family and lead them in prayer and in singing and reading of the word. This will be, to use the word again, of inestimable value to you and to them. And on the evenings you're gone, make sure you've given the tools to your wife to be able to do it. It doesn't just not happen because you're not around. Have your wife do it. Encourage her in that work. As a parent, isn't it our greatest desire to see our children walk with the Lord? Isn't that what you want more than anything else? It's terrifying to think one day you would be in heaven looking across the gulf as Abraham did, right? And he's looking. You can see into the gulf. He sees the rich man there. Lazarus sees the rich man and know that that was your child over there. That thought is awful.

So we ought to do everything we can to teach them and to sow spiritual fruit that, Lord willing, the harvest will be their salvation. How can we expect great spiritual fruit in their lives if they are instructed and taught by the TV, social media, movies, books, etc., for hours and hours every day while we neglect to read God's Word with them or pray with them and for them? How do we spend our time? The same is true of us, though. How can we think that we will bear spiritual and eternal fruit in our lives if our lives are just filled with the pursuit of earthly things and not spiritual things? If, you know, your average movie is two and a half hours and your average time spent with God is ten minutes in reading his word and two or four hours on a Sunday. Like, what are you sowing?

You're struggling to defeat sin. It has such a grip on you. Maybe it's because you've sowed to the flesh and not to the spirit. Maybe that's the source of your depression, right? Maybe the source of our unhappiness is the fact that we've given ourselves over to earthly things and not over to eternal things. We were made to worship God. Discipline. Discipline, such as spanking, can have immediate fruit, and it should. But sometimes it's really hard to see the fruit of disciplining our children right away. And we wonder, what is the use? What is the purpose of this? Well, Proverbs teaches us that foolishness, I like to tell my kids this, foolishness is bound up in the heart of a child, but the rod of correction removes it far from him. The rod.

Spanking can be hard to do, and sometimes you wonder if it has any effect. How is the kid going to put the two things together? Real. Like, we've all asked this, right? You went to discipline your kid, and you're like, are they really going to make the connection? Let me tell you, one week, two week trial is not really proving God's word true or false. The harvest doesn't come in an instant. The harvest is through time. The farmer plants, and months later, He starts reaping, right? In disciplining your children, you're sowing to the Spirit so that you and they might reap a better reward. And if it does seem ineffective, don't give up. Come to one of your elders and ask them for help. They may have tips to help make it better or more effective, or it may just mean you need encouragement in the hard work.

Because you're tempted to give up and to grow weary in sowing to the Spirit. On Judgment Day, we will begin the ultimate reaping of what we have sowed. Remember last week, Pastor Dave was making the point that Jesus says, I did not come into the world to judge the world. But that was the first coming. The second coming is specifically, did you hear in Acts, where the angels come and they say, In the same way, he's coming back. And when he does, this time he's coming with the sword. On judgment day, it will be too late to change what you have sowed. The seed has been cast and you will reap what you have planted. In that day, Jesus, the judge, is going to separate the sheep and the goats. And the king will say to those on his right, come you who are blessed in my father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world.

That's a reward. That's a reaping of spiritual fruit. It's been prepared. Why? For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat. I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink. I was a stranger and you invited me in. Naked and you clothed me. I was sick and you visited me. I was in prison and you came to me. Then the righteous will answer him, Lord, when did we see you hungry? When did we feed you? When were you thirsty? And when did we give you something to drink? And when did we see you as a stranger invite you in or naked and clothe you? When did we see you as sick or in prison or come to you? Isn't this so striking? They're like, when did we do all this stuff? You know why? Because all these things that Jesus are saying are just what Christians do. It's not actually, it shouldn't be unique to do these things. It's just the life of a Christian.

It's the work of the Spirit in our lives. The king will answer and say to them, truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these brothers of mine, even to the least of them, you did it to me. Isn't that amazing? Blows your mind. When we show kindness to other people, wicked, sinful people, Jesus will attribute that as having shown kindness and blessing to him. I mean, that's so radical. The God of all creation who deserves all glory, honor, and praise will accept the kind things that you do to other people as done unto him. He says, not you loved them, and your love is a product of my love for you and the Holy Spirit in your life, and it was done to me. So you want to know how you sow good fruit, how you sow to the Spirit? Do good to others. Meet their needs. Why do we collect a benevolence fund every...

month. That money is used to bless those in need. This is the connection to that first verse, right? The one who is taught the word is to share all good things with the one who teaches him. Why do you support pastors? Well, you support them because in doing so, they feed you and watch over you spiritually. And so there's this amazing exchange that happens where you give of your earthly abundance. in wealth in order to reap a spiritual reward. It's a double spiritual benefit to you. That is, you have pastors who have the ability to devote their time to serving your spiritual needs, and you will reap a heavenly reward. Because do you not think that the great shepherd will richly reward and bless and care for those who care for his under shepherds? We must be diligent, care for the people around you, meet the needs of others, love them.

Show them kindness. And though no one else may ever hear of it or know it or see it, guess what? God does. Because God is writing a book. He's recording your actions. And on that day of judgment that we already talked about, when your name comes up and you stand before that great white throne, he is going to open a book. And that book is going to be what your life consisted of. and you will reap what you have sowed. And if you sowed good seed to the spirit, then you will reap a mighty reward. And all those things that you've done to love other people that no one else saw, all everyone will know in that day, the Lord will bless you. Because as we said earlier, it's this incredible thing where God takes what you have done to others and counts it as done to him. It's astounding. Well, Paul knows this really well, doesn't he? Because you say all this stuff, and then he says, do not lose heart in doing good, for in due time you will reap if you do not grow weary. It's easy, right? I can tell you all this stuff, and we get excited, and we're like, yeah, I'm going to sow spiritual fruit. I'm going to sow a spiritual seed. And then a couple weeks happen, and you sort of...

lose steam with all your resolutions that you've made. It's so easy for us to lose heart, to get deceived. We start doing really well, and then we think, is it worth it? I'm tired. You know, why is it hard? Sometimes it's because we think that we should be rewarded and we should receive something right now. But a good question to ask yourself might be, is your work finished? Christ didn't receive his reward right away. It was a hope set before him. He endured all these things for the hope set before him. Because while there are rewards and there are blessings that God gives us as we sow spiritual fruit, ultimately, our reward is not in this life. Remember the rich man and Lazarus? The Lord says to the rich man, you received your good things in this life. Lazarus has the good things now. And I tell you, what's a better investment?

Things that may last 100 years, maybe, or things that will last for eternity? I mean, it's really not a question, is it? Why do we grow weary? Because it's hard and we suffer. But again, how much complaining did Christ do? What if Christ had grown weary in the work and given up? Where would we be then? A servant is not greater than their master. Don't grow weary in sowing spiritual seed. You know, we look around and we see like, ooh, there is so much need out there. There is so much good to be done, so we don't do anything. And it's like, well, sitting on your hands is not going to get that work done. You know, there's the old joke about how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. You see the good work that needs to be done, do it. Start. Do the best you can.

And here's another thing. Recruit others to do it with you. Share the good news. Call others to come join in the spiritual work. Tell them of the great reward that you hope for, of the spiritual things that you will reap in due time for having sown to the Spirit. Remember, the promise that Paul sets before us is that we will reap in due time. God is no man's debtor. Hebrews says to us, In the same way, God... desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of his purpose, interposed with an oath, so that by two unchangeable things, in which is impossible for God to lie, we who have taken refuge.

would have strong encouragement to take hold of the hope that is set before us. This hope we have is an anchor of the soul, a hope both sure and steadfast, and one which enters within the veil where Jesus has entered as a forerunner for us, having become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek. Don't hedge your bets. You need to live in such a way that if God did not come through for you, your life would have been a waste. Spend your life in the service of God and of doing good. And when you're discouraged and you're overwhelmed and you feel too weary for the work, one thing to do is to remember the promises of God. Look to what he has said and what he will do for those who have given their lives to him. And he's sworn by himself because there's no greater way that he could swear. And finally, I want to say that in many ways, our church does do these things.

We do love each other. We care for one another. When there's sickness and births, we bring meals. Many of us tithe. You should tithe. I know many of you are working at family worship. You've asked me questions. How to do it better? I've seen fruit in the lives of many of your children as you have worked at disciplining them, and we ought to praise God for that. The exhortation for us is to do more, to go further. to plant more seed and to plant better seeds, to stop sowing any thistles. If you plant generously, you will reap even more generously. If you are a stingy sower, you will have a small harvest. Remember that one of the laws of the harvest is that when you sow, you will reap greater than what you sow. Someday, someday you will sit down, on that day of judgment, you will sit down to a banquet, of the consequences of the crops that you have sown. Are you going to be eating crow? Will you enjoy the meal that you've prepared for yourself? This is the last day of the year. Tomorrow starts a new year. What will that year look like for you? Will you grow in sanctification and in holiness? It starts now. What will you do when you leave here? What will you do tonight? What seeds?

Are you going to plant? Let's pray.