Your work and service has secured your harvest!

David had a profound relationship with God. He understood God’s faithfulness and character. He knew that God is a just God. One of the things he was sure of was that when we choose to obey Him and partner with His will here on earth, there will be a corresponding harvest to our labor. This is what he said about that:  “You will eat what you worked so hard to grow. You will be blessed and secure”  (Psalms 128:2 (NET). Understand that we cannot out-give God. God is generous and loving. The Apostle Paul also understood this same principle. He shared this thought about God’s faithfulness and response to our righteous labor and service: “And God is able to make all grace abound toward you, that you, always having all sufficiency in all things, may have an abundance for every good work” (2 Corinthians 9:8). Did you catch that? God has laid up for us abundance for every good work. The key there is “good work.” Work is labor. God can’t bless idleness and laziness. He will bless the diligent. He is always looking for those who are willing to do what needs to be done, so that He can bless them and get resources into their hands. Proverbs 12:24 says: “The hand of the diligent will rule, But the lazy man will be put to forced labor.” When He looks at you, does He see a diligent person, or a lazy person that expects everything to be done for them? Are you ready to partner with God? Remember, we will eat from what we produce. We will eat from the fruit of our hands. What have you been producing that God can bless?

Psalms 128:2 (NET) “You will eat what you worked so hard to grow. You will be blessed and secure.”

Are you enduring something difficult today?

In today’s world, most people try to avoid any aspect of suffering or pain. We want to live a “pain free” life. That’s very interesting, because for any real growth or maturity, we need to get out of our comfort level and endure what we perceive to be suffering and disappointments. We need to fail over and over until we learn how to do things correctly. It’s in the failures and disappointments that we develop discernment and understanding. The Apostle James said that he counted those who endure as blessed. In other words, it’s only when you have to endure something and overcome it, that you enter into the blessed state of an overcomer. James also said that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful. He has a way of working things out for our good, even those things that we deem as failure, disappointment, rejection, unfairness, persecution, problems, overwhelming odds, etc. God is with you in each of these issues, and He will both teach you something while you are there, and He will show you the way out. David once said: “even though I go through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for thou art with me.” (Psalms 23) Declare the same today! As God was with David, He is with you today!

James 5:11 “Indeed we count them blessed who endure. You have heard of the perseverance of Job and seen the end intended by the Lord—that the Lord is very compassionate and merciful.”