Laboring for Love

Wheat field in France

Rev. Molly F. James, PhD

DFMS Noonday Prayer

July 7, 2020; Psalm 115:1-10; Hosea 8:4-7, 11-13; Matthew 9:32-38

May God’s Word be spoken. May God’s Word be heard. May that point us to the living Word who is Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen. 

“Then he said to his disciples, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.’”

So ends our Gospel reading today. It has gotten me thinking about harvesting and labor. What are we harvesting and why are there so few laborers? If the harvest is plentiful then it must be good. We cannot be harvesting fear and anxiety for those are the fruits of scarcity. Love and compassion. Wisdom and understanding. Those are of God. And they are in abundance, if we look for them. The trouble is that it can be easy to miss them. We can get caught up in the narratives of fear and scarcity. The headlines have been full of messages that there is not enough. Not enough beds in the ICU. Not enough resources to keep the economy going. Not enough personal protective equipment. Not enough of essential items in our grocery stores. And of course, once we get ourselves into a mindset of scarcity and fear it can be self-perpetuating. All of a sudden there are more things to fear. We can see something to fear around every corner. 

But my friends, that is not what God’s desire for us. God does not desire for us to be frantic with fear or paralyzed with anxiety. Of course, that does not mean we get to be foolish or careless, throwing all caution to the wind. It does mean that we get to invest in, and keep our focus on that which is life-giving that which restores our soul and fills us with hope. That sounds wonderful we think. So, I should just have more days off and more vacation right? That’s the solution. 

Yes and no. Taking time off is valuable, but note that our Gospel today does not speak of rest. It speaks of labor, of the hard work of harvesting. Today we might think of harvesting in a merely metaphorical sense or of the seemingly simple act of sitting on a tractor while the machines did the work. All that is required of the farmer is driving in a straight line. But this is not the work of harvesting of which Jesus speaks. He is speaking of the exhausting manual labor of harvesting by hand. Perhaps swinging a sickle to harvest wheat. Climbing up and down a ladder to harvest olives. Or the careful hand work of harvesting grapes. Any of those are work that would leave us achy and tired at the end of the day. Yet, I think it would be a particular kind of ache and a particular type of tired. The kind of ache and tired that testifies to accomplishment, to doing something that is important and meaningful. To hard work that sustains life, brings joy, and brings comfort. 

That is a different sort of work than seemingly endless tasks or of busy-ness to ward off anxiety. It is meaningful work. It is hard work. There is no doubt about that. And it is work that is worth doing. 

The call and invitation in our Gospel is to labor. But it is not just to any and all labor. It is not an invitation to simply work more. It is an invitation to be thoughtful about the kind of work in which we invest our time and our strength. Our energy and our care. Let us invest our effort in that which is life-giving for us and for the world. 

There is an invitation in the midst of this challenging time to pause and reflect, to evaluate where our priorities are. Are we harvesting the fruits of the spirit? Are we harvesting that which endures? Are we trusting in God’s abiding presence or are we letting fear take hold? 

We are called by God to labor for the coming of the Kingdom, for the realization of God’s dream. So, as we have (hopefully) a little more time in these summer weeks to rest and reflect, to prepare for what is ahead (as uncertain as that may be), I hope we will evaluate the labors of our lives. I hope we will prepare ourselves to do the hard and holy work that sustains life and brings joy. And I hope we will also have the courage to stop doing, to let go of those tasks and habits which do not serve us, or perhaps more importantly, do not serve the values and ideals to which we are called as people of faith. There is much work ahead of us. On some days it may exhaust our bodies, and yet if we are following Jesus in our labors, the work will fill our souls. AMEN.