The Lord of the Harvest has the absolute right to assign to His workers their unique places of labor in His field.  In many ways, I seem to have been a “planter.”  That is not always according to my preference.  There are more joyful duties on the farm, but all are necessary in the harvest cycle.  Most of the feasts in the Old Testament were joyous harvest feasts.  But someone had to plant.  It certainly is necessary to be possessed of  a living hope if one would be a sower of seed.

     A planter needs to remember the critical question is not “What am I doing?” but “What will I leave behind?”  I recall a definition of leadership from days past, “Leadership is seeing the consequences of our actions further in the future than those around us can.”  Only the supernatural eyes of faith can do that.  “While we do not look at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen.  For the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal” (2 Cor. 4:18).

    We live in a very undisciplined and “do it for immediate pleasure” age.  Much of that aversion to discipline has spilled over into the church.  Few so-called disciples are willing to sacrifice present happiness for the promise of future reward.  But those who are willing to embrace the principle of “Delayed Gratification” are promised an abundant harvest if they faithfully plant in obscurity.  “Those who sow in tears shall reap in joy.  He who continually goes forth weeping, bearing seed for sowing, shall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with him” (Psa. 126:5,6).  But there are no lush fields for harvest at the time the plow has carved the barren earth.

    Paul joyfully consented to this task of planting.  “I planted.  Apollos watered, but God gave the increase” (1 Cor. 3:6).  The issue he would have decided in his soul was not only “What am I doing now?” but “What will be left behind after I move on?”  And the reality of a necessarily consequent result (“shall doubtless come again”) fueled his efforts.  Shall not the rain and the snow that descends from the heavens cause the earth to bring forth a harvest?  “So shall My word be” (Isa. 55:10,11).

    What did Paul leave behind?  No buildings or monuments, really nothing at all which the world considered valuable.  But the Lord of the Harvest thought differently.  He left behind a company of men and women who had the character of Christ formed in their souls.  “My little children, for whom I labor in birth again until Christ is formed in you…” (Gal. 4:19).  That was precious in God’s sight – people “conformed to the image of Christ, the firstborn of many brothers” (Romans 829).  One’s such name was Timothy.  He had trained Timothy to be a planter of righteousness in the souls of men.  “The things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses, entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim. 2:2).     Paul could do this because it is what Jesus had done.  What had Jesus left behind?  No buildings or monuments.  Nothing the world considered valuable.  Just a company of disciples who were willing to accept the principle of delayed gratification as the necessary world view of a worker in the harvest field. “Since You are precious in My sight, and are honored, and I have loved You; I will give men for You, and people in exchange for Your life” (Isa. 43:4).  “In Christ” Paul became a beloved and honored planter bearing the image of the Servant of the LORD.     We can’t escape asking “What am I doing now?” but the more important question is “What will I leave behind because of what I am doing now?”  The disciple can forego some of the instant gratification-enjoyment of the present in the knowledge that what he will eventually leave behind will have the indelible and beautiful stamp of Christ-likeness impressed upon it.