Seed Time and Harvest

Greetings in the Matchless Name of Jesus, the Lord of the Harvest!

Tonight was a night of revelation to my spirit. As we began to sing, the Spirit of God ushered in such a sense of worship that I didn't "feel" right about singing the "fast songs" I had put together. While in prayer, earlier in the afternoon, the Lord had spoken to my spirit about the "secret place" as seen in Matthew 6. He showed me that when I pray I am to enter into my "place"...

Matthew 6:6
"But you, when you pray, go into your room, and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly."

I noticed that the place I am to go into is the place where He is waiting for me. My "room" is His secret place. It's the place of complete abandonment, complete humility, complete dependence upon someone other than myself, and a place of promise unlike anything else. After all, where else is there any more complete promise as "and your Father Who sees in secret (or, sees you in the same room with Him) shall reward you openly)".

So, as we began singing, I felt the Lord usher me into His room and we shut the door behind us. What a holy time. I don't know what anyone else was sensing or feeling; after all, I wasn't in the same room as they were.

I mentioned, though, that this was a night of revelation to my spirit. Here's what I'm referring to. I knew I was to share some things the Lord had just shown me regarding the secret place. As I was teaching, though, I found myself learning some more about the secret place. The Lord had me liken us going to the secret place, the place of promise, to a seed being planted in the ground; its "secret place".

John 12:24 (New Living Translation)
"The truth is, a kernel of wheat must be planted in the soil. Unless it dies it will be alone-a single seed. But its death will produce many new kernels-a plentiful harvest of new lives."

Think about a seed. Regardless of how glorious, beautiful, talented, wealthy, etc. a seed is, it was created not for show and tell, but to be planted. It must be planted, buried to the point of being completely out of the lime light, and then trust its care to the ground and the elements it can no longer see. If the seed stays on display, or decides it has a better use than what it was created for, there can be no harvest. The seed, in its proper "secret place" draws no attention to itself, makes no noise, and boasts of nothing other than its strength is in its Creator; the One Who created it on purpose, for a purpose and Who sees it in its secret place.

There are very few who have taken Jesus' Lordship to this point: "He who loves father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who loves son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me. And he who does not take his cross and follow after Me is not worthy of Me. He who finds his life will lose it, and he who loses his life for My sake will find it." Matthew 10:37-39. But isn't this what Jesus teaches about the "secret place"? Think about this: how many "rights" does a "seed" really have? Yet, it is one of the grandest things God has ever created! The ability to reproduce after its own kind!

Reproduction in the Kingdom of God isn't the result of arrogance, pride, strutting our stuff, putting together all the right programs, dotting our "I's" and crossing our "T's" any more than having babies is the result of putting all the materials that make up a human into a bottle, shaking it a few times, and then placing it in the oven for a couple of hours. The Kingdom of God is completely dependent upon the King of the Kingdom and each part in the Kingdom must be COMPLETELY subject to His Lordship. No seed has the right to dictate what it is or where it is to be planted. It must be completely submitted to its Creator.

You and I, in the Kingdom of God, are God's "seeds". We are and were created "in Christ Jesus unto good works". And good works we will see accomplished as we allow ourselves to get comfortable in the "secret place". Even when the fruit starts to show "above ground", keep yourself in the secret place. Don't allow the will of God to be aborted in your life because you've got to let everyone know that the "fruit" is connected to YOU!

One more verse. Genesis 8:22a: "While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest...shall not cease.'' Catch what the Spirit of God is saying...as long as there are seeds, planted where they were designed by God to be planted, there will be a harvest. And, as long as there are people who meet with their God in their "secret place", that place of completely trusting and yielding to the Lordship of the King of the Kingdom, there will be a harvest; "OPEN REWARDS".

Pastor Jan