From the window where I’m sitting the season is one of my favourites – autumn, but the people I was with last week would call it fall, and by virtue of the fact that people read the blog from all over the world, I’m not going to assume anything.
We often think in terms of what time it is, and plan our lives by the clock or the calendar. I live day to day, plan month to month, and have an awareness of what season I am in, whatever the weather.
Ecclesiastes 3:1 For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven.
What season of life are you in right now? You have to discern what season you are in, because you can’t be the same in each of them. I heard a talk years back by Jim Rohn who described these four seasons and though I have forgotten the detail of what he said, I’ve tried to apply the wisdom from it.
WINTER – Hang in There!
Job 37:6 “He directs the snow to fall on the earth and tells the rain to pour down. Then everyone stops working so they can watch his power.”
I live in the UK where when winter weather hits, everything stops – as if we never had snow before. But we have had winters and you’ll always have winters. You have to learn to handle life’s winters. How? Be ready. Every year, winter comes. Always. We deal with it by preparing for it.Are you prepared to handle the winters in your life? If you had a brain the size of an ant, you would be.
Runners tell one another, ‘There’s no bad weather – just bad clothes’. So whether it’s changing our clothing, our tyres or our changing our way of life, we’re wise to get ready for winter, because we know- it’s always coming. In your life and mine, hard times WILL come – be ready, so when it happens, you’re not stuck out complaining in the cold without a coat. Some winters are of your own making, some just happen. They blow in from nowhere. And then the season changes again. Hang in there! Day comes – after the night, and joy comes in the morning.
Genesis 8:22 While the earth remains, seedtime and harvest, cold and heat, summer and winter, day and night, shall not cease.
One day you’ll open the window and you’ll see the season changed, it’s…
SPRING: Seize it quickly!
Song of Songs 2:11 For behold, the winter is past; the rain is over and gone. The flowers appear on the earth, the time of singing has come, and the voice of the turtledove is heard in our land.
I’ve lived over 50 years and I’ve noticed that every year, after winter, spring arrives. Flowers start to open – even in Manchester! The same thing applies within your life. After the tough cold, lonely time, you will be faced with an opportunity to plant the seeds for a great harvest to come. Because spring always follows winter. If it was a tough winter, the promise of another opportunity is coming your way. It’s time to sing again.
Spring is not a guarantee of a better future – it’s a short season of opportunity, .holding out the promise of a later harvest. It’s a window. But it’s going to close – so seize it. Take advantage while you’re in that short season to pull up weeds, to plant, to sow and to connect to others who will work with you.
2 Corinthians 9:6 (Amp) Now [remember] this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows generously [that blessings may come to others] will also reap generously [and be blessed].
SUMMER: Nourish and Protect the harvest
Every farmer knows, if you are not careful, your crops will be either stolen, destroyed, or spoiled. You have to fight the bugs, because they will take the garden. Love good and hate evil. There’s a creator and a spoiler (John 10:10).
I remember Rohn said the third season is when ‘you must nourish and give life like a mother, and protect and defend like a father. Love like a mother, hate, protect – like a father (any good father would say, ‘Take two more steps closer to this family and you’ll cease to exist!’). So nurture, and protect from what would destroy the harvest if necessary.’ This is the work of summer.
If you planted your seeds in the spring, soon and surely, a summer harvest will come. This is a time where you can reap the benefits. This principle will work positively for anyone who has found the truth that life is not designed to give you what you need, but what you worked for. The Law of Harvest works both ways. If you didn’t plant in the spring, then no harvest comes your way. If you planted little, you won’t receive a lot.I’ll never forget hearing Andy Stanley say, ‘The law of the harvest is that you will reap what you sow, and it is always LATER and GREATER.” You don’t just get back what you put in, good or bad, it multiplies!
Three keys for handling harvest time;
1) Whatever you harvested, don’t complain or apologise. Fantastic harvest? No need for an apology or bragging. Poor harvest? No point complaining. That’s maturity. When you learn to get ready to go through another winter and get back to work in the spring, believing new opportunity will come your way, you’re growing up.
2) Do wise things with your harvest. Think like an ant again. (Proverbs 6:6). If the harvest is a qualification, leverage it for the benefit and service of others because the way way to get what you need is to give what they want. If the harvest is money, don’t blow it but live generously and invest to build financial security. Strive to become financially independent so nobody & nothing has a claim on your assets.
3) Be rich toward God. Humility reminds you that He gave it you all in the first place. If you are only rich toward yourself, you’ll star in the parable of the Rich Fool (Luke 12).
AUTUMN: is the time for REFLECTION
Use autumn to take full responsibility for what happened in the previous seasons, both good and bad, and get ready for the next seasons ahead. This is the time, as the colours change around us, where you can kick the leaves and open yourself to learning the lessons that the previous seasons taught you and put everything into perspective.
Galatians 6:9 And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.
So, what season are you in right now? Personally, I feel like it’s springtime (in autumn).