Eating The Fruit Of Your Labors
Psalm 128:1-3 Amplified Bible (AMP)
1 Blessed (happy, fortunate, to be envied) is everyone who
fears, reveres, and worships the Lord, who walks in His ways and
lives according to His commandments. 2 For you shall eat [the
fruit] of the labor of your hands; happy (blessed, fortunate, enviable) shall
you be, and it shall be well with you. 3 Your wife shall be
like a fruitful vine in the innermost parts of your house; your children shall
be like olive plants round about your table.
I have to admit when my children were younger
and I was retired from the military, I had to hear a lot of commentary as it
concerned choosing to homeschool my children when it was not a popular or even
an excepted or understood choice. I was asked what would make me do that, and
why did I feel I needed to keep my children at home? People asked didn’t I need
a break; I would hear people say things like I need for my kids to go to
school. I made the choice for a few reasons;
first we were stationed overseas, I had allowed my son to go to public school,
and he was discouraged from using both hands to write, as he was ambidextrous,
and he was becoming extremely confused as to the values that he was taught at
home and the ones being learned in school.
Secondly, I attempted to find a Christian school and things were
unfortunately worse than the schools on base.
I had to make some choices for my children, because God had given me
charge over them as the parent to protect, oversee, teach, guide, instruct,
correct, and choose for them until they could choose for themselves. But there
was something I learned as I undertook this endeavor; it was that I was
laboring, I was sowing seeds into my children and I was being allowed to
cultivate the soil that was them, that if they were in public school I may have
missed. I realized this when a friend
took my children for the evening and she came back and said, I cannot believe
how well-mannered your children are and they say yes ma’am, no ma’am, yes sir,
no sir. She said they were so helpful; they helped her set the table, they
asked to help with dinner, I chuckled the other day as I thought of this event
and thought, where are those people now….But, seriously my children or should I
say young people are smart, and well mannered, they can hold an intelligent
conversation and they have respect for God and authority and adults that are
their elders. Again I say they are not
perfect, I still have to talk to them, they still try to test the limits on occasion,
but, they overall are great young people and my daughter promises that she will
take care of me when I am old and grayer…
Our Bishop often says that he takes time with the young
people in our church so that when he is old and has lost his teeth and in a
nursing home, that he will have someone to come visit him and cut up his
steak. Yes it is humorous to put it that
way, but in actuality, we all will eat the fruits of our labor, not just as it
concerns our children and the time and effort we put into them, but also the way
we do things, how we live and how we treat and relate to others. All too often
we think that when things are crazy in our lives, or that our home life is
messed up, or work is a problem, that we are being punished. In some cases, we are being challenged and
tried; but often we have not taken a hard look at what we have planted in our
lives and what we have fertilized the soil of our life with. So often we live like hell and expect heaven.
We treat people poorly and without consideration and then when we are not given
consideration we have a problem. Us as
parents when we don’t take time to teach our children and correct them
regularly, then they are in trouble in school, or they are finding themselves
struggling in most environments they find themselves in because we have not taken
time to arrest or deal with that behavior at home, then we are mad at the
teacher or the coach or the youth pastor because they are doing what we should
have. We don’t apply time to God in our
lives and then we are struggling to find time. The same applies to money, we
don’t tithe, give offering or sow and some of us are not seeking God in
potential job opportunities and just chasing a dollar and then we wonder why
our money is flying out of the window, and then all these unexpected bills and
repairs come up. You see this is us living in the fruits of our labor.
No matter how we are living we will ultimately live in
the fruits of our labor. We should want
to ensure that what we are placing in the ground as seeds and the life that we
are living is pleasing to God and that He is breathing into our lives, our
children and on our money instead of blowing on it and scattering it or allowing
his protection to be pulled back and the devour what we thought was more
important than Him and His way. If you
desire the fruit of your labor to be sweet and plentiful, you have to do the
work and the labor necessary to be able to reap that particular harvest. Think before you act, Pray to understand and
for God’s wisdom to live and give to be a blessing, that opens up the windows
of heaven for you to be blessed!
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