Basic HTML Version
Lessons of Life
67
every living thing. Christ came to the earth “as the One who serves.”
Luke 22:27
. The angels are “ministering spirits sent forth to minister
for those who will inherit salvation.”
Hebrews 1:14
. The same law
of service is written on all things in nature. The birds of the air, the
beasts of the field, the trees of the forest, the leaves, the grass, and
the flowers, the sun in the heavens, and the stars of light—all have
their ministry. Lake and ocean, river and water spring—each takes
to give.
As each thing in nature ministers to the world’s life, it also
secures its own. “Give, and it shall be given to you” (
Luke 6:38
) is
the lesson written no less surely in nature than in the pages of God’s
Word.
As the hillsides and the plains open a channel for the mountain
stream to reach the sea, that which they give is repaid a hundredfold.
The stream that goes singing on its way leaves behind its gift of
beauty and fruitfulness. Through the fields, bare and brown under
the summer’s heat, a line of green marks the river’s course. Every
noble tree, every bud, every blossom, is a witness of God’s grace to
all who become its channels to the world.
Sowing in Faith
Of the almost innumerable lessons taught in the varied processes
of growth, some of the most precious are conveyed in the Savior’s
parable of the growing seed. It has lessons for both old and young.
“The kingdom of God is as if someone would scatter seed on
the ground, and would sleep and rise night and day, and the seed
would sprout and grow, he does not know how. The earth produces
of itself; first the stalk, then the head, then the full grain in the head.”
Mark 4:26-28
, NRSV.
The seed has a germinating principle, a principle that God Him-
self has implanted, yet if left to itself the seed would have no power
to spring up. Human beings have their part to act in promoting
[63]
the growth of the grain, but there is a point beyond which they can
accomplish nothing. They must depend upon One who has con-
nected the sowing and the reaping by wonderful links of His own
omnipotent power.