“Sowing and Reaping!”

Written by: Marjory Morrow

Sowing and reaping, miraculous provision, giving cheerfully….the bible is full of this kind of stuff, but for many of us the test of giving is one of the toughest we have to learn.

We’ve all heard the testimonies where the speaker tells us about the time he gave a certain sum of money and then within hours received a sum 10 times that amount! We love these stories, but we can often get disappointed when our own acts of giving don’t quite seem to produce the same speedy results. We have to remember that we need to add to our faith the vital ingredient of patience, after all it is ‘with faith and patience we inherit the promises‘! (Hebrews 6 v 12). We also are supposed to be in the process of being transformed into the likeness of Christ and our acts of giving should come out of our ‘Christ-like’ nature to give, not because we think this sowing and reaping lark is a good earner!

When our faith is tested in this area we need to choose our response. We can fall into disappointment and discouragement or we can thank God that he is working patience in us and continue to stay in the place of faith. The right response to the testing of our faith will bring forth maturity and the ability to endure, allowing our roots to go deep down into the unshakable nature of God. This is a good place to be! When our emotions want to drag us into disappointment we must remind ourselves of the goodness and kindness of God. He allows the times of waiting for our own development. So if you’re in a waiting place right now, be patient and tell yourself ‘God is growing me into a strong, fit son/daughter’.

In my own journey I’ve had to learn some lessons in this area. The following testimony is an example of this:

Over the years Tom and I have had something of a ‘car giving ministry’ which all sounds very noble, but to be honest it has been a joy. We would thrill at the moment when the person who was being blessed realised the car was for them. Sometimes it was our own cars we gave and sometimes we spotted a ‘fixer upper’ and bought it and fixed it up for the person. Rarely was the car particularly shiny and new but they were all sound and were a blessing to those who got them.

Anyway, last year we bought a car we needed (the ‘van’ as we called it) and had it thoroughly checked it out. Tom reassured me that ‘nothing will go wrong with this car’! Well, needless to say we proceeded to go through 4 or 5 months of agony as one thing after another went wrong with the car and the cost of repairs rocketed. I would like to say I said ‘well praise the Lord’ every time another thing went wrong, but mostly I moaned and groaned and reminded the Lord of ‘all the cars we’d given and this is our reward…?!!’. Oops, a little more time in the refining fire needed methinks!!

It seemed a puzzle to me that all this happened, but in the end after some sulking I chose not to move into disappointment over it and decided to keep my faith in the goodness of God, regardless of how it looked.

A while later out of the blue Tom got the opportunity to go to conference in Dudley. A friend’s wife had called off at the last minute and he was offered her place. Tom accepted and was directed to someone whom he didn’t really know to give him a lift to the conference. This guy had recently bought a new car and was very happy to drive Tom to the conference in it. Driving back to Edinburgh, after the trip the guy turned to Tom and said ‘I think the Lord is telling me to give you my old car – do you need a car?’ Well, we already had our ‘van’ which by now had settled down to being reliable and we had a second car which we shared with others from time to time. The issue with this second car was that it had no power steering and as it was a diesel automatic was a ‘real brute’ to drive (especially for me!) So Tom responded ‘does the car have power steering?’ (cheeky or what?!) Well, it turns out this car was an automatic with power steering and was less than two years old. Wow – this seemed too good to be true. When Tom told me that we were getting this car and I was amazed as I had probably only once thrown up a little prayer saying ‘Lord – I really appreciate this car but one with power steering would be a real blessing’. It wasn’t exactly a request that was high up on my priority list. Anyway, this time we were the ones who were bowled over by the goodness of God and of one of his generous sons.

This act of provision was huge to us because we actually have some impending needs which are of a higher concern than that of the car. But in the giving of the car God was in effect saying ‘if I care enough to give you this car which you didn’t desperately need wont I provide for your true needs as I promise?’ God is good!

There is a final little twist to this tale as we subsequently discovered. Our friend Jenny was one person whom we were previously unable to share our car with, as it was too hard for her to manage without the power steering. Of course she was the first person we wanted to share the news with, knowing she would now be able to borrow the car when she wanted. As we told her she smiled and said that the Lord has spoken to her a few weeks earlier saying ‘I want to give you a car’ and she had responded ‘no Lord, I don’t want the responsibility, hassle, etc. – give it to Tom!’ So it appeared the news of our new car wasn’t much of a surprise to her! How like God to meet the needs of more than one of His children all in one move. God is good and a smooth operator!

God sees and remembers every act of kindness and generosity, it is a joy and delight when He sees us practicing cheerful giving. It is especially precious when we give, and seeing no apparent ‘return’, we keep on giving. It is a sign of our becoming more like him, after all he is the one “who did not spare his own Son, but gave him up for us all-(therefore) how will he not also, along with him, graciously give us all things?” (Romans 8 v 32)