Harvest – Eighteenth Sunday after Trinity – evening
Sunday 30th September 2018
Proper 21 – 18th Sunday after Trinity – Harvest – evening
Joel 2. 21-27
Matthew 6. 25-33
Revd Preb Maureen Hobbs
Harvest is a time to celebrate God’s generosity to all of us, coupled with human endeavour and hard work. And Farmers are notorious for worrying about all sorts of things that will affect the production of food. Weather in particular of course, but also today the ups and downs of political decisions in Westminster and Brussels.
So being told not to worry, and that God will look after us, is sometimes quite hard to follow up?
But Jesus’ words should be seen as a comfort – for many people are more fearful about the future than they’d care to admit.
But the other way of reading it is as a challenge.
What do you spend most time on? Probably it is material things and money, making sure we have enough, planning how to get more and what we might spend it on.
And if money becomes the most important thing in life to us, it becomes an idol – replacing the place that God should occupy at the centre of our existence.
Harvest Festival has the same two sides to it. First it is a chance to rejoice that we have enough to eat and to remember that we’re entirely dependent on God and the weather.
But Harvest is also a challenge, because often we have enough to eat because others are hungry. Because our food is subsidised, home-produced items are cheaper in the shops and foreign producers cannot sell theirs here. Fair enough, you may say. But it doesn’t stop there. Because our cheap food is often also exported to their countries and sold for less than they can produce it for. Well that may be a bit over simplified, but whenever we eat a cheap meal, or wear cheap clothes, a poor man, woman or child may be dying of malnutrition because of the subsidies our elected representatives are paying.
But the poorer nations also often tell us to rejoice in our prosperity and thank God for it – knowing that we cannot simply get our over capacity to satisfy their hunger. But what we can do is pray for the decision-makers, who cause the poor to go hungry, so that we may be well fed. So as we rejoice and enjoy all the evidence of our good fortune – even in a year which has brought the challenges of a cold wet spring and a baking hot summer – let us keep in mind those people who this day go hungry, whether (shamefully) in this country or in other parts of God’s world. Amen