Ask a Pastor Column

Q: How are farmers supposed to take comfort in a God that let their entire year of effort burn up?

A:  I sympathize with the frustration behind this question. When we put so much work and heart into something we expect it to pay off and work out. Our natural sense of justice tells us that hard work ought to be rewarded and, in a year like this, when reality falls far below our hopes and expectations, it is normal to feel disappointed.

I want to reassure you God’s Word does offer comfort and reassurance to Christians in circumstances like these. The first is that God evaluates our lives from the perspective of faithful stewardship, not worldly success (I Corinthians 4:1-2). The world may look at a farmer overwhelmed by a hard year and reject him as a failure, but God evaluates us by our heart (I Samuel 16:7) and only expects us to trust in Him and do the best we can with what we are given (I John 3:23; 1 John 5:3-4). God knows your situation and He promises to meet your needs if you love and follow Him (Romans 8:28; Philippians 4:19). And He will reward you in the end for faithfully doing what is right, whether it results in worldly success or not (Matthew 25:14-29). That is a much lighter load to carry than the world’s expectations, but we cannot experience the joy and freedom of this until we shift our focus from pleasing men to pleasing God (Matthew 11:28-29).

We can also take comfort in the example of how believers in Scripture endured hardship (Hebrews 11:32-35; Romans 8:35-39). When we examine their lives we can see that God was faithful to carry them through hard times and lead them to better circumstances. This assures us that the Unchanging God will do the same thing for us if we trust in Him as they did. Some of the many examples of this are Joseph (Genesis 37:12-28; 50:15-21), Ruth (Ruth 1:1-5; 4:11-17), and of course, Jesus Himself (Hebrews 12:1-3).

It’s been said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. There is one vital exception to this rule. When sin or the brokenness of this world causes good people to miss out on the natural rewards of their efforts, it is right and good to persevere in doing what is right, distinguishing the exception from the rule. Farmers live by the principle that you reap what you sow (Galatians 6:7). When a good farmer sows but does not reap he turns around and puts more seed right back into the ground because he knows that the principle is sound and he will eventually reap that good harvest if he doesn’t give up. That is an example that we can all learn from (Galatians 6:9). Hang in there, farmers; God can make it good!

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