I greet you in Jesus’ precious name! It is Wednesday morning, the 22nd of May, 2024, and this is your friend, Angus Buchan, with a thought for today. 

We start in the Book of Jeremiah 4:3: 

“Break up your fallow ground, And do not sow among thorns.”

Then we go straight across to the Gospel of Mathew 13:7: 

”And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up and choked them.”

We have to prepare our hearts just like the good farmer prepares the land that he will plant his precious crop into. A lazy farmer does not take pride in his land preparation and he doesn’t do a fine job. It is rough, it is unkempt, and from the start the seed is going to struggle. We must be very careful that we don’t try and cut corners because if we do we are wasting our time. The thorns and the weeds and the thistles will grow up and strangle those precious little plants as they emerge from the ground.

If we look at verse 22, we see that the word of God tells us that the distractions, the worries of this world cause the plants not to grow because of the competition on the land. Compromise, pleasures, delights and the riches of this world choke the word of God and it yields no fruit. 

I remember a farmer came into our area many, many years ago. He came from a different part of the country. Here we have very fertile land and it rains beautifully in this area. This man came from a marginal area where the land was quite dry. He did most of his weed control by mechanical means, cultivating his rows of maize with a tractor and a cultivator. We said to him, ”You need to spray all your weeds because they are getting out of control.” He said, ”No, no, I’ll just let them grow and then I will come in on a nice hot day and I will cultivate them out of the ground.” Well, of course that dry hot day never came. It just rained and rained and rained and eventually his whole crop was strangled by the weeds. We couldn’t even see the little plants. After a couple of years that man left this district because he couldn’t farm here anymore. 

We need to cultivate our walk with the Lord. My dear friends, sometimes the most dangerous thing is when you go on holiday and you don’t get up in the morning and don’t have a good quiet time with the Lord every day. You don’t read your Bible, you don’t pray because you say you’re having a rest, but that is when the weeds come in and strangle your relationship with the Lord. When on holiday you need to be spending more time with the Lord and reading His word and praying. Cultivate your land and God will give you a mighty crop.

Jesus bless you and goodbye.