The Harvest

Good morning, to all of you blog readers from a luxury vacation rental in Phoenix. Trust me, it really isn’t so great, but after a 1940’s bare bones cottage in Tucson, this carpeted bedroom with a king bed seems pretty nice.

Laurence poured coffee, and I opened the Word to read Psalm 133, “Behold, how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity! It is like the precious ointment, as the dew of Hermon…” 

We’ve been experiencing the sweetness of fellowship with our brothers and sisters. If you live in the midst of a congregation of the saints, you know this blessing. Likely, you take social life for granted, and maybe even complain about all the busyness.

This is not our lifestyle, but maybe it could be. Why not a home in the sun where we could socialize with our peer group, a place of heavenly conversations?

Then another verse comes, “Say not ye, There are yet four months, and then cometh harvest? behold, I say to you, Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white already to harvest” (John 4:35). And then I understand.

We will go home to our apartment in Queens, to a building filled with a people who don’t know the pleasantness of brethren who dwell together in unity, a place where everyone has a story, and if you listen you will hear about a mother who died, a husband who had an amputation, about the Eid celebration of the people who don’t know Jesus but worship Mohammad. Laurence will return to Elmhurst Hospital where a nurse says, “There is something peaceful about working with you.” My boss at the market tells me that a customer’s cancer has returned. Another customer confides that he’s overwhelmed with life, that his wife also has cancer and the three young triplets and a younger child are causing a lot of stress . . . So many stories if we listen.

My coffee has gotten cold. We’re leaving soon for breakfast with the Seniors, for the warmth of people who understand, and who are from the greatest support group in the world. I would like to stay. 

“The fields are white for harvest. ” Monday, Lord willing, we’ll fly the friendly skies. We’ll land at JFK, and take the subway to Elmhurst Avenue, the place where there’s a Thai restaurant on every block, where the Tibetans dance, where the Mexican Mamas sell tamales, and men go to Friday prayers. The place where we belong.

Berniece