The Fields are Ripe for Harvest: Tending to God’s Creation

Hannah Shultz, GIPL's Program Associate, offered a sermon for First Presbyterian Church - Savannah's Wednesday, April 21, 2021 evening service. FPC Savannah participated in GIPL's Power Wise program, receiving an energy audit in May of 2016, and they have an active Green Team. Below is the manuscript from Hannah's sermon.In 2018 Greta Thunberg, a teenager from Sweden, made a name for herself as one of the world’s leading climate activists. Her campaign for the environment took off in May 2018 when she won a climate change essay competition in alocal newspaper. In August of the same year, she started protesting in front of the Swedish parliament building and refused to leave until the Swedish government agreed to meet the carbon emissions target that was set by world leaders in Paris in 2015. In September 2019, she stepped foot onto the world’s stage when she traveled to New York City by way of a racing yacht, refusing to travel by plane because of its environmental impact. In just a few short years this teenager became the focus of climate conversations as she received international recognition for her strong stance that big governments and world leaders have not done enough to cut carbon emissions and address the climate crisis. At the end of her speech to the World Economic Forum in January 2019, she implored leaders, “I want you to act as if the house is on fire, because it is.”[1]In a similar way, in this passage, Jesus awakens the disciples to the immediacy of their call to do the work of God. The time is now, he tells them; the fields are ripe for harvest. This scripture has important implications as we think about our call today to address the racial and environmental injustices our world faces. To put these verses in context, Jesus’s conversation about vocation with his disciples interrupts a larger story of his ministry with the Samaritans. In John chapter 4, Jesus and his disciples are traveling through Samaria on their way from Judea to Galilee. This might have been a surprising decision to some of the disciples who would have been familiar with the schism between Jews and Samaritans and who probably would have thought of the Samaritans as outsiders and enemies. However, Jesus’s interactions with the Samaritans are an important part of his ministry. In the verses right before the passage we heard today, we learn that while the disciples are in town buying food, Jesus, who is tired from his journey, approaches a Samaritan woman at a well. He openly challenges social boundaries as he asks her for a drink of water and then reveals his identity as the Messiah to her (John 4:26).Meanwhile, the disciples return from town and urge Jesus to eat something. When Jesus tells them that his food is to, “do the will of him who sent me and to complete his work,” Jesus makes it clear that what nourishes and sustains him is his vocation, which is to do the work of God. To help the disciples understand what he’s saying, Jesus turns to traditional Biblical imagery from the Old Testament – the harvest. However, in these words, Jesus presents a challenge to his disciples. It would have been commonly known that there is a period of waiting, growing, and tending to crops in between times of planting and harvesting. Jesus, though, tells the disciples that sower and reaper rejoice together. The fields are ripe for harvesting. In altering this harvest metaphor, Jesus is taking familiar images and filling them with new meaning. The eschaton is not something to wait for in the future; it is something that is already here.This understanding that God’s kingdom is already upon us, is significant for how the disciples were to understand their work with Jesus, and for how we interpret this passage today. Although the disciples might reap a harvest of which they were not primary workers, Jesus is helping them understand that their mission is to bring fulfillment of God’s will right now. They are not merely planting seeds, the work they are doing now matters. Similarly, we are to understand that our vocation is to continue the work of God, that what we do right now matters, and that God is already here, present and sovereign over our world. The new heaven and new earth that is promised in 2 Peter is available to us now. We are critical players in making the earth a place where God’s love is known; a place where righteousness is restored both for the earth and for the communities around us.By bringing the eschatological future to the present, Jesus places a new sense of immediacy on the work we are called to do. Gone are the days of patiently waiting, of anticipating a future yet to come. Rather than sitting idly by, we are called to take part in the kingdom that is already here. Our job is to make God’s presence and love known for all people and to seek out opportunities to actively engage with the world. The time is now; the fields are ripe for harvest. The world is ready to be transformed and it’s our job now to fulfill God’s will in doing so.Jesus challenges his disciples to look around and see how the fields are ripe for harvesting. As we look at the world around us today, what opportunities do we see to do the work of God? This past year has opened our eyes to the world’s profound suffering. The COVID-19 pandemic which has claimed 3 million lives worldwide, forced families and individuals into social isolation, and triggered an economic crisis, continues to rampage communities even in the wake of good vaccine news. In the United States, police brutality and other institutional injustices have reminded us of the unaddressed systemic racism and oppression that is deeply embedded in almost every facet of our society. The earth groans as plastics continue to pollute our oceans and greenhouse gas emissions add particulate matter to our air and drive global climate change. As we look at the suffering around us may we be reminded of our call to do purposeful work, transforming and restoring relationships for the immediate inbreaking of God’s kingdom.Caring for and loving the planet has always been the work of God. From the beginning to the end of scripture we grow to know a God who is continually present to the world, delighting in, blessing, and celebrating creation. This is a God who plays in the dirt and delicately forms the birds of the air and the fish of the sea and calls it good. In Genesis 9, God’s covenant extends to “every living creature of every kind.” God’s devotion to the world doesn’t stop there. Psalm 104 reminds us of the ways that God daily sustains the world through providing water to the beasts of the field and refuge to the birds and wild goats. Our God takes joy in the world around us and carefully tends to it, making it a lush and hospitable home for all of God’s creation. Caring for and loving the planet has always been the work we’ve been called to as well. Made from the dust and dirt of the earth, filled with God’s breath of life, our first calling is to work in the Garden of Eden and to take care of it (Genesis 2:15). Helping the earth flourish was our first and only responsibility, but humanity has done a poor job tending to the garden.Our work of caring for creation has never just been about caring for the garden, either. As theologian and author Barbara Brown Taylor reminds us in one of her sermons, “We are God’s sharecroppers. We tend the earth and it’s riches for someone else’s behalf. We are expected to represent God’s interests, being as generous with each other as God is with us.”[2] We have fallen short on this responsibility as well, as we have allowed low-income, minority, and vulnerable communities to disproportionally bear the burden of the environmental and public health impacts caused by climate change. The same systems and structures of oppression that prioritize consumerism and production over sustainability also perpetuate economic, racial, and social injustices. By situating this passage where he does in the Samaritan narrative, John challenges us to see that the new earth we are part of in the eschatological present grants opportunities for human relationships to be restored.Yesterday, Derek Chauvin was found guilty on all counts for the murder of George Floyd. There is still a lot of work to do but this is a small step in the progress towards accountability and racial justice in our country. Fulfilling the work of God is to continue seeking justice for our brothers and sisters.  It is to name the patterns of racial bias that run deep in our religious institutions and societal structures and to advocate for policies that protect the communities that are mostly deeply suffering.This is the work we are called to do – to take responsibility for the earth and to bring justice to communities suffering from energy burden, pollution, and environmental degradation. We are called back to the garden, to find ourselves hands and knees in the dirt, tending to the Earth until it is once again something to delight in. There are so many ways to do this work, and we each play a unique role in fulfilling God’s will. Some of us are gardeners, breathing life into the ground and producing food for communities without access to affordable and healthy options. Some of us are lobbyists and activists, getting involved at a local, state, and federal level to hold our governments responsible for pursuing justice in our political system. Some of us are conservationists, cleaning our oceans and river systems and protecting our woodlands from deforestation. Some of us are enthusiasts starting recycling programs at our churches and schools and encouraging others to compost, eat less meat, and use reusable bags. We are all environmentalists, given this name and role as our very first vocation in the Garden of Eden.This passage calls us out of our complicity in waiting and calls us to take action now. It reminds us that the eschaton is upon us. That we are to be active players in the inbreaking of Gods kingdom, in the restoration of human relationships, and in the preservation of the earth. Greta Thunberg took a good look at the world around her and saw opportunities to follow her calling; to advocate for justice for our planet. When we are awakened by the prophetic voices around us reminding us that the house is already burning, that the time is now, that the fields are ripe for harvest, we need to ask ourselves: what is it that we feel called to do?[1] “Greta Thunberg Quotes: 10 famous lines from teen activist,” BBC newsround, September 25, 2019, https://www.bbc.co.uk/newsround/49812183[2] Barbara Brown Taylor, “God’s Sharecroppers,” in Gospel Medicine (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, Inc), 109.