Metropolitan Tabernacle Pulpit · Sermon No. 2896
“Is today not the wheat harvest?” 1 Samuel 12:17.
[A peculiar and even unique interest attaches to the present Sermon, as it was the first of Mr. Spurgeon’s discourses that was ever printed. Although it has appeared in another form, the publishers thought that it ought to be included in the regular weekly series, so it is now reprinted exactly 50 years after it was delivered. When cholera was desolating London and the wicked war in the Crimea was still being waged, the young pastor sounded a cheerful note to comfort the Christians of that day while he also warned others of the consequences of continuance in evil-doing. The message spoken half a century ago is by no means out of date even now.—Pub.]
I SHALL not notice the connection, but I shall simply take these words as a slogan and my sermon will be founded upon a harvest field. I shall rather use the harvest for my text than any passage that I find here. “Is today not the wheat harvest?” I suppose the dwellers in cities think less of times and seasons than dwellers in the country. Men who were born, trained up, nourished and nurtured among cornfields, harvests, sowing and reaping, are more likely to notice such things than you who are always engaged in mercantile pursuits and think less of these things than rustics do. But I suppose if it is almost necessary that you should regard the harvest less than others, it ought not to be carried to too great an extreme. Let us not be forgetful of times and seasons. There is much to be learned from them and I would refresh your memories by a harvest field.
What a wondrous temple this world is, for in truth it is a temple of God’s building wherein men ought to worship Him. What a wondrous temple it is to a mind spiritually enlightened which can bring to bear upon it the resources of intellect and the illuminations of God’s Holy Spirit! There is not a single flower in it that does not teach us a lesson. There is not a single wave, or blast of thunder that has not some lesson to teach us, the sons of men. This world is a great temple and as if you walk in an Egyptian temple, you know that every mark and every figure in the temple has a meaning—so when you walk this world, everything about you has a meaning! It is no fanciful idea that there are “sermons in stones,” for there really are sermons in stones and this world is intended to teach us by everything that we see. Happy is the man who not only has the mind, but has the spirit to get these lessons from Nature! Flowers, what are they? They are but the thoughts of God solidified—God’s beautiful thoughts put into shape. Storms, what are they? They are God’s terrible thoughts written out that we may read them. Thunders, what are they? They are God’s powerful emotions just opened that men may hear them. The world is the materializing of God’s thoughts, for the world is a thought in God’s eyes. He made it first from a thought that came from His own mighty mind and everything in the majestic temple that He has made has a meaning!
In this temple there are four evangelists. As we have four great evangelists in the Bible, so there are four evangelists in Nature—and these are the four evangelists of the seasons—spring, summer, autumn, winter.
First comes spring and what does it say? We look and we behold that by the magic touch of spring, insects which seemed to be dead begin to awaken and seeds that were buried in the dust begin to lift up their radiant forms. What does spring say? It utters its voice, it says to man, “Though you sleep, you shall rise again. There is a world in which, in a
more glorious state, you shall exist. You are but a seed, now, and you shall be buried in the dust and in a little while you shall arise.” Spring utters that part of its evangel. Then comes summer. Summer says to man, “Behold the goodness of a merciful Creator—‘He makes His sun to shine on the evil and on the good’—He sprinkles the earth with flowers, He adorns it with those gems of creation, He makes it blossom like Eden and bring forth like the Garden of the Lord.” Summer utters that. Then comes autumn. We shall hear its message. It passes and winter comes forth crowned with a coronal of ice and it tells us that there are times of trouble for man. It points to the fruits that we have stored up in autumn, and it says to us, “Man, take heed that you store up something for yourself—something against the day of wrath. Lay up for yourself the fruits of autumn, that you may be able to feed on them in winter.” And when the old year expires, its death knell tells us that man must die. And when the year has finished its evangelistic mission, there comes another to preach the same lesson again.
We are about to let autumn preach. One of these four evangelists comes forth and it says, “Is today not the wheat harvest?” We are about to take the harvest into consideration in order to learn something from it. May God’s most blessed Spirit help His feeble dust and ashes to preach the unsearchable riches of God to your souls’ profit!