Last year my wife and I bought the girls some pumpkins for the fall time. We carved them out, decorated them, and had a great fall harvest type night. Well after a week or so the pumpkin started to rot so I took it out back by our trash can and laid it on the ground against the house. Being the in-a-hurry/not-liking-to-take-the-trash-out-guy I forgot to set the pumpkin with the rest of the trash for the garbage man. Well…this happened for a few weeks…ok…actually all winter. I kept forgetting about it, then it got so nasty I kept telling myself to get it later when I had some gloves. Then winter came and the snow sort of made it disappear and eventually it just rotted away into nothing. My wife, did however, finally remove the evidence come spring time at the beginning of the year (thank you Erin!)

Well, thinking that the saga of the nasty pumpkin was over we moved on with our life. Then when summer hit, all the sudden, a pumpkin patch started to sprout out of our ground. Not just a little patch a HUGE 6ft area that began to harvest great pumpkins for us this year! WOW, we didn’t even know that this nasty pumpkin we let rot outside our house would sink into the ground and one day grow into a pumpkin patch. Well, the leftover seeds within it got into the ground and planted our very own fall harvest pumpkins.

The lesson we learned…You never know what seeds you are planting! The Biblical principle is always at work…You reap what you sow. Sometimes you don’t even know you are sowing though. Take us for example, we had no clue what we were doing. I asked my wife if it was legal for us to have a pumpkin patch within city limits. She laughed at me, and then realized I was serious, then she really laughed and assured me we wouldn’t go to prison for having pumpkins in our backyard, I was relieved!

You never know what seeds you are planting that may come take months, years, decades to harvest. There are great opportunities that come up in my life to this day that were planted over 10 years ago. I think about the special bamboo tree in China that serves as a great example of dedication. Once planted the bamboo does not grow for four years. All during those four years it has to be watered and cultivated, but it doesn’t grow. The fifth year it does. It often reaches a height of 90 feet. But if neglected during the first 4 years it never will grow to reach it’s full potential.

Robert Louis Stevenson said,

 “Judge each day not by the harvest you reap but by the seeds you plant.”

God measures our life by our contribution not our consumption. In my book Life Rules this is Rule #2 to live by…CONTRIBUTE More Than You CONSUME. This life rule is one that will enable us to receive a great harvest but only if we are faithful to keep planting. God blesses those that are faithful to plant seeds of impact and service to others. What you make happen for others, God tends to make happen for you!

Never underestimate the seeds you are planting, even when it seems there is no harvest…yet! Most people give up to early and realize there could have been more too late. Whatever it is that you are planting in…your job, your spouse, your kids, your career, your opportunities, your church, your ministry, your dreams, etc… KEEP PLANTING and don’t give up! One day you will see a harvest!

Check out this blog post I did about Sow Your Reaping…

Oh yeah…here are the pictures of our legal pumpkin patch…