Come, Ye Thankful People, Come

The pandemic canceled our entire summer’s travel plans, so my husband and I decided to plant a vegetable garden for the first time. Honestly, we needed a positive home project as we grieved heavy losses of not meeting our newborn grandson, not seeing our kids and grandchildren, and missing our planned dream vacation. 

So we planted! We watched with wonder, until the first day of harvesting. It was fun to feel the joy of harvest and eat the fruits of our labor. Thank You, God! We might have sung this traditional Thanksgiving hymn… 

Come, Ye Thankful People, Come

All the world is God’s own field,

fruit unto His praise to yield;

wheat and tares together sown

unto joy or sorrow grown;

first the blade and then the ear,

then the full corn shall appear;

Lord of harvest, grant that we

wholesome grain and pure may be.

“Come, Ye Thankful People, Come,” Alford, H., 1844

This hymn points us to tares or weeds. Yes, our gardens easily fill with weeds. As believers in Jesus Christ, we know that “God’s own field” is a fallen world of weeds right now. We feel the weeds threatening to choke us, so we praise the Lord daily as He bears us up through His Word. 

Jesus talks about weeds in Matthew 13. In our sovereign Lord’s kingdom plan, unbelievers or weeds are growing with us now, but He promises the weeds will be “gathered and burned with fire…at the end of the age” (Mt. 13:40 ESV). 

Final harvest at the end of the age

For the Lord our God shall come,

and shall take His harvest home;

from the field shall in that day

all offenses purge away,

give His angels charge at last

in the fire the tares to cast;

but the fruitful ears to store

in His garner evermore.

This Thanksgiving hymn weighs somber this year, as we watch a pandemic’s destructive path. Doesn’t it seem like a heavy and relevant warning more than a hymn of thanksgiving? 

We who are in Christ, who have repented and believed in His substitutionary death for our sin, who are justified and declared righteous by God because of the perfect righteousness of Jesus, our Savior, don’t need to be afraid of His judgment and harvesting. 

Then the righteous will shine like the sun in the kingdom of their Father (Mt. 13:43 ESV).

For our sake he made him to be sin who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God (2 Cor. 5:21 ESV).

We “rejoice in the hope of the glory of God” because, through Jesus Christ, “we obtained access by faith” into total ”security…grace in which we stand” (Rom. 5:2 ESV). God promises that His believing children will be glorified one day (Rom. 8:30). The harvest is coming one day, beloved in Christ. 

When the grain is ripe, at once he puts in the sickle, because the harvest has come (Mt. 3:12; Mk. 4:29).

Then I looked, and behold, a white cloud, and seated on the cloud one like a son of man, with a golden crown on his head, and a sharp sickle in his hand. And another angel came out of the temple, calling with a loud voice to him who sat on the cloud, “Put in your sickle, and reap, for the hour to reap has come, for the harvest of the earth is fully ripe.” So he who sat on the cloud swung his sickle across the earth, and the earth was reaped (Rev. 14:14-16 ESV).

Come to Jesus

Are you squeezed by the suffering of the pandemic, suffering of your church, and the evil of the world? Maybe we need to look forward with a kingdom perspective, with hope in Christ alone, instead of wringing our hands or seething in anger. 

Perhaps now, more than ever in your lifetime, do you feel an urge to boldly share about His kingdom with the suffering and dying world?

Is this a uniquely quickened time to love thirsty and desperate people by sharing the gospel of Jesus Christ and His free gift of salvation?

The longer the suffering continues, the more I’m beginning to think so! These Scriptures exhort me:

For whoever is ashamed of me and of my words in this adulterous and sinful generation, of him will the Son of Man also be ashamed when he comes in the glory of his Father with the holy angels (Mk. 8:38 ESV).

The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let the one who hears say, “Come.” And let the one who is thirsty come; let the one who desires take the water of life without price (Rev. 22:17 ESV).

Even so, Lord, quickly come,
to Thy final harvest home; 
gather Thou Thy people in, 
free from sorrow, free from sin, 
there, forever purified, 
in Thy presence to abide; 
come, with all thine angels, come, 
raise the glorious harvest home.

Come, Lord Jesus, Come

That glorious day, Jesus will return in final judgment and gather His bride together in the final harvest. We who are His will one day live in the new heaven and earth (Rev. 21) and all sorrow will disappear forever. The weeds will be gone, He will eradicate sin, and believers will forever live with Him in glorious joy! 

He will wipe away every tear from their eyes, and death shall be no more, neither shall there be mourning, nor crying, nor pain anymore, for the former things have passed away (Rev. 21:4 ESV).

Oh Lord, thank you! Please bring forth Your fruit in our lives as we abide in You, seek You, and share the gospel with others during this unique Thanksgiving and Christmas season. Give us a quickened love for others in this season of suffering. We humbly thank You for what You have done through the person and work of Jesus Christ in His perfect life, death and resurrection. In His rescuing name, amen.

This week, I am sharing a Thanksgiving playlist to encourage us by thanking Him for His amazing grace in giving us salvation. We are His now and we will be with Him in all of glorious eternity! Hallelujah! I pray that the songs will strengthen us all to thank Jesus, Lord of the harvest, as the weeds of the world threaten to choke us. May these gospel-centered songs of thanksgiving bring you into rejoicing and contagious gospel joy!

Get ready, dear readers, December playlists will burst into exalting our Savior, Jesus Christ!

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