Most people have looked at their lives carefully and realized that no matter how favorable their circumstances currently are, they have immense unused abilities and feel that they would like be, do, and have more. And a person will look at themselves and recognize a seed that has the potential to grow into something wonderful. That seed might be a talent, or a skill, or a calling, or a passion, or whatever ability that only that person knows in their heart of hearts.
But often when the thought comes, a person might become uncertain and decide to postpone pondering it for another more opportune moment. This is understandable since with all the things that people have to do in just a single day, it can never be the right time to start developing a long cherished, yet untapped talent. However, this is similar to a farmer who retrieves a seed from the granary, looks at the current dry season and postpones the planting until he is surer of the weather conditions. But did you know that most successful farming often requires that seeds be planted in the dry season in anticipation for the rains?
The abundant provisions of nature make in unnecessary for a farmer to worry about how a seed will propagate itself. The farmer’s job is to prepare the land, put the seed into the ground, and then wait. When the time is right, the seed will stir to life and shoot from the ground as a tiny fragile seedling. The seedling will then grow to become a tree and then develop flowers. The flowers will then turn into seeds and will be ready to spread.
When the seeds are ready, nature once again has ingenious ways for spreading them far and wide. Some trees have seeds that are dispersed by the wind, others are eaten by animals and carried in their stomachs, others float in water, while others explode from their pods and are scattered quite a distance from the source.
When we look into ourselves and recognize a seed – say a talent – that we feel the need to propagate, our job is to assume the role of the farmer and plant the seed. Once the seed is in the ground, let God provide the rain, the sun, and the air in the periods and quantities that are favorable for our seed to grow into a magnificent tree. Then the tree will flower and produce seeds and once again God will provide a suitable mechanism for transporting the seeds into the world.
There is the farmer who holds on to his seeds since he has no guarantee that the weather conditions will ever be right. There is the farmer who plants his seeds and then proceeds to bite him fingernails as he looks at past unsuitable weather patterns and worries about the future. There is the farmer who plants his seeds with a prayer and trusts God to provide him with all the resources required for every single seed to multiply many times over.
Take a hard look at your seed - talent, or a skill, or a calling, or a passion – and decide what kind of a farmer you want to be.
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