If I asked you what comes to mind when I talk about sowing seeds, I think most of us would think of farming and gardening. I grew up in the farming world, and I’m grateful for my understanding of sowing and harvesting. It helped me better understand the lessons I learned later in life about the choices I make.
In gardening, you sow a particular seed to get the crop you want. The seed you plant is the exact crop you will harvest. (How you care for your crop is essential to the quality of your harvest, but that’s a lesson for another day.)
You can also sow seeds for the quality of your life and the direction of your future. There are seeds we plant and harvest that impact our spiritual and emotional well being.
Even though I understood sowing and harvesting in the gardening world, I had very little understanding of what it meant in my emotional and spiritual life.
I found myself in a place I became all too familiar with asking the question, “How did I get here?” You might be familiar with this place.
The not so simple answer is: I found myself in that place because of the seeds I sowed, and the seeds, in this case, are the choices I make.
Put another way; our choices are the seeds we sow.
Our choices give us a life of great satisfaction or a life of disappointment.
The seasons of my life have given me clarity about the choices I’ve made and how they’ve impacted my life. It’s become more apparent to me that every single choice I make has a result – negative or positive. I’m in control of every single one.
It may be a little hard to take on that responsibility because society tells us differently. We’re told to believe – “It’s gotta be someone’s else’s fault!”
My life, as it is, may be the result of someone else’s choice. This is true to a great degree. There are choices others make that impact us.
But, that’s only one side of the equation. There’s more!
The “more” I have embraced in the last 15 years is I do have a choice in everything that happens to me, and that choice is – How will I respond?
No matter what someone else said or did to me, how I respond is always my choice.
I can always plant seeds of kindness, love, and mercy, or I can plant seeds of hate, anger, and blame. It’s all up to me.
Let me be clear in saying, I have made choices that have impacted others negatively, and I’ve also planted seeds that have produced a positive harvest. The negative seeds produced a harvest I could hardly live with. The positive seeds produced a harvest I could easily live with.
The choices we sow produce a life that is either meaningful or meaningless. The choices we make, create a better world for ourselves and those around us, or create a world of pain, and hostility.
I know I’m not responsible for the pain inflicted on me, but I am responsible for my response to it.
I can blame others and be bitter for the entirety of my life, or I can make a choice to respond in a way that will make me better.
Take the time to reflect on your seed planting. What are the seeds you sow?
If we look at seeds as choices, we might see more clearly the power of seeds. Have the seeds you’ve planted produced the life you’ve dreamed of having? We always reap what we sow. The next time you drop a seed into the ground, think about what that seed will produce.
I love the lyrics in a song that say, “Sow mercy, sow grace, sow kindness, sow faith.” It encourages me to sow positive things.
What you sow can produce a harvest all your heart has been dreaming. As parents, pastors, teachers, business leaders, and influencers in every walk of life, it is our responsibility to sow well.
