Greetings,
Today I am back in Bellingham. It was great being in my home church yesterday after being gone for five Sundays. Thank You Pastor Jonathan for another great day at Alife!
I have been addressing the subject of the Law of Harvest. True harvest supplies life and a future to others beyond our own lives. Harvest is not a matter of success, but one of significance. God wants us to be people of significance. What is the difference between being people of significance and successful people in life? Successful people are not always significant people and significant people don’t always look the most successful. Our greatest example is found in the natural life of Jesus Christ. He lived for 33½ years and by the standards of success it appeared that He was a failure. By the standard of significance Jesus changed the entire world. We know that to be a huge success, but by appearances it didn’t seem that way during His life upon the earth. Let me give you some definitions for success and significance:
Success:
- the achievement of something planned or attempted
- impressive achievement, especially the attainment of fame, wealth, or power
- something that turns out as planned or intended
- somebody who has a record of achievement, especially in gaining wealth, fame, or power
Significance:
- the quality of having importance or being regarded as having great meaning
- implied or intended meaning
- status as a statistical value that is not accidental or random (often used before a noun)
(Encarta® World English Dictionary © 1999 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Developed for Microsoft by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc.)
It is possible to achieve things that we plan or attempt to do in life. Those achievements can be very impressive and even gain us fame, wealth, or power. Things can turn out as we plan them to and we can be people of success, but we may not be significant people. Successful people can be self-fulfilling. We can say we are living according to the Law of Harvest in our lives when we are really only attaining the personal goals that we have set to succeed in during our lives. Remember, harvest is for export. Harvest brings life to others and causes them to become what they could not be before. It is bread that transforms the world to become more than it was before. Harvest is for seed to the generations that follow. To attain true harvest in life we must be significant people.
Significant people impact the lives of others. Each of our lives is intended to have great meaning. We were born for the nations and the generations. We were born to impact the world with the life of Christ. It is not an accident; it is our destiny in Christ. When God called the man Abram and transformed him to become Abraham the father of our faith, it was all about being significant. There were four parts to the good news preached to Abraham.
Genesis 22:15-18
1) In blessing I will bless you
2) In multiplying I will multiply
3) Your descendants shall possess the gate of their enemies.
4) In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed
These four things were all about Abraham’s ability to impact the world that he lived in. These four promises are our promises today. These four things empower us to become significant in this world. Jesus Christ made a way for us to fulfill the commission of this good news in the world in which we live. We are born again in Christ to impact the world by being a blessing, expanding through multiplication, possessing the gates that influence the generations, and see the nations blessed in Jesus name.
Jesus told a parable that well describes the purpose of our lives. It is the parable of the talents (Mt. 25:14–29). A talent was an amount of monetary trade. In weight it was the equivalent of 1200 ounces of gold. In today’s market, that would equate to over 1.5 million dollars per talent. That is a lot of cash! In the story, one man was given 5 talents. That is almost 7.6 million dollars. Another was given 2 talents. That is over 3 million dollars. The least was given 1 talent, about 1.5 million dollars. Each was given an amount according to their ability. The parable is about handling money, but it is even more about handling our lives. Our lives are meant to impact the world in which we live. We weren’t given lives simply to live for ourselves. We are to be a blessing, bring multiplication, see our descendants possess what couldn’t be possessed before, and see all the nations of the earth blessed.
The man with 5 made 10, the man with 2 made 4, and the man with 1 kept 1. In monetary value it would be the same as saying the man with 7.6 million dollars turned it into 15.2 million. The man with more than 3 million dollars increased it to 6 million. The man with 1.5 million dollars kept it as 1.5 million. He was afraid that the master would simply take any gain when he came anyway. He was not mindful of being significant in any way. When the master did come he took the 1.5 million from the man who failed to increase what had been given him and gave it to the man with 15.2 million dollars. No doubt the man with the most impacted the world in a big way. He probably had many employees. He no doubt affected the economy of every one within his sphere of influence. He was a significant man. The master told both the man who had doubled the 5 talents and the man who had doubled the 2 talents to enter into the joy of their Lord. The joy of their Lord was to impact the world with the purposes of Gods kingdom. These two men proved to be significant and could change the world in which they lived.
The man with 1 talent failed to see the purpose for what he had been given. He lived a life filled with fear. Living fear-based lives will rob us of being significant. This parable is about money, but it is a story about much more than money. It is all about the purpose of our lives in that which we have been given. We are called to be significant people. Remember, harvest is meant to bring supply to the world in which we live and to provide seed for the generations to come. We are meant to change the world in which we live. We are not here to simply succeed in seeing our needs met. We are to make investments for the future of the world. Investments beyond our daily needs will bring blessings to others. We must live to bless others, to multiply all that has been given to us, to see our descendants possess what could not be possessed before, and to see the families of the earth blessed because of our inheritance. This is what significant people do.
Significant people think:
- Not my will but Yours be done
- I give my life for the increase
- I live with a generational mindset
- God will be glorified
You are not one in a million. You are not even one in seven billion. You are one in eternity. You have been given a measure in life to change the world by the uniqueness of all that has been given to you. Choose to live your life as a significant person.
Blessings,
Ted J. Hanson
