Harvest contrasts.
The seasons have their lessons for all of us, teaching both by analogy and by contrast; for the warnings suggested by the opposition of our own condition to that of the natural world may be as instructive as the encouragements arising out of the harmony between the two. To Jeremiah the harvest came in its brightness only to show the condition of the Jews in the deeper shadow. A similar experience may occur to those of us who have no harvest-song in the soul to respond to the harvest-gladness of the world without.
I. THE MOST HOPEFUL EXTERNAL EVENT IS NO SECURITY FOR DELIVERANCE FROM THE GREATEST TROUBLES OF LIFE. Even harvest did not bring deliverance. People are too ready to rest their confidence on various indications of God in the outside world.
1. Time. The harvest is a new waymark in the course of time. Many trust blindly to time to bring them some help, while they do not stir a finger to secure it.
2. Change. The harvest indicates a new season. The sanguine are too ready to believe that any change must be for the better.
3. Material prosperity. The harvest brings bread for the body. Must it not, therefore, lay the foundation of perfect and lasting good? To those men whose "god is their belly" the harvest would seem to promise complete satisfaction.
4. Indications of the merciful kindness of God. He sends the harvest. Then, it is reasoned, he wishes to bless, and therefore will permit no harm. But experience proves the error of these anticipations, and reflection should soon detect the fallacy which underlies them. Outward events do not always correspond to inward experiences; the latter have their own separate conditions. God may deal mercifully with us now and in earthly things, but his present forbearance is no proof that we shall never suffer from his righteous wrath in the season of judgment.
II. THE MOST HOPEFUL EXTERNAL EVENT DEEPENS THE SENSE OF THE INTERNAL DISTRESS WITH WHICH IT IS CONTRASTED. The harvest past, and yet undelivered!
1. A new stage of time has gone, and the deliverance is still delayed.
2. Outside events change, but the essential condition remains unchanged.
3. Material good is enjoyed while real good is still unattained, and this makes the minor blessing seem but a mockery.
4. God is merciful, and yet we are not delivered! Some fearful evil must be at the foundation of such a strange condition.
5. A time of rest is looked for but comes not. After harvest should come rest. Distress is heightened by the disappointment of expected deliverance.
6. Approaching troubles increase the gloom of present distress. The harvest is past. Now we look forward to chill autumn, to stormy winter. Not saved in harvest! What are we to expect in less propitious times?