Balance...Harmony

BALANCE....I have been thinking about balance in my life and how I need balance and as many of you  know how unbalanced I am:)   However, in my readings the other day I came across HARMONY!   Being a lover of music--HARMONY just seems more like my word.   So I want to be in harmony more!  Balance seems to bring to mind that I am walking a tight rope and one thing out of balance and I fall.   But I was reminded that one does not HARMONIZE alone!     So I ask the Lord to sing loudly so that I may sing a long so when I am off key....He will still make my song beautiful!

I wrote this awhile back and I am still on this journey but it seemed as though I was letting the worries of life "change my song"--my harmony.    I asked for words...words to help me.   And so I have been reading in my Living Bible everyday and have been going through the New Testament.   I was in Luke but then for "some reason" skipped and read Romans for 6 days.  However, I had went back to Luke soooo on this very day at the very time that I was asking for words (Yes this would be my point!   I love it when these little "coincidences" seem to happen:)....  ANYWAY I read the following in Luke 8:5-15, and living in the country around farms...these words touched me even more.

"A farmer went out to his field to sow grain.   As he scattered the seed on the ground, some of it fell on a footpath and was trampled on; and the birds came and ate it as it lay exposed.  Other seed fell on shallow soil with rock beneath.  This seed began to grow, but soon withered and died for lack of moisture.  Other seed landed in thistle patches, and the young grain stalks were soon choked out.  Still other fell on fertile soil; this seed grew and produced a crop one hundred times as large as he had planted." (As he was giving this illustration, he said, "If anyone has listening ears, use them now!")

His apostles asked him what the story meant.

He replied, God has granted you to know the meaning of these parables, for they tell a great deal about the Kingdom of God.  But these crowds hear the words and do not understand, just as the ancient prophets predicted.

This is its meaning: The seed is God's message to men.  The hard path where some seed  fell represents the hard hearts of those who hear the words of God, but then the devil comes and steals the words away and prevents people from believing and being saved.  The stony ground represents those who enjoy listening to sermons, but somehow the message never really gets through to them and doesn't take root and grow.   They know the message is true, and sort of believe for awhile, but when the hot winds of persecution blow, they lose interest.  The seed among the thorns represent those who listen and believe God's words but whose faith afterwards is choked out by worry and riches and the responsibilities and pleasures of life.  And so they are never able to help anyone else to believe the Good News.

But the good soil represents honest, good-hearted people.  They listen to God's words and cling to them and steadily spread them to others who also soon believe."

How I love parables and stories as they seem to be how I learn best--how I think.  So I think how I would like to be in the good soil.   But I see myself sometimes with the harsh winds and the thorns.   Being around farming and agriculture, I think of times during the hard winds...BUT even these "crops" are given water and rains to BALANCE to HARMONIZE to overcome the harsh winds.   And the one that seemed to talk to me the "thorns"...But I know God can take care of my thorns and so even if my soil isn't how it should be...I think the Great Farmer is helping my"land" be able to produce the "crop" that He planted in me.   And with any harvest...the more you put into your crop...the more it grows!

May today you have harmony in your life and as my friend shared with me not just harmony but HOLY HARMONY!

lyp