During a month of sickness, I watched as my apple tree dropped onto my lawn the best crop of apples it ever produced. I was too weak to harvest them, and my kids were overloaded with schoolwork and music activities. My husband was doing double duty as it was.
Each week, more apples ended up on the ground. I kept thinking I’d get well and be able to harvest them before they all went to waste, but every time I thought I was healing, I’d take a turn for the worse.
Finally, when just about every apple was on the ground, the weather turned warm and I had enough strength to gather from the ground as many decent apples as I could find.
I took a large laundry basket and a bucket -- and began to sort. Many apples were large this year. I would find some that were large and unblemished, and I quickly set them in the laundry basket. Others were split or pitted and I dumped them into the bucket.
Sometimes, I’d come to an apple that looked robust on the surface, only to turn it and find ants eating up the other side. Or I’d find one that looked firm and crisp but then I’d notice a very small hole and could see that just under the surface, it was rotting.
Occasionally, I’d find one that looked misshapen, and I’d be about to toss it into the bucket when I saw that, despite its odd shape, it was healthy and crisp. Into the basket it would go with the good apples. Sometimes an apple would have a mark, but it was only a surface scratch, and the apple was still quite fit for a pie.
As I sorted through the apples beneath my tree, I thought of Jesus’ parable in Matthew 13. The harvesters wanted to know if they should gather the weeds before the crop was grown, but Jesus says no. They might accidently uproot the good seed with the tares. He wants none lost. None. He says to wait; then, at harvest, they can first throw out the bad and then carefully choose the good.
He doesn’t want a single good apple lost in the rooting out of bad apples.
We are valuable to Him. So valuable that he won’t risk losing us in his haste to destroy the work of the wicked one. Even though bad and good grow together for a time, so much so that we sometimes question God: Didn’t you plant good seed? Why is there bad here? Even so, he allows his reputation to be held in question for producing the bad rather than destroy a single apple with potential for pie or apple strudel.
Each week, more apples ended up on the ground. I kept thinking I’d get well and be able to harvest them before they all went to waste, but every time I thought I was healing, I’d take a turn for the worse.
Finally, when just about every apple was on the ground, the weather turned warm and I had enough strength to gather from the ground as many decent apples as I could find.
I took a large laundry basket and a bucket -- and began to sort. Many apples were large this year. I would find some that were large and unblemished, and I quickly set them in the laundry basket. Others were split or pitted and I dumped them into the bucket.
Sometimes, I’d come to an apple that looked robust on the surface, only to turn it and find ants eating up the other side. Or I’d find one that looked firm and crisp but then I’d notice a very small hole and could see that just under the surface, it was rotting.
Occasionally, I’d find one that looked misshapen, and I’d be about to toss it into the bucket when I saw that, despite its odd shape, it was healthy and crisp. Into the basket it would go with the good apples. Sometimes an apple would have a mark, but it was only a surface scratch, and the apple was still quite fit for a pie.
As I sorted through the apples beneath my tree, I thought of Jesus’ parable in Matthew 13. The harvesters wanted to know if they should gather the weeds before the crop was grown, but Jesus says no. They might accidently uproot the good seed with the tares. He wants none lost. None. He says to wait; then, at harvest, they can first throw out the bad and then carefully choose the good.
He doesn’t want a single good apple lost in the rooting out of bad apples.
We are valuable to Him. So valuable that he won’t risk losing us in his haste to destroy the work of the wicked one. Even though bad and good grow together for a time, so much so that we sometimes question God: Didn’t you plant good seed? Why is there bad here? Even so, he allows his reputation to be held in question for producing the bad rather than destroy a single apple with potential for pie or apple strudel.
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