The “Harvest” Mentality – Part 1

There seems to be a “harvest” mentality amongst many Christians, even grace Christians: this is based around various Bible verses that promise wealth, particularly Galatians 6:9.

⁷ Do not be deceived, God is not mocked; for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. ⁸ For he who sows to his flesh will of the flesh reap corruption, but he who sows to the Spirit will of the Spirit reap everlasting life. ⁹ And let us not grow weary while doing good, for in due season we shall reap if we do not lose heart.

Galatians 6:7-9

During the Word of Faith stage I went through for several years, I got caught-up in a “harvest” mentality: I became convinced that I would reap a harvest of wealth, power and miracles – if I developed a certain level of faith and adhered to certain principles and formulas. I was told that faith came by the Word of God, which is based on Romans 10:17. So I assumed that the Bible was the Word of God and I had to understand it and study it in order to have faith. I was told that faith and conviction was the same thing, so I needed to know what was right in scripture, I had to rightly divide the Word, so that I could have faith. After all, how could I be sure of something that I did not even know what right or wrong or did not even understand?

So I thought that I had to have answers for everything and that I needed to persuade other people to see things from my perspective. However, this caused me to be overbearing and highly opinionated at times and to desire after control and influence. If I could have this type of “faith”, I assumed, and then I would be able to reap a “harvest”. Can you see how the wrong concept of faith as portrayed by the institutional church, enmeshes with the neurotic temperament, and thus, compounds it? No wonder the world tends to look upon Christians as being unpleasant and opinionated people.

The church, of course, was also quick to seize upon the concept of tithing as a means of reaping a harvest. This “harvest” mentality stirs-up the fantasies that people have as they feel encouraged to think about all the things that they will reap from God for their obedience and faith. It sort of makes it all worth it because they are also upholding a vision of God that is angry, demanding and judgemental.

When You Fail to Reap…

All the while, when you do not reap your “harvest” you are told to persevere and to have faith and not to lose heart (as Galatians 6:9 seems to encourage). It is little wonder that a large component of the preaching we hear in church is what I call pep-talks. It really boggles my mind how Christians will allow preachers to intimidate and patronise them – all because they believe that the person on stage behind the pulpit is closer to God than they are; that the pastor knows more than them and that they hold all the answers to an abundant life. I used to love listening to Joyce Meyer, but now; I wince when I hear the way in which she patronises people. I think she means well and she does teach some true and amazing things – but in amongst all the good stuff is an awful lot of intimidation.

I think you can reach a point when you suddenly realise that you are not going to be the next Billie Graham or Benny Hinn, you’re not going to have your own intercontinental jet plane, performing miracles before a huge audience of adoring fans. I think you come to a place in which you get the feeling that it would really be good for your mental and emotional health if you were to climb down from your cloud and embrace real life. I think this reality-check can be too much to bear for some Christians. We would rather hold onto the fantasy rather than to come to terms with the fact that the institutional church has fed us unrealistic expectations, or even lies, all of this time.

The Lust of Sensationalism

Darin Hufford of the Free Believers Network discusses the subject of over-sensationalism in the church in the podcast episode entitled podcast The Lust of Sensationalism. This is a wonderful, long awaited podcast that I feel picks-up from Darin's blog on Spiritual Porn Addiction. This podcast has helped me to come to terms with the sheer wackiness that we simply accept without question in Pentecostal circles. It is sad but true that sensationalism is like a drug to the frustrated, insecure and gullible Christian who is seeking more in life.

Famous Prayer Quotes

 

"True prayer is the breathing of the life of God in the soul of man"

– Octavius Winslow (1808-1848).

“Don’t try to reach God with your understanding; that is impossible. Reach Him in love; that is possible.”

– Carlo Carretto.

“The first purpose of prayer is to know God.”

– Charles L. Allen.

“By prayer, the ability is secured to feel the law of love, to speak according to the law of love, and to do everything in harmony with the law of love.”

– E.M. Bounds

“The whole meaning of prayer is that we may know God.”

– Oswald Chambers.

“Prayer honours God, acknowledges His being, exalts His power, adores His providence, secures His aid.”

– E.M. Bounds.

“Prayer crowns God with the honour and glory due to His name, and God crowns prayer with assurance and comfort. The most praying souls are the most assured souls.”

– Thomas B. Brooks.

“The right way to pray, then, is any way that allows us to communicate with God.”

– Colleen Townsend Evans.

“Prayer is the force as real as terrestrial gravity. As a physician, I have seen men, after all other therapy had failed, lifted out of disease and melancholy by the serene effort of prayer. Only in prayer do we achieve that complete and harmonious assembly of body, mind and spirit which gives the frail human reed its unshakable strength.”

– Dr. Alexis Carrel.

“Prayer is not merely an occasional impulse to which we respond when we are in trouble: prayer is a life attitude.”

– Walter A. Mueller.

“Do not pray by heart, but with the heart.”

– Anon.

“Prayers not felt by us are seldom heard by God.”

– Phillip Henry.

“Many pray with their lips for that for which their hearts have no desire.”

– Jonathan Edwards.

“In prayer the lips ne’er act the winning part, without the sweet concurrence of the heart.”

– Robert Herrick.

“When you pray, rather let your heart be without words than your words without heart.”

– John Bunyan.

“I pray on the principle that wine knocks the cork out of a bottle. There is an inward fermentation, and there must be a vent.”

– Henry Ward Beecher.

“Prayer does not change God, but it changes him who prays.”

– Søren Kierkegaard.

Photo Prayer is the Language courtesy of lel4nd

Prayer in the Light of Grace

I've long asked myself and others about the role of prayer in the light of grace. We have tended to see prayer as a means of changing the way God sees us and the circumstances that we face in life.

Word of Faith preaching has falsely given believers the understanding that they can dictate to God what He should do in their lives – how and when He should bless them according to what they believe is best for them. Insecure Christians believe that they can circumvent their insecurities and their warped perceptions of God - if they pray long and hard enough - what nonsense. I fell for that misconception and struggled with it for over ten years.

The truth of the matter is that God is already inclined to accept us, bless us and to guide us through the good and the bad times.

Prayer, I believe, is simply the natural expression of the heart of a person who is in covenant relationship with God. This kind of prayer cannot be learned from a book – it is something that must be allowed to develop and be expressed by an individual as he learns more about God in his own personal way and develops an intimacy with Him. Too many times we try to use prayer as a formula to “move the hand of God”. Yet we fail to comprehend the fact that God already has a plan for our lives, that He accepts and loves us as we are that He will meet our needs without our coaxing and striving through prayer and works.

God’s plan for our lives will unfold naturally – if we allow it. Our well intended means of trying to “help” God only makes matters worse. The test, I believe, is in how natural, and enjoyable, the expression of our words are before Him. Empty words recited verbatim from the latest Christian book will do little to change the heart of God and to improve our lives in some way.

And another thing: why do Christians try to ask God to give them those things that the Bible says we already have in Christ? Surely, we have made prayer into a ritual, an obligation that we ought to fulfil? Prayer has become, to a great extent, the expression of the wants of insecure Christians.

The Bible tells us that we have already been blessed with every spiritual blessing (Ephesians 1:3). Furthermore, Jesus Himself told us that every material need we have would be added to us – when we seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness (Matthew 6:33). So why is it that we ask God in prayer so often for those things the Bible says we already have?

¹⁶ For out of His fullness (abundance) we have all received [all had a share and we were all supplied with] one grace after another and spiritual blessing upon spiritual blessing and even favor upon favor and gift [heaped] upon gift.

John 1:16 AMP

Photo Prayer 2 courtesy of khrawlings

Faith and Prayer as an Expression of Insecurity

I have come to understand that the way we approach faith and prayer is quite often from a standpoint of insecurity. When a person is insecure they often seek to control the way things happen.

Insecurity leads a person to establish specific expectations. When things do not happen exactly the way that you expected, then you become frustrated and disappointed. It is during such times of disappointment that you can read a whole lot of meaning into the situation that has no solid basis whatsoever.

Say for instance, a person might have a job interview lined-up. The person is anxious by nature, and as expected, the person is rather nervous about the forthcoming interview. In this anxious state, the person sees this job interview as the only means of fulfilling his needs. He feels that if he does not pass the interview, he will feel like a failure and he will be distraught as he believes that he will not get his needs met as a consequence.

The day of the interview comes and as expected, he is decidedly nervous. The interview ends and it just so happens that he did not pass the interview. Understandably, the person is disappointed, but he takes the occasion to mean that he is a failure and he is overcome by a sense of dread that he will never get a job, and therefore, will struggle to get his needs met.

If an insecure person such as this gets hold of faith teaching, he will be delighted that there is a means available by which he can control the power of God at will. The security of an insecure person comes through the belief that he has control over what does or does not happen in his life. He will read of testimonies of people who applied God’s Word to a particular situation in order to bring about a specific outcome and meet a specific need. This approach is perfectly scriptural.

But the mistake that people often make is in trying to use faith in order to make specific demands on God in order to control circumstances – when it is done out of a sense of insecurity. Faith works by love and there is no fear in love. If a person fears, they will not have love, and therefore, they will not have faith.