Good morning my friends, yep, that's right its Tuesday this overcast day. By the way, do you know what was used to rub pencil marks off of paper before pencils had erasers? Was it sand paper; sponges; steel wool; or was it table bread? Make a guess!
Tuesday 6/13
Prov. 31:16 "She goes to inspect a field and buys it; with her earnings she plants a vineyard."
This verse points out her resourceful endeavors, to invest & reinvest are common efforts for the virtuous woman. This points out the confidence in decision making efforts. Many times in this day a controlling family member would die or become incapacitated & would need someone to purchase & take care of the land, sometimes permanently other times just frr as while. Making the land productive & fruit bearing, etc. leaving the homestead for the family to live in, while children were growing up.
This sort of arrangement is probably what this passage is talking about. In my youthful years my Uncle did this several time, he would lease tillable acres for a split in the profits. I can remember plowing land and readying it for planting, he would have fertilizer spread and then have me turn under the ground before the winter rainy season began.
He worked as a grocery truck driver for Armour Star delivering sides of beef to them. So during the summertime or week ends I would work for him, as I had a license, back then you could obtain a agricultural license as the age of 12. To get to school & then to the farm endeavors your family was involved in. I always enjoyed these projects, my uncle Leonard was a cleaver farmer, and he knew how to be helpful to farmers down on their luck, and at the same time due to his contacts and other community efforts help friends get back on their feet.
Sometimes I would work for a share in the crops success if there were any, but I just mostly enjoyed driving the tractor on those cool summer mornings. I bought a radio & would listen to music and plow acres of land, or rake it for rock removal, etc. This sort of work is so refreshing as you turned the soil, then planted, then witnessed the ground producing crops, Then harvest time was exciting as you saw the returns for your efforts.
The sort of efforts this passage is speaking of is much the same, they used much more antiquated implements, ox & plow, rather than tractor & plow. But none the less the wonder of working the ground, then planting the seed & seeing crops respond to this preparation with growth & crops. What a thrill would be experienced when God caused the land to prosper.
I am sure as the virtuous woman taught her children this process of investment, they experienced this same thrill. These results were on their mind as they began the hard work of preparing the soil & planting the seed.
So Go With God for throughout your life He is preparing & planting seeds in others lives for you to care for and then share in the harvests of lives that came to the point of surrendering to Christ. There is no greater thrill. Let Him guide you, just as my uncle guided me on those first few endeavors. As I experienced the results, what joy was the result. So also as you invest your efforts in others lives, you won't regret the joy that results from your efforts. As you follow in His ways you may not see immediate results, but at harvest time (heaven) you will rejoice.
If you don't believe me, just ask brother Sheldon he has experienced this extreme blessing mant times in his life. Ask Becky in her work endeavors at IEHP she experienced this thrill of harvest in the lives of the many nurses she planted the seed, watered their hearts & then she witnessed the fruit of her endeavors.
Wild guess table bread