Today is a powerful day. A total solar eclipse, a new moon and the first Harvest holiday!! How will you be celebrating?
I think we're going to pick blackberries, bake some Lugh cookies, read some stories from Circle Round, read some scriptures and reflect on what we are harvesting. I know I planted a lot of seeds this year and I'm now having to deal with the fruits thereof.
I planted the seed of Sunstone and now I'm busy preparing for that trip (we leave in 4 days!!)
I planted the seed of joining the LDS church and now I am thankful for the blessings I am wreaping but it's a garden I must tend more carefully than I first imagined. Just sorting it all out somedays is a full time job and is mentally exhasting. Once it's sorted though I have moments of indiscribable joy!
I planted the seed of moving to a new home but am now dealing with the fact that it was a missplanted seed and now I must prepare to move again by November 1st.
And that's all on top of the literal seeds we planeted and are now harvesting from our garden!
Sheesh! Harvesting is fun but it's a lot of work!
A Mormon Perspective:
The havest holidays!
Utah Mormon pioneers knew of the hard work required for a bountiful harvest. They named one of their early towns Bountiful, UT where they kept communal grain storage bins.
In the book of Mormon we find reference to the harvest in Alma 17:13 "..that they seperated themselves and departed one from another, trusting in the Lord that they should meet again at the close of their harvest; for they supposed that great was the work which they had undertaken."
What work have we undertaken this year? What awaits us at harvest time and have we put our faith in the Lord that we shall reap what we have sewn?
We see refence to the Lord of the Harvest in Alma 26:5; "Behold the field was ripe, and blessed are ye, for ye did thrust in the sickle, and did reap with you might, yea, all the day long did ye labor: and behold the number of your sheaves!"
Alma 26 goes on to say in verse 7; "But behold, they are in the hands of the Lord of the harvest, and they are his; and he will raise them up at the last day."
On the last day of this earth we will all reap what we have sewn and be lifted up to become one with the Lord of all creation.
Blessed Lammas!!
