“So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God who gives the growth.”
1 Corinthians 3:7
Several years ago, I mentored a young woman over the course of three years about Christ and the gospel. I had taken her discipleship as a personal responsibility and was very invested in her working out her faith. After about three years, she decided to be baptized into Christ. I happened to be out of town that week. I wasn’t able to be there to baptize her. I wasn’t even able to be there to see and celebrate with her. Honestly, I felt cheated, like I deserved that. As if it were my own accomplishment or my own victory. It was wrong of me, a moment of selfishness and vanity in what should’ve been a moment of thanksgiving and praise to God.
This is always the story that comes into my head when I read this verse. It reminds me just how off base I was to feel cheated that I didn’t get to be the one to baptize her. Paul reminds us that it is neither the one who plants the first seed who matters, nor the one who waters it, nor the one who fertilizes it, but God, who makes it grow. Of course, all of the people before had been God’s tool to bring about growth, but without God there never would have been any plant in the first place.
Have you ever wished you could see how your donations are helping a person or a cause? Have you ever wanted to know if the money you gave that homeless person ever actually helped them? Have you ever wished you could know whether the encouragement you gave led a person to Christ? I definitely have, I think most of us probably have felt this way or have felt something similar. We want to know if what we’re doing is actually working. We want to see the end result of our sacrifice. We want tangible rewards.
What Paul is telling us is that it’s not ours to see, to feel, to touch. It’s not our place to reap the harvest, it’s God’s.
Don’t worry about the reward. Don’t worry about the end result. Do the part that God has ordained for you to do, and trust that he will provide the growth. Plant the seed. Tell someone the gospel, disciple someone, give to someone in need, encourage someone, and be content with not knowing the end result of that action. Know that you are an instrument of God’s will, and that he will use you for good things. One day, in heaven, I believe we will receive the full reward and more.
Prayer:
Father,
Help us not to be so self-centered and inwardly focused as to want results for our own sake. Help us not to make discipleship into some kind of competition, or the gospel into some kind of personal glorification tool. I pray that you would use as a tool for your Kingdom and that we will be content to do our part and to await our reward in heaven.
In Jesus’ Name,
Amen.
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