A few months ago I began fertilizing my rose trees and pruning them.

At the time of doing so, I could see no sign of new growth or of any potential rosebuds forming. In fact, weeks passed and still there was no sign or evidence of any change.

It almost would seem that all the attention, fertilizer and pruning had produced no results at all.

However about a month later the shrubs were all covered with new buds, while new branches had also grown, appearing overnight. Soon my roses were in full bloom.

The Holy Spirit began speaking to me and said, “The farmer does not see anything in his field indicating that a harvest was coming after he had just sown his seed. Yet in patient waiting the time will come where his entire field will bear a rich crop, ripened and ready for the harvest.”

A few days ago someone made a comment about an individual, saying, “What a lovely, calm, gentle, and a friendly big man….” Had she however known the person she was talking about in years that had gone by, her report would certainly have been wrong.

What happened? Jesus had been sowing Himself into this man and as the years progressed, so the man was changed into becoming as the One Who had influenced him for so.many years.

Patience is key!

We all know that you cannot force a fruit to be ripened. It will however ripen, if allowed the proper time in which to do so.

It takes years to sow into the lives of our children, many times without any change seen in the immediate years to follow.

Eventually it may even look as though we have failed, but then suddenly and without warning we see them stepping up to become the very individuals, parents and responsible adults which they had rebelled against ever being,

So what is life’s greatest secret?

• Continue to do what is right consistently and faithfully.
• Receive what God pours into you of Himself so that it may grow to become a harvest in you that will bear the fruit of all that He Is and all that He has revealed of Himself in you.
• Do not fear change, rather embrace it. Change constantly and continuously as He transforms you and directs you.
• Be patient, even if you go through an extended period of sowing, or having been slowed into, when it may seem that nothing has changed. It is the virtue of patience that allows you and me the grace of “going without knowing”. At the end what was sown will produce and will bring forth after His will.
• Be faithful and consistent, content and patient, knowing that God’s harvest may be unseen, but in the unseen, it is growing to produce a bumper crop of His Goodness in you!

~ Johann van der Hoven

Johann van der Hoven has been in service of the Lord since 1991 and has hosted numerous mass revival meetings in South Africa and abroad and is a published author. He is the visionary of Fellowship of the Believers, host to “Eagle Food” Apostolic & Prophetic Seminars, and currently pioneers “Deeper Life” Revival School International, from South Africa where he resides. For more info visit www.sonsofsovereignty.com

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