[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":4},["ShallowReactive",2],{"reading-0703":3},"JULY 3\r\nDoth the plowman plow all day to sow? (Isa. 28.24).\r\nOne day in early summer I walked past a beautiful meadow. The grass\r\nwas as soft and thick and fine as an immense green Oriental rug. In one comer stood a fine old tree, a sanctuary for numberless wild\r\nbirds; the crisp, sweet air was full of their happy songs. Two cows lay in the shade, the very picture of content\r\nDown by the roadside the saucy dandelion mingled his gold with the royal purple of the wild violet\r\nI leaned against the fence for a long time, feasting my hungry\r\neyes, and thinking in my soul that God never made a fairer spot than my lovely meadow.\r\nThe next day I passed that way again, and lo! the hand of the\r\n\r\ndespoiler had been there. A plowman and his great plow, now\r\nstanding Idle in the furrow, had in a day wrought a terrible havoc. Instead of the green grass there was turned up to view the ugly,   bare, brown earth; instead of the singing birds there were only a   few hens industriously scratching for worms. Gone were the\r\ndandelion and the pretty violet I said in my grief, \"How could any one spoil a thing so fair?\"\r\nThen my eyes were opened by some unseen hand, and I saw a vision,\r\na vision of a field of ripe corn ready for the harvest. I could see\r\nthe giant heavily laden stalks in the autumn sun; I could almost\r\nhear the music of the wind as it would sweep across the golden\r\ntassels. And before I was aware, the brown earth took on a splendor it had not had the day before.\r\nOh, that we might always catch the vision of an abundant harvest\r\nwhen the great Master Plowman comes, as He often does, and furrows through our very souls, uprooting and turning under that which we\r\nthough most fair, and leaving for our tortured gaze only the bare and the unbeautiful. --Selected.\r\nWhy should I start at the plough of my Lord, that maketh the deep\r\nfurrows on my soul? I know He is no idle husbandman, He purposeth a crop. --Samuel Rutherford.",1783499793173]