Pentecost Sunday celebrates the 50th day since Easter, or as farmers and gardeners would recount, the time between the barley harvest and the wheat harvest. Mighty moments mark this day, and what better way to commemorate than to add Wheat to the Plant Guide and the A-to-Z Plants from God’s Word.
May the LORD’s mighty plan resound in your heart with the pitter-patter of poetry.
is for wheat–
earth’s finest flour milled from standing grain;
watered in the holy land
by winter and spring rains.
The ancient cereal is well-known:
wheat sprouts and forms its heads;
growing green, spikelets tufted
with beard-like awns or threads.
When starches rise and color fades,
sowing has passed into reaping.
Gather the wheat, let sheaves dry in shocks,
though ‘tis hardly a time for sleeping.
Three festivals the LORD decrees,
crop-harvests tell the story;
cereals in spring, fruits in fall–
celebrating mandatory!
Death passed us over! God delivered His people
from slavery to freedom.
The first feast commemorates the event,
the barley harvest its beacon.
Over time, the substance of our lives
becomes God’s Holiness;
His Holy Word, His Holy Spirit
bequeathed at the wheat harvest.
This second feast features two loaves of bread
made with yeast–we’ll need a bread knife–
to celebrate that we are not merely free,
but freed to live a holy life.
Yet hard work remains beyond wheat’s gathering,
once dried and stored, there’s more…
heads must be separated, wheat from chaff,
on the threshing floor.
The threshing floor, where David found Araunah–
a place not coincidental.
The LORD appeared amidst the farmer’s work,
And this ground became the temple.
Remember this, dear pilgrim, in life’s partings,
this poignant story comes back around:
Christ warned Peter he’d be sifted like wheat.
The threshing floor is holy ground.
Your faith will not fail! You are sustained
by the prayers of your Savior, one and only:
Hear him gently whisper, “Rise, Get Up”–
“Be holy because I am holy.“
Learn more about Wheat in the Plant Guide:
http://gardenndelight.wpengine.com/plant-guide/wheat/
Photo Credits:
© 2001 Monica Arellano-Ongpin “Covoni di Grano” from Flickr Creative Commons
© 2013 Shelley S. Cramm “W is for Wheat” botanical drop cap sketch
