Yesterday I decided that it was high time I learned to harvest rice! After all, I’ve been here in Asia for almost three years and haven’t yet tried it! I was so excited about it that I was up before the normal time and had breakfast early.
This is what I saw when I arrived.

The field was definitely ready to be harvested, some of the rice stalks had already fallen over and were laying in the water instead of standing up straight like proper rice! Well, not wanting to waste any time I grabbed a scythe and went out into the field. After watching the pros for a few seconds I decided that this didn’t look all that hard, and confidently began making cuts of my own.

And then it happened! I cut my finger instead of the rice I meant to cut! Oh my, as I walked toward the pump to wash the cut, the others around me cried out blood! blood! They thought that it must hurt greatly from the amount of blood that was squirting out. (I will spare you the picture of this one!) As it turned out when I got it clean it was in fact a small cut and nothing to worry about. So with that assurance I went back to work, ever so slightly more careful this time though. Here is one of the villagers who was working with us.

And these are some of our students, from Wat Preah Yesu.

We finished just one of the rice fields yesterday, but that was enough to give me a healthy respect for the villagers who know this as a way of life.
Now this harvest was a small one, but it reminds me of another harvest that Jesus spoke of in Luke 10 “Therefore said he unto them, The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he would send forth labourers into his harvest.”  Jesus was not talking about a harvest of wheat or rice here, He was talking about a harvest of souls for the kingdom of God. He is inviting us all to join with Him in the labours and the blessings of this harvest. Now the choice is up to you, are you going to say with the prophet of long ago, “Here am I; send me.”?  Or are you going to sit back and let the rice fall into the water, “to be trodden under foot of men”?