All things come from you and of your personal can we offer you.
WE ALL know that Christian Harvest Festivals have their roots within the biblical practice of giving to God the primary fruits of each collaboration between human beings and the remainder of creation. From the instructions for the Festival of Ingathering, in Exodus, through details for celebrating Sukkot present in Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy, right as much as the parables of Jesus, the Bible has agricultural and pastoral imagery and references running like a green thread through its many books.
In the English Church, harvest festival as we understand it today was apparently reinvented by a marketing-savvy Cornishman within the nineteenth century, although gratitude for crops safely stored and livestock born has a for much longer tradition. Our reference to our surroundings is a superb, godly thing, to be taken seriously; and our well-being is dependent upon the well-being of our planet.
I BELIEVE I actually have taken greater than 100 different “Harvest Festivals”, in contexts starting from muddy farmyards to oxygen-depleted retirement homes, and from urban primary schools to red-trousered semi-rural congregations. I actually have shared in suppers given by the owner of a giant estate to thank their employees for efforts of the previous 12 months as a record harvest is gathered in, and have struggled to search out words for communities whose livelihoods were washed away within the floods of 2007, when cheerful farmyards were transformed into wastelands of mud and soggy hay-bales.
I actually have seen home-grown courgettes, marrows, apples, and carrots piled in overflowing heaps on the chancel steps, all topped with a triumphant harvest loaf — and half-a-dozen tins and a bunch of flowers set forlornly against the altar by a community totally distanced from the physical work of food production. One size cannot fit all: “Harvest Festival” is each broad and deep, and therein lies the challenge for the minister.
THIS is because Harvest will not be like Christmas or Easter, after we are celebrating something universal and world-changing. For these occasions, all Christian churches share a single message: Christ is born! Christ is risen! The challenge there’s deliver these transformative truths in essentially the most appropriate way for our context, without disguising them behind the medium so heavily that the message is lost.
In contrast, Harvest is a container for a multiplicity of ideas and themes. It will not be enough simply to know the history of harvest festivals, or how harvest has been celebrated within the Bible — vital, definitely, but not the top of the matter. Just as Paul wrote his letters addressing specific issues to particular communities based in Corinth, Ephesus, etc., so our preaching and liturgy have to be direct and focused.
Rather than exegete the Bible, we must perform the identical process in our locality. We drill down into what Harvest might mean for our communities at this particular time, attempting to discern what their relationship is with a theme, before looking for to construct on this. Only then will or not it’s possible to expand outwards and upwards, and explore how the aspect of Harvest on which we’ve chosen to focus might relate to the broader picture, whether that is regional, national, or global.
Still more vital, it is barely after we’ve selected the message that Harvest might hold for our community, and where this matches in the larger picture, that we are able to move on to a discussion of where God sits amongst all of it, and the way he is perhaps discovered, higher appreciated, or more deeply understood through this particular celebration.
SO, DOES your congregation have to find out about food production, perhaps specializing in environmental issues and our responsibility to be sure that what we eat has been produced in essentially the most useful way for all creation?
Are you going to have a look at “food miles”, and promote using local produce, aware at the identical time that the survival of communities in other countries might rely on our consumption of what they grow?
Is the emphasis to be on sharing what we’ve been given in such generous quantities with those that haven’t been so fortunate, and, in that case, what shape will that take — supporting local foodbanks, or overseas aid charities?
Perhaps you’ll use the chance to attach your contemporary community with its ancestors, bringing back ancient traditions and celebrating Lammas Day in addition to Harvest, making corn dollies, and eating traditional food together. It could also be enough to concentrate on one sort of foodstuff, explore its variety, wonder at its ingenious construction, and provides praise to the one whose imagination created it; or just to gaze in awe on the landscape that surrounds us.
Is your vehicle going to be a conventional Harvest service, or something more specialised — a visit to a neighborhood farm or food producer? Will you incorporate a shared meal, and, in that case, who will you invite? Will you might have an ambulatory event just like rogation, or will you seek to bring the skin in with wild decorations?
As with all these seasonal services, if we as church leaders take the time to check our congregations and their wider communities, listening to their concerns and learning what matters to them, we are able to integrate this with the gospel message to provide an occasion that’s profound and effective, encouraging and difficult — and perhaps whilst memorable as “the one where the bull escaped. . .”.
The Revd Dr Sally Welch is Vicar of the Kington Group within the diocese of Hereford.
Resources:
Practical Points:
- You could also be sick of singing “Come, ye thankful people, come” and “We plough the fields”, but omit them at your peril. Such hymns provide continuity and rhythm in communities whose lives are based on the seasons, and remind urbanites that there’s a whole world on the market of which they’re unaware, but that’s, nevertheless, vitally vital.
- Establish well upfront where the harvest produce goes, and whether it is going to be gratefully accepted. You may find that 15 butternut squashes are usually not as highly wanted as two dozen cans of baked beans. Ask for a listing of preferred items that the congregation can shop for. Many churches now auction off fresh produce to the congregation and donate the result to a food- or water-related charity. Others don’t go down the “harvest display” route in any respect, but make a set as a substitute
- Unless the cash raised and/or collected goes to the church, keep in mind that you might have a legal obligation to let people know where their money goes. This should ideally occur upfront of the service, but definitely before the gathering is taken.
