Christian comment with Rev Mike Holloway, Vicar of the Beacon Benefice

WE ARE once again in the midst of the season of Harvest Festivals.

I’ve been to two so far and have another three to go.

That makes it sound like a chore but it really isn’t; harvest festivals are wonderful occasions and great fun to be involved with.

There’s a well-known harvest hymn which starts: ‘Come ye thankful people, come.’

This reminds us what a harvest festival is all about – being thankful!

But what, I wonder, are we being thankful for?

Is it just that there will be food to put on our plates in the coming year and we’ll be alright?

To a certain extent, yes, but when you see it written down like this, you realise that this is a rather selfish reason.

Surely there’s got to be more than this.

Perhaps we’re being thankful for all the hard work, and it really is hard work, that goes into producing our food.

This is better, isn’t it?

We should be thankful for all those farmers and distributors who provide for us.

There are very few people who could disagree with this reason for being thankful, whether or not they have any religious belief.

But for those of us with a belief in God, there is still another reason for giving thanks.

For, despite all that hard work from farmers, they don’t make the seeds germinate and grow or the apples swell and become sweet.

They help, certainly, by providing the right conditions but the germination, growth and development just happen – or do they?

For us, this is where we discern the hand of God at work in his creation and why we give thanks to God for providing us with a world, a biosphere, which can do this and a universe in which this is possible.

Giving thanks for the harvest is a point when we remember we don’t control everything and acknowledge God’s goodness and love in providing for us.

But we do affect our environment.

So at harvest also remember those already affected by global warming, mostly the poorest communities on earth!