Thou crownest the year with thy goodness;
and thy paths drop fatness.
Psalm 65:11
"If we begin with the blessings of the nether springs, we must not forget
that for the race of man the joyous days of harvest are a special
season of excessive favor.
It is the glory of autumn that the ripe
gifts of providence are then abundantly bestowed; ....Great is the joy of harvest.
Happy are the reapers who fill their arms
with the liberality of heaven.
The Psalmist tells us that the harvest is
the crowning of the year.
Q: What if I compare the opening spring to the
proclamation of a new prince, the latest born of Father Time? With the
musical voices of birds, and the joyful lowing of herds, a new era of
fertility is ushered in.
No studs of silver or rows of jewels can vie with the ornaments
of the year.
No garments of needlework of divers colors can match the
glorious vesture of Time’s reigning son.
Then when the fields are covered with a cloth of
gold, and fruits are glowing with the rich hues of ripeness, and the
leaves are burnished with inimitable perfection of tint and shade, then
with a coronal of divine goodness, amidst the glad shouts of toiling
swains, and the songs of rejoicing maidens, the year is crowned.
Upon a
throne of golden corn, with the peaceful sickle for his sceptre, sits
the crowned year bearing the goodness of the Lord as a coronet upon his
placid brow......riding
in triumph throughout the summer along a pathway strewed with flowers,
and at last mounting the throne, amidst the festivities of harvest,
while the Lord in lovingkindness puts a diadem of beauty and goodness
upon its head,"
Charles Spurgeon