MORE THAN ENOUGH

1. Introduction

a) What is the meaning of 'surplus harvest'?

i) Surplus - being more than or in excess of what is needed.

ii) Harvest - the act or process or of gathering ripened crop in a season.

2. Condition - obedience

i) 1“Do not make idols or set up carved images, or sacred pillars, or sculptured stones in your land so you may worship them. I am the LORD your God.

ii) 2You must keep my Sabbath days of rest and show reverence for my sanctuary. I am the LORD.

iii) 3“If you follow my decrees and are careful to obey my commands, (Leviticus 26:1-3 NLT)

3. Rewards (blessings) for obedience

i) 4I will send you the seasonal rains. The land will then yield its crops, and the trees of the field will produce their fruit. 5Your threshing season will overlap with the grape harvest, and your grape harvest will overlap with the season of planting grain. You will eat your fill and live securely in your own land. 6“I will give you peace in the land, and you will be able to sleep with no cause for fear. I will rid the land of wild animals and keep your enemies out of your land. 7In fact, you will chase down your enemies and slaughter them with your swords. 8Five of you will chase a hundred, and a hundred of you will chase ten thousand! All your enemies will fall beneath your sword. 9“I will look favorably upon you, making you fertile and multiplying your people. And I will fulfill my covenant with you. 10You will have such a surplus of crops that you will need to clear out the old grain to make room for the new harvest! 11I will live among you, and I will not despise you. 12I will walk among you; I will be your God, and you will be my people. 13I am the LORD your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt so you would no longer be their slaves. I broke the yoke of slavery from your neck so you can walk with your heads held high. (Leviticus 26:4-13 NLT)

4. How is the Lord going to do it?

a) Instruction for Sabbath Year

i) 1While Moses was on Mount Sinai, the LORD said to him, 2“Give the following instructions to the people of Israel. When you have entered the land I am giving you, the land itself must observe a Sabbath rest before the LORD every seventh year. 3For six years you may plant your fields and prune your vineyards and harvest your crops, 4but during the seventh year the land must have a Sabbath year of complete rest. It is the LORD’s Sabbath. Do not plant your fields or prune your vineyards during that year. 5And don’t store away the crops that grow on their own or gather the grapes from your unpruned vines. The land must have a year of complete rest. 6But you may eat whatever the land produces on its own during its Sabbath. This applies to you, your male and female servants, your hired workers, and the temporary residents who live with you. 7-Your livestock and the wild animals in your land will also be allowed to eat what the land produces. (Leviticus 25:1-7 NLT)

b) Condition - obedience

i) 17Show your fear of God by not taking advantage of each other. I am the LORD your God.

ii) 18 “If you want to live securely in the land, follow my decrees and obey my regulations. (Leviticus 25:17, 18 NLT)

c) How?

i) 19Then the land will yield large crops, and you will eat your fill and live securely in it. 20But you might ask, ‘What will we eat during the seventh year, since we are not allowed to plant or harvest crops that year?’ 21Be assured that I will send my blessing for you in the sixth year, so the land will produce a crop large enough for three years. 22When you plant your fields in the eighth year, you will still be eating from the large crop of the sixth year. In fact, you will still be eating from that large crop when the new crop is harvested in the ninth year. (Leviticus 25:19-22 NLT)

d) Why?

i) The land needs rest.

@1.33I will scatter you among the nations and bring out my sword against you. Your land will become desolate, and your cities will lie in ruins. 34Then at last the land will enjoy its neglected Sabbath years as it lies desolate while you are in exile in the land of your enemies. Then the land will finally rest and enjoy the Sabbaths it missed. 35As long as the land lies in ruins, it will enjoy the rest you never allowed it to take every seventh year while you lived in it. (Leviticus 26:33-35 NLT)

5. Prayer focus

a) Pray that we may experience 'more than enough' in our daily life, and obey the Lord's call and in doing so, we may enjoy the surplus harvest in our land.