Ezekiel 36:8-10a, 11b
“But you, O mountains of Israel, will produce branches and fruit for my people Israel, for they will soon come home.  I am concerned for you and will look upon you with favor; you will be plowed and sown, and I will multiply the number of people upon you…I will settle people on you as in the past and will make you prosper more than before.  Then you will know that I am the Lord.”

Psalm 65:9-13
“You care for the land and water it; you enrich it abundantly.  The streams of God are filled with water to provide the people with grain, for so you have ordained it.  You drench its furrows and level its ridges; you soften it with showers and bless its crops.  You crown the year with your bounty, and your carts overflow with abundance.  The grasslands of the desert overflow; the hills are clothed with gladness.  The meadows are covered with flocks and the valleys are mantled with grain; they shout for joy and sing.”

Matthew 13:23
“But the seed falling on good soil refers to someone who hear the word and understands it.  This is the one who produces a crop, yielding a hundred, sixty or thirty times what was sown.”

Lord of the harvest, you show your love for the land by tending it gently.

All that is chaff and stubble you turn into nourishment for spent soil.  With softening rain you bring to life ground gone stale and dry.

Plough our hard hearts in preparation to receive the seed you plant.  With compassion till our fallow places into rich, rejoicing furrows.

We pray in the gracious name of Jesus, who by his season sown in death promises a great year of abundance.

Listen to ‘Mountains of Mercy’ by Grace Worship