Cybercolumn by Berry D. Simpson: To the very edges

Posted: 10/02/07

CYBER COLUMN:
To the very edges

A few months ago, I read a passage from Leviticus, and ever since that morning, I’ve been wondering about my life—wondering where the edges are; wondering when I should be generous; wondering what I should be giving away.

The verse I read was Leviticus 23:22, which says: “When you reap the harvest of your land do not reap to the very edges of your field or gather the gleanings of your harvest. Do not go over your harvest a second time or pick up the grapes that have fallen. Leave them for the poor and alien. I am the Lord your God.” This verse is located among a collection of rules about how to present offerings to God, so I’m assuming the command to leave some of the crop behind was more about worshiping God than about sharing with the poor. I wrote in the margin of my Daily Bible: “I wonder what the equivalent is for me? What are my crops, and where are my edges?”

God wasn’t encouraging the people to be sloppy farmers when he told them not to harvest to the very edges; he wanted them to live a generous lifestyle. He expected them to not be greedy, even with the fruit of their own labor, but rather to be generous and free. He also meant that they shouldn’t make needy people beg for help—don’t make them stand in line to ask for the leftovers, but leave them respect and honor along with the crops.

So my questions: What is the harvest of my land? What do I produce? What is it that I should leave behind, around the edges, for others to glean?

Well, as a petroleum engineer, I’ve created a large library of spreadsheets and economic analysis reports and recommendations and cost estimates and workover procedures. You could say those have been my crops. I thought about scattering some computer printouts and a couple of data-filled CDs around the corners of my yard, but that seemed tacky, not generous. And it would get me in trouble with Cyndi for cluttering up our yard.

But all that engineering stuff isn’t my crop, it’s the finished product created from my real crops. My real crops are ideas, insights, influence, good will, teaching, writing and personal stories. Maybe the most valuable crop I have is my time. According to Leviticus 23:22 I should be generous with my time. The command to “not go over your vineyard a second time” means I shouldn’t plan my time all the way out to the edges. I should intentionally leave some slack in my schedule so I can be generous with my time as the need arises.

That’s a lot harder to do than it is to write. There are always too many good things to do with my time. For years I’ve used my noon hours as the time when I worked on my Bible study lesson for church or wrote in my journal or did other stuff that seemed very important to me. And because it was important to me, I resented any intrusion into the time. I balked if someone wanted to meet me for lunch because I thought it was too great a sacrifice to give up my study time. After all, my time was important. In fact, spending my noontime alone working on my stuff was my sacrifice to the world, my gift to my many students, and like that.

Until one day when it occurred to me how arrogant I was. I realized the greatest thing I had to offer was not the quality of my teaching, but the gift of my time. Maybe it was more important to hang out with someone than to teach a class. Nowadays, I almost always say yes when someone asks for a meeting or wants to meet for lunch. And I’ve learned the value of that time. That sounds so goofy when I write it out, and I’m sorry to be such a bookish nerd, but such is my life. I think one of the ways I leave the edges of my field for others to glean is to give away my time.

But leaving the edges for someone else takes courage. What if we’re giving away too much? What if someone thinks we’re being lazy instead of generous? What if our boss thinks we aren’t dedicated if we don’t give every available hour? Can we thrive if we don’t harvest every nook and corner of our field?

Leaving the edges takes gratitude, which is a mature grown-up emotion. We can’t be generous if we aren’t thankful.

And leaving the edges takes faith—faith that God will bless the part we harvest more that we can imagine.

Berry Simpson, a Sunday school teacher at First Baptist Church in Midland, is a petroleum engineer, writer, runner and member of the city council in Midland. You can contact him through e-mail at berry@stonefoot.org.