Some content taken from Altar-ed by Sam Nobles
His winnowing fork is in His hand, and He will thoroughly clear His threshing floor; and He will gather His wheat into the barn, but He will burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire.
Matthew 3:12
Matthew 3:12
In biblical days there was no machinery, so after the harvest, the grain was separated from the straw and husks manually on a flat, smooth surface, known as the threshing floor. After the wheat (grain) was separated from the chaff (husk), winnowing forks were used to throw the mixture into the air so the wind could blow away the chaff, leaving only the good grain on the floor.
In the Bible, the threshing floor is symbolic of judgement. It is a place where good and evil are separated. The grain is the good stuff and the chaff, that blows away in the wind, is the bad stuff.
Every one of us will meet God on the threshing floor of our lives at some point, and that will prove what we are made of. The meeting at the threshing floor is necessary to separate the chaff (trivial, worldly, etc.) from the wheat (substantial, significant, etc.) in our walk with the Lord.
I’ve been there, going along with my own plans, living life in my own strength. Then I hit a bump and think I can solve the problem in my own strength. Our loving Lord allows a meeting on the threshing floor in our lives so that we can learn to die to our strength, to our plans, and to our agenda. We really begin to see what is going on inside of us when we meet God at the threshing floor.
Perhaps you’re at the threshing floor today. Maybe you’ve hit a bump at work or maybe things are a bit shaky in your marriage and it looks as if it may fall. Maybe you’ve thought you could straighten things out in your own strength only to find that you can’t. At the threshing floor, it all gets hashed out.
The threshing floor is the place we come to when something has to change, when we can no longer go on living the way we are. We desperately need the wind to carry away the chaff. Even though it is a place of judgement, it is a place of cleansing. God meets us on the threshing floor, and in His name we are refined and made whole. At the threshing floor it all gets sorted out, and when we walk away from the threshing floor, we walk away with only the good.
Scripture to Claim: Let the wicked forsake his way, and the unrighteous man his thoughts; let him return to the Lord, that he may have compassion on him, and to our God, for he will abundantly pardon. Isaiah 55:7
