This verse is at the same time depressing and encouraging. It’s a downer because it seems clear that if we do good, the expected short term rewards will lead to weariness. Great work means more work assignments. Meeting high expectations means even higher expectations. Being generous leads to more requests for help.

It can get really weary, doing good. The temptation is to conclude: “This isn’t worth it.”

Without the eyes of faith, this is a reasonable conclusion. But with a perspective shaped by God’s promises, doing good becomes seeds sown that will yield a certain and bountiful harvest. The harvest will be much greater than we can even imagine. We are told “Eye has not seen, ear has heard, nor has entered into the heart of man the things God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Cor 2:9).

A perspective of faith requires us to believe something else that can be even harder – that God’s timing is better than ours. We tend to want to be the ones that decide the “proper time”.

It is a temptation to grow weary doing good. A perspective shaped only by experience might lead to despair. But God is on his throne. All things will be brought to light. All that is wrong will be righted. And all our doing good will be rewarded. The good we did by faith while weariness knocked at the door will receive a special blessing, the crown of Heaven.

“Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time we will reap a harvest if we do not give up.”
– Galatians 6:9