In Matthew 9:37-38, Jesus calls you to action: "Then He said to His disciples, 'The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.'"
This is a pivotal passage about bridging the gap between Jesus’ ministry and ours, so that we have the same kind of ministry that He had. I would love to have the compassion that Jesus had, but that is not the only thing Jesus talks about. He speaks to His disciples at this pivotal moment, giving them something to believe and something to do. So this passage also gives us something to believe and something to do.
What does Jesus tell us to believe? He says, "The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few" (v. 37). He switches metaphors from shepherding to farming. And what He tells us is that the harvest is ready. In other words, people are ready to receive the good news of the kingdom. People are ripe for the gospel of Jesus Christ. Many are ready to receive Jesus as theitr Lord and and Savior, but they need to be shown the way!
The problem isn’t that people are unready to receive the good news; the problem is that we aren’t ready to tell them! "The workers are few" (v. 37b). Imagine a farmer with fields ready to be harvested, but workers who are AWOL or non-existent. Jesus looks around Him and He sees people who are helpless and harassed and ready to hear the good news of the gospel. The problem is, there is nobody to tell them. The question is, who will go into the harvest?
So let me ask: Do you believe the harvest is plentiful? The harvest is plentiful all around us! Do you believe that? Jesus gives it to us as something for us to believe. One of the greatest lies of the devil is to convince us that people aren’t interested, that it’s a waste of time to tell them. The harvest is plentiful! God has prepared them! There are many yet to be reached with the gospel of the kingdom and there is an urgency. They are ready to hear. This is what He tells us to believe. Do you believe it?
Note the urgency of evangelism: It is theologically urgent, because of what God has revealed, including the truth that there is a heaven and hell. It is spiritually urgent, because people are utterly lost spiritually apart from Christ. It is physically urgent, because death is coming for all and with it the opportunity to respond to the gospel will be past. It is statistically urgent, because many people in our community have not yet heard the gospel or been invited to respond to it. It is strategically urgent, because God chose to use the church as His strategy for reaching the lost. It is personally urgent, because each of us must respond to God's call. (DashHouse.com)
So if we believe that people are ready, what does Jesus tell us to do? Surely He would say, "Get out there and tell them!" But that is not what Jesus said. Surprisingly, He said, "Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest" (v. 38).
Why would Jesus tell us to pray instead of doing something? He wants action. In the very next chapter, remember, He is going to instruct His disciples and then send them out to preach and teach and do the things that He has done. But He knows that before we can have the ministry that He has, we must have the same prayerful reliance on the Father that He has. Before we have the compassion of Jesus, we must have the connection with the Father that He has.
Warren Wiersbe said, "When we pray as He commanded, we will see what He saw, feel what He felt, and do what He did. God will multiply our lives as we share in the great harvest that is already ripe." (Ibid)
It is one thing for us to go and do. It is another thing altogether to plead with God that He would raise up people—either through conversion or growth—who are ready to go; to pray that God would give them a spirit for the work, call them to it, and give them wisdom and success.
Matthew Henry said, "It is a good sign God is about to bestow some special mercy upon a people, when He stirs up those that have an interest at the throne of grace, to pray for it" (Ibid). God is up to something when we begin to pray like Jesus commands us in this passage.
When we start to believe that the harvest is plentiful and we pray that He would send out workers, you never know if we may become the answers to our own prayers. Perhaps we would be the workers commissioned by the Lord of the harvest. Being involved in evangelism is a core discipline of the faith. It is something God calls each of us to do—to reach out and reach the lost. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment