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Before I begin the sermon, I'd like to say just a personal word of thanks to this church. This past year was probably the most difficult year my wife and I have faced with her diagnosis of cancer. We're pleased to say that God has answered prayers that she is doing so much better than she was last year. And we know that this church, individuals in the church, as well as the church as a whole have prayed for us. and we appreciate that.
Thank you so much for your support during these difficult times. Also, thanks for the warm welcome. When we came back, Suzanne said, "It's like coming back home. We know people. We know our way around. It's not new. It's it feels like home to be here." So, thank you for that welcome. Let's pray together.
Father God, I do give you thanks for this church. I thank you for the love, the care that we've experienced. I thank you for the ministries that the church has and the desire that the church and so many of the members have to reach out and share your love, your gospel with those around us. Father God, as we look at your word this morning, we'll be looking at how you are sending us out into the harvest fields around us. Help us to open our eyes as we look at the fields. Impress upon us who with whom we should be speaking and how we can go outside our comfort zone and share the love of Christ with other people. So we pray that you would speak to us through your word this morning. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Well, the sermon today picks up with where we left off two weeks ago. Two weeks ago, the sermon dealt with the very first part of John chapter 4. But just in case you may have forgotten a few details, I'd like to just kind of summarize what's happened up until the point where we began the reading today. Jesus and his disciples had been in Judea and they were heading north to Samar to Galilee. And the scripture says Jesus must go through Samaria. And as they went through Samaria, it was about noon, very hot. As they were approaching a village, they saw a well outside the village. So Jesus sat down at the well. And the disciples went on into town to buy some food. Pretty soon, a lady from that village came to the well. And when Jesus saw her, he said, "Would you please give me some water to drink?" She was startled. She said, "How is it that you, a Jewish person, is asking me, a Samaritan woman, for water?" Because you see, Jews and Samaritans had nothing to do with each other. And they definitely would not share utensils or drink from the same cups. Well, Jesus replied and he said, "If you knew who it was who was asking you for water, you would ask him and he would give you living water." The lady didn't understand and she says, "How can you give me water? You don't have anything to draw the water with. Do you think that you're greater than our ancestor Jacob is, who gave us this water?" Jesus said, 'If you drink of this water again, you'll get thirsty again. But he who drinks of the water that I give will never thirst again. But that water will well up into eternal life. The woman said, "I'd like some of that. Give me of that water." And Jesus said, "Well, first go into the village and bring your husband back." The woman said, 'I don't have a husband.' Jesus said, 'You've said correctly, you've had five husbands, and the man you're living with now is not your husband. The woman said, "Well, sir, I perceive, I recognize that you must be a prophet. Tell me, our ancestors say we should worship God on this mountain right over here, but you Jews say we should worship God in Jerusalem, which is right. And Jesus told her, "The time is coming and already is here that we will not worship as a center of our worship either on this mountain or in Jerusalem, but we will be worshiping God in spirit and truth because God is spirit and those that worship him will worship in spirit and truth." The lady said, "Well, I know the Messiah is coming and when he comes, he will explain everything to us." to which Jesus then replied,"I am. I am he. I am the Messiah." And about that time, the disciples came back. They had brought food, but Jesus wasn't interested. The disciples didn't say anything, but they were wondering, "Why in the world is Jesus talking with that woman?" Well, the lady went in. She told the people about Jesus. And then when Jesus started talking to his disciples, he started talking to them about spiritual food. He had food to do the will of God and complete the task. And then Jesus changes metaphors again. He had spoken about water in a figurative sense. Then he had spoken about food in a spiritual sense. And now he's going to talk about the harvest. And we need to understand that this is also metaphor. It's not literally going out into the palm tree plantations or the rubber plantations and working. We're going to be talking about going into the harvest fields today. And just like Jesus using the metaphor, he's talking about going into the world, going to where the people are, especially going to where people are that don't know Jesus, and then working in those fields, sewing the seed of sharing the gospel, harvesting the crop when people express interest and want to repent and place their faith in Christ and acknowledge him as the rightful Lord of their life. The title of a sermon is not found in this particular passage, the Lord of the harvest. But that title, Lord of the harvest, is given to Jesus in other places. When we look in Matthew's gospel, we see that when Jesus saw the crowds of people, he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. And so he told his disciples, "The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Pray therefore that the Lord of the harvest will send out laborers into his harvest." And then we see the same title again in Luke. And evidently, the disciples had already prayed that the Lord would send out more harvesters because that's exactly what happened. By the way, if you pray this prayer, which I would encourage you to do, you might be one of the first harvesters that the Lord will send into the harvest. But we see that Jesus sent out 72 others. But again, telling them, pray that the Lord of the harvest will send out more laborers because the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Even with 72, they needed more. And that's true today. The Lord of the harvest is wanting to send us into the fields. And we're going to talk about that. But before we talk about the Lord of the harvest sending us into the fields to work, I want us to look to see first of all how the Lord of the harvest is equipping us in order that we will be ready and able to go into the fields. The first thing we are going to see and how the Lord of the harvest equips us is that he shows us how to place the highest priority on doing God's will. Place a high priority on finishing the work that God has given us on doing the task of sharing the gospel and making disciples of all peoples. Remember back in the text that we just heard read, Jesus when he's given physical food, he's not interested. He says,"I have food to eat that you don't know about." The disciples wonder, "Hey, did somebody uh go to the hawker stall down the road and beat us back or somebody run to the drive-in at McDonald's?" But no, Jesus said, "My food is to do the will of him, Father God, who sent me, and to accomplish his work." Jesus priority in life was to do the will of God, to complete the God-given mission that he had. Now in Jesus' life, this ultimately culminated in the crucifixion as he gave his life a sacrifice for sin and then the resurrection. The events that we celebrated last week ago, Friday and Sunday. But at this particular point in Jesus ministry, the task he had at that moment was to sew the seed and harvest the seed. Jesus was in a mission field in Samaria and there were people there hungry for the gospel and it was God's will for him to talk to this woman that was at the well and it was God's will for him to then also share with all the people of that village. His food was to bring in the harvest. Jesus wants us to partake of the same food. He wants us to know and to do the will of God. He has given us the task of the great commission making disciples of all people and he wants us to finish that task be faithful doing that task that he has given to us. So he models for us how we can place priority in our lives on knowing and doing God's will. And this is a result of true worship. You remember a couple of weeks ago in the sermon Dr. Peter was emphasized in the passage that talked about worship and he mentioned and when you truly worship God a result of this worship will be that you will be involved in evangelism and mission you will be going into the harvest field. That makes sense. If we submit ourselves to the lordship of Christ, who is the lord of the harvest, of course, we're going to be involved with him in the harvest field. So Jesus models for us rightly placed priorities of doing God's will. The second thing that Jesus will model for us is that of being intentional. Being intentional. We see this when we go back to verse four in the text. The text says Jesus must go through Samaria. It was necessary. He had to pass through Samaria. Now this was not a geographical necessity. There were other routes he could have taken. But this must was a spiritual necessity. we might say it was an inner compulsion, a divine leading. Going through Samaria was something he knew he should do, he ought to do, he wanted to do because he knew that's the way God was leading him. Now, many people will point out that when Jewish people went from the southern part of Judea up to the northern part of Galilee, and you can see those two places circled in blue there, that the shortest route would be like where that green arrow is pointing, going right through the middle of Samaria. But many good Jews would refuse to go through Samaria, especially the pious religious people, because see, the Samaritans were considered to be unclean. So instead, they would take that route to the right that's in red and they would go maybe two or three days out of their way walking to get up to Jerus up to Galilee. So when Jesus went straight on up, he was going purposely on a route that many people of his day would have purposely avoided. But as one commentator pointed out, we don't know really where Jesus was. The direct route through Samaria would be direct only if you were in the middle of Judea. If you look at this map, you can see the Jordan River on the right. And we know that right before Jesus went north to Samaria to Galilee, that he had been baptizing people. We don't know where he was baptizing. But if he was baptizing on the Jordan River that you see there on the right, the shortest route would have been to just go ahead and cross the Jordan, stay in the Jordan Valley, head north, and then cut over to Canaa of Galilee where he ended up. So if that was the case, if he was already on the Jordan River, he went out of his way. He added extra kilometers to his trip in order that he could go through Samaria. So either way you want to look at it, Jesus was intentional with the route that he chose. He chose a route that purposely ignored the way most pious Jews would have gone. Or if he had already on the Jordan, he purposely took a route that added extra time to his trip in order that he could go. You see, he had a divine appointment and he was intentional in going through Samaria. Jesus wants us also to be intentional. He wants us with intent to look for divine appointments, to go out, see people that don't know Christ, get into conversation, share with them. Not too long ago, I was talking to a businessman, not a preacher, not a missionary, a businessman. And he said that one day he was in downtown KL. And he was walking downtown and he said he was praying to God that God would show him somebody that he could share his faith with. and he saw a person that by the way the man was dressed he could tell this man was not a Christian and more than likely this man might even be hostile to the gospel but he felt like God was saying that's the one God are you sure yeah that's the one so this businessman sat down by the man he'd been sitting on a bench sat down by the man and got into some small talk just started a conversation was able to transition to spiritual topics. And he said they talked for over half an hour on spiritual things. And at the end of the conversation, this man who he thought might be hostile to the gospel said, "Thanks for talking to me. I'd like to have more conversations like this." But see, that conversation would have not taken place had this businessman not been intentional wanting to go where people need to hear about Jesus. Who is the one that God might be leading you to? Or who are the ones that God is putting into your path? It was necessary for Jesus to go through Samaria because Samaria was a mission field. An entire village was waiting to hear. It's necessary for us to be intentional in taking steps to be able to share the gospel with people around us because the Clang Valley is a huge mission field. Many, many, many people here need to hear the gospel. So Jesus shows us the importance of placing a high priority on doing God's will, which includes sharing the good news of the gospel with all peoples. And he models for us being intentional in our witness, even if it means going out of our way, taking intentional steps to share the gospel with those who otherwise might not hear. And now related to that being intentional but important enough that I'm going to make it a separate point is Jesus models for us how to go outside our comfort zone. Jesus went way out of what would have been the comfort zone for the Jewish people of his day. I'm sure it was way outside the comfort zone of his disciples. And when his disciples heard he was going through Samaria, there's no reaction given in the Bible, but just based on what we know about relations between Jews and Samaritans, the disciples were probably not too pleased with this particular choice of route. And the fact that they had to go into a Samaritan village to get food, that wasn't nice either. And then it got worse because at the end of the time there they had to spend two more days way outside the comfort zone of the people in Jesus days.
Not only did Jesus want his early disciples to go out of their comfort zone, he wants us to be willing to go out of our comfort zone to be able to share with people that don't know. I think possibly one of the biggest hindrances to the spread of the gospel is so many Christians are just not willing to go outside their comfort zone. And the reality is most of the people around us are not like us. Different ethnic groups, different religious groups, different socioeconomic statuses. And sometimes it's just not comfortable to go around people that are different from us. But that's what Jesus modeled, going outside the comfort zone.
We see people that are different from us. And rather than seeing that as an opportunity, we often see like, ooh, I don't want to be around that kind of person. And the barriers that we have erected or the barriers that have been erected within our society that then we have adopted stand in the way. But look at Jesus example once again. The Samaritans and Jews, they hated each other. They had nothing to do with each other. They wouldn't drink or eat out of the same utensils. They wouldn't even speak to each other. The Jewish people thought, "We are a superior race. You folks are beneath us. We're better than you." And they looked down their nose at the Samaritans. And because these Samaritans were from a different ethnic, different racial, different religious group, they had nothing to do with them. Jesus crossed that barrier. But there were more barriers he crossed. The lady was obviously a lady, a woman. And in that day, it was a cultural taboo for a Jewish man to speak with a woman in public. But Jesus knew she needed to hear. Not only was she a woman, she was a Samaritan woman. Now, according to the Jewish tradition, any woman during her particular time of the month was considered to be ceremonially unclean. But the rabbis taught Samaritan women are unclean ceremonially, religiously. Not only during their particular time of the month, they're unclean from the day they're born. A little baby girl already unclean. They don't have a chance. And Jesus goes beyond that barrier. So here we see Jesus crossing barriers that are cultural, religious, ethnic. He also cross crosses a barrier of social status. This lady would have been on a much le social plane than Jesus who had been respected and treated as a rabbi. This woman was also a moral person. Nobody had respect for her. So many barriers to cross way outside the comfort zone of most people. That's why the disciples in verse 27, when they came back and saw Jesus talking to a Samaritan woman who probably had an immoral character, lower social status, they were thinking to themselves, "Why in the world are you talking to her?"
We think sometimes the same way. How in the world can I talk to somebody like that? Jesus helped his disciples to get out of their comfort zone and he will help us to move out of our comfort zone. You see Jesus disciples had their first experience seeing Samaritans come to faith right now at this point. And it's only a couple years later, two or three years later, Jesus is going to tell his disciples to go be my witnesses to people like you in Jerusalem and Judea, but also go to the Samaritans.
And if Jesus had waited until the very end to say that, I'm sure the disciples, oh no, I don't want to go to Samaritans. I don't like those people. But Jesus had already prepared them. He had enabled them to already learn how to go outside their comfort zone.
Today, God's people need to be willing to cross cultural barriers, be willing to cross barriers between ethnicities and religions, the prejudices that we harbor. We need to be able to cross those. And that's one of the most difficult things for many Christians. It's true in my homeland. It's true here. We all almost every culture seems to think we're the we're the superior race and I don't want anything to do with people different from me. Somebody was telling me somebody from an ethnic majority, a person was attending a church that although there were a few different ethnic groups in the church, it was vastly one particular ethnic group for the majority. And this person from the ethnic minority, he went into church one Sunday morning and just about every chair was filled. There were a few empty places, but there wasn't a whole row of empty seats any place. So, he just went and sat down in an empty seat beside somebody who was from the majority ethnic group. And that person when she saw the color of his skin got up and left. How are we going to share the gospel with people that are different from us if we won't even sit by them in church
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my home church when I was a boy growing up there's something that happened that I can still remember many years later I'm getting older so it's been many years now but when I was about 11 or 12 years old, like I said, many years. There was a couple that moved to our church that seemed to be spiritual giants and they went on a mission trip to Africa. Now, I was really impressed. Back in those days, it was not common at all for churches to go on mission trips and international travel was more difficult, also more expensive when you look at the real value of dollars. travel within Africa was much more difficult. Communication was extremely difficult. And so when they come back from the mission trip and they're showing all of these slides, they were in Africa south of the Sahara. That means the people were extremely dark. And so this couple, we see pictures of them interacting with these dark-kinned Africans. And I'm thinking, man, this is great for several reasons. One, I thought, hey, that'd be fun to go to Africa. That was an adventure to me as a 12, 13 year old boy. Thought, man, that'd be fun. But I also was thinking that's good that they can go and share the gospel with people who may not have ever heard. And also another thing that impressed me, you see, this was in the 60s. And the 60s in the US were a time of extreme racial tension, civil rights movement going on, marches, protests, riots, and even churches were splitting over or debating whether or not they would integrate and let people from other races in. And unfortunately, many churches, even Baptist or maybe especially Baptist churches, would say, "No, no, no. We don't let black people in our church." So, it impressed me. Here's a couple that's going to associate with people different from them. Just a few weeks or months after they gave their mission report, there was some kind of a public discussion and I heard the lady from this couple make some very disparaging remarks about African-Americans. I couldn't believe it. This lady just spent tons of money, lot of time, lot of effort to go be with black people. Traveled halfway around the world to be with black people. And now she doesn't even want them in the church. Here we saw pictures of them worshiping with Africans overseas, but they're not going to go across the street or to the next town, the next county to talk with somebody that has a different skin color. So I asked my mom, "What's going on? I don't understand this." And my mom, fine Christian lady, a lot of understanding. I thought she also said, "I don't understand it either." But you need to realize some people are so blinded by their prejudices that they just don't understand the heart of God. They're blinded to the truth, blinded to God's will. They don't see or maybe they refuse to see such a huge contradiction in their lives and their attitudes toward others. And she said something to the effect and some people just don't let the gospel penetrate their heart and change their attitudes and change their prejudices. Well, Jesus is showing us that we need to be able to go past the cultural barriers and reject the cultural prejudices, the deeply ingrained prejudices that we, whether through our own making or whether through the adopting of our society's prejudices, we need to be able to move past those. And Jesus models for us how we can do that. Is there a people group that you don't like?
Are there certain types of people you would rather not associate with?
If you don't want to associate with them, I guarantee you won't be sharing the gospel with them. But yet Jesus wants us to share the gospel with people even from groups that we don't like.
Many times we feel, well, I'm superior to them. I'm not going to stoop and talk to that kind of a person. Look what Jesus did. He stooped and spoke to one of the lowest members of society in his day. God wants us to get to the point that we can see all people as people that he created in his image. People that he loves. people that he loved so much that he sent Jesus to die for them. To do God's will, to finish his task of making disciples of all peoples, we're going to have to take intentional steps to purposely go outside our comfort zone. Sometime last year, I was visiting in a church in California. And where I was in California was a very diverse area. And the church I was visiting had a few minorities in it, but it was also pretty exclusively people like me, white people. And I can remember the pastor talking to his church and just in a very loving way, he was saying,"I want to encourage you that before the end of this year that you will at least go to one person who is outside your comfort zone." He said, 'I know many of you are really good at talking with people within your comfort zone, within your circle of influence, but try to think of at least one person outside your comfort zone. Let God lead you to them. And before the end of this year, share with somebody that's different from you. I'd like to offer the same challenge that he made sometime soon. Don't wait till the end of the year, but sometime soon, maybe within the next couple of months, who outside your comfort zone could you go to? Well, there's a fourth way that Jesus models for us how we can how how we can be equipped to go into the fields. And here we see that he takes the initiative. You see, Jesus began the conversation humbly, politely, in a vulnerable position, needing some help. He started talking with the lady, just asking her for some water. We sometimes talk about small talk, just something to break the ice, just something to get a conversation started, just something to get a connection there. And that's what we see Jesus doing. Now, for those of us who are introverts, you might say, "Oh, but that's outside my comfort zone." Refer back to point C. I'm an introvert. It's difficult for me. I understand it can be difficult to start a conversation with somebody you don't know, especially if that person's an introvert. But yeah, two things. One, like I said, refer back to point C. Or two, maybe team up with somebody that is more extroverted. Find somebody that you can together share with people and one person get the conversation started then you can help or you can pray you can do something. Jesus not only took the initiative to get the conversation started then even more importantly he took the initiative to bridge to a spiritual conversation. Now some of us are quite good at getting conversation started. Matter of fact, some are so good at getting conversation started, it's hard to get the conversation to stop. Yeah. You know, oh,
but to get the conversation going on to spiritual things, that's where we have trouble. One person not long ago was telling me, "I can get a conversation started, no problem, but I find it difficult to start talking about spiritual things." Very seldom is somebody going to come up to us and say, 'Hey, would you please tell me about Jesus? I've heard you're a Christian. Could you explain your faith to me? Occasionally that might happen, but very seldom. But if we take the initiative and bring it up, some of those people with whom we talk are going to be glad that we did. Just recently we with a friend of ours who was more extroverted than us. We were visiting Suzanne and I were visiting in the home of somebody who was from a different country, different religious background and started off with small talk. Fellowship got better when food was brought out and we were able to enjoy a meal together and then the conversation moved to spiritual things and we were able to share some from the scripture also pray in the name of Jesus and the man of the patriarch of this extended family
started to say an older man but he's younger than me he said I am 60 years old and this is the first time a Christian has ever come into my house and shared the holy scriptures with me and prayed with me and he was happy about it. He was excited. He was glad that somebody had taken the initiative to share with him from the scripture and to pray with him. A few years back, I can remember a seminar that I was leading. And I was trying to help people realize how they can get a conversation started with people from another religion at a specific time in the calendar. And I was trying to encourage them, don't feel like you have to bring them to faith the first time you hear them. Occasionally that happens, but seldom. But for many of you who have never even talked about spiritual things to anybody, just try to do this to get to a spiritual conversation and see what happens. Well, some people actually tried what I suggested. Now, that's sometimes unusual, but also encouraging that they try to put it into practice. And they came back and reported it was no problem. We were able to get into a spiritual conversation. And some of them it was the first time ever they had had a spiritual conversation with a person from that particular background and they said the other person was glad that they had taken the initiative. They enjoyed the conversation. So Jesus wants us to take the initiative not just to get started but to get on to spiritual topics. And then a fifth thing that he helps us with in enabling us to go to the fields is he shows us how to be persistent. Now I don't mean in a nagging or negative or pestering or whining way. But by be persistent I mean don't give up too soon. Don't give up too easily. You see, Jesus could have given up right at the very beginning when that lady said,"Wh are you a Jew giving me asking me a Samaritan for water?" Jesus could have said, "Oh, I'm sorry. I guess that was inappropriate. Never mind. I didn't mean to offend you. It's okay." Or when she said to him, "How can you give me water that's living water? Do you think you're greater than our ancestor Jacob? Jesus could have thought, "Who is she to question me? She's insulting me. I'm not going to talk to her anymore." Or when the lady couldn't understand what he was talking about with living water, he could have thought, "Oh, it's no use talking to this lady. She'll never come to faith. She's so dense. She won't understand anything."
He could have been distracted in the conversation and then gotten off talking about things that are really irre irrelevant.
be persistent in getting to the goal of helping them to understand who Jesus is so they can come to faith. I've heard some people say, "Well, I tried sharing my faith once and it was a disaster. I'm not going to do that again. I'm too uncomfortable." Go back to number C.
I've heard people say, "Well, I tried to explain it, but they just couldn't understand. or I shared the gospel but they didn't come to faith. I doubt there's very many of us in here who came to faith within the first five minutes after the first thing you heard from scripture. Be persistent. Don't give up. Well, we've seen how the Lord of the harvest equips us in many ways because he models for us how to go into the harvest field and work and do the will of God who has sent us. Now, I want us to go beyond just the preparation, but to the fact that he is sending us into the harvest fields. Most of us have heard the great commission, go make disciples of all peoples. We know that, but it's not a matter of whether we know it. It's a matter of are we doing it. Many of us will say, "Well, yeah, I know that's what to do, and and I'm going to do that someday. There's somebody at work that I'm going to talk to about Christ someday. There's somebody in my neighborhood that I know I want to share with. I really want to share with and someday I'm going to do that. Someday I'm going to do that. If you look up the phrase someday in a dictionary, do you know what how it'll be defined?
Someday means never.
Now, my daughter's an English teacher, and if she heard me say that, she'd say, "Uh-uh, Dad, if you looked in the dictionary, I realize that technically it's not a synonym." But in reality, that is the way it so frequently works out. Yeah. Someday,
someday never comes. So, we see that Jesus is sending us out into the fields with a sense of urgency. Look at what he says to the people. Don't say there's four months to the harvest. Lift up your eyes. See the fields. They're white for harvest. Now is the time. This is important. This is urgent. Don't waste time. Wake up. Open your eyes. Look all around you. And Jesus was telling his disciples, "Look." And probably at that time some of the Samaritans who had heard the lady's testimony were already coming from the village. And he looked out and he saw as they were coming. Possibly some were wearing white turbons to protect their head from the heat of the sun. And these white colors were coming. Look, there's a harvest field. He's telling us today, "Wake up. Open your eyes. Look around you. The Clang Valley is full of people who need to hear about Jesus. There's a mission field. The whole world is right here. We can fulfill the great commission without ever leaving the valley. There's people from everywhere that are right here. The Lord of the harvest is calling us to go into the fields with a sense of urgency. You see, in agriculture, sometimes if you wait too long to bring in the harvest, you end up losing the harvest.
I don't know if I can tell the next illustration. I'll try.
We met a man a few years ago and one day he introduced me with a lot of excitement to his new wife. Beautiful girl, young and vivacious, full of life. And he was so happy that he could introduce her to us. We were able to share some from scripture with her that very evening. Even though we were at a party, we visited their home a few times, shared again with them. And then one day got a call saying that she was sick and didn't think it was anything too serious. She went to the doctor. The doctor couldn't find anything wrong. We visited her again after she had gotten sick and she didn't look real good, but again, we didn't think it was too bad. And we were again able to share from the scripture. As a matter of fact, I shared the scripture that Peter preached from last Sunday, John 11, where Jesus said, "I am the resurrection and the life. He who believes in me, though he dies, yet he will live." Shortly after that time, we left the we were out of town for two or three weeks. And in that time, I got a text saying she had died. She was gone. No more time for harvest. She was gone. We had not realized the urgency we shared, but she was gone.
friends of ours from the US. We lived right next door to them in the US for six months
in Africa sharing the gospel with people as missionaries. Died in a car wreck just about a month ago.
There's urgency. Not only the people that we want to share with, there's no guarantee they're going to be around. There's also no guarantee that we will be around to share the gospel with people.
Wake up. There's a sense of urgency
with this. Jesus also clicker's not working. Jesus when he sends us with a sense of urgency, he's sending all of us. Some of us say, "Well, yeah, that's for the preachers. That's for the missionaries. That's for the people who have special training." Look at the lady in the story. She had no theological training. She had just met Jesus. And yet with excitement, she was ready to go tell other people. Not only does he send all of his followers, all those who acknowledge him as Lord, Lord of the harvest, but also he sends us to all people groups. No exceptions. We can't rule out the Samaritans. We can't rule out the people that we don't like. And we see that Jesus also I'm sorry we see that all peoples are included when we look at this commission. Go to Samaria. Go to the ends of the earth. And then we see that when we're sent out sometimes our job is to sow. Sometimes our job is to reap. In our passage it talked about some sowed. You're getting ready to reap right here. Jesus told his disciples at that point because he had already done the sewing. He'd already shared with the lady and now all these people were coming out wanting and ready and willing to hear the gospel. But both are necessary, the sewing and the reaping. I think many of us would prefer the reaping because it does bring joy to see somebody come to faith in Christ. But before somebody's going to come to faith in Christ, they've got to hear. And so the Lord is sending us into the harvest to both sow and reap. Another thing that we see the Lord doing, we see that the Lord of the harvest is going to work with us in the field. Now, it's not stated in our text, but we know from other scriptures that Jesus is with us. He sends us to make disciples of all people, and he promises to be with us. And the verse we just looked at a minute ago where he sends us to all peoples of the world, we're doing that with the power of the Holy Spirit. And our text gives us a great example of how Jesus is working with us in the harvest. Look at these verses. The woman left her water jar, went away into the town, and said to the people, "Come see a man who told me everything that I ever did. Can this be the Christ?" And what was the result? Many people believed because of her testimony. So that's what Jesus wants us to do. The same thing as a Samaritan woman. go and tell people what Jesus has done for us and then invite them to come. When we look at the text, we see that she did two things. Shared what Christ had done and then ask them to come come and see Jesus. And that's what God wants us to do. This is what Christ has done for me. Let me tell you who he is. is let me introduce you to him. Now, I said that God Jesus is the Lord of the harvest is working with us in the fields, but so far I've only shown what the Samaritan woman did. Well, let's keep reading further. Many more than believed because of Jesus word. They said to the woman, "It's no longer just because of what you said, but now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this is indeed the savior of the world." It's not our job to save anybody. We have the same responsibility as the lady did. Tell others what Jesus has done for us. invite them to come meet Jesus, sharing with them from the scripture, helping them to know Christ. But Jesus is the one who does the converting. Jesus is the one who does the saving. When we point people to Christ, he will reveal himself to them. And he will show them their need for salvation, reveal their sin, reveal their need to repent and place their faith in him and to acknowledge him as the rightful Lord of their lives. So we go, we share what Christ has done. We point people to Jesus and Jesus works with us. He's the one that will draw people to faith. So, we've seen the Lord of the harvest equipss us. He sends us. He works with us. And the final thing we'll look at today is we'll see that the Lord of the harvest rewards his workers, both the swer and the reapers. How does he do that? Well, the first thing I want to point out is once again go back to this metaphor of food. He will give us from the food, the spiritual food that he has. Food that nourishes, food that sustains, food that fulfills, food that brings joy. I can remember something that I thought was pretty funny that happened in our life group a few years ago. Somebody had mentioned they were going to a certain place on vacation. I don't remember where it was, but obviously it wasn't a real popular vacation destination. So other people in the life group said,"Wh are you going there?" One word answer, "Man." And the attitude of everybody in the group changed. Oh yeah, Macan. That's why. Yeah. Why spend your valuable vacation time, your money, your energy to go to that place? Macan, why spend your energy, your time, your money to share the gospel with those kinds of people? My God, food that God will give to us. A friend of mine recently told me that when he comes home at night, if he's been able to share the gospel with somebody that day, he has this sense of inner peace, a sense of contentment, a sense of fulfillment, a sense of satisfaction. He's experiencing the spiritual food that God gives. other rewards that we receive, treasures in heaven, eternal life, joy, and the promise that there will be a harvest. And we see all of that in this verse where it says the harvesters, those who reap, are receiving their wages, treasures in heaven. They're receiving eternal life, both eternity with God in heaven as well as a new quality of life now. And there's joy. And we have the promise there will be a harvest if seeds are sown abundantly. This past year, we had the opportunity to meet a man that I had heard about, but I had never gotten to know him. That I had first heard about him like 40 years ago because I met his daughter. And I remembered because she was cute. This is before I met Suzanne. Cute girl, but also she had been raised in Africa and I was just finishing my university studies and was getting ready to go teach for two years at a school in West Africa. So I was interested in getting to hear about her stories. Well, after coming back from Africa, I was at a conference where the leader of a mission organization was speaking and he mentioned this man. I'll call this call him Harold. He mentioned Harold and I recognized immediately, oh yeah, that's the father of that cute girl I met a few years ago. And he said, this man had been working as a missionary in Africa, East Africa, for several years with a tribe that had been pretty much unreached by the gospel. It was a tribe that some of the tallest people in the world come from. And it was a tribe that was known for fierceness because the boys in order to become a man have to kill a lion first and not with a gun. And so there had been very little evangelistic witness among this people group. But then all of a sudden there seemed to be a huge movement, many many people coming to faith in Christ. And the head of the mission organization said that when he heard about all of these people coming to faith, he went to Africa to East Africa because he wanted to talk to some of these people and ask them some questions. And he asked him, "Why is it that so many of you are coming to faith now? And earlier nobody was coming to faith." and he was told because nobody told us earlier. Of course, they're not going to come to faith if they've never heard. Romans 10 tells us or ask questions. How will they call in faith on someone they don't believe in? And how will they believe in somebody they've never heard of? And how will they hear unless somebody tells them they won't? But when they do, when seeds are sewn in abundance, like with this tribe in Africa, there will be some response. We have the promise of a harvest. How will you respond today? I would encourage you to respond to the Lord of the harvest the same way the Samaritan woman did, leaving her water jug and going to tell people what Christ had done for her and inviting them to come and meet Jesus. I would encourage you to respond the way that Jesus modeled for us as we place priority on doing his will, being intentional in our witness, going outside our comfort zone, taking the initiative, and not giving up. Suzanne's going to sing now. And as she sings, I want to ask you to pray and ask God to reveal to you two people. One person, somebody that you already know that's in your circle of friends, circle of influence who's not a believer that you've been wanting to someday share the gospel with. Pray for an open door with that person. For the second person, try to think of somebody outside your comfort zone. Maybe somebody from a different ethnic group, different socioeconomic status, different religious group. Ask God to show you somebody outside your comfort zone and ask him to help you to take the initiative to talk with that person. Not sometime, but maybe within the next two months. Two months from today, the beginning of school vacation, before school vacation starts, let God lead you to talk to two people. One you know well and to somebody outside your comfort zone. Listen to the words as Suzanne sings, but also pray and ask God to show you who you can share his love with. [Music] Every day they pass me by. I can see it in their eyes. Empty people filled with care. Headed who knows where. [Music] On. They go through private pain living fear to fear.
Laughter hides the silent cries. Only Jesus hears.
People need the Lord.
Keep on near the Lord
at the end of broken dreams. He's the open door.
People need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
When will we realize
people need the Lord?
We are called to take his light to a world where wrong seems right. What would be too great a cost for sharing life with one who's lost through his love our hearts can feel. All the grief they bear.
They must hear the words of life. only we can share.
People need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
At the end of broken dreams is the open door.
People need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
When will we realize
that we must give our lives for people need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
Sing with me on the chorus. People need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
at the end of broken dreams. He's the open door.
People need the Lord.
People need the Lord.
When will we realize
people need the Lord?
Let's pray together. Father God, we thank you that you have called us to you. We thank you that you have shared with us the living water, the food that brings satisfaction to our soul. As we acknowledge Jesus as Lord of our lives, we pray that we would be submissive to the will of the Lord of the harvest. Do his will. pray that you would open doors that we might be able to share with these people that you've brought to our mind, even those outside our comfort of c our circle of comfort. And father, if there's somebody today who has not yet responded in repentance and faith to you, who has not yet confessed their sins to you, ask forgiveness, receive Jesus as the Lord of their life, I pray that today you would speak to their heart, offer them the living water that brings satisfaction and that quenches our thirst. I pray that they today would respond to you in faith. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
