Thirty-Seventh Day of Lent

Thirty-Seventh Day of Lent

Wednesday, April 12, 2017

The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.
Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore,
to send out workers into his harvest field.

Matthew 9:37

There may be more than a little reticence in us to pray this prayer. If we ask God to send workers out to do the harvesting, we may be the ones he sends! If there is one thing that we don’t want Jesus to tell us to do – again – in this new kingdom of his, it is to go out and harvest the fields!

Of course, he is not talking about wheat or corn or beans! He’s talking about people! And the fields are not necessarily in Africa or China! He is telling us clearly that there are people all around us – a plentiful harvest – who have had the seeds of faith planted in them by others, and we need to go and reap that harvest for God, for the new kingdom.

The all-time best news the world has ever heard is that Jesus came, taught, lived among us, died for us, and rose for us. The incredible truth is that we were once separated from God by our own sin, and Jesus took it on himself, dying so that we could be forgiven. John says that, “to as many as received him, to them he gave the power to become the children of God.” (John 1:12)

Why am I so hesitant to say this to others? Do I or do I not believe it? We have heard it said that each of us must find his own way to God, but Jesus says, “no man comes to the father but by me.” If I believe others, I can be quiet. If I believe Jesus, I need to be about the business of harvest.

Prayer: Father, it looks like you mean all of us are to harvest, not just the pastor. Teach us to do this, to do it well, and to have the courage to tell others the Easter story. Amen.

And He Set His Face toward Jerusalem. . . .

A Lenten Devotional Guide
prepared for Homosassa United Methodist Church, Spring 2007,
by Patience Nave, Christian Education Coordinator