In my previous post, I shared how it is more important to focus on what we feed our children spiritually than physically. Jesus told his disciples that he has food to eat that they nothing about. Jesus wasn’t done teaching his disciples his object lesson with food. (Which as a dietitian, I love the food analogies in the Bible!)
“My food is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work. Do you not say, four months more and then harvest? I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields! They are ripe for harvest. Even now the reaper draws his wages, even now he harvests the crop for eternal life, so that the sower and the reaper may be glad together. Thus the saying, One sows and another reaps is true. I sent you to reap what you have not worked for. Others have done the hard work, and you have reaped the benefits of their labor.” (John 4:34-38)
Jesus says that “the food” is doing the will of God and completing His work. I am His child, and like Jesus, He has given me a purpose and will for me on this earth. That purpose is to sow and reap the fields; sowing and reaping the harvest of souls that need salvation that comes from Jesus!
Do you see that the harvest is ready? When news about ISIS, cops being killed, Christians being martyred, religious freedoms taken away flood our news feeds, at first glance it looks like no one wants Jesus. However, it’s the complete opposite. I need to open my eyes WIDER and look at the fields – to the people around me. Because deep down, so many are crying out for help. They are looking for a solution to this world’s problems. They are ripe. And I have believed the lie that Satan wants us to believe: there is no harvest. Stop trying. Give up. Go back to your comfortable lifestyle.
I can say those things because I believed those lies for too long which blinded my eyes to the harvest of souls. Yet, as my passion for Jesus has grown the past few months, my passion for people, specifically the lost without Jesus, has grown. The more we know Jesus, the more we see that He was ALL about people.
I recently read the book Just Walk Across the Room by Bill Hybels. If you want to know how to sow seeds and reap the harvest of souls, pick up this book now! It taught me practical advice on how to “walk across the room” and Living in 3-D: develop friendships, discover their stories, and discern next steps by following the Holy Spirit’s direction. The goal is to allow the Spirit to use you to move the person at least one step closer to Jesus or maybe a giant leap!
I have felt defeated in the past when I share the gospel and the person doesn’t give his/her life to Jesus. Or I’ll give a track and see them laugh or throw it away. Or I have gotten to the point with some people that I’ve given up and told God there is nothing left for me to do. While true, I cannot save the person, I have to remember what Jesus meant in the passage above: There may be times that I am sowing the seeds of the gospel by introducing the free gift of salvation to people, while other times I may be the reaper and being used to see that person come to receive that gift of salvation. OR I may be somewhere in the middle of the harvest process. Yet, no matter where God places me in the process, I am helping to complete God’s work and bring glory to Him.
What is your field? It shouldn’t take you long to figure that out. Look around right where you are. Doesn’t matter where you are. Home, work, store, missionary field, airplane, hospital, on Facebook reading this blog…. That’s your field; right where God has placed you.
Back in December, Brett “walked across his keyboard” by sharing the gospel through Facebook with a girl who was desperate for hope. Brett shared the Only Hope, Jesus, and she gave her life to Him changing the direction of her earthly life and eternal life. For about 6 years, I have “walked across the yard” planting seeds with my neighbor. Many times I felt like I said the wrong thing or not enough. However, I was a friend. I cared. I showed her who Jesus is and who He can be in her life. Less than 2 weeks ago, she was ripe and gave her life over to Jesus!
A good friend of ours is currently in the hospital from a ruptured appendix. It was so severe that the infection spread to his blood (sepsis), and he came close to dying. Yet, even though he can’t eat much right now, he is taking Jesus’ food, and doing the work he was sent to do right there in the hospital as he suffers. Even though he has tubes and monitors hooked up to him and cannot physically get out of bed, he keeps “walking across the ICU” by writing gospel letters to the other patients and sharing Jesus with his nurses. As of now, a nurse accepted Jesus as her Lord, and then our friend used that nurse’s phone to Skype to a patient in another room to pray with her to receive Jesus!
If you are a parent, don’t forget that we have a harvest of little souls that we feed, bathe, play, wipe, snuggle, teach daily. As a mom of small kids, there are so many days that I end thinking, “did I do ANYTHING that counted for eternity?” But every time I “walk across the room” to change my son’s poopy diaper, teach my daughter phonics, discipline disobedience, pray over them as I put them to bed, I’m planting seeds. I may not see the harvest for a long time, but if I’m faithful with receiving Jesus’s food and doing what He has sent me to do right where I am at, then I can have hope of reaping the benefits of all my labor.
Last week Kherington came out of her bedroom at night crying huge tears. I asked her what was wrong. Her sobbing reply, “Jesus died on the cross for my sins. I want Jesus! I want Jesus!”
She still does not fully comprehend the gospel, but Brett and I looked at each other and didn’t have to say anything. Seeds. She’s listening. She’s watching. Harvest is coming.
Varvelicious 