Wanted: Harvesters - Life of Christ Part 35

I want to play a little word association game, alright?

I'm going to give you the word and you tell me what mental image you get. Here we go. Ready?

Everybody ready? Billy Graham, what you got? Crusade, probably open air stadium, crowd in the stands, man down on the field preaching, people streaming down the aisles and out onto the field to respond to his invitation, something like that.

That pretty close for the mental image most of us get. You know, for many of us in the 20th century, Billy Graham is kind of the quintessential example of open air evangelism. But it may come as a shock for you to realize that he's not the father of modern open air evangelism at all. As a matter of fact, to find the father of modern open air evangelism, we need to go back about 270 years to a man named George Whitfield. George Whitfield lived in England.

He was an ordained minister in the Church of England. In 1939, he went to Bristol, England because he had a burden on his heart to reach the coal miners who lived near Bristol, England. Now the coal miners who lived in Bristol were a rough bunch. As a matter of fact, they were considered to be the off scouring of British society, the scum of the earth. They were known for their violence.

They were known for their viciousness. They lived in a squalid ghetto that visitors didn't dare enter because they beat them up. In the town of Bristol, because there was no church in the ghetto, if he could use their church buildings to hold meetings to try to reach these miners.

The townspeople were so afraid of the miners that they told him absolutely not. They didn't want those people coming into their town and they didn't want them coming into their churches. And so as a response, George Whitfield began to go to those people in the open air. Now the ministers who told him that he could not use their churches also said to Whitfield, George, they are uneducated, they are uninterested, and they are unreachable. You're wasting your time. It's a waste of time. Go back to your parish and minister to your middle class and upper class people.

It's a waste of time. But Whitfield didn't believe that and so in 1739, he stood on a hill outside the mine and as these miners empty out of their dingy hole in the ground where they'd been from sunup to sundown, Whitfield began telling them about how God loved them. And he began telling them about how God wanted to forgive them and how God wanted to give them a new life. And before long, there were over 10,000 miners standing and listening to him on this rock outside of the entrance to their mine. Whitfield wrote in his journal and I quote, he said they were glad to hear of a Jesus who was a friend to those whom the world despised.

Before long, I began to notice white gutters on their cheeks, made by tears rolling down faces made black by the dust from the coal pits. Hundreds and hundreds of them were moved to a sound and thorough conversion, end of quote. In fact, Whitfield stayed there a number of weeks and before long he was holding 30 meetings a week with these miners and his audiences were totaling 40 to 50,000 miners a week who would come to his meetings. His early morning prayer meeting, which was before sunup, drew 8,000 miners.

His 6 a.m. young people's meeting drew 5,000 teenagers. And on Sunday, March 8, 1739, he wrote this, he said no less than 20,000 were present. Blessed are the eyes that see the things that I see. To behold such crowds of miners and poor people standing about in silence, listening to the word of God and to hear them singing and to hear their singing run from one end of the glen to the other is both solemn and surprising, end of quote.

Incredible. You say, well, now, Lon, wait a minute. I didn't come here for a history lesson this morning.

I mean, what's the point? The point is that what I've given you is not a history lesson. What I've given you is a lesson in spiritual truth, the very spiritual truth that Jesus Christ is going to comment on in our passage this morning, that there is no such thing as people who are unreachable. There is no such thing as people who are uninterested and people who are a waste of time. And where Jesus wants to convince us of that this morning, because we have a culture out here that many Christians are convinced is unreachable and is a waste of time.

And I'm telling you, it's not true. And God needs to motivate our hearts to be more involved than we are in reaching people in our world. And a lot of that comes from seeing our world the way Jesus saw it.

So let's look at the Bible together and see if we can do that. Chapter 10 of Luke's Gospel, verse one. After this, the Lord appointed 72 others and sent them two by two ahead of him to every town and place where he was about to go. Now, what was the mission of these people that he sent? Well, you find it down in verse nine. Verse nine says, heal the sick who are there and tell them the kingdom of God is near you. Heal the sick when you go into a town and tell them the kingdom of God is near you. This is the mission Jesus sent them on. Now, what does it mean when Jesus said to them, you're to tell them the kingdom of God is near you?

What exactly were they trying to tell these people? Well, you know, there's a lot of people who think that you become a member of the kingdom of God by doing certain stuff or by not doing other certain stuff. I mean, if you're Catholic, you're told that to become a member of the kingdom of God, you've got to be a faithful church member. You've got to be baptized. You've got to take communion.

You've got to go to confession and do all kinds of other things. If you're Islamic, to become a member of the kingdom of God, you've got to pray five times a day. You've got to go to Mecca.

You've got to keep Ramadan. If you're Jewish, to become a member of the kingdom of God, you've got to fast on Yom Kippur and then you hope for the best. If you're a secular American, you're told that to become a member of the kingdom of God, you need to try not to be any worse than your neighbor, to do a whole bunch of good works and hope when God puts it all on the scale and weighs it out that you come out looking all right. And if you're Baptist, you're told that you're not to drink or smoke or cuss or chew or hang around with them which do, and you can be a member of the kingdom of God. But what does the Bible say? What does the Bible say? What does the Bible say about the kingdom of God?

Well, right back in chapter 9, if you'll look back with me, Luke chapter 9, it says in verse 27, Luke chapter 9 verse 27, and we've been over this before, but let's review. Jesus said, I tell you the truth, some of you who are standing here will not taste death before they see the kingdom of God. And then seven days later, Jesus took three of his disciples, that is some of them, up on a mountain and the Bible says he was transfigured before them. He pulled back the veil on his true divine nature and allowed these three men to glance and to glimpse and see the glory that belonged to him as the second person in the Godhead. Now folks, the Bible teaches that they saw the kingdom of God, but what did they see? What they saw was Jesus Christ revealed in all of his glory. And so what the Bible is telling us is if you want to know what the kingdom of God is, the kingdom of God is Jesus Christ. It is Jesus Christ and all that he is and all that he did for us. Jesus Christ is the kingdom of God. And when these people went proclaiming the kingdom of God is near you, what they were proclaiming is Jesus Christ is coming through this town. These 72 men were not sent out to offer people rules and regulations and rituals and rosaries and restraint and reform and religion and rhetoric. They were sent out to offer people Jesus Christ. That's what they were offering.

They were offering people the opportunity to acknowledge him as the Messiah of Israel, the opportunity to trust him as their personal savior and the opportunity to accept him as the Lord of their life, because that's how you become a member of the kingdom of God. That's how you get in. If I say the name James Miller, does that ring a bell with anybody? You say James Miller, James Miller. Familiar name?

No. Well, James Miller was the skydiver who tried to get into the Evander Hollyfield Riddick bow fight without a ticket. Remember that guy? Parachuted in from the sky, got hung up, landed in the ropes, got all tangled around.

And what did they do? Well, they grabbed him and they arrested him and they carted him off to jail. Because if you wanted to see Evander Hollyfield fight Riddick Bow, you had to go in through the gate, right? It's the only way to get in. If you want to see the Orioles play, you got to go in through the gate.

If you want to see the Redskins play, not that anybody really cares, you got to go in through the gate. And friend, if you want to get into the kingdom of God, you got to go in through the gate. Jesus said, John chapter 10, verse 9, I tell you the truth, I am the gate. Check it out for yourself, John 10, 9, I tell you the truth, I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved.

They will come in and go out and find pasture. And you know, for every one of us here this morning, the number one most important question in our life is are you and I trying to use the right gate to get eternal life and get into heaven? There's a whole lot of people trying to use the wrong gates.

I just listed a whole bunch of them for you. Jesus said, I'm the gate and I'm the one that works. And my dear friend, the gate is personal faith in Jesus Christ.

Not church, not good works, not religiosity or any of these other things. And this is the message that Jesus sent these 72 people out to preach. And I hope if you're here that you're able to look at your life and say, I know the gate and I've used the gate. And I hope that's true of you this Christmas season.

If not, it can be. And I hope you'll make it true of you. But let's go on. Luke chapter 10. Well, it says in chapter 10 that he sent them out and he said to them in verse 3, Go, I am sending you out like lambs among wolves. Now, why would Jesus say something like that to them? Well, the reason is because it was true.

I mean, think now. The religious leaders of Israel had uniformly rejected Jesus. They threw everybody out of the synagogue who confessed Jesus. They were actively seeking a way to kill Jesus. Everywhere Jesus went, they followed him around and made trouble and havoc and confusion and opposition. And parents, the Bible tells us, even distanced themselves from children who confessed Christ because they were so afraid of the pressure and the backlash they were going to get from the religious leaders of Israel to Jesus's disciples. I'm sure it looked like they were going out like lambs in the presence of wolves.

I'm sure it must have seemed to them like the whole world was against them. And I'm sure that these 72 guys must have wondered, well, Jesus, who are we going out to preach to anyway? I mean, there's nobody out there interested, Lord. There's nobody out there who's receptive, God. All that's going to happen is that we're going to go out there and get our spiritual teeth kicked in. That's what's going to happen because there is nobody out there who wants to hear what we've got to say.

The mission you're given us is mission impossible. And it was against this backdrop that Jesus shares a great spiritual truth with them that you and I need today. Look at verse two. Jesus said, The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few.

Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out more workers into the harvest field. What would Jesus really say to them? Jesus said, Listen, guys, don't worry about the opposition out there. Listen, guys, don't worry about the vocal minority out there. Don't let them throw you for a loop.

Don't let them blind you to the real condition of the fields out there. Jesus said, Now you listen to me, fellas. I know the heart of every man, every woman and every child in the world, every one of them. And I'm telling you, listen to me. I'm telling you that there are lots of people out there who are ready. There are lots of people out there who are interested, that there are people out there who are hurting. There are people out there whose lives are empty on the inside. There are people out there who are searching. And there are people out there who are ready to listen and ready to think about me and ready to believe. The harvest is plentiful. Don't you let the opposition that you're getting dupe you into thinking that there aren't people out there that aren't interested, because I'm telling you there are. The problem is not a lack of harvest, but a shortage of harvesters.

That's the problem. And so what's the action item from all of this that Jesus comes up with? Well, right in verse two, there's two of them. Number one, Jesus says, You all go on out there like I told you and harvest for Christ. And number two, pray that more Christians will respond to the voice of God and get out there and help with the harvest. And would you notice, Jesus never told spectators to pray for more harvesters.

Isn't that interesting? He told harvesters to pray for more harvesters to come out in the field and help them. I'm interested how we always turn to people sitting in the pew who aren't doing anything and say, Pray for more workers to go into the harvest. Those are the wrong people to be praying.

The people Jesus said ought to be praying are the ones already out there in the field, asking God to please rouse others and send them out to help. Now, that's the end of our passage, but it leads us to ask the really important question. And you know what it is.

What is it? So what? Right.

Let me answer that question. George Barna, by the way, is a very fine Christian. You know, he's a demographer and does a lot of great stuff.

He wrote a book called The Barna Report, What Americans Believe, and I'd like to read you something from it. He says, and I quote, inviting people to church is one thing. Inviting people who are not already believers is quite another story. Barely one third of Christian adults have ever invited someone to church who's not already involved in a Christian church. He goes on to say a recent nationwide study conducted among unchurched adults indicate that 25 percent would attend church if a friend ever made the effort to invite them. Our best estimate is that the unchurched population of this country is roughly between 60 and 70 million people. That means that 15 to 18 million adults are waiting to be asked to go to church. That's more people than live in all of Belgium or all of Holland.

It's twice the population of New York City, end of quote. Now, folks, I know that inviting people to come to church is not the most crucial issue. I know that talking to them about their personal relationship with Jesus Christ is.

But listen, if only 30 percent of Christians have ever invited a non-Christian to even come to church, doesn't it make sense that even fewer have ever spoken openly about a relationship to Christ with non-Christian people? And my question is, why? Why? Say, why do you ask questions like that? Because they're the right question to ask.

Why? Why don't people like you and I who know Christ go out there and do more to try to reach people? Well, I don't know. There are probably lots of answers. But it seems to me, in my contact in 23 years with fellow Christians, that the single greatest reason is that we don't see the world the way Jesus saw it. That's the greatest reason.

In other words, we say to ourselves, hey, nobody out there wants to hear what I have to say. Nobody out there is interested in Jesus Christ. Are you out of your mind? They wanted to make money. They're interested in going around the world. They're interested in buying their new car. They're interested in having their nice clothes.

They're interested in all, but they're not interested in Jesus Christ out there. Are you kidding? It's a waste of my time. I'm going to go out there and embarrass myself. And for what?

For what? Nobody out there wants to hear what I have to say. Nobody cares. Now, if you think like that, you're not going to talk much about Jesus Christ. But, folks, that's not the way Jesus saw the world. That's not the way he saw the world. Let me show you how Jesus saw the world.

We're going to find the same truth, but let's just see it said a different way. John chapter 4. Here, Jesus is in the middle of Israel in a land called Samaria, and he's talking to Samaritans. Now, if you've been with us, you remember that the Samaritans were a race of half-breeds. The Jews hated them. They considered them to be unreachable. They considered them to be unworthy of salvation.

They considered them to be beyond the reach of the grace of God. And Jesus here in John 4 has just led a prostitute to faith in Christ. And as a result, she in turn heads off to go get the whole rest of the town and tell them.

Look what happens. Verse 39, chapter 4, verse 39. Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony that he told me everything I ever did. So when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words, many more became believers. And they said to the woman, we don't believe any longer just because of what you said.

Now we have heard him for ourselves, and we know that this man really is the savior of the world. How many Samaritans came to Christ? I don't know. 50? Maybe. A hundred? Maybe. Hundreds?

Probably. And isn't it interesting that this is a group of people that the Jews considered to be unreachable, beyond the grace of God, unworthy of salvation. And yet Jesus Christ went to a group that was considered to be uninterested and unreachable, just like George Whitefield did 1,700 years later, and look at the harvest for God that they reaped. That's why Jesus said, look back up at verse 35. He said to his disciples, you guys look around and you say there's four months until the fields are ready for harvest.

It was January, and it would be at least four months before there was time to do any harvesting. And Jesus said, you're absolutely right when it comes to looking at the fields of grain. But Jesus said, I tell you guys, open your eyes and look at the fields, not the fields of grain, but the fields of humanity.

Open your eyes and look at the field of humanity. They are already ripe for harvest. Jesus said, hey fellas, you don't need to wait four months to reap in that field. You don't even need to wait one day to reap in that field.

Did you just see what happened here today? There are people who are already ready in that field, people who are ready to listen, people who are ready to believe. This is how Jesus Christ sees the world. And folks, since he's God and he knows the true state of everything, if this is the way he sees the world, then I'd like to say to you, this is the way the world really is.

Doesn't matter how you and I see it, this is the way it really is. The really tragic thing is that the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are so few. The tragedy is that there's so much fruit to be harvested out there for the kingdom of God, and there's so few of us out there doing it.

You say, well now Lon, wait a minute, just hold on a second. I hear where you're coming from, but I got a big time objection to all this. And my objection is Jesus wasn't talking about Washington, D.C. Now maybe he was talking about people who live in Iowa, or maybe he was talking about people who live in Mississippi, but he was not talking about people who live in the metro Washington, D.C. area.

Lon, if Jesus had been walking around here, he would not have said that. That field out there is not ready for harvesting. There's nobody out there really interested.

You got to go to Iowa and Mississippi to find those people. Now wait a minute, wait a minute. Are you sure of that?

How sure are you of that? I want to read you a couple of letters I get. I get letters all the time. The ones I don't like I throw away, but I keep the ones I like. And I kept some of these. Let me read you a couple of these.

You say that the people out there who are not ready to believe, listen to this. This is from a foreign exchange student from Japan. Dear Lon, hello, how are you? Thank you very much for making time to read my letter.

I'm a graduate student in linguistics at Georgetown University. I got to know this church through the friendship program by people of the world. That's our international ministry here. And have been attending this church for more than a year now. I accepted Jesus as my Lord and Savior in March 1993. The joy and peace that I have now is what I didn't expect. I didn't even know before. I'm so happy that he drew me near him and gave me eternal life, which is much more important than the MA that I came to America to get.

I agree. I'll finish my study next May and go back to Japan where all my family members are not Christians. I had been pretty much scared to go back and thinking of staying in the States for another year or two. And I kept on praying to God to show me what he wanted me to do. And for this prayer I got his answer last Tuesday by being informed very sad news that my grandfather got in a hospital. I knew at that moment that God wants me to go back and show his love to the people in Japan and soften their hearts. I don't want to tie you up for too long, but I want you to know that I was born here in McLean Bible Church.

Got another one. Dear Lon Solomon, I'm a German exchange student studying at Georgetown University for one year. Through the People of the World program I got in touch with my host family and when I first got here they invited me to church and ever since I haven't missed a single Sunday at McLean. Living in the United States is very exciting, but if somebody asked me what I like best I'd say it's McLean Bible Church.

Isn't that wild? And the love of God that came into my life. Do you know I grew up as a somewhat Catholic family in East Germany? I was baptized when I was a baby and went to Sunday school once a week. But I never realized the importance of Jesus for my life until I was arrested by the East German State Security Service for political reasons.

I was 19 at the time and I spent two years in jail with my father. When the wall came down in November 1989 my dad and I were freed from prison and my entire family moved to West Germany. I had so many plans and dreams, the greatest of which was spending a year in the United States studying and I'm very grateful that God made my dream come true. I praise God for you and the whole community at McLean Bible Church who are touching lives with the love of God.

My life has certainly never been touched before like this until I came to the United States. One more. Lady who works for WINZ in Miami.

Dear Sirs, a note of thanks. On Saturday, November 19th, this is several years ago, I arrived at Washington National Airport at 4.30 p.m. I was in the area from Miami, Florida for a job interview. After getting off the plane I made a phone call to a friend who was unable to pick me up so I was instructed to take the metro into the district.

Some friend. Upon leaving Miami, she didn't say that, I did. Upon leaving Miami I had not checked the traveler's forecast and was dressed quite inappropriately for Washington's weather. I had on cotton attire and it was about 35 degrees and raining here.

Leaving the airport a young couple stuffed a yellow piece of paper into my hand which I then stuffed in my pocket. As I left National Airport with heavy bags to walk to the metro station it was raining. It was cold. And I really felt abandoned and alone. It began raining harder.

My bags got heavier and the metro station seemed farther than ever. I saw a telephone booth and went in to rest. I began to cry. I looked in my pocket for a Kleenex and pulled out the tract I had been given. And as I read the scriptures I was comforted and reassured that God really loved me. I just thought you might want to hear how I was touched through the dedication of believers who took the time to be at the airport. Imagine how many others have been touched as well.

And she signs it. Friends, I got a whole drawer full of these. My point is that there are people in your family who are ready to listen. There are people in your office who are ready to listen. There are people in your apartment building and in your neighborhood who are open and ready to listen.

There are people on your campus or in your school. There are people in jail and people in nursing homes and people on your ball team who are ready to listen. Friends, your doctor that you meet might be ready to listen or some waiter or some client or even your boss might be ready to listen. You say, no, Lon, wrong.

My boss is not ready to listen. Well, miracles still happen, folks. God does miracles. There are people out there who are ready and willing to listen. If you don't believe it, come down and read through my drawer.

And they all live right here in Washington. I'll tell you something. Twenty-three years ago, I was a pretty unlikely-looking candidate for someone to give their life to Jesus Christ.

I had hair out to my shoulders, bell bottoms on, a tank top, love beads, and smoked dope. And I'll bet there were a lot of you here who are Christians today who a few years ago were pretty unlikely-looking candidates yourself. Aren't you glad that there was somebody who read the Word of God and believed the Word of God and saw the world the way Jesus saw it and was willing by faith to go out there and talk to people and you were one of them? Aren't you glad there was somebody willing to do that?

I sure am. And my question to you is and to me is are we willing to believe Jesus Christ in that same way and go out and do the same thing? Doesn't matter how many people you lead to Christ. That doesn't matter. What matters is how many of them you offer Christ to.

I took out my calculator this week and began doing a little bit of ciphering. I figure there's 1,400 adults here on a given Sunday morning, and if every one of us dedicated ourself to speaking to one person a day about Jesus Christ, not 100 or 25 or even 10, just one, or giving out one piece of information about Jesus Christ a day to one person, that's all, just one. Do you know in one year if we all did that, we would touch half a million people for Christ?

You realize that? And that's giving you a few Sundays off, half a million people. Do you realize in five years that would be two and a half million people?

That's more than the entire population of the metropolitan Washington area. Can it be done? Yes. Could this one church turn Washington upside down for Christ? Yes, we could. But it means that there are people, you and me, who are going to have to see the world the way Jesus Christ said it really is and put our lives and our faith on the line and get out there and get in the harvest field and get to work.

Stop sitting on the sidelines praying for others to go do it and get out there and do it ourself. There's a great opportunity coming to you this weekend. We've got our Christmas concerts. Folks, you know, we don't do those Christmas concerts so you have a nice place to take your family for Christmas for a program. You can go to the Kennedy Center for that. We do it as a way that you can reach out to neighbors and friends and co-workers and relatives and people you care about and present Christ to them this Christmas season in a way that is attractive and done with excellence and relevance.

That's what it's all about. So who are you planning to invite to our Christmas concerts? She said, well, Lon, I wasn't planning to invite anybody because I don't know anybody who's... Uh-oh.

Interesting. I met a guy yesterday and we were standing right here because we were here practicing. And he said to me, you never believe it. He said, you know, my wife thought of two friends we know who are really non-Christians.

You know what I'm saying? And my wife said, why don't we call and invite him to come? And I said, you've got to be kidding. And she said, no, I'm going to call him. And she called him up and she said, you won't believe it.

Guess what? I said, they're coming. He said, right. I can't believe it. Can you believe that they're actually going to come? I said, are you surprised?

And he said, well, yeah, I am. I said, well, God bless you for asking. No, God bless your wife.

God bless your wife for taking the risk. Hey, what's the worst that could possibly happen? They say no. It's not like you just had an automobile accident or your stock portfolio just dropped through the floor. They could say no. Maybe you might get a little blood in your face and be a tiny bit embarrassed.

That's the worst that could possibly happen. Is somebody's soul worth that price? I think it is.

And you know what? I'll bet you there are a lot of people out there who'd say yes. If you just ask them, 25% is what Barna says, that means if you ask four people, you're bound to hit one. The problem is not that there are people out there who aren't interested. The problem is we don't see the world the way Jesus Christ said it really is. Underneath all of that plastic they put up, there are people who are hurting, people who are lonely, people who are searching, and if we've got the answer, friend, we've got it.

And there are people who are willing to listen if we're willing to talk. Friends, we're not interested in being a maintenance church. You know what a maintenance church is? A maintenance church says let's just get everybody together who already agrees with us and let's just take care of them. We're not interested in being that kind of church. We're interested in being the kind of church who maintains our people, absolutely, but also the kind of church that says there's a whole lot of other people out there that need Jesus Christ.

We need to go out there and we need to reach them or do our best we can. And if you're going to be part of this church, that's the attitude we want you to have. God will bless your life. And we want to see hundreds of people come to know Christ this Christmas season.

But you know what? No amount of church programming can do that. Church programming doesn't reach people. People reach people. So how many of you are going to get out of the stands and on the field? That's the question I got for you this morning. Let's pray about it. Heavenly Father, thank you for speaking to our hearts this morning. And Lord, we want you to challenge us, to challenge us to get out of our rut, to get out of our comfort zone, to be willing to take a risk for Jesus Christ because every one of us here who are Christians, somebody took a risk for us or we wouldn't be a Christian today. Lord Jesus, I pray that you would help us see the world the way you see it, that underneath all the smoke and mirrors there are people out there who don't have answers and who want answers and who are willing to listen if we're willing to talk to them with love and compassion and tenderness. And so Lord Jesus, I pray that this Christmas season you would take the members of this church family who know Christ and you would make us missionaries to this culture of ours. And Lord, even if we get rejected once or twice, help us simply to pass it off as well, that's what the disciples got to, but to keep sowing seed knowing if we sow enough we're going to hit good ground. Lord, work in our hearts and make this real for our lives and grant that we might be able this Christmas season as a church family to see hundreds upon hundreds of people come to believing faith in Jesus Christ. Lord, that would be the best Christmas present this church could ever give you. And may we do our best to see that that happens, we pray in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen.