Good News Week: Eyes for the Harvest

Jesus invites us to view our world through the eyes of the harvester. When Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion on them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” When Jesus sent out the seventy two on mission again he told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field. Go! I am sending you out like lambs among wolves... In our city we are God’s sowers and harvesters.
Further, as Jesus explains the parable of the sower, He teaches his disciples that harvesting is about sharing the Word of God, as the source of Good news about Jesus. Jesus said to them, “Don’t you understand this parable? How then will you understand any parable? The farmer sows the word. Some people are like seed along the path, where the word is sown. As soon as they hear it, Satan comes and takes away the word that was sown in them.  Others, like seed sown on rocky places, hear the word and at once receive it with joy. But since they have no root, they last only a short time. When trouble or persecution comes because of the word, they quickly fall away. Still others, like seed sown among thorns, hear the word; but the worries of this life, the deceitfulness of wealth and the desires for other things come in and choke the word, making it unfruitful. Others, like seed sown on good soil, hear the word, accept it, and produce a crop—thirty, sixty or even a hundred times what was sown.” In our life as God’s people in this city, we want to keep encouraging each other to hold out the Word of God to our friends, which in God’s power is able to bear fruit in their lives.
Paul reminds the Corinthians that ultimately God is the harvester with whom we work as his servants. “What, after all, is Apollos? And what is Paul? Only servants, through whom you came to believe—as the Lord has assigned to each his task. I planted the seed, Apollos watered it, but God made it grow. So neither he who plants nor he who waters is anything, but only God, who makes things grow. The man who plants and the man who waters have one purpose, and each will be rewarded according to his own labour. For we are God’s fellow workers; you are God’s field..”
As God’s people we are called to work with God in the harvest, not all of us are up front speakers, not all of us are confident sharing the good news with strangers. But all of us have friends, family, neighbours and people in our networks who are harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd with respect to their spiritual lives. We all have an opportunity to speak of how God has worked a harvest of righteousness in our own lives. 
Jesus says “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 labour.”
In the lead up to Good News Week in August, we have opportunities to work with God in harvest activities. Pray that the Lord of the harvest might bear fruit among us, pray for your participation in our harvest activities, pray that the lost in your networks might have an opportunity to hear the good new about Jesus and live!
Sow and Reap!

GP