Responding to Jesus (Week 7)
2020: A Year of Celebration!
“Jesus is Lord of the Harvest: Go with Him!”
Key Verses: Luke 10:1-3
Welcome to 2020, A Year of Celebration at FBC! This is our 110th anniversary year as our church was chartered on July 7, 1910. We are planning a big celebration the weekend after our anniversary date, so save the date for the weekend of July 11-12, 2020.
Who are we celebrating? We are celebrating Jesus and in doing so we are going to do one thing all year long: LIFT UP THE NAME OF JESUS!
Our theme verse for 2020 is John chapter 12, verse 32 (John 12:32, ESV), which proclaims, “And I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all people to myself.” This verse explicitly points to the fact that Jesus would be lifted up on the Cross of Calvary to give His life as a payment for sin, as the very next verse says, “He said this to show by what kind of death he was going to die.” The implications of this verse go beyond Jesus’ death and influence every area of our lives: we are called to live our lives in response to Jesus being lifted up on the Cross as the Savior for all the World!
Today, we are going to learn: Jesus is the Lord of the Harvest and He has invited us to pray for people to work His fields. Let’s look at the text where Jesus teaches us this.
Turn with me to Luke chapter 10, verses 1-3 (Luke 10:1-3):
After this the Lord appointed seventy-two others and sent them on ahead of him, two by two, into every town and place where he himself was about to go. And he said to them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Go your way; behold, I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves.”
This is not the only place Jesus gives His followers a command to take the good news (gospel) to other people—we call this evangelism or missions.
Jesus famously commands in Matthew 28:18-20, “And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.’”
In our lesson today, we see that Jesus instructs His followers:
1. The work is not just for pastors and missionaries.
Jesus sent 72 followers, not just the 12 Apostles. This is the mission of the church—all the people of God are to go!
2. Don’t go alone!
In the Army, we were trained to have a battle buddy… [I will tell a story of my battle buddy linking arms with me in Ranger School to illustrate what a battle buddy is and why they are important.]
Do you have a battle buddy? That question may seem out of context, but when you listen to Jesus’ words, they make sense: “Go your way; behold, I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves.” There is hardship and pain awaiting each of us in the world we live and attempt to serve in the name of Jesus. We live in a very broken world, filled with sadness and grief, sin and selfishness. Bad things happen to all of us and all we have sometimes is our faith in this message of hope, to reminder ourselves and to share with others because so many are feeling hopeless and beat up by a world that doesn’t seem to care.
If you got at it alone, there is a very good chance that your initial excitement to be a part of the work of God will waver and fail in the midst of so much pain and hardship. It is amazing how much life can beat us down, circumstances and chronic pain, alike, can distract us and keep us from seeing any light at the end of the tunnel.
Listen to three promises from God’s Word about spiritual relationships:
- 1 Corinthians 16:17-18 states,
“I rejoice at the coming of Stephanas and Fortunatus and Achaicus, because they have made up for your absence, for they refreshed my spirit as well as yours. Give recognition to such people.”
- 2 Corinthians 7:13 reiterates,
“Therefore we are comforted. And besides our own comfort, we rejoiced still more at the joy of Titus, because his spirit has been refreshed by you all.”
- Hebrews 10:24-25,
“And let us consider how to stir up one another to love and good works, not neglecting to meet together, as is the habit of some, but encouraging one another, and all the more as you see the Day drawing near.”
3. Go to every place Jesus would go! Stay in His yoke!
Jesus commands His followers to follow a certain path in how we plow the field: I want you to listen to some teachings from Jesus that help us understand how we are to work His harvest fields.
“But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.”
This scripture has 2 lessons I want you think about: 1) start where you are because this is where you are (Jerusalem, your home community), but be willing to move outside of your comfort zone as the Lord leads you. That can include our region/state (Judah), the nation (Samaria, this also has the implications of people who may not be like you, maybe people considered outcasts or “not like us”), and to the end of the earth (anywhere and everywhere, people distant from you in every way).
Jesus is tearing down the cultural and religious prejudices of His day and He’s still doing it, today! Are there people or places you are not willing to go?
Don’t just think about way away out there, think about in here (around this room) or around our city or your school or workplace or extended family… Are their barriers in your mind and heart that disallow you from loving people the way Jesus loves you? Do you need to seek forgiveness or forgive another person today? Are there a few difficult minutes of a hard conversation ahead of you so that you can be free forever?
Does this sound like a heavy-burden to you? Does it cause anxiety or fear just thinking about going across this room or across the street in your neighborhood or across town or across the lunchroom or across the world?
“Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me, for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.”
I want you to get one thing out of this passage today: when you take on Jesus’ yoke, He will direct your path and set your pace in the harvest field. When you are yoked to Jesus, you are now working under a different power source that causes His yoke to be easy and His burden to be light. We are in the yoke of Jesus when we are empowered by the Holy Spirit. You are not alone!
And when you are not alone, you can do whatever it is God is putting on your heart to do! You can go where He leads you, even if others don’t understand why you are going to that place or to those people. We all needed someone to come to us at some point in our life… Let’s return the favor and reach out to others where they are.
‘Why does he eat with tax collectors and sinners?’ And when Jesus heard it, he said to them, ‘Those who are well have no need of a physician, but those who are sick. I came not to call the righteous, but sinners.’”
Where is God calling you to go? Then, you go there! If each of us would just go where we each were called to go, then how many more people would have Jesus in their lives?
4. The final point for today is this: Pray for God to capture the hearts of more people to come on journey with Jesus and share in all the work.
Don’t go alone means praying to God and inviting Him to go with you. He also invites you to bring a friend with you as you go. If you are currently going alone, pray and ask God to raise a worker to join you.
If you currently see places of need that you aren’t called to go to, then pray that God would raise up people to go.
I can’t go everywhere, because that would be disobedience to what I am called to do. No guilt to you, nor will accept guilt to come back on me. We each are called—I’m in the yoke of Jesus learning to go where He calls me.
Whose yoke are you in and where is that yoke taking you?
It’s time to pray…