SPIRITUAL NOURISHMENT FOR TODAY

Passage: Matthew 9:35-38

“Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd. Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.”“

Memory Verse: Matthew 9:38 (NIV)

“ASK THE LORD OF THE HARVEST, THEREFORE, TO SEND OUT WORKERS INTO HIS HARVEST FIELD”

In this edition of Spiritual Nourishment, we want to think through the above passage concerning Jesus’ ministry and mission and what we can also do in helping to complete the task for which the Father sent him into the world.

Jesus came into the world with a mission. His main mission was to ensure that the good news reaches every corner of the earth. He therefore worked tirelessly around the clock to ensure that his mission on earth was fully accomplished. As part of his mission, Jesus went through all the towns and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every sickness.

He embarked upon what missiologists** describe as wholistic ministry. He did not focus on teaching the Jews and proselytes alone, but he also embarked on preaching the good news to the God fearers and the pagans as well.

He did not only preach under roofs, but also under trees, on the plains and other open places. Jesus did not take interest in preaching in the cities and big towns only; He preached and taught in the villages and towns as well as the cities.

He was not so much interested in his personal comfort as many missionaries, pastors, teachers, prophets and evangelists of today do. This should be a great lesson for those of us who have been called by God in these end times. We should eschew the desire for personal comforts which are detrimental to the expansion of God’s kingdom on earth.

We should be prepared to preach and teach in season and out of season, irrespective of the numerous constraints, perhaps, we shall be able to win some souls for God.

When Jesus saw the many people who were distressed and hopeless, He had compassion on them. He healed the many sick ones among them and set those under the control of demonic powers free.

Jesus understood the spiritual and physical needs of the people and also understood His mission on earth. He did as much as He could, but surely He could not reach all the peoples of the world, because of the limited time he had to spend in the world, knowing the enormity of the task of winning souls into the Kingdom of God, he stated that “the harvest is plentiful but the workers are few.”

If Jesus said the workers were few about two thousand years ago when the population of the world was far less than what it is today, I wonder what He might be saying from His abode today, when the population of the world is in billions. Your guess may be as good as mine. That is why He is asking the Father to bring in more workers for the harvest.

Beloved of God, we are living in a world which is full of wickedness. Many forms of sins are seen or heard of each and every day. Satan and his cohorts are doing whatever they can to get more people into their camp. It is indeed the time of harvest because the Day is approaching.

This is when more Christians, especially pastors, evangelists, teachers, prophets, deacons, elders, missionaries etc. are required to go all out in harvesting more souls for God.

Unfortunately, this has not been the case. Many Christians are satisfied with what they see around them such as the huge church auditoriums or the many people found in them. The truth is that the huge church auditoriums and large numbers of people seen attending church in certain parts of the world do not necessarily mean we should relax in working to win more souls.

It is true from what Jesus says in Matthew 7:21 and what we see around us that not all those who attend church are demonstrating the Christ-like nature required of Christians.

“Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven,” Matthew 7:21.

Also, not all the buildings used as church auditoriums are indeed the houses of God. In addition not all the people who call themselves men and women of God are true representatives of God. The above shows that true Christians have a lot to do in order to win more souls for the Father even from among those known to be Christians. The harvest is indeed plentiful!

Quite apart from the places where many people claim to be Christians, there are many places in the world where Christianity is almost non-existing. There are places with few or no churches. There are places with no evangelists, missionaries, teachers and pastor to preach and teach the good news.

There are many more places where the few Christians present are being killed or persecuted in one way or the other. All these places must remind us of the fact that indeed there is a lot of work to do.

The question therefore is, “Who are the workers willing to partner the Master in the soul winning business?”

May I take this opportunity to remind you that God is calling on all true believers to participate in the harvesting of souls in these end times? It is not the duty of a chosen few; soul winning is the task of all believers.

Let us therefore respond to the call of the Master and do our part in our small corners to ensure that many souls are won into the Kingdom of God. We all need to understand that failure to partake of the Master’s soul winning ministry is tantamount to selfishness. And a believer who is selfish may not inherit the Kingdom of God.

Let us therefore respond to the calling of becoming workers on the Father’s harvest filed today, and we shall be blessed beyond imagination!

THE WORD OF THE LORD!

 

**Missiologists – those who study Missiology: the theological study of the mission of the church, especially the character and purpose of missionary work.

---

Pastor Nana Kobina Baisie
Teacher/Pastor at Nadrim Mission International School, Busan, Korea.