Ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his
harvest fieId. Years ago this would have been seen as a
traditional text for calling people to ministry or missionary
activity. A call no less necessary today and more urgent. It is
a delusion to say we live in a Christian country which espouses
Christian values. We live in a society that has pushed Jesus to
the edges of life with a Prime Minister who doesn’t believe in
God where many who claim to be Christian never worship with
God's people. If challenged they see the Church having an
integral place in the community and would be missed if not
there. Someone once described them as four- wheeled Christians:
prammed in for baptism, driven up for marriage, wheeled out at
their funeral. They are passive, it’s done for them. A "Don't
call us, we'll call you" attitude.
The need is still urgent for people to offer for ministry for
the harvest is ripe, except now the mission field does not have
the glamour of an overseas country. As the field for the
disciples was to be found all around them, so it is for
us.
Yet, Jesus refers to the disciples and their mission field as
if they
we were lambs being put in amongst wolves, where they may be
expected to be misunderstood, attacked, torn apart. Where
there were slim odds for their survival. Jesus gave strict
instructions and didn't try to hide that the task would not be
easy. The basis of the task was the nearness of the Kingdom of
God which they were to share by both word and deed.
Wherever the disciples went they were to offer shalom: the
peace of God which would bring about one of two responses:
they would be received they would be rejected.
By either response, people would experience the Kingdom of
God. It is this experience of the kingdom which sifts, separates
and divides bringing the experience of peace or the experience
of judgment. The reign of God or the reign of doom.
Jesus is clear about the commission he gives to those he
sends:
He who listens to you, listens to me.
He who rejects you, rejects me.
He who rejects me, rejects him who sent me.
Jesus then gives insight into the nature of the harvest field
and the nature of the harvest: The field is a spiritual
battleground.
Paul puts it in a similar manner when he writes to the
Ephesians: For our struggle is not against flesh and blood
but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the
powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of
evil in the heavenly realms. The gospel of Jesus Christ is a
head-on confrontation with these powers: powers which motivate
people for the achieving of their own ends, rather than the
kingdom of God.
Those who proclaim this gospel do so with the full assurance
that the evil that grips this world will not and cannot survive.
The disciples returned with joy. They experienced demons
being
cast out, Jesus said how he had seen Satan, the Prince of
this
world, and ruler of this world's spiritual forces cast down.
The full authority of God is given by Jesus, a power vested
in the Holy Spirit is given to all so that those who are sent
like lambs will overcome. Hence, the Church affirms Jesus as the
Lamb of God, sacrificed for our sin, but raised for our
justification.
Jesus says I have given you authority and power to
overcome the power of the enemy, nothing will harm you.
Nothing can harm us when we live our daily lives in
this power of God, when we live our lives experiencing the peace
of God. This doesn't mean that we'll not be tempted, not be
oppressed; that we'll never be ill, that things will never fall
down around us. But we have the assurance that we can overcome
by the blood of the Lamb, Jesus and the power of our own
testimony!
Christ is with us. In his love for us he has been there
before us. He is with us in the present. He is before us as we
journey ahead.
Go, I am sending you out like lambs among wolves! However, do
not rejoice because the spirits sumbit to you. Do not worry
about being successful. Do not count up the number of scalps of
people you have converted or brought to the Lord.
Rather, rejoice that your names have been written in heaven.
Rejoice that you have been obedient, like Jesus.
The task of the Church is to continue this preaching and
healing task and in doing so:
1. to be utterly committed to the Word of God in Jesus
Christ.
2. to have a keen sense of the immediacy of the gospel of
Christ so that people may experience the kingdom of God now and
not as some future thing after they have died.
3. to go, and in going be sent only where God sends.
4. to travel light.
5. to speak only of God's peace which itself will determine
people's responses.
6. to not worry if we are received or rejected.
7. to stand firm in the knowledge that God has sent us and
nothing can ever separate us from His love.
We’ll leave it here for today. Luke goes on to tell another
story in the context of the mission field which no doubt David
Spitteler will pick up next week. For in this story, the Church
is but an image of the place where the Good Samaritan brings the
hurt and needy to be cared for. Meanwhile, the field is ripe.
Are you ready to fulfil your calling? Is God nudging
you to consider full time ministry in His Church, or to
volunteer in some program? Are you prepared, as we said last
week, to give up your excuse making and are now willing to say
"Yes, I am a bit nervous about it, but I will fulfil the purpose
for which God gave me life and freedom"?
Let us pray.