Skilled Laborers for Delicate Harvests

Instead of just sitting in Heaven and disapproving of our fallen condition, our Lord did something remarkable: He came here to walk with us, experience our suffering, and show us how to rise above our sinfulness. He paid the complete price for us to be able to reconcile with the Father, even in our brokenness and flawed Adamic nature! Just as God sent a representative into the human race to save all, He continues to do this on a different level today: He uses US to walk among and impact others with whom we share similar struggles or questions. That’s why we aren’t to just go around vexed and speaking with disdain about our fellow man’s wretched conditions. We are to pray that God assigns the right persons to each group of people who are walking in a particular pocket of darkness.

The Word tells us that where sin abounds, grace does much more abound (Romans 5:20). There is no segment of our society so wicked, so blind, or so hopeless that God cannot send a messenger capable of reaching them!  Perhaps you’re not as socially-versatile a person as the Apostle Paul; after all, his wide circle of influence came because he had a mighty wide background before coming to Christ.  If you are limited in those whom you can reach, or if frustration causes you to be ineffective in your witness, this message is for you–and it’s a message of GREAT HOPE.

Don’t make it your business to just stand back and curse others for their sinful behavior. Speak the truth, yes. Never compromise. But don’t use your words as weapons to just rip to shreds people who desperately need Jesus. It may not be YOUR voice that reaches them with convicting impact. If your voice isn’t capable of bearing that fruit, use it for prayer instead of for pounding! God’s already told us to pray that the Lord of the Harvest will send laborers. God intends to give all men and women a way of escape from the clutches of sin, if they’ll take it. He has already created and called special laborers to these seemingly impossible segments of the field of souls.

The ear who’s closed to most other voices? It will open when the right messenger delivers that same uncompromised truth. God will anoint that messenger with the ability to be heard . That harvest will feel connected to, loved by, and understood by the person sent to engage them. They will take seriously from him the same message that they may have scorned out of the lips of others.

God didn’t call us to be the voice of disapproval…He called us to be the light of the world! Disapproval? Oh yes, that’s totally what the lost expect of us…and we have sure given them a whopping dose of it. But…have we sprung the message on them that God loves them and that so do we? Have we demonstrated to them that Jesus died for all, and that no one is beyond His reach?  Zacchaeus could climb out of the scorn of the crowd and watch Jesus from a safe distance in that sycamore tree…but WOW…when Jesus saw him and announced (in front of the others who despised this money-grubbing little tax collector) He was going home with him!  He could handle rejection all day long, and had.  Jesus’ approval, however, totally disarmed him!

It’s OK if you have no gifting to reach every single personality type, societal group, or area of sin bondage. If you feel no compassion for, or patience, or common ground with a particular group of people who embrace something you feel strongly against, then do this: step back enough to where you can see objectively and begin to just pray for them. Don’t shun them, just don’t try to engage in a verbal dispute over the lifestyles they’re living. Show the love of God and only speak what will actually bear fruit. At that same time, begin to pray IN EARNEST for someone to come into their paths who has that gifting, and keep praying until God sends His chosen laborer into that particular harvest field.

Let me explain. Having dealt with loved ones who were in deep bondage to addiction from the early days of my childhood, I am not the best person to engage someone wrestling with a drug or alcohol problem. When I encounter a person who’s high or drunk, I still get that feeling of dread in the pit of my stomach from old memories I’d just as soon not resurrect. So, instead of being gifted at reaching that person on a genuine level ground, I am too preoccupied with fighting my own bad memories to really be the most effective witness–one whose message will be received. Probably the person himself/herself even feels the vibes coming from me of someone who’d like to just escape this situation as soon as possible! Someone else can step into that role, however, and completely dominate the spirit of addiction. A peace can settle in and a common ground be established where the addicted person feels understood and loved, rather than dreaded. In that setting, God has great leeway to build a bridge to rescue the perishing! In my element, there are others I can more effectively reach…and as I remain faithful in doing what I CAN, God will increase my areas of influence.

Sometimes God will even send someone into that harvest area who isn’t so close to the problem. If the really-bound person is your family member, your frustration about the situation may be too strong to allow you objectivity. That person may be completely unreceptive to your pleas. Trust God to send the perfect influence into that person’s path. It’s ok if the right messenger isn’t YOU! Your obligation is to continue in love and intercession…and God can sometimes do His most effective rescue blitzes through a third-party intervention.  There’ll be time for reconciliation between you and your loved one later, once Christ reigns in his or her life, too.  Let go and let God.

Instead of me just spewing disapproval of the lifestyles of those in bondage (and causing them to completely shutdown from any chance to receive what I have to say about the love of God), I need to intercede for ones I don’t positively impact, and let God put the perfect spokesperson into their paths. He will. And He will hold me accountable to touch others…those with whom I have a particular rapport! There’s a special group of people for whom God will grace me with reachability; and I am to work in that area of the field with my whole heart. So are you.

In short, that old saying does ring true: Don’t curse the darkness, but instead light a candle. If your testimony of hope and the love of God can’t come across as just that (instead of a closed fist), then you might not be called to that person in the area of “getting down to the nitty gritty.” What you might not be able to with interaction on a horizontal level, you can do on a vertical level! Be careful not to wound the lost sheep…they still need rescued!