All right, brethren, I'm going
to just read our passage, which is John chapter 4, verses 31 through 38, is what
we'll be looking at today during the message. I just figure if
I read it now, then you'll have the whole view in your mind when
we come to preaching through it. John 4.31 In the meanwhile
his disciples prayed him, saying, Master, eat. But he said unto
them, I have meat to eat that ye know not of. Therefore said
the disciples one to another, Hath any man brought him ought
to eat? Jesus saith unto them, My meat
is to do the will of him that sent me, and to finish his work. Say not ye there are yet four
months, and then cometh harvest. Behold, I say unto you, lift
up your eyes, and look on the fields, for they are white already
to harvest. And he that reapeth receiveth
wages, and gathereth fruit unto life eternal, that both he that
soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. And herein
is that saying true, one soweth and another reapeth. I sent you
to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labor. Other men labored,
and ye are entered into their labors. Let's pray. Our gracious Lord, we thank you,
Father, for your great mercy, for your care and love toward
us, which is freely provided richly made known in your Son,
Jesus Christ. Father, we are entirely dependent
upon your grace to us. Lord, help us to hear your word.
Help us to understand what you are teaching here and what you
would have us to know as your people, what you would have us
to know concerning our Lord the work of our God, our purpose
here as a church, as a body of Christ. Lord, help us to hear
and help us, Lord, to have that desire and that motivation to
serve you, to do the work of our God, not for want of reward,
Lord, but because you have saved us and filled us with your spirit,
and given us a hope in Christ. Lord, we pray for our brethren,
those that are sick, those that are not well, those that are
fearful and afraid or troubled about something. Lord, we ask
that you would speak to them this morning, that you would
reveal your will in their hearts, that you would comfort your people
and that you would make known to us the salvation you've provided
in your Son, Jesus Christ. Lord, we pray that you would
continue to dwell with us, to meet with us, to guide us and
lead us, and that, Lord, you would establish this church in
this part of the world, that you would indeed help us to find
a permanent location and a place where your people will be called
out from darkness and from the trappings of man's religion and
that they would find Christ, that they would be drawn by you
to know you and to be settled in Christ and to have fellowship
with you and with your people. It's in Christ's name we pray
and give thanks. Amen. All right, brother. Let's stand and sing number 40,
Great is Thy Faithfulness, number 40. Great is Thy faithfulness, O
God my Father. There is no shadow of turning
with Thee. Thou changest not, Thy compassions
they fail not. As Thou hast been, Thou forever
wilt be. Great is thy faithfulness, great
is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies
I see. All I have needed thy hand hath
provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord,
unto me. Summer and winter and springtime
and harvest, sun, moon, and stars in their courses above, join
with all nature in manifold witness to thy great faithfulness, mercy,
and love. Great is thy faithfulness, great
is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies
I see. All I have needed thy hand hath
provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord,
unto me. Pardon for sin and a peace that
endureth. Thine own dear presence to cheer
and to guide. Strength for today and bright
hope for tomorrow. Blessings all mine with ten thousand
beside. Great is thy faithfulness. Great is thy faithfulness. Morning by morning new mercies
I see. All I have needed thy hand hath
provided. Great is thy faithfulness, Lord,
unto me. Turn to 258, he hideth my soul. 258. ? A wonderful Savior is Jesus my
Lord ? ? A wonderful Savior to me ? He hideth my soul in the
cleft of the rock where rivers of pleasure I see. He hideth my soul in the cleft
of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life
in the depths of His love, and covers me there with His hand. And covers me there with His
hand. A wonderful Savior is Jesus my
Lord. He taketh my burden away. He holdeth me up, and I shall
not be moved. He giveth me strength as my day. He hideth my soul in the cleft
of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life
in the depths of His love, and covers me there with His hand,
and covers me there with His hand. With numberless blessings
each moment He crowns, and filled with His fullness divine, I sing
in my rapture, O glory to God, for such a Redeemer as mine. He hideth my soul in the cleft
of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life
in the depths of His love, and covers me there with His hand,
and covers me there with His hand. When clothed in His brightness
transported, I rise to meet Him in clouds of the sky. His perfect salvation, His wonderful
love, I'll shout with the millions on high. He hideth my soul in
the cleft of the rock that shadows a dry, thirsty land. He hideth my life in the depths
of His love, and covers me there with His hand. And covers me there with His
hand. Thank you. Turn with me to Galatians 6. Galatians chapter 6 Brethren if a man be overtaken
in a fault ye which are spiritual restore such and One in the spirit
of meekness considering thyself lest I also be tempted Bury you
one another's burdens and so fulfill the law of Christ For
if a man think himself to be something when he is nothing
he deceived with himself But let every man prove his own work
and then shall he have rejoicing in himself alone and not in another. For every man shall bear his
own burden. Let him that is taught in the word communicate unto
him that teacheth in all good things. Be not deceived, God
is not mocked, for whatsoever a man soweth that shall he also
reap. For he that soweth to his flesh
shall of the flesh reap corruption, but he that soweth to the spirit
shall of the spirit reap life everlasting. And let us not be
weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap if we faint
not. As we have therefore opportunity,
let us do good unto all men, especially unto them who are
in the household of faith. Ye see how large a letter I have
written unto you with mine own hand. As many as desire to make
a fair show in the flesh, they constrain you to be circumcised.
only lest they should suffer persecution for the cross of
Christ. For neither they themselves who are circumcised keep the
law, but desire to have you circumcised, that they may glory in your flesh.
But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our
Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me and
unto the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision
availeth in anything, nor uncircumcision, but a new creature. And as many
as walked according to this rule, peace beyond them and mercy and
upon mercy and upon the Israel of God from henceforth let no
man trouble me for I bear in my body the marks of the Lord
Jesus. Brethren, the grace of our Lord
Jesus Christ be with your spirit. Amen. Father, we come to you today.
Thankful for this, this passage. Father, don't ever let us think
of having anything, or being something, or being able to offer
anything towards our salvation. Father, we're just thankful that
you sent your son to do all the work, because we would have,
would, will not, and cannot contribute. And Father, we just ask that
you watch over our pastor as he brings the message, and Father,
that you watch over our church as we do search for a permanent
location. Father, we ask that you be with
all the other pastors that are preaching the gospel this morning.
Give them the words that you would have your people to hear. And Father, give us the ear to
hear. And Father, we just ask that you watch over and care
for us in Christ's name. Okay brethren, turn with me to
John chapter 4 and we'll be looking at verses 31 through 38. Now last week we were looking
in this passage and we saw the fruit of faith when our Lord
said to the Samaritan woman, I that speak unto thee am he,
saying I am the Christ whom you seek, whom you're speaking of
and looking for, I'm the Christ. We saw how that the virtuous
power of Christ struck her heart with such force. She was saved. She was blessed of God. She was
given life, eternal spiritual life. She was born again, and
so she went out with that knowledge, with that joy and salvation,
and she went and told others. She immediately began to bear
fruit herself, not only the fruit of faith in her, but she then
went forth telling others of what she had heard and directed
others to Christ, that they should come and meet him. And so today
what we're looking at here is these few verses here which appear
between the woman and her bringing her fellow citizens of her city
back to meet the Lord. There's some time in between
there where the Lord is with his disciples who were with him,
who were Jews and came to Samaria with him. He's preparing them
for the harvest. He's preparing them to reap the
labors, the fruits which were labored or sowed by others, by
the Lord himself and others according to the word of the Lord. And
what he does here is he, to teach them, to prepare them for this
work, He takes their eyes and their focus off of the flesh. And if we're honest, the flesh
is something that we spend a lot of time caring for, our own flesh. We spend a lot of time thinking
about what we're going to do for our flesh and how we're going
to care for it. And so the other thing that we'll
see here is that whether you are a sower of the word or a
reaper of the harvest, we all benefit. We all share in that
one reward, which is Christ. It's not to set ourselves above
another, but what the Lord is actually teaching here in the
latter half of the text is that there's one reward, and it's
the Lord, and whatever part you play in it, we all share and
partake of that same blessed reward. Now I've titled this,
Sent to Reap. Sent to Reap. Okay, so we'll
begin here with the Lord growing his people, his disciples, in
their understanding of the Lord. He's preparing them to be laborers
in his kingdom. All right, so what we have here
is undoubtedly the disciples had spent some time with Christ
now, these Jewish disciples. They had spent some time with
him and they probably thought they knew him pretty well by
now. They certainly rejoiced to know
him and to go about with him. They believed that he was indeed
the Christ sent of God to save his people and they knew some
things about him but like these disciples what we find in our
of ourselves is that if we spent any time what we find is that
the Lord is always revealing himself to us. He's always showing
us new things concerning him, right? And surprising things
and things in which we stand amazed to see what the Lord is
doing so that he's growing us in a deeper knowledge and understanding
of our God, of our salvation, what he's accomplished in us
and is accomplishing for us. Paul, when writing to the Ephesians
in Ephesians 3 verse 20, he says, now unto him that is able to
do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think. God is able to surpass and do
for us far beyond what we think to ask for or what we think God
is able or willing to do. He's able to do exceeding abundant
above what our feeble, puny, carnal minds can think up or
ask. And it's according to the power
that worketh in us. Therefore, Peter, when he's instructing,
brethren when he's speaking to us he says things like that as
newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word that ye may
grow thereby and what I understand in that is you know we we read
the word of God A lot of times we'll pick up the Bible and we'll
read it and it can be, you know, we could be as dead as a doornail
looking at it and get nothing from it or we can just see it
in a very carnal light and take away from it just a very carnal
understanding or think that we've done something good for ourselves
in doing it. But the sincere milk of the word
is is going to that Word knowing that we can't control whether
we're going to get anything from it. We don't know whether we're
going to read it in the Spirit and be fed and nourished, but
we go there sincerely asking the Lord, hoping that God will
meet us and bless His Word to our heart, that we might learn
something of him and be comforted and reminded of the hope that
we have in the Lord and grow by it. Remember that as we go
about through the rest of our day. And then concerning his
grace in Peter's second letter, 2 Peter 3.18, the very last verse,
he encourages us, but grow in grace and in the knowledge of
our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, right? Not that we have power
to necessarily grow in grace and knowledge, but it's to give
us that desire to see we do grow. The Lord's people do grow in
grace and in knowledge, and so that we seek the Lord for his
mercy, that we grow in grace and knowledge, that we do grow
in him, all right? So what we also see is that there's
endless learning that we have of the Lord, all right? are too
big, right? Does God ever outgrow Him being
your son? No, no, He's always gonna be
your son and you're always gonna say things expecting Him to hear
it. And the same thing for us who are the children of God,
right? We always need Him. We're always
growing in grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, all right? And this is so in this occasion
here. So the Lord now providentially,
is now alone with his disciples. He was alone with this woman
and now he's alone with his disciples and it's just before a harvest
is going to take place. A harvest that is resulting from
his ministering there to this woman, him blessing this woman
with spiritual life and filling her with fruits of righteousness,
which were not there before, right? The Lord has done this. And one of the things that we
learn from this is that our Lord is never going to fit in and
remain in the box that we think surrounds him, right? Even systematic
theology. It's helpful, it can be helpful
to frame out and kind of help us understand some things about
the Lord, but our God always outgrows our thoughts and what
we think about him or can ask or know of him. He's not going to be kept. in
our weak, puny, little flaky box that we think God fits in,
no matter how large we make it. And, you know, I'm sure like
me, many of you saw this as well, that, you know, we knew some
things about the Lord. We had an understanding of his
word. we did religious things, but
I remember when someone, when the Lord raised up someone who
spoke of, who revealed and taught the doctrine of His grace, of
God's salvation in Christ by grace, when they spoke of it,
and God gave it to me with power, right? My understanding of say
the word salvation is of the Lord, Jonah 2.9, or salvation
belongeth unto the Lord, Psalm 3.8, right? My understanding
of that wasn't simply that, oh, the way of salvation is provided
by the Lord or laid out by the Lord. He determined we'd be saved
by Christ. It went from the way of salvation
being of the Lord to all of my salvation is of the Lord. Not
simply his sending Christ, but he's provided everything so that
that by his glory and power I shall come to a knowledge of what He's
done. I am called of Him, predestinated
of Him, created by Him, formed by Him, conformed to the image
of His Son. He's done everything. He's given
me a will and a heart that desires Him, that believes Him that I'm
a sinner and can't save myself, and that His Son, Jesus Christ,
is my salvation. God's done all that. for me,
all right? So you see how we go from a small
little understanding of God that, oh yeah, he provided the way.
He's determined this is how I'm gonna be saved. And then I just
gotta do these things and get myself saved. No, nonsense. All of your salvation is of the
Lord. So the Lord, he becomes magnificent and glorious to his
people. He grows before their very eyes
to know that salvation is all of him. Paul when he was writing
to the Ephesians, and we'll come to this as we're going through
Ephesians, but look over there in Ephesians 1 verse 17. This is Paul's prayer for the
brethren. And notice what he's praying
that the Lord do for the Ephesian brethren and for us, those who
are faithful, who faithfully believe our God by His glory
and power. Verse 17 says, that the God of
our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of glory, may give unto you the
spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Him, the
eyes of your understanding being enlightened. that ye may know
what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory
of his inheritance in the saints, and what is the exceeding greatness
of his power to usward who believe. according to the working of his
mighty power, right? That's how we believe. It's according
to the working of his mighty power, not my mighty power, but
that which he wrought in Christ. So what the Lord is showing us
is that we are going to grow in the knowledge and understanding
of our God. We're gonna see glorious things
that our God has done for us in his son, Jesus Christ. Now,
this is what we have here with the disciples. If you recall,
when he spoke to that Samaritan woman, she was delivered from
her bondage in sin and in darkness, and she goes forth and begins
that fruitful walk, where it's not just in her, but she begins
to tell others. Well, we're told there that upon
this came his disciples. This is verse 27, John 4, 27. Upon this came his disciples
and marveled that he talked with the woman. Yet no man said, what
seekest thou, or why talkest thou with her? And in one sense,
we know that it was custom that a man shouldn't be alone speaking
with a woman. But not even Peter, as bold as
he was, and as the one who always said whatever was on his heart,
just let it fly. Even Peter didn't say anything
or question the Lord about it. And it shows the respect that
they had for their Lord, their Lord. They knew this is the Christ
and he had the authority to speak to all his children, men or women. He's God. He can do those things
that transcend our customs. The rest of us need to be mindful
of what's proper and right and appropriate. The other thing,
though, that we see, and I think what's more being done here is
that we know from the passage that Jews, that they don't have
dealings with the Samaritans. The Samaritans were just a half-breed. The Samaritans were a filthy,
vile, idolatrous people that were despised by the Jews and
treated like they were filthy and vile sinners, and that the
Jews were above them in all things. All right, but what we have here
is that they're gonna be given a greater understanding of what
the Lord's been showing us through John. John's actually taking
us through an understanding, right? We saw with the miracles
how the disciples were seeing this is the Christ and the miracles
he was doing were greater and greater, right? Right up to the
time when he cleansed the temple so that they saw that Christ
was pulling down the curtain and showing us all the ugly in
the religion there that the Jews had come to practice. He exposed
the whole thing for being just a filthy system built on filthy
lucre, money and power. But the other thing that we saw
is what he was teaching Nicodemus, right? When they heard, the reason
why we have John 3 is because they heard what Christ, what
spoke to Nicodemus and they recorded what he said. And they heard
him say in John 3, 16, that God so loved the world. that he gave
his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth on him should not perish,
but have everlasting life." And we rightly understand what the
Lord is saying there, right? Religion teaches us, oh, that
means God loves everybody and wants everybody to be saved,
but his hands are tied and he's frustrated, and you just got
to make a decision for Jesus and get yourself born again by
your decision. Nonsense. That's not what he's
saying. They're actually learning, in practice, what Christ was
teaching Nicodemus is that salvation is not simply for the Jews, but
he has his people among the Gentiles, which includes the Samaritans,
scattered throughout the world. He so loved the world. All his
people he has scattered throughout the world that whosoever, that
those will be revealed whom he loves in their believing on the
one whom he sent. and having faith born in them
by the spirit and power of God. So they're seeing this in effect
now. He's speaking to a Samaritan
woman. They're seeing, wow, I see what he meant by God so loved
the world, that he has his people even among these filthy, sinful
Samaritans. And God is calling them out and
bringing them to a knowledge of the hope we have in the Christ,
the Messiah, right? So now, while this woman is off
in the city, our Lord uses this time to teach his disciples some
more things, right? So the second thing that we see
here is that the spiritual is so much greater, so much more
necessary than the carnal. And that's good for us to hear
because we do set our hearts on carnal things a lot. We spend a lot of time coddling
and pampering and providing for this flesh, right? And things
of this world, things that are passing away and have no eternal
bearing, right? So the Lord is setting our hearts,
bringing us to see him and to behold his kingdom and to set
our hearts on the things of God. So the lesson here begins like
this in verse 31 through 33. In the meantime, while his disciples
prayed him, right, while she's off in the city, his disciples
prayed him saying, master, eat, right? physical needs master
eat you got to take care of these things but he said unto them
i have meat to eat that ye know not of right you don't know this
yet but i'm going to teach it to you therefore said the disciples
one to another hath any man brought him ought to eat, right? So they heard it in a very carnal
way. They were wondering, wow, did
he already eat yet? Because certainly we saw him
when we left him and went to the city to buy food. He was
weary. He had to lean up against the
well. He couldn't go any further as
someone brought him food to eat. One thing I appreciate about
that is that's how I see many things. I think carnally very
often. I look at the word and I think
of carnal interpretations. I'm thinking of it in very sensual,
carnal terms, of this flesh. And I don't always understand
what the Lord is doing in Providence, or as I see things unfolding,
or as I interpret them, or think they should go. And I wonder,
Lord, what are you doing? Well, the disciples, they voiced
that, they expressed that, so that we see, yeah, they were
ignorant of the things that the Lord was doing as well. I'm not
alone. I'm a natural, carnal, in this
flesh and I need the Lord to reveal to me his word. So be encouraged. If you don't
understand, ask the Lord though. Let it encourage you to ask him
and to seek him. Lord, teach me. Open my understanding
that I might understand the scriptures and see your son and see your
salvation and be satisfied with Him and be comforted with Him.
We're told in Psalm 103, 13 and 14, that like as a father pitieth
his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him. And just
a word on that fear, it isn't that carnal fear, that dreads
punishment, that God's gonna get me. I've been bad today,
God's gonna get me. It's not that kind of fear. The
fear spoken of here, then, that fear him, are those that have
heard that salvation is in Jesus Christ alone, and they believe
God. That's the fear of God. You that
believe Christ, that have no confidence in the flesh, and
believe that God has provided everything in the Son, and you
believe Him, you rest in Christ, that's the fear of God. You're
saying, Lord, you're not playing. You're not kidding. When you
say, Christ is my salvation, that He's all I need to stand
before you, that's the fear of God, which He works in His children. And it says, for he knoweth our
frame, he remembereth that we are dust. That's what he's teaching
you, his people, you that he loves and has revealed Christ
in you, all right? So what this word reveals to
us is that this flesh is only ever carnal in nature. That's
all we're gonna ever rise to in this flesh, of this flesh,
by the works of this flesh and the wisdom of this flesh are
carnal things. can't enter into the spiritual. There's no understanding of the
spiritual things of God except the Spirit of God dwell in us
and reveal them to us in His Son Jesus Christ, all right? And so, you know, one way that
we see this manifested is even, you know, as parents, A lot of
times we want the best for our kids and the best for our kids,
sadly, a lot of times are very carnal things, very earthy things,
things that subject them to greater temptation and worse things as
far as the spiritual things go, as far as our knowledge of our
savior, right? You take education, for example,
Education is good, right? We want our kids to be able to
think and be good critical thinkers and to have a knowledge of things
so that they might be able to succeed in the problems that
they're facing in life. But a lot of times we go far
beyond just an education and push them into occupations that
are either will yield them better riches or better connections
right in the world. And we we would push them to
be friends of this world and friends with those who are who
hate God and have no knowledge or fear of the Lord. And it's because, you know, when
we're asleep in the light, we we can do some some very foolish
things and hurtful things right for ourselves and even for those
that that we love. But if you think I'm exaggerating
this think of what our Lord gives us in Genesis back there in Genesis
chapter 13 verses 12 and 13. We're told of one man Abram and
Abram dwelled in the land of Canaan. And then we're told of
another man, Lot, his nephew. Lot dwelled in the cities of
the plain and pitched his tent toward Sodom. All right, he pitched
his tent toward Sodom, but the men of Sodom were wicked and
sinners before the Lord exceedingly. All right, so when we're advising
our children and encouraging them in certain things, be mindful. Don't encourage them to pitch
their tent towards Sodom, where the people of this world are
exceedingly wicked and sinful before the Lord. Encourage them
to think of Christ. Encourage them to settle where
the gospel is preached. Encourage them in those things,
especially from a young age, and pray that the Lord keep their
hearts. Because it's the Lord's will. We want to be faithful in what
He has revealed to us. We do. We want to be faithful
in those things. The next thing that we see here
that our Lord is helping his disciples to understand here
is what his true comfort, his joy and peace is. He says in
verse 34, my meat is to do the will of him that sent me and
to finish his work. That's my satisfaction, he says. my joy. That's what I'm here
for. That's where I draw my comfort
and my nourishment and my satisfaction is found in doing the will of
my Father that sent me to finish His work. What I've always found is when
I do those things that I know are right before the Lord, when
I do those things that the Lord has shown me in his word to do,
I always find peace in that. I'm never upset or sad for abstaining
from some lust in the flesh, from something that I know is
sinful. If I don't do it, there's peace. I haven't done it. If
I do it, oftentimes there's that carnal fear and that being afraid,
because I've done that which I know I ought not to do. But always when you do the Lord's
will, when you serve the Lord, there's no fear in that. There's no pain or suffering
in that with the Lord. You might suffer in the flesh,
you might receive trouble in the flesh, but What a great comfort
it is to suffer persecution and doing that which is right versus
suffering persecution when you've done that which you know is sinful
or against a person unlawfully and not justly, right? You know
what I'm talking about. We suffer things. We feel pain
and suffering and let it be for doing good. like Peter said,
do that which is righteous, and if you suffer for it, it's the
will of God, and you can rejoice in that. But if you do that which
is wicked, and you suffer for it, what did you expect? You're
only getting that which you've earned in that sense. All right,
but what we see here is that Christ was laying aside those
reminders of our weakness in the flesh. We are weak in the
flesh, all right? We are carnal people, and of
this flesh, but we seek to walk by the spirit. But the flesh
is full of weaknesses still, right? And in Christ we see he
suffered weariness, he was tired, he was hungry, he was thirsty,
he knew those limitations that are in our flesh, but he put
them aside in order to minister to those whom the Lord had given
to him. And what he would say later is
in John 17, he would say, you know, he was sent that he should
give eternal life to as many as the father had given to him.
All right. That's what he was laboring to
do. That's why he was setting aside the the reminders of the
weakness of this flesh, that he might fulfill the will of
God. And he would say this as well,
this is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true
God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent. And so Christ understands
in this moment, right, while this woman is away, I don't,
maybe the disciples thought that was it, she was gone, and was
gonna, you know, not come back, And they're encouraging him,
hey, let's retire to this nice, you know, spot over here. Let's go sit down and rest, you
know, eat food and just relax. But Christ knows there's a harvest
coming and he wasn't going to miss that opportunity to satisfy
the hunger that he had there in the flesh. And what the Lord
is showing us there is that You know, I think about how many
opportunities, and I'm speaking as a man here, of course, but
how many opportunities do I miss while I'm serving and ministering
to some weakness of my flesh, right, something. Just not being
mindful that the Lord is always working in sowing his word in
the hearts of his people when we're there casting forth that
seed, and then to be mindful that Maybe the Lord will cause
it to grow immediately like this in this woman's heart that he
did for her. Now, he asked this in order to
teach the disciples in verse 35. He says, say not ye that
there are yet four months and then cometh harvest. And what
he's saying there, I don't think that they had just planted their
seed there. I guess grain takes about four months typically once
you plant it before it yields the fruit that you can harvest.
Typically about four months for a grain or corn or something
like that. And what he's just saying is when you plant Don't
you say it's about four months before it's time to harvest?
But he says, what he's showing them here is, I just planted
this seed. And he says, behold, I say unto
you, lift up your eyes and look on the fields, for they are white
already to harvest. What we see in that is that there's
a set and proper time for things in the flesh, right? There's
an order of things. There's customs that we become
aware of depending on where you live or, you know, how you were
raised and how you grew up. There's an order of things, a
proper order that you follow and you don't break that decorum
and you try to do what is expected of you in the boundary of those
things, right? When you're preaching the gospel,
you're going to offend people. They're going to be offended
by that word. And so a lot of times we don't
want to break the quorum. We don't want to speak of what
the Lord has done for us because someone's going to get offended
and someone's going to be uncomfortable in the flesh. And then I'm going
to feel uncomfortable in the flesh because I've made them
Uncomfortable right and so we don't want to take those opportunities
that the Lord brings to us to just declare What he has done
what he's taught us what he's what he's sown in my heart All
right, we we get afraid because there's a there's a proper order
I don't say anything because you might upset somebody if you
say the truth, right? So we we clam up and we're quiet
about it or You know, we look at things we justify ourselves
to to satisfy the flesh in opportunities when we know that there's an
opportunity but we say well you know it's proper that I should
be able to eat or I'm tired I don't want to go and do that or what
whatever it is you know we we willingly set aside a spiritual
worth Because we were taking care of the flesh and that's
what our Lord is not doing He's he's not gonna take care of the
flesh and miss that harvest that's coming up over the hill in the
form of these Samaritan people. All right, and so You know, it
can be hard a lot of times we'll even You know turn ourselves
away from those opportunities because a lot of things that
we do are In the name of the Lord, when we do some good or
some kind thing for another, a lot of times it goes unnoticed. Even for the person that we're
doing it, they may not realize the sacrifice that you're making. Knowing that, having had that
experience, sometimes we let that determine whether or not
we're going to do another nice work or kind gesture for our
brethren or for another. Who knows, maybe they won't even
notice it, and so what's the point? But the Lord shows us
in his word, in fact, all of Matthew 6 largely deals with
doing it nonetheless, doing that which you know is right, even
though God alone is the one that sees it. For example, he speaks
of fasting, and he says, but thou, when thou fastest, anoint
thine head and wash thy face, that thou appear not unto men
to fast, but unto thy father which is in secret, and thy father
which seeth in secret, shall reward thee openly. And so, what
the Lord is showing us is, do it anyway. Just trust, you don't
know, just cast that seed forth. Take advantage of the opportunity
of the Lord just bringing it to your mind, and instead of
satisfying the flesh first, and then the opportunity's gone,
take that time to invest it, to put it, to give it to the
Lord, and to trust that He'll use it as it pleases Him. Not
to bring glory to yourself and attention to yourself, but quietly
do it anyway, because there's a lot of fruit that the Lord
may bear in it. We need only think of our Savior
who went to the cross for us, and I'm certain that that was
very disagreeable to His flesh. To be crucified is a horrible
death. It's a torturous death. It's
a great suffering that He suffered for you, His bride, that He loves. And He did that willingly for
you, that you should have eternal life and to know Him, and to
have fellowship with Him, experiences love and joy and power. If we
resolve every issue by something we do in the flesh instead of
taking it to the Lord, we miss out seeing what the Lord himself
will do and how he will bring about much good. So think, just
think about that. That's what the Lord's doing.
He's setting the thoughts and the attention of his disciples.
He's taking it off of just fleshly things and showing them there's
a whole spiritual realm going on here. God is working his will
and he's established his people to be the bearers of that good
word, that salvation that he's provided and to declare it to
others, all right? And so our Lord says to them,
he says, lift up your eyes and look on the fields for they are
white already to harvest. And he's speaking of the harvest
of their souls, right? To be there, to receive them
when they come up over the hill, to see who this guy is that this
woman is talking about, right? Let's be here. Let's stay here,
he says, and be ready to preach the word and speak this good
word to them. All right? And so the other thing
he's saying is it's always time to do the will of the Father.
It's always time. We wonder, well, is now the right
time to say something? Well, it's always the right time
to serve the Father and to side with Him and to declare what
He would have us to say. Peter said it this way, 1 Peter
3.15, but sanctify the Lord God in your hearts. All right, let
him be your first love. All right, that's really what
he's saying. Sanctify the Lord in your hearts. Let him be preeminent
in your thoughts and in your heart and what we do here in
the world here. And be ready always to give an
answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that
is in you with meekness and fear. All right, a lot of times if
asked certain things, we might hold back because we don't want
to offend Maybe it doesn't seem proper to do it, but what the
Lord is saying is the carnal isn't the preeminent thing. That's
not our primary goal and protection here. The spiritual is preeminent,
right? And what the Lord is doing, sanctify
them in your hearts. Before you walk out that door
and say, Lord, if there's an opportunity, let me see it and
let me serve you in it. Let me just be faithful, right?
You don't have to convert them. It's not ours to convert people
or convince them or twist their arm. Just speak that word in
season, if the Lord gives you that word. If he gives it to
you. Sometimes we miss it, we just don't even think about it,
and you can't beat yourself up over it, because we don't always
think of things, but if you do, say it. Say it kindly, gently,
but speak the truth and trust the Lord to use it as he will. And what he's saying is, now's
not the time to fulfill the flesh. Don't forget that we're the Lord's
and there's coming a day. Now's not the time to fulfill
the flesh. Our Lord said himself, the night cometh when no man
can work. And what he was speaking of is
his work, the father's work that he had to fulfill when he would
no longer be there. But he's finished that work.
He's obtained salvation of his people and he's risen to the
right hand of the father and given us his spirit whereby we
know him and serve him. And so as long as the church
is here in the earth, it's the day of grace. It's the time for
us to preach and to declare His salvation, right? Because night
is coming. When the judgment comes, it's
going to be night for the inhabitants of this earth. And they're not
going to be able to do anything about it, because Christ is coming
and they refused Him. They saw no value in him so the
gospel must be preached and and that's really what the lord is
is showing us here that his word is to go forth because it's the
harvest all right and then this labor here that we see The reason
he gives is, verse 36, he that reapeth receiveth wages and gathereth
fruit unto life eternal, that both he that soweth and he that
reapeth may rejoice together. Now, at first reading, you might
think, wow, is he talking about rewards? Am I gonna be better
than my brethren if I do these certain things? That's not what
he's saying. In fact, the opposite. He's not
speaking of greater rewards for you, What he's declaring is the
Lord has given some to sow and others to reap, to see the fruit
of what others have sown. The Lord gave the law and he
gave that to Israel. He gave the prophets to instruct
the Israelites. He sent John the Baptist to prepare
the hearts of the people. He sent Christ to work salvation
for his people and to secure their salvation in him and he
gave the apostles to teach it, to write this word that we might
know the gospel clearly and plainly and many others, many pastors,
many people, men and women have laid down their lives that we
should have this word. Even the Roman civilization was
blessed that they might create roads and make it more safe to
travel and to communicate this word. And we got the printing
press and the internet now, and we can make use of those things.
So there's a lot of sowing going on, and you may be a sower, you
may be a reaper, but we all receive that one reward, the Lord Jesus
Christ. And you that believe him will
one day soon be embraced in the loving arms of Jesus Christ. All the pain, the sorrow, the
loneliness you feel will all be richly rewarded in the arms
of Christ. And that's for all his people,
right? The sowers and the reapers and
them that love him. He says, and herein is that saying
true, one soweth and another reapeth. He says, I sent you
to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labor. Other men labored and
ye are entered into their labors. So the word to us is labor. Be willing laborers knowing that
God has sent you. He's blessed you and given you
that authority to speak of him, to speak well of him, of what
he's done for you. You're not necessarily going
to convince anybody, but just be faithful when you have those
opportunities to speak of what He's done for you. Your calling
is, I sent you to reap, He says. He sends us there not knowing
what's been done before, but trust that the Lord has laid
the groundwork, and if the opportunity comes, just declare Christ and
encourage them to look to the Lord Jesus Christ, knowing that
other men labored and ye are entered into their labor. So
it's all that the kingdom, the whole kingdom of God may rejoice
as one. So I pray he bless your hearts
in that and and help us, give us that boldness and not that
fear of the flesh, right? And certainly not one of reward,
but just in joy and gladness, serving our Lord till he come
again. So I pray he blessed that word
to you. All right, brethren, let's close in prayer. Our gracious
Lord, we thank you, Father, for your great mercy. Lord, we are
so carnally minded and so easily weakened in this flesh and find
so many excuses to do what we will, Lord, rather than seek
you for your will to be done, that we may be fellow laborers
in your kingdom. And Lord, not for greater rewards. The one reward that we see is
to be found in the in the embrace of our Savior, our husband, our
Lord, our friend. Lord, that we may know you and
rejoice in you and be glad in you. And we pray, Lord, that
you help us, that you teach us, Lord. We know that you are faithful
and kind and that you pity your children, knowing that we are
but dust, that we are frail creatures and so easily turned aside. But
we ask that you would keep us, that you would set our hearts
upon you, that we would desire the sincere milk of the word,
and that we would grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord
and Savior, Jesus Christ. Fill us with your spirit, bless
us in your spirit, and help us to be helpers together with one
another, to be helpers of each other's joy, and that we would
be encouragers and sons of encouragement like Barnabas, Lord, and that,
Lord, we just pray that you would bless your church even here.
It's in Christ's name we pray and give thanks. Amen. Okay, brother. All right, brother. Let's stand and sing a closing
hymn, 512. Saved by Grace, 512. will break and I no more as now
shall sing but oh the joy when I shall wake within the palace
of the king and I shall see And I shall see Him face to face
And tell the story saved by grace And I shall see Him face to face
And tell the story saved by grace day my earthly house will fall
I cannot tell how soon it will be but this I know my all in
all has now a place in heaven for me and I shall see him face
to face and tell the story saved by grace and I shall see See
Him face to face and tell the story saved by grace. Someday when fades the golden
sun beneath the rosy-tinted west, my blessed Lord will say, well
done, and I shall enter into rest. And I shall see Him face to face,
and tell the story saved by grace. And I shall see Him face to face,
and tell the story saved by grace. Someday till then I'll watch
and wait, My lamp all trimmed and burning bright, That when
my Saviour hopes again, My soul to Him may take its flight. And I shall see Him face to face,
And tell the story saved by grace, and I shall see Him face to face
and tell the story saved by grace. Thank you.