Soul Winning: The Secret of the Harvest John 4:35-38
Soul Winning: The Secret of the Harvest John 4:35-38
Pastor Barry Kerner
Evangelist Jay Strack made nine visits to the Holy Land. On each of those visits he asked for and received the same Bedouin tour guide. And, on each tour he witnessed to the man. The last time he spoke with him, the guide was interested as to why Jay was so persistent in sharing his faith. Jay explained to him that they were friends and he simply could not fail to share the way of salvation with one about whom he cared so deeply.
The guide looked at him and said, “I understand now. You do not want to commit the sin of the desert.” Jay was not familiar with that phrase, so his friend explained. To Bedouins, who are nomadic people, the ultimate sin is the sin of the desert . . . knowing where water is but refusing to tell others.
The sin of the desert may well be the greatest sin of churches today. We live in a wasteland of spiritual dryness and despair. And we know where the water of life can be found. To not tell others about it is the sin of all sins. That means evangelism is not optional for us. It rather should be the obsessive obligation of the church. But, how do we evangelize effectively?
If we really want to know the secret we would do well to study the Master Evangelist, Jesus. The apostle John, in his gospel, tells us of one of the great evangelistic harvests in Christ’s ministry (John 4:35-36). What he did and what he taught in this experience is the secret to a great evangelistic effort anywhere, anytime.
Jesus and his disciples were traveling through Samaria on their way from Jerusalem to Galilee when they stopped at Jacob’s Well outside the city of Sychar. Jesus rested by the well while his disciples went into the village to buy food. Presently, a lone woman came to draw water from the well. Two things were unusual about this. First, it was high noon and the women usually waited until the cool of the evening to draw water. Second, she traveled alone. The women of the village usually traveled in groups, chatting about the events of the day. Jesus, who knows the hearts of all people, immediately recognized that she not only had an empty water bucket, she also had an empty life.
The evidence, as John revealed later, was that she had been married and divorced five times and was now living with a man who was not her husband. She had flitted from man to man, from marriage to marriage, from relationship to relationship, looking for something or someone to satisfy the deep longings of her heart. She thought, perhaps another lover, another marriage, another affair, would do it. But they hadn’t. Her life was as dry and as empty as ever. Disillusioned, she no longer troubled herself with the legalities of marriage. She now just lived with a man. Jesus viewed her life more as sadness than badness. She was not so much to be scorned as to be pitied. She was searching for something she had never found and, often, it is the one who is searching the most who makes the most mistakes.
Jesus broke the ice by asking her for a drink of water. The woman, was surprised and responded, “How is it that you, being a Jew, ask me, a Samaritan, for a drink of water?” Then John adds this footnote for the reader, “For the Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans.” The Samaritans were a mixed race, the result of intermarriage between Assyrians and Jews centuries before. The Jews considered them as half-breeds, mongrels, dogs. So deep was their prejudice toward the Samaritans that they had no dealings with them at all. Jesus, as we know from his numerous dealings with and various teachings about Samaritans, did not share this prejudice.
So, he said to the woman, “If you knew the gift of God, and who it is that speaks to you, you would be asking me to give you Living Water.” The woman was thinking of physical water and wondered how Jesus could give her a drink since he had no rope or bucket with which to draw. Jesus then moved quickly from the physical to the spiritual by saying, “Whosoever drinks of this water shall thirst again: but whosoever drinks of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life” (John 4:13- 14). The idea of water that could forever satisfy her inner thirst captured this woman’s attention and she said to Jesus, “Sir, give me that water.”
Jesus then revealed his knowledge of her past immorality. This convinced her that he was a prophet. Jesus then told her he was more than a prophet, he was the Messiah, the Savior of the world. With this thrilling revelation fresh in her mind she left her water pot and rushed back to the village to tell the men she had met the Savior. In the meantime the disciples, having returned from Sychar, were engaging Jesus in a conversation about the will of God. As they talked, Jesus looked up a saw a great host of people — mostly men — dressed in white robes and turbans coming toward him.
He then said to his disciples, “Say not ye, there are yet four months, and then comes the harvest? Behold I say unto you, lift up your eyes, and look on the fields; for they are white (men dressed in white robes and white turbans) already to harvest” (John 4:35-36). The men of Sychar began to talk with Jesus and they were captivated by him. So much so that they invited him to remain in their village for a time. He accepted their invitation and stayed with them two days, preaching and teaching. John then adds this commentary: “Many of them believed on Jesus because of the sayings of the woman.
And many more believed because of his own words.”
Don’t miss those two phrases set side by side: “many believed” and “many more believed.” They speak of the great harvest that occurred that day. This whole experience, what Jesus said and what Jesus did reveals to us the secret of a great evangelistic harvest anywhere, anytime. There are three things that leap out at us: We must see the masses; we must seize the moment; and we must share the message.
We Must See the Masses
The first thing that is essential to an evangelistic harvest is to see the masses. As Jesus saw the multitude of people coming from the city he said to his disciple, “Lift up your eyes and look . . .” Why did he say that? Because his disciples had just been in the city of Sychar buying food and mingling among the same people who were now coming to meet Jesus. But they apparently had not witnessed to a single person. They brought no one to meet Jesus. Now the village, in response to the witness of this woman, was coming en mass to see and hear him for themselves. The disciples had missed one evangelistic opportunity and he did not want them to miss another.
Why had they missed that first evangelistic opportunity? For two reasons — because of preoccupation and because of prejudice. When they first went into the village they were so preoccupied with their own needs they did not think of the needs of others. They had been so interested in physical bread that they forgot to share the bread of life. And, they shared the deep prejudice of their fellow Jews toward the Samaritans. It never entered their minds that God cared about the Samaritans or that the Samaritans might long to know God. The Samaritans were not their kind of people. They were of a different race, a different religion, a different culture. On the basis of preconceived ideas, deep prejudice, they were totally blinded to a whole city of people who were anxious to come to the Savior.
What the disciples did, we are in danger of doing ourselves — missing a great spiritual harvest, an evangelistic opportunity, because of preoccupation and prejudice. Preoccupation is our greatest danger. We can become so wrapped up in making a living, running a business, raising a family, planning a vacation, or even pastoring a church that we crowd out the eternal things of life. We can so focus on our own needs and wants that we forget about the needs of others. We can so focus on the physical that we forget the spiritual.
Jesus warned us of this danger in the parable of the sower. When the farmer went forth to sow, some seed fell among the thorns. The seeds germinated and sprouted and the plants grew but the thorns soon wrapped themselves around the tender plants and choked the life from them. Jesus identified the thorns as “the deceitfulness of riches and the cares of this world.” We are in constant danger that the cares of this world may choke out the spiritual from our life also. That’s why the apostle Paul, describing Christians as soldiers, said, “No man that goes to war entangles himself in the affairs of this life; that he may please him who has chosen him to be a soldier” (2 Timothy 2:4).
Many Christians start out being a faithful witness and a discipler of men. But their entanglement with the world soon draws them away from the battle for the souls of the lost. Their relationships, families, jobs, keep them from the ministry they once had. Before they know it, the cares of this world spring up around them and become more of a priority than winning souls. A piece of advice, “Watch out for the thorns of this world, they’ll get you!”
Prejudice is another obstacle to evangelism. The disciples were so blinded by their prejudice toward the Samaritans that they never saw the need or the opportunity to witness to them. They thought, “These are not our kind of people.” They felt no responsibility toward them. Larry McSwain, provost of The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky, said, “We Baptists are missing the folks who are smarter and richer than we are, and we are missing the people who are dumber and poorer than we are.” The fact is, we’re missing those who are much different from us in any way.
Jesus does not share our narrow views. He tells us we are not to miss anyone. In the Great Commission he commanded: “Go ye therefore and teach all nations . . .” The Greek word translated “nations” is the word “ethnos.” From it we get the word “ethnic.” It literally means every race, every tribe, every culture – ALL PEOPLE. All around us there are ethnicities, people of other races, other cultures, other nationalities, other languages that need to be won to Jesus Christ. And we must not be so absorbed in our own needs or so blinded by our prejudice that we do not see them and reach them.
By the way, the disciples would have missed the woman at the well for the same reason. They would have looked on her immorality as a sign of disinterest in spiritual things. But, how wrong they were. Her immorality was not a sign of spiritual indifference, but a sign of spiritual emptiness. We need the focus and the passion of Mahatma Ghandi, the great Indian leader. The passion of his life was “the last, the least, the lowest, and the lost.” That should be our mantra as we look enter the fields for the harvest.
Phillips Brooks reminds us, “We cannot believe in Christ for ourselves without believing in him for the whole world.” In the business world some companies are “niche marketers.” They target only a small segment of the population and go after them. Those of us who follow Christ can never be “niche marketers.” We must go after everyone. We must seek to win all people to Christ. Someone has said, “We all live under the same sky, but we don’t all see the same horizons.” Some people see things others never see — new potentials, new opportunities, new challenges, new needs. We must lift up our eyes, open our hearts and see the needs of the people around us or we will never do anything to meet them.
We Must Seize the Moment.
The second secret to a great spiritual harvest is to seize the moment. Jesus asked, “Do you say, there are yet four months, and then the harvest will come? I say . . . the fields are white already to harvest.”
- B. Myers said of this experience, “If those disciples had been appointed a commission of inquiry about the possibility of a Christian enterprise in Samaria, I know exactly the resolution they would have passed. The resolution would have been: Samaria unquestionably needs the Master’s message, but it is not ready for it. There must first be plowing, sowing, and then waiting. It is needed, but it is not ready.” Can’t you hear many of our ecclesiastical assemblies passing such a motion? We are always ready to recognize needy areas, but just as ready to find perfectly good reasons why we should do nothing at the present time.
In meeting the physical needs of the world, James 2:14-16 warns us about faith without deeds, “What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone claims to have faith but has no deeds? Can such faith save them? Suppose a brother or a sister is without clothes and daily food. If one of you says to them, “Go in peace; keep warm and well fed,” but does nothing about their physical needs, what good is it? In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead.” How much more important is acting to meet the spiritual needs of those around us. We must beware lest we spend so much time analyzing and organizing and agonizing that we never get around to evangelizing.
Anyone remotely familiar with farming knows that the harvest is seasonal and soon passes. Crops go through three stages: green, ripe, rotten. The harvest is effective only at one stage. Likewise, intervention, at the right time, can produce rich spiritual harvest. When the harvest is ready to be gathered in, you must be ready to act. Urgency is essential. Every indication is that our world today is ready. But too many of our churches are twiddling their thumbs while the harvest is lost. We need to be reminded that any church that is not seeking the lost is lost itself.
In the movie, “Dead Poet’s Society,” Robin Williams plays the part of a teacher, John Keating. In his first class session, Keating takes his students into the hall to the trophy case and shows them pictures of heroes from the past history of the school. He says to them, “All these young men were as you are today — starting life with great promise. All of you will someday be as they are. They are all dead and so will you be. What do you think they would say to you? Get close to the glass.” As the class leans toward the glass, Keating, in a raspy voice, says, “Carpe diem . . . carpe diem . . . carpe diem.” Seize the day! “If we the church have anything to say to the world, we need to say it now!” In the television mini-series, “The Kennedys of Massachusetts,” Joseph Kennedy, the patriarch of the clan, said, concerning time, “There is little enough of it and none to waste.” That must be our attitude when it comes to evangelism. There is no time to waste.
Lyndon Johnson’s father used to say to him, “You must seize the moment.” That’s it! We must see the masses and we must seize the moment.
We Must Share the Message
The third secret to an evangelistic harvest is to share the message. The end result of this experience was that, “many of the Samaritans of the city believed on him for the saying of the woman. . . and many more believed because of his own words.” Don’t miss John’s emphasis on “words” — her words and his words, human words and divine words, the words of a witness and the word of God. Sooner or later all evangelism must reduce itself to words.
Somebody has to tell what God has done and what they have experienced. That’s the secret of a great harvest. This, I believe, is our basic problem. It is not that the harvest is not ready, but that we are not ready. Our job is simply to be faithful in sowing and reaping by witnessing. We all know we are to do that, but the minute anyone begins talking about it, someone says to himself, “The best way to do that is by example. I live my faith.” We ought to live our faith. And everyone knows our lives ought to speak louder than our words. But as a matter of fact they do not, and perhaps cannot. For while our example may be potent, when we face trouble courageously, or live an evidently disciplined and unselfish life, no mere life can give testimony to all the richness of the Christian Gospel.
I cannot, by being good, tell persons of Jesus’ atoning death and resurrection, nor of my faith in his divinity. The emphasis is too much on me, and too little on him. It would be the height of conceit to think that my life could ever become good enough to mirror these things very clearly to other people. Yet they are the verities in which my faith stands. And I must bear witness to them.
Keith Parks, while president of the Foreign Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention, said, “As far as I know we are never told in the scriptures that we should prepare the hearts of people. That’s God’s business. What we are told is to busy ourselves at sowing and reaping.” It’s God’s business to prepare the hearts of people and he is always doing that. He furrows the hearts of men through scores of circumstances to prepare them to receive the gospel. Sometimes it’s the birth of a child, sometimes it’s an illness, sometimes it’s a financial reversal, sometimes it’s a marital difficulty, sometimes it’s a tragedy. And often times he’s at work when we don’t even recognize it.
James Gilmour, that heroic and solitary soul, the story of whose labor is more thrilling than any romance, learned this from experience. He said that early in his Christian life he heard the message, “Go to Mongolia,” but when he got there he found that he had been mistaken for the message all the time had really been, “Come to Mongolia.” Jesus had been there all the time waiting for him. He is always ahead of us, preparing the harvest if we will just see the masses, seize the moment, and share the message.
It was June 6, 1944, one of the most crucial times in world history. The high command of the allied forces under Supreme Commander Dwight David Eisenhower were gathered at Portsmouth, England. They were poised for Operation Overlord, the cross-channeled attack from England to France. It would be D-Day, the invasion of Normandy.
The United States, Great Britain, and Canada had assembled the largest amphibious assault force in history. It involved 3 million men, 5,000 large ships, 4,000 small landing craft, and more than 11,000 aircraft. It was the greatest invasion fleet ever to sail the seas. If successful it would mark the beginning of the end of World War II. The invasion had been set for June 5, but bad weather had caused the launch to be delayed at least 24 hours. Now, as General Eisenhower met with his chiefs of staff, all eyes turned to J. M. Stagg, the chief meteorologist of Operation Overlord. General Eisenhower asked, “Mr. Stagg, could you give us an update on the weather?” Mr. Stagg replied, “A fresh weather front provided hope of improved conditions the following day. We will have a corridor of about 36 hours where the ceiling will be 3,000 feet. If we wait beyond that it will be at least a month before the weather will allow us to go.” Ike asked each of his commanders how they thought the forecast would affect the operation. But ultimately, the decision was his. After they spoke Ike sat in silence for thirty, maybe forty seconds. Then he raised his head, looked at his fellow commanders, and said, “The consequences of delay justify great risk. We’ll go.”
Our decision to go affects more than the outcome of a war in time. It affects the souls of men for eternity. We are sowing and reaping for everlasting life. How many hours do we have before the ceiling falls? I do not know, but it’s getting awfully dark outside. God knows we have had enough time already. The time has come for us to say, “The consequences of delay justify great risk. We’ll go.