Monday 9 November 2015

Send Forth Labourers



Send Forth Labourers

Scripture:  Luke 10 v 2:
"The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few: pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that He would send forth labourers into His harvest."

Jesus says the harvest is ready to be gathered in. The harvest is the souls of those ready to be saved. He has sent His angels to separate the chaff from the wheat.

This work has speeded up in recent years as the season of apostasy takes hold. Apostasy will cause the "falling away" spoken of in 2 Thessalonians 2 v 3 which will cause the man of perdition, The Antichrist, to appear. It is already well advanced in many churches who 'go with the flow' and do not diligently check doctrines for truth and error. 

The chaff represents those who are "chaffing"! Its a slang word meaning 'pretending'. There are many who pretend to be Christians, who are wolves in sheep's clothing, who gain the trust and acceptance of the sheep just before they fleece them.

This fleecing is not beneficial to the sheep as it removes their anointed spiritual covering and lays them bare to the attack of the enemy. Jesus is calling on the labourers to come in and take care of the sheep, to build them up and teach them vigilance against Satan and his wolves.

The problem is that there are so few labourers to gather the lost souls in, and tend their wounds. The wolves have injured them with heresies and false doctrines to turn the sheep off the strait (strict) and narrow (moral integrity) path which leads to life, onto the broad way (fun/money-loving/entertainment/laughter/self esteem/proud/false experiences) that leads to destruction.

Wolves do not like to be accountable to the flock. They announce that they are God's anointed and that you may not question their actions. Jesus was not like that and there was no-one more anointed than He.  Wolves single out the vulnerable and use them mercilessly to their own gain. In John 10 Jesus says that His sheep do not listen to the voice of strangers because they know His voice and follow His truth.

We may not all be appointed as labourers in the Harvest, but we are all able to share our faith in Jesus with one person a day or once a week tell someone that Jesus loves them. The only thing you can take to Heaven are the souls you have rescued from the flames of Hell.

Hell is real and a place of terrible torment at the mercy of a hateful and cruel master Wolf. Would you want to know that your spouse or children are on their way to eternal damnation and do nothing to turn them onto the right path. Your friends or colleagues may seem to reject your testimony but the Holy Spirit will use it to open their hearts to the truth.

So make a choice to be a labourer, a reaper of the harvest and allow the Lord to use you in His work. He needs those who can recognise the wolves and warn the sheep of their presence and the deadly poison in their bag of tricks.

Paul named and shamed the wolves he encountered and prayed for them to even be handed over to Satan for the destruction of their flesh so that they could still have hope of salvation. 1 Corinthians 5 v 5; 1 Timothy 1 v 18 - 20.

Prayer: Heavenly Father the time of the great harvest is near and I ask to be part of Your team of workers to help in any way I can to keep everyone I know from eternal fire. Teach me to recognise the wolves in sheep's clothing that I may warn Your flock of danger.  In Jesus' name. Amen.