There is Something for All of Us
Great Harvest • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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Scripture
Scripture
And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.
But when he saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd.
Then saith he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the labourers are few;
Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth labourers into his harvest.
INTRODUCTION
The Gospel say that Jesus preached the message of the Kingdom wherever He went. The Bible is not an anthology of random stories. The thread that ties the entire Bible together is the theme of the kingdom. God’s goal is to see His rule and authority cover the earth through the expansion of His kingdom. That is God’s purpose in history.
Scripture was penned in order to facilitate that one agenda. The unifying central theme of the Bible is the glory of God through the advancement of His kingdom. Every event, story, and personality from Genesis to Revelation is there to stitch that them together. Without that theme, the Bible becomes a collection of disconnected stories that seem to be unrelated to one another.
Similarly, when you don’t recognize and incorporate the theme of the kingdom in your own life, your experiences will likewise seem disconnected, unrelated, and random. They will lack the cohesion that your kingdom purpose provides. Understanding and embracing God’s kingdom is the secret to living with meaning, simply because your life is tied to His kingdom. God’s kingdom agenda for your and for all others is based on His comprehensive rule over every area of life.
We celebrate our country and our citizenship by reciting the pledge of allegiance and singing the national anthem. But if you have been born again through Jesus Christ, you are part of an even greater kingdom. You are a citizen of the kingdom of God.
Understanding what the kingdom is and how it impacts you is vitally important because it explains your life and purpose. It shows you how things blend together to create an integrated whole. It gives your life meaning. Apart from the kingdom, the events and aspects of your life remain unattached to each other and cannot produce their intended results.
Butter by itself doesn’t taste very good. Nutmeg by itself doesn’t taste very good. Flour by itself doesn’t taste very good. Salt by itself doesn’t taste very good. None of these ingredients by themselves would be enough to tempt anyone to taste them. But when a baker measures them and mixes them together for an intended purpose, putting them in the heat of the oven…the smell of the freshly baked bread is enough to lure anyone into the kingdom.
When we believers do not make our lives all about God’s kingdom, we segment our lives into various components rather than allowing God to blend them all together toward a greater good. We often quote Romans 8:28
And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.
MAIN POINTS
Before we look at the passage this morning, I want to look quickly at what else we have going on in this chapter. Jesus is beginning to show the authority that was His. Despite the signs, despite the wonders, despite the display of authority over the spiritual realm, people still weren’t catching on to who this man really was. In the first part of this chapter we see Jesus interacting with a paralytic in His own town, the place where He grew up. Jesus leans down over this man and does something that sets off some fireworks. Instead of simply healing the man as he had been doing throughout the towns and countryside, He tells the man that His sins are forgiven. Jesus has been displaying the power of God for the people, but now, He is claiming not just the power from God but He is claiming the same authority as God to forgive sins, this is the first real instance where Jesus claims divinity through His words and actions. Only God can forgive sins. Jesus does not tell him, Son, God has forgiven your sins. He tells him that they are forgiven, and says that He has the authority to do this, that Jesus has forgiven him. There is tremendous weight and meaning behind these words. Jesus is taking upon himself an attribute that is God’s alone, the authority to forgive sin.
The Pharisees pick up on this immediately. They are enraged and accuse Jesus of blasphemy, a sin that was punishable by death in those days. Jesus replies to them in verses 4-7. Matthew 9:4-7
And Jesus knowing their thoughts said, Wherefore think ye evil in your hearts?
For whether is easier, to say, Thy sins be forgiven thee; or to say, Arise, and walk?
But that ye may know that the Son of man hath power on earth to forgive sins, (then saith he to the sick of the palsy,) Arise, take up thy bed, and go unto thine house.
And he arose, and departed to his house.
I’ll show you my authority, I’ll show you the power that is mine. Get up and walk. And the man gets up. Wouldn’t you love to have been there and to have seen this exchange. Well, the ones that were there still didn’t get it. Listen to verse 8. Matthew 9:8
But when the multitudes saw it, they marvelled, and glorified God, which had given such power unto men.
The people were impressed, but they were impressed that God would allow a man that authority. They still didn’t get that this was the Messiah, they still didn’t get that this was God. It makes sense, somewhat. This was the place Jesus had grown up, these were his people, they had seen him as a baby and a child and a teenager. To think that this was God and that God had been raised in their midst would have been tough to get their minds around at that point. So, Jesus continues to show his authority in this chapter. He displays authority over sin, death, the spiritual realm, and the physical body. He raises a young girl from the dead, He heals a woman who has had issues with bleeding for twelve years. She had no hope of comfort or relief, until her encounter with the living Hope. He heals the blind and mute and drives out the demons from a man who is possessed. The crowds were amazed. The Pharisees were enraged and you can feel the tension rising between Christ and the religious leaders who could feel their control and power slipping away. All of this is setting the stage, all of this is building up until the Pharisees can take it no longer and they send Christ to the cross so that He can complete the mission that He accepted on our behalf. That mission is to save the sinner.
Here are some points of Jesus mission
Who He Calls - Matthew 9:9
Behold, I stand at the door, and knock: if any man hear my voice, and open the door, I will come in to him, and will sup with him, and he with me.
2. Who He Came for - Matthew 9:12
3. Who He Had Compassion For - Matthew 9:35
The harvest is still plentiful today. Look around you. The people you go to school with, the people you work with, the people who live next door, or that you meet at the grocery store, the world is full of people who are longing for and ready to hear the hope that we have. They are longing for meaning and purpose in their lives that only Christ can provide for them. When is the last time you went out to harvest? When is the last time you intentionally built a relationship so that you could have an opportunity to share Christ with someone? I know one thing for sure, we will not reap a harvest if we are not going out into the fields.
We know that God wants us to keep our lives pure and free of sin. We are called throughout Scripture to separate ourselves from the world. We are not to love the world and the things in it. We are called to not get comfortable with the evil that goes on around us. In every instance, the commands refer to the prevailing attitudes of the world. The thoughts and lusts and sin and evil that is rampant, it refers to the things that Satan controls. In not one instance does it mean that we are to cut ourselves off from lost people. These calls to be separate do not mean that we separate ourselves from the people who need to hear God’s message of Hope. The things that we are to avoid, the things of the world will pass away. 1 John 2:17 says: 17 The world and its desires pass away.
CLOSINGS
Jesus said “The Kingdom of God is at hand”
Jesus walked on water, calm the storms, multiplied food, setting the oppressed free, heal the sick, and spoke into your life.
Jesus’ proclamation of the Kingdom, that God had come to restore His Kingdom rule and reign was like a sledge hammer swung at the face of Satan, who had, from the time of the fall, set up a counterfeit kingdom, with humankind as its subject.
The battle line was drawn right from the beginning. Right after Jesus was baptized by John the Baptist in the Jordan River, He was sent out into the desert to do battle with Satan.
After 40 days without food and water, Jesus had made His point…that He means business.
Listen: sinners w/out Jesus are like sheep w/out a shepherd. Without Jesus they have no protection.
Political leaders, instead of caring for their constituency, use and abuse them, and if they care at all, many only care about their vote!
People today are led more by Hollywood, the media, and popular opinion than anything else. Let me remind you that Satan wants to use the TV industry to subtly change you--to get you to laugh at filth and be more tolerant of perversion, to get you to treat your family the way those on that show do, to get you to accept a liberal mindset of life and current events, etc.
Truly America is being fleeced from all directions! They need the Good Shepherd! Without Jesus they have no protection.
Without Jesus they have no direction.
Look at this world--people blindly following each other, and they’re all in a hurry, but none of them really knows where they came from, why they are here, or where they are going.
--somebody flies past you on the road / you think it must be an emergency--he must have a pregnant lady in labor in the back or something / then you pull into your destination, which was McD’s, and there’s that same guy, chomping down on a Big Mac! Oh good, disaster averted by emergency panic driving skills!
Ill.--pilot radioed to passengers on plane over the Pacific / "I’ve got good news and bad news / the bad news is we are lost, and I don’t know where we’re at--the good news is, we’re making great time!"
Everybody’s in a hurry but nobody knows where they are going! And the longer you live and the older you get w/out a shepherd, the more futile and meaningless life will become. The devil has no happy old people--mark it down! But make Jesus your shepherd and He’ll give you not only protection, but direction for life!
