The Harvest
Category: Evangelism & Soul Winning
Speaker: Anthony Arron
Date: June 7, 2024
I had a great trip. It was truly eye-opening. I don’t know how many times I’ve heard a missionary church where they show slides and tell about the work. As a boy, it always intrigued me. I thought I had a little bit of an understanding, an idea of what I was getting into, but I was mistaken. It’s nothing I can describe to you—just the power of God.
In that church, just to be able to experience something that here in America… I grew up in a, I guess, a lower middle-class home, if you will. I didn’t have to worry about my next meal. We always had a house. We always had a bedroom that I could sleep in. It is amazing just to see how people live. It was eye-opening for me, and I definitely encourage every American to take a mission trip, go somewhere out of the country, and just experience something like that. I have some pictures I’d like to show you.
So we’ll go through these here. I did go to Mexico. I did eat a cheesy taco. I did wear a big sombrero. But I didn’t get to ride a donkey; I got to pet a donkey. I didn’t get to ride a donkey. Oh, so slow. We’re going to go ahead; I’ll show these pictures. Brother Martin, you can go ahead and flip the next one. I stayed in like a prophet’s chamber while I was there. It was really nice, actually. The church was very generous. I met Hector Avala.
I met him probably a month before I got there. I communicated with his brother. His brother was at the Spanish church we were going to here in Smyrna—Jonathan. We were able to communicate with him, and his dad is a pastor in Monterey, Mexico, which is closer to the border.
That’s what we thought we were going to do: load the family up, caravan style, and travel down to Mexico across the border. Once we threw the kids across the river there, we can get through—no, I’m just kidding. We were going to drive across the border and go down to Monterey. That’s what we planned on.
More and more, a lot of the people and contacts we’ve had in Mexico, and people we’ve spoken to, made us aware that that’s just not the thing to do. The border right now is very dangerous. We like our children, so we’ll keep them with us. Cotor and I really wanted to do this. We don’t know what—the world’s going crazy. I don’t know how many opportunities I’ll have to do this. Cotor is like, “You should just go.” Of course, like a good husband, I said, “Yes, ma’am.” But no, we talked about it.
I really wanted to take my family so we could experience it together, but the Lord had other plans, and he knew exactly what he was doing—the timing, the contacts, the people we were able to talk to. I wish I could just tell you the stories just to get us to Mexico City. Their contact there, Jonathan’s brother, his dad is a pastor in Monterey. Sorry, I’ll keep this story together, but his dad is a pastor in Monterey, and that’s what we were going to go to.
Again, advice said, “No, don’t drive down there.” It was going to be too expensive for us all to fly in. I didn’t really know what to do; I was kind of stuck, but I knew this is what the Lord wanted us to do. I knew the Lord wanted at least for me to go to Mexico this year, and I had already asked the preacher for it. So I’m like, “All right, we got to go.”
Then Jonathan got married, and his brother came up from Mexico City to be part of the Lord. He was preaching at the Spanish church we were going to, and I went to hear him. He said, “Man, you don’t want to go to Monterey. If you want to see a real Mexican work, you need to go to Mexico City.” I don’t know if it was a brother rivalry there or not, but he said, “You come to Mexico City, and we’ll house you, we’ll feed you, we’ll make sure that you’re taken care of. You won’t regret coming to Mexico City.” So I said, “All right, let’s do it.” That’s what we did. The Lord again opened so many doors. The only thing I paid for was my plane ride to get down there. I was taken care of; I was driven wherever I needed to be and ate a ton of food, so I was thankful for that. The Lord just opened so many doors, and I was thankful. My family was protected and able to experience a lot of things with that as well.
We’ll come through this. You can cut the next couple pictures. These are the streets. I landed on a Monday, got to Mexico about 1:00 in the morning. So on Tuesday, 1:00 AM, I got in the plane ride. We ate tacos at 1:00 in the morning, and that was my first experience in Mexico eating tacos at 1:00. I still felt those the next day. We ate the tacos; that was great. The very next day he said, “Hey, let’s go soul-winning at 9:30.”
I said, “All right, let’s go.” I was in this thing; I was ready to go. I got a couple hours of sleep, and I was up, ready to go. I had my Spanish New Testament, and I was using Google Translate, getting as many words as I could, trying to have an arsenal ready. I went out, and you can see a couple of pictures here. This is just one picture; I have tons of pictures. It was eye-opening for me. I went soul-winning a couple years back in New Jersey, and that’s probably the only thing I can compare it to as far as people living so close to each other. I come from Texas. Your next neighbor, you walk down a mile to get to their driveway, and then you go up a mile to get into their house. We were just very spread out. This was different; it was unique to be able to see this.
Just houses—if you can see here—there we go. I don’t know if it works or not. All right, no cats in here. Good. You can just see they have the houses here, and then they have their businesses. This just goes on forever. I have a picture here at the end that we’ll see. I was amazed flying into Mexico City by how many people live there. Mexico City, as far as I could tell, is the second-largest city in the whole world. It houses—I’ve gotten different numbers, I should have looked it up myself—anywhere from 25 to 30 million people live in Mexico City alone.
I was just blown away. I’ve never seen anything like that anywhere close to that. I lived in Dallas, but nothing close to that. As I flew in, once we got over the mountains and you got into the city of Mexico, Mexico City, it’s like a chili bowl—a lot of mountains around, and then in the center is all the city. As soon as we flew over those mountains, I just looked at lights. It was late at night, and all I saw were so many lights. An old preacher told me a long time ago, “Every light you see in a city is a soul that needs saving.” Seeing that many lights, I thought, “Wow, this is so much bigger than I thought it was going to be.” It was incredible. This is just one street. I don’t know how many people live on the street, but we went out with a group. There were probably about 50 soul winners that went out in a group. They are part of…
Russell Anderson pays a salary for these—sometimes college students, sometimes older people who have retired and want to go soul-winning. There was a lady who went out soul-winning on a Tuesday. We had just finished, and she said, “I’m going to go back out soul-winning. I’ve already eaten. I want to see 100 people saved today.” It’s incredible; she is 70-something, 76, maybe close to 80 years old, and she has such a fire. She wasn’t the only one. There were about 50 soul winners paid a full-time salary by Russell Anderson just to go soul-winning. That was my introduction: “Hey, get on the bus, let’s go.”
We were walking down the street, and there were people selling candy, people selling cigarettes. We didn’t take the cigarettes, but it was amazing how many people were all over the place, wanting to sell something, wanting to talk to you. I said, “Well, hey, I don’t have any money, but I do have, ‘Silver and gold have I none; but such as I have give I thee.’” Here’s a tract. I want to give you a tract, invite you out to church, tell you about Jesus Christ. People were so receptive. You hear about Mexico, and you think it’s just heavily Catholic, and nobody wants to hear the gospel. But I did not find that. Maybe it’s just because I was a green go, but I did not find that. They wanted to listen. They wanted to hear the gospel.
I had my little New Testament, and I had some words that I wrote out and printed while I was here. I had them for a while but never used them because I didn’t know if they worked or not. I was able to use that, and while I was in Mexico City, I was able to see 12 people saved one-on-one, just in Spanish. It was amazing.
It’s amazing that people were receptive. They were okay with me sitting there—and I know we have some Spanish speakers back here, it was horrible—but I was sitting there with my paper, reading it to them, and they were listening. I think of the Lord saying, “Hey, it’s not you. It’s my message that I’m trying to give out. You’re just the vessel, if you will.” I saw that firsthand. It wasn’t my soul-winning strategy; it wasn’t the way I said things. I was stumbling over words to the point that one of the ladies I was witnessing to grabbed the New Testament and started reading what I had written down. The people were receptive; they wanted to hear the gospel.
Just many streets like that. You can keep going. Ms. Stacey there. This is just one of the groups we went with. The only one who spoke English was this guy right here; everyone else spoke completely Spanish.
There were not very many people I met in Mexico City who spoke English. This was my soul-winning partner; his name was Jose. He kind of threw me in, sink or swim. He was like, “All right, brother, here’s the first guy. Go ahead. All right, this is what you say.” Wait, what did you say? What are you supposed to say? I was handing out tracts, and then he said, “All right, this guy right here. You can witness to him.” All right, well, let’s go.
I was trying to witness in Spanish, and the poor guy didn’t really understand what I was saying. I started using Jose to translate for me. When we finished, he said, “Praise the Lord, he got saved.” He said, “But you’ve got to do this on your own. You’ve got to learn how to witness, because when you get to America, you won’t have me.” I said, “Wow, all right, okay, let’s do this.” The Lord used him to push me out of my comfort zone. His name is Jose. You can keep going, brother.
This is him witnessing to a couple of people, just teenagers. Teenagers who normally would just blow you off, wouldn’t give you the time of day. But these teenagers wanted to hear, and all three of them did get saved. Keep going, brother. These were the first three people I saw saved that first day I was there. This guy right here was the one I used the translator for. For the next two, I tried to do it solely in Spanish. I would give my little gospel plan, and I would have them pray. Then my Spanish partner, Jose, would clean up for me a little bit and make sure they understood. They were very receptive people; they were nice. The lady on the end is a business owner, but she took time for me to give her the gospel. She wanted to hear. She grew up in a Catholic church but hardly went; that was just tradition, if you will, but she wanted to hear the gospel. We’ll keep going, brother. This is just a couple of people here.
One guy, I’m sure, was homeless. Somebody had just given him a piece of corn, but he wanted to hear the gospel. Jose was able to talk to him and lead him to the Lord. This man right here—I witnessed to him, and he had some questions. As soon as they started asking questions, I was like, “All right, I don’t have anything written out for that.” Jose was able to help me. When Jose was witnessing to him, the man started crying. He said, “As soon as you told me that God had a gift for me, I wanted to make sure you were saying the right thing. I wanted to make sure that was true.” He was crying; he readily received Jesus Christ. Just an amazing, sweet spirit there.
You can keep going, brother. This is the old bus. It’s a five-speed bus, and they cram on there. I’m talking cram. We were standing up on top of each other; we were all crammed in there. If they could have strapped us down on top, they would have. It was crazy, just such a sweet spirit. There is nothing like soul-winning with other believers who are out there to see people saved—not just to waste time, not to argue, but to see people saved. It was addictive.
This was on the second day, which would have been a Wednesday. We went to a little mini flea market—it’s Tianguis or something like that is what they call it. They blocked off about two miles of a street and started setting up shops everywhere. They were selling used hubcaps—hopefully, I don’t know if they were stolen or not—but there were hubcaps, car parts, boots, everything you can think of. They just had it all sitting out there. One guy had a radio pulled apart; maybe he was going to sell each part individually to make more money, I don’t know. But people were just out there trying to make a living.
Here in America, we have people standing on the side of the street begging for money. I only probably saw two people like that—one guy, you could tell he was blind and missing a leg. But most everybody was trying to sell you something, trying to work. That is the spirit there in Mexico City: they were workers; they wanted to work.
Just a couple of pictures to give you an idea of what that was like. They were everywhere; it was about two miles. We just kept walking. As people were walking by, they’d say, “Hey, you want to buy a dress? You want to buy this? You want to buy that?” And I’m like, “Hey, again, I don’t have any money, but let me tell you about Jesus Christ.” It was very neat. You can keep going, Brother Moreland.
That was the group of soul winners that came out. Just a sweet spirit—most of them college students, but again, some older people who just wanted to see people saved. Some of them don’t even get paid. They just know the bus is leaving, and they will stand at the end of their street, and the bus driver knows to pick them up, and then they go out selling. Amazing.
Keep going, brother. This is the church, Iglesia Bautista Monte Sion. This is Pastor Kevin Wynn. He started the church about 34 years ago, and he didn’t know any Spanish. He knew just a touch of Spanish. He was trying to take classes, and he just wasn’t getting it. So he decided, “If I’m going to learn Spanish, I’m going to learn Spanish among the Spanish people, where I don’t have anybody to help me out.” That’s exactly what he did 34 years ago.
You will see here we have some pictures of the church. The church was massive. You can see here, this is just two different pictures, but the church is full of people—a full balcony, full lower level. They were trying their best to follow social distancing, even with the coronavirus, but so many people wanted to get into church. They were having to turn down a bunch of people because they could only keep a certain number. I think this auditorium seats about 3,000 to 4,000 people, and there was one Wednesday night—I’ll show you a picture of here—it was just full. You can go ahead and flip to that next picture.
This is a baptistry; it saw several people baptized. This is one of the services. This was not even the most full service; this was when I first came in. This was on a Wednesday night, their big Wednesday night, around Mexican Independence Day. The Lord again knew which day I needed to go down there to see this; it was amazing. The whole bottom was full, so we had to go to the top, and there were people everywhere. Eventually, so many people were sitting in those seats that they were asking us to sit on the floor. I can’t imagine something like that here in America or anywhere else, where they say, “Hey, you can come to church, but you’ve got to sit on the floor.” They wanted to hear the gospel; they wanted to hear what Brother Kevin Nguyen was saying. It’s just amazing, just a good, sweet spirit.
This is the bus routes. They have 150 bus routes. When I first got there, I didn’t realize where they kept the buses. I was like, “Where are you going to keep the buses?” What they do is they go to a city bus. They get on the bus, ask the bus driver, “Hey, we’ll pay you 700 pesos if we can rent your bus for the rest of the night.” He says, “All right.” They drop everybody off, go pick up the bus captain at the beginning of the route, and then they head toward church. These buses were just full, and most of them were adults. I would say 70% of the people who rode those buses were adults.
Very few children rode the buses; most were adults. It was neat. As we drove into church, you could see these other buses. The bus captains were on there preaching. People had their Bibles open, reading their Bible—just people so hungry for God’s Word. They were going to a church where they might have to sit on the floor. It is amazing to me. There are 150 bus routes there. This is the view from the church. There is a mountain; I was able to take a little cable car up there, but just so many people. Keep going, brother.
This was one of the families I stayed with. If you can imagine, what we are looking at now is their living room. Everything was wide open. They had two stories, but it was about as far as from this side of the pew to there—just two rooms. One was a bedroom, one was a kitchen, and then there were two bedrooms upstairs, no windows, no doors. There was no running water. What they had was a garden hose they would pass around to the different neighbors; that was how they got their water to fill up for baths and stuff like that. There is a little restroom off to the side; it was just a concrete slab with a drain in it. I was amazed; I had never seen anything like that. They gave me the master bedroom. It was just a piece of plywood with hinges on it, but they gave me that master bedroom. So giving—so many giving people. This is a very poor family, but they made sure that anytime we ate, they gave me two portions. I couldn’t even barter with them or say, “No, I didn’t want it.” I had to eat the two portions. They sacrificed for me, and I appreciate their giving. This is a picture of their living area; it’s all wide open. It did rain, but everything is wide open. That’s just how it was—very incredible. You can keep going there.
It showed the bedroom and the little kitchen there. I told Coutre we should get something like that for our house to save a little bit of space; it didn’t go over so well. It’s amazing how they live. We did try to climb a mountain, but we got to the top and it was closed due to COVID. We probably walked about two miles up this mountain—crazy—but it was beautiful. It was another little city that I was able to go to, just to see the people.
This is on a Saturday. There are Saturday soul-winners; there were probably four to five hundred people out soul-winning. Brother Wynn asked, “If it’s your first time, go ahead and stand,” and there were probably 10 or 12 people who had come out soul-winning for the first time.
Then he said, “If you led somebody to the Lord the first time this week, would you stand?” About 10, 12, 15 people stood up who had led their first soul to the Lord that week. There is such an emphasis on soul-winning, just a great spirit.
After the soul-winning meeting, we went to what is called an Esquilita. It is just a Bible club. A Bible club, as I am used to, is about 15 to 20 kids, and you basically have to bribe them with a PlayStation 4 or PlayStation to get them into the meeting. I was prepared. I said, “It’s going to be about 15 or 20 people. This is good for me. Let me try to preach in Spanish.” I had my sermon written out in Spanish, and I thought, “This is going to be it.” I pulled up to the Esquilita, and I saw all those people there—about 100 people. I said, “Well, all right, I can’t preach in Spanish. I’m going to mess up all over the place.” But I didn’t have anything else, so that’s what I preached. I preached in Spanish, and praise the Lord, about 40 people got saved.
As best as I could tell, they raised their hands afterward, and about 40 people got saved at that little meeting. Again, there were probably 20 to 25 people behind the scenes getting people to come. That’s their focus: people have a desire to see people saved there. I was able to baptize—the only time I had ever baptized anybody was in college for a class, and that wasn’t real baptism, if you will. They were like, “Hey, do you want to baptize these? They want to get baptized.” I said, “All right, let’s do it.” Such a sweet spirit with those people. They were asking, “Hey, you just got saved. Let’s go ahead and settle that with baptism. Let’s go ahead and tell the world, ‘Hey, I’m saved; I’m going to heaven.’” They had a little horse trough there, and I was able to baptize. About 20 people got baptized. It was amazing. They didn’t even want to wait to change clothes. Many of them just jumped in, tennis shoes and all, because they wanted to get baptized. Just a hunger—just amazing. Even for me, I was reading my sermon in Spanish, and they were still intent; they were listening to what I was saying. Incredible. You can keep going; there are some more pictures of people getting baptized.
I did preach on a Sunday morning to the teenagers, and there were probably about 300 teenagers who came out for their split services. There were about 300 in the A service and about 300 in the B service. These are both Sunday morning services, and they were there. I was able to preach; I had a good time with that. I did preach with an interpreter so they could understand me. He got all the amens; I didn’t get anything. But it was great; it was an encouragement, just to see all those teenagers. Of course, like many teen groups, you have some who are just there because their mom told them to be. But I was able to see teenagers who said, “Hey, I got to see somebody saved this week,” or, “Thank you for that message; I’m going to go try to witness to my family members.” It is amazing that even the teenagers had a heart for it. That trickles down from the pastor to the people, to the parents, and also to the teenager. Just amazing there. Keep going there, Brother Marlon.
This is the last picture. I know I’m talking too long because my mouth is dry. We got to go to downtown Mexico City, and there were so many people. Police officers were ready with their riot gear; they had the riot shields. It was Mexican Independence Day, and they were celebrating. They had a big parade that went through downtown. A man was going around—we had gotten rained out, and we were taking shelter—and one of the men thought it was a great opportunity. He was an older guy, and he had his drum. He was beating his drum, yelling, “Viva Mexico!”
It was amazing, just a great experience. I really appreciate your prayers in it all. When we came back here on Saturday, I was able to lead a man to the Lord in Spanglish—half Spanish, half English. I don’t want to waste this. This is a trip I’ve been wanting to do. I wanted to go to Mexico before I was 30; that’s what I told the Lord. I said, “Lord, open those doors.” I am thankful for the pastor and thank you for allowing us to do that. That’s kind of the pictures there, but I want us to see this next picture. I apologize; I did have one more picture.
This is the picture of the city that, at best I could tell, is a panoramic picture. When you stretch it over a slide, it doesn’t turn out exactly right. But as far as you can see, these are city—these are little houses out through here, going all the way around through Mexico City. Just massive. I couldn’t wrap my head around it. I was recording while I was on that little cable car, going down the different streets for about 20 seconds. There must have been thousands of houses we passed by in just those 20 seconds. It is amazing—so many people, and they are hungry to hear the gospel. I really appreciate that. We’ll just leave that picture up there if that’s okay. I’ll turn these lights on. If you want to take your Bibles and turn to John Chapter 4, I promise we will make sure to preach just until 8 o’clock. I think that’s normal Wednesday time, but no, I’m aware of the time.
John chapter 4. We’re going to read verse number 4, and then we’re going to read verse number 30 going down through 38. We’ll read this, and I just ask for your attention as we go through this. I just have three points here, a simple message, and I just hope that it’s a blessing to you. Let’s go ahead and stand. We’ll just read verse number 4, and then we’ll be seated. We’ll read verse number 30 through 38 as well.
John chapter 4, verse number 4, the Bible says this: “And he must needs go through Samaria.” Very important. This is Jesus telling the disciples He needed to go through Samaria. Then look at verse number 30. Why did Jesus need to go through Samaria? “Then went out of the city and came unto him. Meanwhile, his disciples prayed Him, saying, ‘Master, eat.’” But He sent unto them, “I have meat to eat that you know not of.” Therefore, said the disciples one to another, “Hath any man brought Him to eat?” “My meat is to do the will of Him that sent Me and to finish His work. Behold, I say unto you, lift up your eyes. Look on the fields, for they are already white to harvest.”
Let’s pray. God, I thank You so much for You. Thank You, Lord, for Your example. Jesus Christ, You could have just told us, and we had to figure it out on our own, but Lord, You not only told us to go, but Lord, You gave us this example. You set the bar for us. I just ask You, please, just help us in this time that we have left to make a big deal about the harvest. Lord, I ask Your blessing in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Thank you so much. You can sit down. I forgot to tell you this, but this morning, if you were sitting on this side of the auditorium, you got a special wink from Miss Gatorre. Usually when I’m up here leading singing, Ms. Gatorre will sit back in her seat and just wink at me. I’m leading singing, so I don’t want to wink and then everybody pass out or anything. But her being up here, I was able to wink at her while I was sitting in my seat. It’s okay; we’re married. I was able to wink at her, and she winked back. Praise the Lord for that. About 10 guys came up after the service and gave her their phone number, but I’ll talk to them later.
We’re going to talk about the harvest tonight, the harvest. If I could take one thing away from Mexico, it’s this: There is a heart for people who want to hear the gospel. There are people everywhere who want to hear the gospel. None of those people wanted something fancy. There were times where I didn’t really understand and couldn’t give the gospel like I wanted to, and praise the Lord, I had somebody who could. But for the most part, they were okay with me giving the gospel, even with my very rough Spanish, like, “Puedo darte un folleto?” They wanted to listen; they had a heart to hear the gospel.
This is what Jesus says to His disciples, the same exact thing. He says, “Look, you say four months until the harvest.” I say, “Look right now. The harvest is already ready. The harvest is there; it is white to harvest.” That means it is ready to be plucked; it is ripe for the pickings. That is what Jesus is telling us. So there are three things we need to know about this passage. Let’s look back at verse number 35.
The first thing is this: “Say not ye, ‘There are yet four months, and then cometh the harvest.’” Behold, I say unto you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are white already to harvest. The number one thing we need to know about the harvest is that there is a great harvest. I love what the preacher pointed out this morning. The lake of fire is a small unit of measurement, but we talk about the country of heaven—that was encouraging to me. It tells me that there is a harvest of people that God wants to see saved. It is out there. It is not something we have to conjure up or try to force people to do. No, it is already out there. God says they are already white to harvest, meaning they are ready to be plucked; they are ready to receive the gospel; they are ready to get saved. Praise the Lord, we do not have to go to their house 50 different times and teach them what the Bible really says through the Book of Mormon and through these other false teachings, the Watchtower Society. I can go to somebody and within 10 or 15 minutes show them that they are a sinner, they are on their way to hell, and they need Jesus Christ. God says, “Hey, it’s already white for harvest.”
The first thing we need to know is that there is a great harvest. It is not a small harvest. We were hearing the preacher talk about Calvinism recently. There is not just a harvest that is going to pluck itself. No, it is out there for us. Jesus gave us the awesome responsibility to take the Word of God, to take the gospel, and to go tell it to somebody else. There is a great harvest.
I think about the two shoe salesmen in Africa. Two shoe salesmen for different companies were dropped into Africa. One salesman called up the boss and said, “Look, man, this is pointless. There is nobody in Africa that wears shoes, so just send me back home. This is a pointless venture.” Then this other man called up his boss and said, “Boss, you’re not going to believe this. You need to send me as many shoes as you have because there are no shoes here in Africa, and they need to buy some shoes.” That was funnier than I thought.
But what is it? We are looking at the harvest. It is a great harvest. I think about when we were at a fair. You had your little tugboat station, your little anti-bullying station, and your lawn mowing section, whatever. Are these people trying to sell things or give things away to just a select few people? But when we had the gospel, I was passing out tracts to everybody. Why? Because the harvest is for everyone. There is nobody who is going to get a tract that God did not already have lined up. God had those people line up; God had those people cross our path so we can give them a gospel witness, so we can give them a tract. There is no limit to that. It is not, “Oh, well, I don’t know if he’s ready to receive the gospel.” No, “Hey, let me give you this. It has some Bible verses on there to show you how you can know for sure you’re going to heaven.” There is a great harvest.
America’s population, as of now, is 332,829,768. That is a lot of people, a ton of people. But again, as the preacher mentioned, that is just such a small portion of the whole world. But you know what? Somebody is born every eight seconds. Somebody dies every 11 seconds. There is one migrant, this is interesting, about a net migration of one person every 670 seconds. Every 670 seconds, there is somebody migrating internationally to America. What does that tell me? The harvest is here in America, and yes, the harvest is in foreign fields. But what is God doing? God says, “Hey, I’ve given you the gospel. I’ve given you the Bible. I’m going to bring them here.” We are seeing people from all over the world come to America. That was not by accident; that was the divine purpose from God saying, “Hey, I’m going to make a nation where I know if I send somebody there, they will be able to hear the gospel.” There are churches throughout America that will be able to preach the gospel to them. That is exactly what happened. That is why we have so many people migrating here to America. It is amazing. It is a responsibility we have been given.
We are such a diverse country. I noticed in Mexico, I think I saw maybe less than 50 people who were either white, black, or somebody other than a Mexican. I thought, “Wow, that’s incredible.” You cannot walk down the street without seeing such a diverse group of people. You could start a Spanish church here in Smyrna, Tennessee, fill up your church, and still have room. You can start a Burmese church; you can start different churches and still have a great group of people you can reach. That is not by accident. God put them here.
When I was in Mexico, I was really praying, “Lord, do You want me to be a missionary?” I have always loved missions. Ever since I was a kid, my dad brought us around missionaries. We were involved in giving to missionaries. I love missions. I was really praying, “Lord, is this what You want? Was this why You put the desire in my heart?” I did not get an answer. God said, “No, I have you in Smyrna, Tennessee. There are plenty of Spanish people in Smyrna, Tennessee, that you can be a witness to.” That was encouraging to me, saying, “All right, Lord, I’m going to give to missions, of course, but hey, You’ve brought the mission field to me. Lord, I’m going to be a witness wherever I can.” We have such a diverse country here.
Number one, there is a great harvest; we have to remember that. Number two, there is a great need for laborers. I’ll emphasize this a little bit. Look at verse number 36: “And he that reapeth receiveth wages and gathereth fruit unto”—what are the next two words?—“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 those labors.”
We have a godly heritage. We were sitting here in church; we did not have to go through a security check. We did not have to worry about a police blockade blocking us from coming to church today. We do not have to worry about some crazy military police coming in the back trying to get us out and kill us for coming to church tonight. We have religious freedom. But what are we doing with that religious freedom? God says, “Hey, I want laborers.” He says, “Look, the laboring that you are laboring is for life eternal. It is far better than the temporal things we have down here on earth.” But there is a great need for laborers.
Any salesman you talk to, when they bring you through salesman class, the first thing they say is, “You can make as much money as you want to.” Why? Because it is how hard you work. Praise the Lord, we serve a God who is not all about numbers, per se, of, “How many people did you say?” No, He said, “How many hours do you go out telling people about Me? How many gospel tracts have you given out?” It is about the labor. I can do that; we can do that. We can labor together for the Lord.
Think of what the early Christians would have been able to accomplish with the freedoms we have. We have religious freedoms. We have the complete Bible. We have a good support group. We have church buildings we can bring people to. Think of what the early Christians could have done. The early Christians were under-governed Christians. They did not have the Bible that we have; they only had portions here and there. But they had a desire to get close to God and a desire to labor for the Lord. God has greatly blessed that. I think one of the reasons why the reward is not until we get raptured away is because those men and women who have sacrificed for so long are still reaping benefits. It is that ripple in the water. Their labor for religious freedom, their labor to get the Bible to us—it is not done yet. They are still reaping in that. We have a great godly heritage. I did not have to struggle for religious freedom. I did not have to lay out my life so that I can give the gospel to somebody. I do not have to worry about that because someone has already done that. Somebody has already been there. I stand on the shoulders of great men, and that is what Jesus is saying here: “I sent you to reap that whereon ye bestowed no labor; other men labored, and ye are entered into their labors.”
That is okay, but the thing is, just as you want your child to do far better things than you have done, that is exactly what if you were to ask any one of these martyrs, any one of these early Christians, they would say, “Hey, use what you’ve been given, use the benefits and the blessings that you have to go see people saved.”
Sometimes we get so busy with the temporal that we forget about the eternal. In a thousand years, will it be worth it that we worked and got another $10,000 a year? Will it be worth it in a thousand years that our kids were involved in sports and Chinese checkers and everything like that? Or will it be worth it in a thousand years if we take our kids out soul-winning? Or will it be worth it in a thousand years where we go out and get on a bus route? There are kids all over the place who need a ride to get to church. There are places here in the church where we can labor. You can be a part of a Sunday school class; you can get involved in labor. Why? It is for the eternal; it is not for the temporal things. You can get involved; you can help in a children’s church. Labor is what we need—laborers. Praise the Lord, we can all do that.
In Mexico, it is amazing. These people would labor; they were hard workers. They had every excuse not to work. There was a guy washing windows on a car who had one arm, and he was going to town on those windows, getting it done. I think, “Man, what about us? Am I laboring for the Lord?” That man is laboring just to get a couple of pesos. Do I have that same desire to get out of my comfort zone, walk across the street, and tell somebody about Jesus? Do I have that same desire if I am in Walmart and somebody strikes up a conversation? Do I witness to them? Do I give them a tract? The field is already ripe for harvest; we need to get involved.
What was Jesus’ prayer request in Matthew 9:37? He says, “The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest that he will send forth laborers into his harvest.” That is what God’s prayer request to us is: that we would pray to God that He would send us laborers. Praise the Lord, we have good people here in the church, but sometimes I feel like I work and I work and I work, and I think, “Man, I’m doing a lot of spiritual things, but am I spiritual myself?”
Am I getting caught up in the busyness of church work or things around the house or whatever? Am I just trying to be busy? Busyness is not equal to godliness; they are not the same thing. In America nowadays, we are busy people. We are crammed full of things, but are we spiritual? Are we godly? Sometimes even in godly work, whether it be singing or running the buses, I could do that in my own flesh. I think, “Lord, I don’t want to do this; I want to do it in Your harvest.” God can do so much more than my flesh can ever do. God has a harvest out there. God has enabled you with everything you need to go forth into that harvest. Labor is the world’s greatest equalizer. Everybody can labor. Think about men and women who have started businesses; they probably were not the smartest cookie, they probably did not have everything together, but they were hard workers. God can use somebody who is a hard worker; God can use a laborer.
I am very challenged by Paul. Before he was Paul, he was Saul. What did he do? He woke up every morning with a determination: “I am going to eliminate the church. I’m going to eliminate those people of that way.” He ate that for breakfast, lunch, and dinner; he wanted to make sure the whole church was destroyed. That convicts me. Do I have that same passion that the world has to destroy teenagers today? Do I have that same passion to see somebody saved as the world has to produce these movies and TV shows that are destroying marriages and kids today? Do I have that desire, as Paul had, to see people saved?
There is a great harvest. There is a great need for laborers, and the third thing is the time is short. We read it today in our class in Revelation 1:3, “The time is at hand.” The time is short. We do not know when God is coming back. The days are long, but the years are short. My wife says this all the time: “The days are long, but the years are short.” We look back, and we have almost been here for five years—a little over four and a half years—and we think, “Wow, it just flew by.” The days are long, but the years are short. We do not know when God is going to come back. We do not know when that last trumpet is going to sound. Nobody knows that, but the time is short. It is going to happen. I love the track Brother Tom Kent has; I think it is called “Time Is Running Out.” Time is running out. The clock is ticking. God has given us everything we need, but we need to use that short time we have left. God is coming soon.
I think about when we were growing up, my mom would leave to go to work and say, “All right, boys, when I come back, I want the laundry done, and I want the house clean.” Did we do everything she said right away? No. We played around all day—being homeschooled just meant we got to play around all day—and then when it came time for the test, we crammed real fast. We played around all day, and then we saw my mom’s van coming across the driveway. You have never seen a house clean so fast; that took three to four seconds from when my mom got into the driveway. But we do not have that kind of heads-up. We do not know when the Lord is going to come back. If the Lord came back today, would you be satisfied with your work? Would the Lord be satisfied with the time, the energy, the strength He has given you? Would He be satisfied for the return on His investment? Do not wait. The time is at hand. Do not wait for a New Year’s resolution. Do not wait for a new fad. Do not wait for the program to end and then start back up again to jump in. Start today. Start today. Do not wait, because the time is at hand. The time is at hand.
I cannot control who gets saved. I cannot control the harvest. I cannot control when. But I can control my labor. I can control being in church like I am supposed to be. I can control grabbing a fistful of tracts and handing them out during the week. I can control my labor. That is what God is telling us. He says, “Look, I have meat to eat that you know not of.” He said, “Look, there is somebody who is about to get saved. She is bringing family members so that they could get saved. This is what I am here for—the work that My Father started. This is it.” Is that our goal tonight? Is that our plan—that we are going to labor for the Lord as long as we can? Work, for the night is coming.
There is a great song by John O’Rice, “So Little Time.” A great hymn. Along those same lines, the harvest is ending. Where are we at? There is another great song: “My table is full, but my fields are empty. No one wants to work in the fields. All my children want to do is sit around the table, but no one wants to work in the field.” Is that our life story? Will we be servants? Will we be a laborer for the Lord?
Let’s go ahead and bow our heads and pray. We cannot decide when the Lord is going to come back, and we cannot decide who is going to get saved. Sometimes we sow, sometimes we reap, but we can decide to labor. We can decide to labor. I want us to take this time for this invitation where you just make a decision tonight: I am going to come, and I am going to decide to use the time that I have left. I told you about that 70-something-year-old lady; she knew her time was coming to an end. She did not know how many years she had left, but she was going to use the time she had left to see people saved. When she gets into heaven, those first five minutes of heaven, she will be able to see those rewards—the rewards for that labor she put in. Let that be our story. Let that be our testimony tonight. As the pianist plays, let’s go ahead and come down to the front to pray.
Original File: The Harvest - Brother Anthony Arron Sunday PM 101021