So, there you go, that one's free. Where I would like to draw attention today and seems fitting given the beautiful hymn that I did not ask for, the title of the message is The Harvest. This is the time of year that we have a harvest. This is the time of year that in this part of the world we collect the fruits that God has allowed us to grow. That'd be corn and soybeans and things of that nature. It's the fall, the time of the year when we reap everything that we have worked so hard to produce. It's the season of gathering, if you will. And that's really what the word means. To harvest means to gather something together, or it also means the effect of our labor. We could say we have a harvest, which means we have the impact of the thing that we worked for. Now, few of us anymore are actually farming per se, but we can look around still in this part of the world and see the effects of farming and see the things that are going on. Farming and in particular harvesting has a significant breadth of coverage in the scripture. Again, like I mentioned last night, we flow through the scriptures and we don't think very often about how often things occurred at night in the scriptures and we can flow through the scriptures from the front to the end and fail to pick up just how often that there are scriptures that talk about the harvest and things of that nature and it's very important. Now, most of the time that is associated, rightfully so, not necessarily with the physical instruction of how we are to harvest and to grow things, but it's a spiritual application, which is where I want to spend time today, the spiritual things of this. Read a couple of verses here. Amos 9.13 says, Behold, the days are coming, declares the Lord, when the plowman shall overtake the reaper and the treader of grapes, him who sows the seed, the mountains shall drip with sweet wine and all the hills shall flow with it. And so we can be assured that at some point, whether it's now, no matter what struggles we might go through, there is a great harvest, a great spiritual harvest, that God will have His way in this world and in us, whether or not we can see it, whether or not we know it. We get really concerned with the harvest. So turn with me, the text will be out of Matthew chapter 9 this morning, Matthew chapter 9. And as you're turning there, I'll just remind you of a few things that are going on in this chapter. Jesus is incredibly busy during this chapter. We see that near the beginning He heals the paralytic and then He takes almost no time and He's calling Matthew to be a disciple. He continues on and He raises someone from the dead and while on his way to do that miraculously heals a woman with the issue of chronic bleeding. He heals two blind men later on in verse 27 and then he's able to cast out a demon and allow man to speak in verse 32. So Jesus is going and he is ministering constantly and we come to verse 35 in chapter 9. And Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every disease and every affliction." You see, Jesus didn't waste any time while He was here on earth. He was about His Father's business. He knew exactly why He had come. He knew exactly what He was supposed to do, because the scripture says He watched what the Father did, and He did what the Father told Him to do. He had perfect harmony and perfect obedience, something that none of us ever will have, but He had. Yet at the same token, He was able to do that because He was in fact fully God, but He was still fully man. And where those two things come together, I can't hardly understand, but I would hazard to guess this, that after a long day of healing people, and preaching to people, and casting out demons, and raising people up from the dead, that He had to be exhausted because He was both physically man and spiritually God. So, somewhere in that mix I believe He was tempted like we were, which means He would get tired like we were. He would have to rest. He would have to take time because He still was a man, but there was more to do. There was always more to do. There was always more people to heal. There was always more people to listen to the gospel. There was always more instruction to give. There was never enough, quote, unquote, time for the man who made time. when he was in time. Yet, just a side note here, he still took time to be alone with God, to be with his father. And what a lesson for us today, as we go about our busy lives. Let us think, if Jesus took time out from healing people, and doing the work of sharing the gospel, and preaching the good news, and bringing those into faith, into salvation, yet He could still take the time to steal away, and to pray with His Father, and to spend time alone, how much more should we be that much unlike Jesus? And so the point of all of that was to say that in this chapter we see just how busy he was, just how active he was. And then he says some interesting things in verse 37. Now, church, we must be careful reading too much into Scripture. What do I mean by that? Well, we can go and look at it to distant and just say, well, these are just words and we can read into the context too much. But I don't think it's inappropriate to think that when Jesus says these next few phrases, that he says it with a heartbreak and a desire for the people that was probably evident in what he said. verse 37, then he says to his disciples, "...the harvest truly is plentous, but the laborers are few. Pray, therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth laborers into the harvest." Now, like I said, we can just read that and think that there's words. I can try in my own frailty to add some type of voice inflection to this. But imagine Jesus Christ as desperate as he was that everyone would know the truth, looking out across all that were there and thinking to himself, I don't have because I am in time. I do not have the time to reach everyone, but everyone needs to be reached. There is so much to do. And if we think about it and consider it's even peculiar in the sense that God sent Christ to a specific time and a specific place to a specific people. He did not at that time, now I do believe this will come later, but He did not at that time give Him the ability with one voice to speak to all people at once. But He sent Him into an area, a local community. into small communities to do His work and His will with those people. And I believe Christ looked out at the multitude and had great compassion and great pity for them and was telling His disciples and others the harvest is ready, but there's no one to actually go out and to harvest. Now, again, this is a spiritual context. He's not talking about looking at the fields and thinking that it's time to actually harvest the wheat or the barley or whatever they had. He is trying to teach us an important aspect of this. The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Now, I want to look at these verses for just a few minutes a little bit closer. I want to first point out that it's the Lord of the harvest. Lord of the Harvest. Who is not the Lord of the Harvest? I am not the Lord of the Harvest. You are not the Lord of the Harvest. But how many times do we want to be? How many times do we want to control? How many times do we want the power to cause to grow and to have it be something that we're in charge of? No, God is in control of the times and the seasons of the Harvest. Amos 4, 7 says, I also withheld the rain from you when you were yet three months to the harvest. I would send rain on one city and send no rain on another. One field would have rain and the field which did not, rain would not come. Brothers and sisters, we can get really upset and really thinking that somehow God isn't blessing in the way that we want Him to. We can somehow think that it's in our control to cause all of this or to bring all of this around. But what we fail to understand is that God is the Lord of the harvest. That means He does what He wants to whenever He wants to. It is our duty to go out and to be those who harvest when there's an opportunity for it, not to make it happen. And I want to say something today that may be counterintuitive. I think in this country, we are on the edge of a tremendous harvest. Now, you could turn on the news and you could look at all the things going on and think, well, how could you possibly say that? And trust me, I could look at the news and question whether this really makes sense. But you know what I do is I listen and I read some other people, and I am astounded at what God is doing. I'm absolutely surprised. I'm going to get maybe political here for a minute, but you can deal with it. I've been listening to a few people over the last couple years. And I have seen God work in people's lives in tremendous ways. Now these aren't preachers and these aren't Baptist ministers. Has anyone listened to Tucker Carlson talk about God? You should. Has anyone seen Russell Brand admits that he lived one of the most hedonistic lifestyles he possibly could, sleeping with whoever he wanted to, addicted to drugs. Have you heard the man share the gospel with a crowd of 10,000 people on his knees praying to God and preaching a gospel with more power than I have? Have you heard that? Have you listened to people get on and have conversations with Jordan Peterson and try to convert that man who believes that there is a God but can't quite go all the way? Brothers and sisters, I have listened to him struggle as he works through this and I don't believe he's there. But what is happening is people are realizing all of this woke nonsense, all of this there is no truth, All of this, we can do whatever we want to. All of this, let's get rid of God, is a complete and utter waste and is causing the downfall of our entire culture. And what I see is people that God is using, whether they're fully belonging to Him or not, but God is using them to reach people and the fields are ready for harvest. They're ready for you to walk into situations where they've been listening to these people and wondering to themselves, maybe we went too far as a culture to say, let's get rid of God. Maybe there is a God and it's time for us to go. Yes, there is. Let me tell you about it. There is a whole generation of people who are coming up and are saying, this is all nonsense. I don't like any of this. Where is the truth? I want to know what is real. And it's time for us to stand up and say, I know what is real and I know who is truth. We can run away, we can put our heads in the sand, we can say, oh, the world is falling apart, and yes, it is. But listen, at any one time, any of those people and others that I mentioned may have 10 or 15 or 20 million people listen to a lecture that they give. That's 5% of the U.S. You think 5% of the U.S. is in church this morning? I don't know that it is. Now, I'm not saying that we have to praise these people or follow after them, or that they're right, or that all of them are believers, and I had some of their names here, but it doesn't matter. The point is, I believe there is an awakening, an appropriate awakening, in our culture right now to realize that there is a God and there is something bigger than we are. And we, as believers, must capitalize on this. We must go into the field and must be willing to harvest with God's help. Let's consider and turn with me for a minute to the woman at the well. I'm going to read out of John for that. John 4. I won't repeat the whole story. Jesus says he has to go to Samaria, which is somewhere that a good Jew never goes. And the disciples, of course, are confused like they usually are. And they follow him, and he sits by this well in the hottest part of the day, and they go in to try and find food because they're all hungry, which is, you know, natural for all of us, especially good Baptists. And they all go in, leave him alone. And this woman comes to get water in the hottest part of the day, and this woman, the focus really isn't who she is, but she was not a good person. And she comes and Christ shares the gospel with her. And in verse 26, I'm in chapter 4, and Jesus said unto her, I that speak unto thee am He. Jesus said the most amazing thing. She said, where is this God? She goes, you're talking to Him. You're talking to Him. And upon this came His disciples and marveled that He talked with a woman. Yet no one said, Why seek you or why are you talking with her? The woman left her water pot and went her way into the city and said to the men, Come see a man which told me all things that I ever did. Is this not the Christ? And they went out to the city and came unto him. In the meantime, while his disciples prayed him, or asked him, saying, Master, eat. And he said unto them, I have meat to eat that you know not of. And therefore the disciples said to one another, has someone else brought him something to eat? And Jesus said unto them, my meat is to do the will of him that sent me and to finish his work. say not ye there are not 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 ready to harvest and he that reapeth receive his wages and garneth fruits unto eternal life that both he that soweth and he that reapeth may rejoice together. And herein is the saying that is true, one soweth and another reaps. I sent you to reap, whereupon you bestowed no labor. Other men labored, and ye are entered into their labors." Let's talk about this for just a minute. Once again, as is classic and so often, as I mentioned last night, the disciples were not chosen because of their aptitude, they were given special ability. And so, they were confused and remained confused through so much of Jesus' ministry. They go in looking for food to fill their bellies, concerned with the things of the world. Jesus stays behind because He knew in His infinite knowledge that a woman who needed to know Him would come to see Him. She comes in the middle of the day. He shares the gospel with her. He tells her about herself. So she has to admit who she is. Sounds familiar. She goes away a changed person and runs into town to tell everybody there, listen to come see a man who's told me everything I've ever done, who knows our deepest, deepest thoughts and our intimate feelings, who knows every sin and every thought that we've had. process of that no doubt while she's running into town the disciples are coming back out with food. They're confused and wondering why on earth Jesus would have any relation with this woman, why He'd even be speaking with her because culturally He wasn't supposed to. Again, remember He's kind of a rabbi so to speak and should be remaining pure and clean and not with these dirty, horrible people. But Christ obviously didn't see it that way, He doesn't see it that way today. And so, she goes and gets everybody to come. And his disciples are like, hey, you should probably eat something. And he's like, I don't need to. because the energy, the sustenance, the nutrition that I get is from doing the will of the one who sent me. You see, He reminds them it's not about what we do in this earth, it's about what we do spiritually. And no doubt as the crowds came, He looked out over them, just like we saw in the last reading, and He says to them, look at the fields, the harvest is ready, who will go and harvest? And then he reminds them of something very important. You're going to harvest where you didn't plant. And some of you will plant and never harvest. And some of you will have in between. But everyone who plants or harvests earns a spiritual reward. Spiritual reward. It is not by might or wisdom souls enter the Kingdom of God, it is by His strength. He is the one that provides the increase. We can help plant, we can help harvest, but God is the one whose success depends on because God is the one who allows it to grow. It's the Holy Spirit that works in people's lives. We only have a part of this. It is only God who can put a new heart and a new spirit into inside of a man and a woman. It is only God who can remove the heart of stone, as it says in Ezekiel, and replace it with one that is soft and open. God is the Lord of the harvest, and the success depends on Him, not on me. I had to learn this the hard time, the hard way, several years ago. I was just so distraught and so concerned that I couldn't get certain people to come to church. You ever been that way? And I finally had to realize with the Lord's help, that's not up to me. I do what I do. I come, I preach, I prepare, I make sure the house is open, I invite, I encourage, I extol, I warn, but beyond that it is up to them and God for what happens. I am there to plant, I am there to harvest, but it is up to Him to have the yield." You could interpret that, you could say, Lord of the harvest could be master of the yield or chief of the harvest. I don't get to choose. And if I don't get to choose, I certainly can't be disappointed by what comes out, can I? It's simply for me to be obedient. As I said, the disciples were too focused on their earthly things. They had gone to get food. Even after witnessing a miraculous miracle, they still missed the point. So, one of the challenges I have for us today is, what are we focused on? Are we focused so much on our earthly possessions, on filling our earthly bodies, that we fail to think about the spiritual? Are we so focused on other things that we fail to really consider what the Lord would have us to do? Where is your focus? And is it where it should be? And what about that increase? As I said, sometimes we don't ever get to see it. Sometimes we only plant. Another completely separate point in my life, although about the same season, I became very bothered by the fact that I hadn't seen any fruit from what I consider all the labor I was doing for the Lord. I was very, very upset about that. And I won't go into the whole story, but the Lord reminded me in a very clear way, that is not my business. It's not up to you. You may have spoken to your children, to your spouse, to your friends, to your coworkers, to people in church over and over again. And you may never, ever see the increase, but that's not up to you. That's up to God. I will say, a little side note here, it'd be really nice for us to encourage people who have planted in our lives. It would be nice for us to go back and say, you know, brother, sister, you helped me through this hard time. God worked in your life to do amazing things. You were here and that allowed this to happen. We don't always get that opportunity, but it can certainly be encouraging. But understand that it is Christ who gives the increase. Galatians 6, 9, let us not grow weary in doing good, for in due season we will reap. if we do not give up. I don't know a lot about heaven. The Bible doesn't say a lot about heaven. We have a lot of incorrect thoughts about heaven. I do think there will be some ability for us to know each other in some way, whatever that is. And I wonder sometimes when we get there who will be able to say it was because of you. It was because you put $10 in the plate to buy Bibles for a country that doesn't have them. It was because of your testimony and the way that you lived at work that got me curious about the Lord. And although it wasn't your church I went to, I attended another church and was saved. You see, the only way that this works is if we pass the gospel down and down and down. And so we stand on the testimony of thousands of people who have gone on before us who have preached and proclaimed and lived the gospel. That's why I love the one hymn that we sung this morning that for 500 years has been a bulwark of the church and many men and women who have gone to their graves and been martyred for the cause of Christ have sang that song as they went. And I am a beneficiary of that and they never knew me. And maybe someday they will. But that is cause for us to never give up, to never stop working for the good, never grow weary in doing good. A harvest of righteousness is sown in peace by those who make peace, says James 3.18. And Psalms 126 and 6 says, those who go out weeping, carrying seed to sow will return with songs of joy, carrying sheaves with them. I didn't ask for that song to be sung this morning if I didn't say that. I want to point out one more thing about this passage before we come to a close. So, I guess I'm going back to Matthew 9th chapter, the last part. Notice it says something again kind of peculiar in verse 38, maybe easy to skip over. Pray you therefore, the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth laborers into the harvest. Should we pray for people to be saved? Well, yes. Should we pray that the Lord will send people into the harvest? Yes. Notice right here, notice right here, all these people before him, what is, what is he teaching his disciples? Well, sure, we pray for people's salvation, but we must pray that the Lord of the harvest will send forth laborers into the fields. That's a little different. We are to pray that the Lord will send workers. not for the increase, not necessarily for the salvation, not necessarily for success, not for protection, not for comfort, not for anything we think, but that workers would be sent into the harvest. Well, who gets to be sent? Well, church, look around. We're right here and we're gathered in today into a space where we could come and to learn and to praise our Lord and Savior. But this is certainly a harvest area. And most definitely, as soon as we leave these doors, that is an even more intense harvest area. We should pray that God would send more of us into the field. Our job is to sow and to harvest. His is to grow. We are not to focus on the results, but rather the activities that God has told us to do. And so I encourage you and I beg you to not sit around thinking that this world is going to hell, which it is, without understanding that the harvest before us right now is immense. And that what God really wants is for us to go out into that harvest. Many of us want to wait. Many of us think that, well, the one who does the sowing and the reaping stands behind this pulpit. No, not even remotely. Certainly, I want people to be saved. Certainly, we want those who are here to come to acknowledge the Lord. But it is those who are believers, those who are sitting in the pews, all of us are sent out into the harvest. It is not just my job. It is not just Brother David's job. It is your job if you know him. And we can think, well, I want to wait until I have a big opportunity. Listen, you may have a big field to plant. And you may want to wait till you get a nice, like, 48-row planter. But the reality is, if you only got one that has 12 heads on it, and that's all you got, you just got to get to work. To think that you're going to wait until you have this amazing opportunity to give your testimony before all your co-workers or before everyone in your class, that's just silly. Every single day, we have an opportunity to plan and to harvest. No matter what our platform looks like or where we're at, we are to about our father's business in the fields, planting and harvesting whoever he gives us the opportunity to do it with. And so don't wait until you get a big platform or you end up waiting forever. God has uniquely gifted you to plant and to harvest in the lives of those who you're around. Don't try to be somebody you're not. Great words of advice I got when I first started preaching. Don't try and be like another preacher. It doesn't work that way. Be how God made you to be. where God has placed you. Now God needs people to go into the harvest and I think many times we think about this verse and we think well that means I'm supposed to go somewhere and some have and will be and maybe even some of you are called or led by God to actually go a distance away to do His work. Maybe you will be called to a foreign mission field as we would consider it today. But again, just as it's incorrect to think it's only the pastor's job to harvest and to plant, it's not like you're not planting and harvesting if you're not in the mission field somewhere else. You don't have to necessarily learn a foreign language. You don't have to move. Sometimes we just have to start right here. Your family. You have the most influence over your family. Significantly. I mean, let's just be honest. Again, I said it, you know, I'm not going to be political. We're all going to throw our votes away in a few weeks. You know that, right? Because it doesn't really matter. I mean, I'm going to vote anyway, but it doesn't matter, right, especially not in Tennessee. And you can think you're going to change an election, and you won't. But you will change your family because you have influence over your family, whether you think it or not. What about your friends? Are you planting and harvesting among your friends? Your close friends, not your Facebook friends you've never really met or haven't seen for two decades. I'm talking about your actual friends, on a daily basis, those who you have in contact. What about at church? Well, now I'm going to start meddling a little bit. Sunday school teachers, you plant and you harvest. Teachers of other classes, you plant and you harvest. Song leaders, people who help administer the church, deacons, whoever cleans your building and cuts your grass, if you all do that yourselves, you are a part of the work of God. Everyone who is here has an opportunity to plant and to harvest, and we have tremendous influence here. And we should be giving this opportunity and this church everything we have because that's where God has called us. Our family, our friends, our church. Next is our school or work area. The people you sit with every day in class, no matter how young you are. The people you work with every day when you go to work. And then lastly, I'll just say your community at large, Mount Juliet, this area, and not just Mount Juliet way on the other side of 40, right here, your neighbors, the ones you can see from your building. ones whose new homes are being built this way. This is your community. This is where we are to minister. And God may take you and send you to another church. He may take you and send you to the other side of the world. But he most certainly, without having to prick your heart, has sent you to your family, your friends, your church, your work and your community. And we must be active, sowing and reaping where God gives us an opportunity. Your greatest influence in life is those who you are closest to. And just like Jesus looked out, brothers and sisters, the fields are ready to be harvest. That's what that means is the fields are white. grain of that time when the heads would begin to turn white, and they would look white, and that's how you knew that it was time. Brothers and sisters, look at what is going on in the world around us. Look at the edge of disaster that we are on. But look at all the people who are saying, wait a second, something's wrong, something's not right. There might have been something about this God that we just rejected for the last 20 or 30 years, and we must be standing up saying, you're right, I know the truth because I know who is truth. Let me tell you about this person. Let me tell you about how God changed my life. You do not have to be polished. You do not have to be skilled. You just simply have to scatter the seed. Live your lives for Him. That is the message for those who are here who know Him. Let us be about the harvest. Let us work while it is day. Because the night is coming when there will be no work. I mentioned that last night. We have an opportunity now. And the fields are certainly ready for us to go into. So let us be bold, to borrow your phrase. Let us be strong. Let us be confident. And for those who've never been harvested. Second Corinthians says, In a favorable time, I listen to you. And in a day of salvation, I have helped you. Behold, now is the favorable time. Behold, now is the day of salvation. See, God is calling each and every one of us to know him. God is calling us to be saved. And maybe in today's message, I didn't strike so hard at the gospel, but I have certain confidence that if you've been here a few times, you've heard it. Brothers and sisters, this is your opportunity. Today is the day of salvation. What does that mean? Today you can be harvested, not of your own will, not of your own strength, but through God. And we must seek that. And as I said last night, I'll close again with the book of Revelation. And I looked and behold, a white cloud And upon the cloud one set, like the son of man, having in his hand a golden crown, and in his hand a sharp sickle. And another angel came out of the temple, saying with a loud voice to him that sat on the cloud, Thrust in thy sickle and reap, for the time has come for thee to reap, for the harvest of the earth is ripe. And he that sat on the cloud thrust in his sickle on the earth, and the earth was reaped." Listen, there is coming a time and coming a day when the final harvesting happens. And until that comes, and while you have breath, there is opportunity. And if you know that you need to be harvested, If you know that you need to have your heart of stone replaced with the heart of flesh, then you need to ask and beg for forgiveness and seek that out. And those of us who have received and have been harvested and know him, it is our job to get busy, to get into the field and to do the work that God has given us with no thought about the outcome, but simply about our service and devotion to him. further I'll let you decide how to close.