Winning the lost, reaping His harvest

Winning the lost, Reaping His harvest

by Carol Hull-Jackson

As believers, we may be involved in formal church strategies, various evangelistic events, and programs. However, I wanted to stir us up today in our own personal evangelism.

Here are some points for us to be more effective as witnesses in our day-to-day walk.

1. Be available, alert and understand the assignment. The end goal of our mission here on earth is to be agents of reconciliation, carrying out the great commission to go into all the world and preach the gospel. So be present and available to God wherever we are and wherever He sends us, at work, supermarket, gym, taxis, and buses. Say, "Lord, I am available." Romans 12:1 MSG So here’s what I want you to do, God helping you: Take your everyday, ordinary life—your sleeping, eating, going to work, and walking-around life—and place it before God as an offering. Embracing what God does for you is the best thing you can do for him.

2. Make the most of every opportunity. Ephesians 5:15. The end goal in everything we do is not just to make better lives for ourselves and our families but to take as many people to heaven with us as we can. God wants to partner with us to reap a harvest of souls. If each one of us is activated and alert in this way, we can have great reach for the Kingdom. Whether we are at work, in recreation, or shopping. If we have this mindset, we will always be open to opportunities for when the Lord leads someone into our space or leads us into someone’s space. Be hospitable: opening our hearts and homes and making ourselves available to people in exercise groups, taking someone out to lunch, coffee, and food always opens up the heart and encourages conversation and relationship building.

3. Listen. Keep your spiritual ears tuned to heaven even in the daily business of your work and home life for who the Lord would direct you. Also, listen to others as they speak and share with you. What are the deep-seated needs of those in our circle? How can we meet those needs with the love and gospel of Christ?

4. Respond to God’s voice when he speaks. Ask him for boldness and let him do the rest. Sometimes it will be easy, sometimes hard, sometimes people will come to us, and sometimes we will have to go. Romans 12:2 MSG Don’t become so well-adjusted to your culture that you fit into it without even thinking. Instead, fix your attention on God. You’ll be changed from the inside out. Readily recognize what he wants from you and quickly respond to it. Unlike the culture around you, always dragging you down to its level of immaturity, God brings the best out of you and develops well-formed maturity in you.

5. Show Christ's love & Compassion. Mark 6:34 When Jesus landed and saw a large crowd, he had compassion on them because they were like sheep without a shepherd. So he began teaching them many things. Like Jesus, let’s be genuinely interested in people’s well-being. Christians come off as in-genuine, like salesmen, when all we seek to do is push our “religion”. Rather, Christ had compassion on all people; He knew that He had the solutions to their problems, whether it was sickness, relational, financial or other; we see Christ always acting in compassion. So too, we must be moved by love and compassion and know that the faith, wisdom, and wealth we have through Christ, by His Spirit, is the ultimate remedy to people’s issues and problems. This makes us genuinely care and want to help. So if someone is sick, be there to pray; if someone needs advice or guidance, be there to give it. Be the source of Kingdom light, wisdom, God’s presence and peace in your circle of influence.

6. Practice a relational gospel. Especially in dealing with people of other religions and persuasions. Do not offend others, do not offer another religion, offer a relationship with the person of Christ. Relate with people as Christ did. He sat with all kinds of people, and so should we. Don't be so high-minded about your Christian position that you judge and turn others off and enter into quarrels. The light we have is greater than any darkness. 2 Tim 2:23 Don’t have anything to do with foolish and stupid arguments because you know they produce quarrels. 24 And the Lord’s servant must not be quarrelsome but must be kind to everyone, able to teach, not resentful. 25 Opponents must be gently instructed in the hope that God will grant them repentance leading them to a knowledge of the truth.

7. Be truthful and transparent. Christ was a man but also God. Let people see your humanity. God used persecution in the church to scatter the church and spread the gospel, so too, the Lord uses persecution and challenging situations in our lives as the common ground for us to share His Kingdom comfort with others who are suffering just as we are or have. 2 Cor 1:3 Praise be to the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of compassion and the God of all comfort, 4 who comforts us in all our troubles, so that we can comfort those in any trouble with the comfort we ourselves receive from God. 5 For just as we share abundantly in the sufferings of Christ, so also our comfort abounds through Christ.

8. You are not alone. You have the Holy Spirit’s power. Acts 1:8 But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.” The Holy Spirit is with you in POWER (Dunamis). We have His power to heal, power to prophesy, boldness and courage to be witnesses. The whole gamut of the Holy Spirit’s gifts is available to us as we witness. We can step out in confidence in whatever area he calls us.

9. God has already prepared hearts. It is His harvest. He is already in the harvest preparing hearts, and we are invited into His garden to pick the fruit. Luke 10:2 He told them, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.

10. Let us be patient. Just like different fruit takes different lengths of time to ripen, it may take years for God to work in people’s hearts to bring them to a place where they are ready to say yes to Him. Others may hear once and be impacted to change immediately! Let us be patient and not be weary in our prayers or in well-doing but trust the Lord of the harvest that nothing he calls us to do is wasted time, even if it seems not much is happening or we are not being as fruitful as we would like. Our prayers and efforts are softening hard hearts and hard ground, and we must keep on until the fullness of time comes. We may be seed planters, OR we may reap what others have sown. Gal 6: 7 Do not be deceived: God cannot be mocked. A man reaps what he sows. 8 Whoever sows to please their flesh, from the flesh will reap destruction; whoever sows to please the Spirit, from the Spirit will reap eternal life. 9 Let us not become weary in doing good, for at the proper time, we will reap a harvest if we do not give up. 10 Therefore, as we have the opportunity, let us do good to all people, especially to those who belong to the family of believers.

11. Just go! Special training is very helpful, but even the youngest of believers can share Christ's love, pray for the sick and show acts of kindness. Matthew 28:19-20 Amplified Bible 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations [help the people to learn of Me, believe in Me, and obey My words], baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 teaching them to observe everything that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always [remaining with you perpetually—regardless of circumstance, and on every occasion], even to the end of the age.”