Help Wanted - Martin Wiles

The harvest is so great, but the workers are so few. Pray to the Lord . . . and ask him to send out more workers for his fields. Luke 10:2 NLT

I heard their help wanted plea, so I took the job. They needed help—and I needed more money.

Picking watermelons was one task I’d never undertaken. I had recently moved to a farming community where one of my fellow church members grew watermelons commercially. The owner had only one regular employee but hired extra hands during watermelon season. When he asked if I wanted to be one of the extra hands, I agreed.

Little did I know it would mean sweltering in one-hundred-degree temperatures in fields clothed with stagnant air. I also didn’t know I’d have to work bent over, rising only to toss the melon to the person waiting in the back of the farm truck that meandered down each aisle. After loading a truck, we’d drive back to the farmer’s home where an eighteen-wheeler waited. Here, we’d unload what we had just loaded. One summer was all I needed to realize we needed extra help.

The harvest Jesus spoke about wasn’t a nice crop of watermelons. Souls were on his mind. He was sending His disciples out into a world where the majority of the people were unbelievers. They had never heard of Jesus—which was possible since He’d only been around thirty or so years—or they had chosen to disbelieve He was the Messiah.

Every church could hang a sign over their doorway reading, “Help Wanted.” Most of the time, pay isn’t involved, but they need the help, nevertheless. While we have more means to preach the gospel message now than ever, the need to tell it is just as critical as in the first century. Technology helps us spread the good news faster and more effectively, but the world is still filled with those who need to hear and respond.

The disciples’ earlier decision to follow Jesus indicated their willingness to apply for the “Help Wanted” position. They would encounter opposition, ridicule, unbelief, and persecution. Some would be martyred. But they went, nevertheless. We should do the same.

Have you answered God’s help wanted ad? How can you share this ad with others?

Father, open my eyes to the harvest around me. Then give me the courage to go.

Tweetable: Have you answered God's "Help Wanted" call? 

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