Harvest? What Harvest?

The Parousia Update Letter For the Week of April 18, 2011

All past newsletters now posted as PDF files in our Newsletter Archives at  www.safehousesofhopeandprayer.org.

Dear Friends,

Much swirling around right now. I’ve included an update on “My Brother’s Keeper” below and  would appreciate your prayers as we enter a critical phase of identifying and recording personal  stories of adversity and triumph. I’ve already been blessed and we’re just getting started.

Blessings,
Maurice
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Harvest? What Harvest?

Sorry I haven’t been more active lately (well, I have been, just not here on this page!). This  musing was prompted by a recent post by our friend Guy Muse (The M Blog) in Ecuador. Guy  posted an article entitled “20 Reasons why we don’t see harvest”.  Just like I’m  doing now, Guy was reflecting on an excellent post by our mutual friend Felicity Dale who  blogged on “15 reasons we don’t see harvest” . Guy added 5 more reasons to come up with an “even  20".

Not being a terribly creative dog and of limited abilities, I thought I would simply “piggy back” on  what Guy and Felicity have done and make some comments of my own concerning the lack of  any significant harvest in the Western Church. Some of these thoughts have appeared in other  articles (hey, I told you I wasn’t very creative), but here I want to apply them to the topic of “Why  no harvest?”.

1. Post Modern Skepticism. I’ve beat this drum before and I’ll continue to beat it until we get it.  Specifically, the Post Modern skepticism of our culture has infected the Church and is rotting us  from the inside out. A growing number of people in the Church genuinely believe that there are  other ways to God and that adherents of other faiths will make it to heaven without conversion to  biblical faith in Christ. If that’s true, who needs missions or a harvest? Combine this with the  rising number of “practicing universalists” in the Church who believe that God loves everyone so  much that He will find a way to get them into heaven, even if He has to break his own clear  Scriptural rules and concoct some form of “post-mortem salvation”. In an article in Relevant  Magazine posted on-line, Scot McKnight writes: “My own estimation is that somewhere near 75  percent of my students, many if not most of them nurtured in the church, are more or less  universalist. They believe in Jesus and see themselves as Christians but don’t find significant  problems in God saving Muslims and Buddhists or anyone else on the basis of how God makes  such decisions. The Baylor Study of Religion, if my memory is correct, asked a question or two  that reveals that an increasing number of American evangelical Christians think the majority of  humans will be saved.”   If you want more evidence of this, read Jon Meacham’s article on Bell in TIME on-line. Simply put, how do you raise up a generation of missionaries and martyrs in such a pervasive  cloud of doubt and skepticism?

2. Thinking that better training equals a bigger harvest. Let me be clear. Training can often  times be helpful, but the people attending “training weekends” are (generally speaking) those  already motivated to make a difference and simply need to work on their “technique”.  As a  college student during the tail-end of the Jesus Movement I cut my teeth on Campus Crusade  for Christ leadership training and went on to spend 2 years on staff before heading off to  Seminary. So I am well aware that training can be helpful. But my spiritual hair was on fire long  before I ever attended a Campus Crusade Leadership Training Class, Group or Conference.  Why is there no harvest in America today like there was during the Jesus Movement? The  correct answer certainly isn’t “training” or a lack thereof (if you need some excellent organic  house church training, go to www.CMAResources.org). Training alone will not turn “Laodicean  believers” into fire-breathing missionaries. That requires a burning coal fresh from God’s altar. If I  must ever choose between a “trained” person and a “passionate” person, I’ll choose passion over  training. Why? Because the passionate person can be “trained” and his passion productively  channeled, but a trained person can’t be made passionate. Passion is “caught” not “taught”.  Either your heart and your hair are on fire for God or not. On a side note, lots of “training” is what  you get from a Church dominated by “teachers”. Teachers have never encountered a problem  which (in their opinion) couldn’t be solve with more and better teaching. Likewise, prophets have  never met a problem which couldn’t be solved with a “fresh word from God”. Apostles have  never encountered a problem which couldn’t be resolved with a better strategic understanding of  what God is doing and a renewed commitment to pioneer new ground. Well, hopefully, you get  the point. Where more training is the answer to all the Church’s woes (including a bigger  harvest), teachers are in charge. And when the only tool in your tool box is a hammer, every  problem looks like a nail. I’m just sayin’ . . .

3. Equating “harvest” with “reaping”. Consider the words of the Apostle Paul, “I planted,  Apollos watered, but God was causing the growth. So then neither the one who plants nor the  one who waters is anything, but God who causes the growth. Now he who plants and he who  waters are one; but each will receive his own reward according to his own labor.” (1 Corinthians  3:6-8) Simply put, everyone wants to “reap”, but no one wants to sow or water. Can God allow  us to reap where no one has sown? Certainly He can. He’s God. But that is the “exception”. Paul  is giving us the “rule”. If we want a harvest, then we need to pray for laborers willing to sow and  water, possibly without seeing any fruit in their generation. In an excellent article on the changing  role of missionaries in Ecuador, Guy Muse points out that the current harvest being experienced  in Ecuador among house churches represents the fruit of many years of sowing and watering by  others in that country. Some laborers will sow. Other laborers will water. Still others may harvest.  But Jesus is Lord over all their labors. On a side note, American Christians have been taught to  equate “evangelism” with “closing the deal”, sort of like a door-to-door vacuum cleaner  salesman. When our “prospect” doesn’t immediately respond to our sales pitch with an order to  buy (i.e., pray to receive Christ on their doorstep) we pack up our traveling display case and  move on to greener pastures, leaving a trail of confused and bewildered non-Christians  wondering what that little episode was all about. Spend more time sowing and watering and less  time trying to sell vacuum cleaners and maybe we’ll see more and better fruit.

4. A Failure To Understand Seasons of Spiritual Awakening. Yeah, I know. I’m a broken  record on this theme (or in today’s jargon I guess I’m a looped mp3 file or something). The point  is simple, historical and unmistakable. Men’s training and techniques notwithstanding, the history  of the Western Church for the past 300 years demonstrates that the greatest periods of church  growth - both in numbers and percentages - has occurred during times of historic spiritual  awakening.  Such periods, on average, witnessed between 5 and 7% of the population of the  affected areas making first time professions of faith in Christ, usually within a span of 2 or 3  years (localized percentages could be much higher). In an America of over 300 million people,  this would mean a dramatic influx of between 15 and 21 million new believers in 36 months or  less. That’s what I call a harvest . . . and a discipleship challenge. For more on this topic see my  book, “Preparing For The Coming Spiritual Outpouring” (ISBN 978-0981528922), available on  Amazon.

“My Brother’s Keeper” Moving Forward

When you get a chance I would suggest that you visit our website, especially if you’re short on details regarding this video project.  We’re starting more frequent updates and beginning the first phase which I’ve entitled “Everyone  Has A Story”. We’re going to begin videotaping personal stories of hunger, homelessness,  drug/alcohol addiction and recovery, and more. These stories will be professionally edited down  to 2-to-3 minutes and then posted on the “My Brother’s Keeper” website. Our long-range goal is to identify compelling stories which can  be developed into half-hour episodes of “My Brother’s Keeper”. Keep us in your prayers as we  move forward with this project, designed to communicate the love of God in practical terms to  those in need.

This past week I met with several students from a local community college. One of the  professors at the school works for the City and teaches classes on social service. He received  the e-mail I circulated to all of the ministries and social service agencies in the city concerning  “Everyone Has A Story”. He copied my e-mail and distributed it to students in his classes, telling  them “Here’s an opportunity for you to tell your personal story”. My phone began ringing and last  Thursday I met with several students who were interested in becoming involved, including  Shauna (not her real name). She told me how she had started using drugs at the age of 9 and  was a full blown addict by age 13. She told me of having three children which she placed for  adoption, and that she now has a daughter of her own. I told her how much I appreciated her  moral courage of being responsible and doing the right thing. She is now finishing an Associate’s  degree and is living in a transitional living home. As I talked with the students (Shauna was one of  3 I talked with together at one sitting) I shared the Christian and biblical roots of “My Brother’s  Keeper”. When we were done and everyone was getting ready to leave, Shauna spoke up. “I  need you to know that I am not a Christian,” she told us (the other 2 students were and attended  the same church). “But I still want to tell my story.” It was a poignant moment. “You need to tell  your story, and we want to help you tell it in your own words,” I responded. So, our journey into  demonstrating the love of Christ through practical service to those in need has begun. Pray for  us, as I am certain many challenges lie ahead. But I am constantly reminded of the  Biblical truth  that “when you did it to the least of these, you did it to Me.”

Support Our Ministry Financially

As you can no doubt surmise, these are tight financial times (and not just for us). The good news  is that donating to and supporting this ministry is quite simple. Go to our website  and click on the “Donate” button at the top of the right  hand column. This takes you to our PayPal account where you can donate quickly, easily, and  securely. Your financial support is greatly appreciated!

© 2011 THE PAROUSIA NETWORK (www.safehousesofhopeandprayer.org)