The combines today are bigger and far more expensive than when I was involved in farming. It’s a beautiful sight, isn’t it, when you drive by a field with a combine eating up the crop. On a hot, calm day the dust kind of hangs in the air. You can actually smell it.

One of my favourite photographs is almost a half century old. It’s a picture taken when my dad was bringing in his harvest. My grandfather and uncle were finished their fields so they were able to bring their two combines over to help. If my memory serves me correctly my dad had a 5542 White and I was left with the old 431 Cockshutt (no cab). I was a dirt magnet.

The picture shows all four combines coming down the field lined up like volunteers in a search party looking for a lost child. The picture moves me to this day.

In Luke’s gospel we read that Jesus sent out 70 (some translations say 72) to prepare the way for Jesus’ ministry. In this context Jesus said to them, “The harvest truly is great, but the labourers are few; therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into His harvest” (Luke 10:2).

All farmers know what it’s like to have grain ready for harvest but not enough equipment or manpower to bring it in before a big rain or frost downgrades the quality of the grain. If snow comes it’s all over and a farmer will have to wait for spring.

So, what did Jesus mean when he said that the harvest is great but the labourers are few? What did he want us to do?

Again, context is important. Jesus is not sending them out to save people. Jesus will do the saving. Their job was to let everyone know that there is someone who is able and willing to save them. If you think that their commission didn’t really matter, think again! Jesus removes any sense of the trivial when he tells them that “he who hears you hears Me, he who rejects you rejects Me, and he who rejects Me rejects Him who sent Me” (Luke 10:16).

There is still a great harvest to bring in, still a great number of people who don’t know that Jesus is able and willing to save them. Over the last couple of centuries many missionaries have gone out from Canada and the United States to do just that. Over the last half century, however, it has become apparent that it’s right here at home that we need workers for the harvest as well. Who will go?

May I suggest that for those who claim to follow Jesus the going doesn’t necessarily mean travelling to the inner city or overseas, although for some it might. What it means “to go” is that you influence the people that are right around you. Let them know that Jesus is able and willing to save. It’s what the woman at the well did in John 4. After meeting Jesus she left her water pots and went back to her city to tell her neighbours about Jesus. Jesus responded by telling his disciples, “lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest” (John 4:35). Jesus ended up staying there for a few days all because of the woman at the well’s testimony.

What has Jesus done for you? Remember this. We do the telling and Jesus does the saving!