In all of my adventures around the world, I have had some "take my breath away" moments of God's amazing beauty. One of them was in Moldova, a small nation between Romania and Ukraine. I happened to be there when the sunflower fields were in full blossom. It was very close to the photo I have attached to this post. I can imagine Jesus seeing a similar picture with a wheat field when he said...
"Do you not say, “There are still four months and then comes the harvest’? Behold, I say to you, lift up your eyes and look at the fields, for they are already white for harvest!" John 4:35
Let me give you the picture of what is happening. Outside of the Samaritan village of Sychar is a vast wheat field. Jesus was just in the village spending quality time with a Samaritan woman who was broken and rejected. She had come out to fetch water from the village well during a time when no one else would be there because she did not want riduculed. Jesus spoke to her, patiently shared freedom and His identity to her it radically changed her.
Jesus was the sower of seed in this Samaritan field. He sowed the seed into the heart of one woman. It so impacted her that this seed multiplied as she went to every person in the village saying, "Come, see a Man who told me all things that I ever did. Could this be the Christ?” Because of seed sown in her life, she went from shame, guilt, and rejection to a person set free and on fire for God.
It generally takes four months from seed sown until a full wheat harvest. One person can handle the sowing of a field but it takes a whole village to bring in the harvest. Jesus had just sown a seed into one womans heart, but within hours not days, weeks, months, or years, Jesus and the disciples reaped an abundant harvest.
As Jesus is standing in or near this fully ripe wheat field, He is looking behind and beyond the disciples at an entire village coming to meet Him. The field was ready for harvesting so the villagers would have been dressed in harvesting clothing, generally white garments. Jesus is saying, it doesn't take a long time for a harvest to come, look here comes our white harvest already.
What does this have to do with us today? We have entered into a unique time in history with the Lord. He is doing some very amazing things right now. You may have shared the Gospel with many people over the years and have been frustrated at the results. I want to encourage you today that we are in a time, right now, when it no longer takes "4 months until the harvest," God is on the move. Get ready!
Also every person needs to take part in the harvest. I may sow and others may sow but it quite literally is going to take all of us to reap the harvest. If you have been praying for someone for a long time, if you have been sharing with very little fruit, if you have been disappointed by the harvest, get ready, the fields are white! The season has changed and God is in the process of being radical in His approach. Keep being faithful and get ready because the season has changed!
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