The Harvest Is Abundant, But The Workers Are Few

by Scott Dunn

Those words were spoken by Jesus Christ over two millennia ago, and they still ring true today. Typically, we look at harvesting as a seasonal thing. It is how we recognize that summer and fall are exchanging places on our planet. Farmers work to pull the fruits of their labor from the ground and sell or store it for future use.

Those words were spoken by Jesus Christ over two millennia ago, and they still ring true today. Typically, we look at harvesting as a seasonal thing. It is how we recognize that summer and fall are exchanging places on our planet. Farmers work to pull the fruits of their labor from the ground and sell or store it for future use.

The Bible has many stories around the harvest and its necessity for human survival. When you see a subject crop up in the Bible, so many times, there must be some significance there. From the Old Testament to the New, we have examples of the harvest and the separation of the fruit of the harvest from the waste. In Daniel 2:35, we have King Nebuchadnezzar with a dream where the ungodly nations of the world represent elements of an idol that disintegrate before the victory of God’s Kingdom.

John the Baptist portrayed Jesus as the winnower or harvester of grain, “I baptize you with water for repentance, but he who is coming after me is mightier than I, whose sandals I am not worthy to carry. He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire. His winnowing fork is in his hand, and he will clear his threshing floor and gather his wheat into the barn, but the chaff he will burn with unquenchable fire.” (Matthew 3:11-12 ESV)

John the Baptist was communicating more than just the coming of Christ. He was telling people what Jesus was going to do, in full, albeit in only a few words. First, he said to us that Jesus was coming to save the world by his proclamation of baptism through the Holy Spirit. This is the gift we receive when we accept Christ and commit to living our lives for Him.

Secondly, he tells us that Christ will save His harvest and burn the chaff in unquenchable fire. There is but one place where the fire is unquenchable, and that is eternal separation from God. The chaff of a plant is its unusable portion. It has no nourishment and provides nothing good. The picture of harvesting is an allegory of God’s work within humanity. We are his harvest; the chaff is our sins and those who are not believers. Still, at that time, people did not understand everything that was being spoken to them. Therefore, the Bible is an eternal message from God.

We are still discovering the messages that God gives us in His Word. What we know today is that Christ came, he healed, ministered on how to live, taught his apostles, and then died for our sins. The work Jesus accomplished was the start of the harvest that humanity so desperately needed. He pointed this out in Matthew 9:36-38 (CSB), “When he saw the crowds, he felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dejected, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is abundant, but the workers are few. Therefore, pray to the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest.”

His dialogue here is not just that the harvest is abundant, but that more workers are needed for Kingdom work. This is the call for Christians to fulfill the Great Commission. This Kingdom work is not just about loving our neighbor or caring for the poor. Those are things anyone can do; they require compassion or some financial endeavor.

Truly leaning into harvesting and doing Kingdom work is spreading the Gospel and helping make disciples. Those are the worker’s Christ calls for. The men and women who commit to living like Christ and submit themselves to God’s sovereignty, just as he did by bleeding out for you and me. Are we going to do that perfectly? Absolutely not, but a true transformation from sinner to saved arms you with the tools, stronger will, and fellowship to resist those old ways.

Jesus taught the world in parables because many opposed his direct teachings. He quotes Isaiah 6:9-10 concerning this, and so he used these stories to teach people about faith in God. The Parable of the Soils (Mark 4:1-20) is, in my humble opinion, the most crucial parable that Christ gave the world. To summarize, a sower is spreading seed for harvesting later, and the seeds fall upon four different types of ground.

• Along the path—The seeds get devoured by birds

• On the rocky ground—The seeds germinate quickly but dies from lack of soil to root itself

• Among thorns—The seeds had no chance; the thorns choked them and yielded no grain

• Among good soil—The seeds produced grain in abundance beyond the sower’s comprehension

That leaves us with some interesting dialogue to digest. The saved are the workers of God’s harvest. They are charged with sowing the fields and reaping them when the time is right. What kind of sower are you? One full of pithy Christian clichés with zero substance that evaporates as soon as it leaves your lips. A sower that has promise but cultivates in a shallow rocky field where the start is impressive, but the long-term care is nonexistent. Maybe a sower that lures in the potential of life and then proceeds to strangle it into submission, providing no nourishment whatsoever but using it for your work, and not God’s?

Or are you a sower who is striving to work with people as whole beings? Working to cultivate them in mind, body, and spirit so that they too can join the harvest. I strive to be the latter so that God can say to me, Well done, my good and faithful servant! Don’t you long to hear that too?

Scott Dunn is a Christian husband and father who has spent over 15 years in the telecommunications industry. He is the founder of Talking with God (https://twgpodcast.com), a podcast that seeks to educate and encourage a closer relationship with God. Scott is a northerner who migrated south and has fully acclimated to the wonderful area known as the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains. He serves at his local church by helping with the production and online streaming of services. He has a genuine passion for the Christian man and his responsibilities, often writing about them on his blog https://justholdfast.com. Here he shares open and real-life experiences so that other men can relate to the human condition and how that relates to a stronger love relationship with God.