Sometimes when I am out in public where a vast number of people are milling around, I feel the way Matthew 9:35-38 often makes me feel when I read it:

And Jesus went throughout all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom and healing every disease and every affliction. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion for them, because they were harassed and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few; therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest.”

English: Folio 9 from the codex; beginning of the Gospel of Matthew (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Now, the crowds at sporting events and theme parks and such hardly seem harassed and helpless. But I sometimes cannot help but feel sadness thinking that there must be so many among them that do not know the Lord. Pray earnestly for more laborers. That is truly a good prayer for a Christian to pray.

Jesus prepares to send out his twelve apostles in chapter 10; and he tells them a lot of things. But perhaps the most notable things he said to them might be in verses 34-39:

Do not think that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I have not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. And a person’s enemies will be those of his own household. Whoever loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me, and whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me. And whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.

How often do families find themselves in turmoil because some choose to turn from the Lord? Or because some turn toward the Lord, while their family members do not? And how much more so in times like these? Taking up one’s cross daily may not mean the kind of suffering today that one might have expected then, but it can still be very difficult.

/Bob’s boy

Bible Reading Schedule for this month
Click links below to read or listen to audio of one of this week’s chapters in Colossians and Luke

Matt 6, Matt 7, Matt 8, Matt 9, Matt 10

___________________

some images © V. Gilbert & Arlisle F. Beers

Please visit this site’s menu item “The Author’s Books” for info on the author’s books, website, and Facebook page.

All of my comments in this blog are solely my responsibility. When reading any commentary, you should always refer first to the scripture, which is God’s unchanging and unfailing word.