Pleasing God, Making Disciples of Jesus Christ

Do We See Them?

MATTHEW 9:36-38 – 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.”

 

THEME OF THE DAY:  DO WE SEE THEM?  They are right outside the doors of our homes.  They live next to us. They drive on the same streets, shop in the same stores, get gas at the same stations, and go through the same difficulties in life as we do.  They are people.  Do we see them?  Please, I am not insulting anyone’s intelligence.  Of course, we see people, but I mean do we really see them, like God sees them? As we walk in our worlds and like Jesus, notice the crowds of people around us, are we seeing them through His heart – a heart of compassion?

 

Friends, we need to take a long “stare into our hearts” with this question because how we see people will tell us three things about our lives, particularly, our spiritual lives; how close we are to Jesus, how involved we are in the lives of people, and how much we are controlled by Christ’s love and thus living out the true Christian life – the life of love.  And here is more “food for thought” as we evaluate ourselves along these lines. It comes from a quote by Francis Schaeffer, “If we do not show love to one another, the world has a right to question whether Christianity is true.”

 

For us to see people through the heart of Jesus, we must be drawing near to the heart of Jesus.  And not only near but being transformed to have the heart of Jesus for people. This transformation requires three things.

 

First, be in the Word of God daily, yes, daily.  We are in the world daily and it wants to transform us into its loveless, selfish image, and it will, if we aren’t daily in the Word to counter its influence.  But we don’t come to the Word just to get knowledge.  We come to get Christ.  Make that our goal; to see Jesus, to see the heart of Jesus each time we come to His Word.

 

The next requirement to have the heart of Jesus so we may see people as He does is fervent prayer.  Prayer is the fuel keeping the flame of first love for Jesus, which is the source of love for people, aglow.  Neglect prayer, the flame goes out and that means love for the Lord and people is extinguished.

Finally, to have the heart of Jesus to see people right, we must be doers of the Word not mere hearers.  James warns us of this danger – “Be does of the Word, not hearers only, deceiving yourselves” (James 1:22).  Allow me to add another layer of danger if we only hear the Word, but neglect obeying it.  Truth heard, known, and not obeyed will harden one’s heart and when that occurs, we cannot see people as Jesus does.  All we see is the world and people through our own sinful lens of self-love.

 

Let’s go back to the beginning.  Do we see them?  People.  Do we really see them? Like Jesus?  We will know by our active involvement in their lives with Christ’s love pointing them to Him, both believers and unbelievers.

 

PRAYER: “Father, forgive me when I fail to see people, all people, through the eyes and heart of Your Son.”

 

QUOTE: “The only way to see people as Jesus sees people is to be as close to Jesus as humanly possible.”

 

Because of Him,

 

Pastor Jim