Matthew 2024

We've been working our way through this gospel, Matthew's gospel, and we're just gonna be considering these words at the end of chapter 9 verse 35 to 38.

That's page 974 in these church bibles. Jesus went through all the towns and villages teaching in their synagogues proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and illness. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them. Because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few ask the lord of the harvest therefore to send out workers into his harvest field.

This is god's word to us this evening and, Pete's gonna come and preach for us now. Well, good evening and happy New Year. I think I can still say that. I don't know how long you can say it for. What?

Happy Christmas, but that's gotta go down tomorrow. Otherwise, we're in trouble, aren't we? Something like that. Great. Well, as as Tom said, we're having a look through, this this fantastic, gospel of the lord Jesus Christ.

Let me just pray. Father, help us now. In these, few minutes together, encourage us challenges. Help us to hear what you have to say to us in Jesus' name, our, ma'am. The well known French philosopher Jean Posartre.

He said, hell is other people. He was rather a miserable bloke, I have to say, if you've read his biography, but, hell is other people. He he loved his own space, he loved his own company, but hell is other people. Mean, that is quite a shocking statement, isn't it? Hell is other people.

But if you think about it, it's often our response, isn't it to people? We've talked about, you know, it's it was hell on the road. You know, there's that great Chris Rear song, isn't there? What is it? Highway to Hell?

No. Not Highway to Hell. What's it called? Road to Hell? Isn't it?

And it's about the m 25. And then we go out there. You know, the is a crowds or a nightmare. So we use words like nightmare and hell when there are big crowds of people. I just couldn't get home.

It was a nightmare out there. Yeah, it's hell on the road. So maybe we're not, you know, as far away from him as we as as we might think hell is other people. People are everywhere. Of course, they are.

And how do you view them? And how do you respond to people that you see in, around you? I mean, sometimes they're just in the way, traffic, and queues, and bad drivers, and stuff like that. Sometimes we enjoy them that we we we're entertained by them. We're even pay for them to entertain us.

We quite like it. Sometimes we would rather just ignore people walk past them, avoid them because we don't, you know, know what they're about or what they're up to. Sometimes we're in competition with people. You know, we wanna prove ourselves. We wanna be above someone and show that we stand out better better than than them.

Sometimes Well, we wanna manipulate them and use them. And, that's an awful thing. We hate some. We, we idolize others. We learn from others.

Now, how do you view people? How do you think of people, the masses out there? When you think about it, it's often really about me, isn't it? About me, how I feel, what I get out of them, how I feel about them, how they help me. And it's quite interesting how me centered.

We are Maybe we're not as far away from Jean Paul Sartre as we thought. Hell is other people. When you look at Jesus, he's outstanding in this area. It's just so different. And this is why it's just amazing.

When he looks at the crowd, he sees the crowds differently. So differently. He's not there to, manipulate them, so that he can get something out of He's not there to be entertained by them. He doesn't actually want to avoid them even. The nightmare for him about the crowds is that they are in serious trouble.

The hell that he thinks about is that he's prepared to go to hell and back for them, not to have a comfortable life where they'll just get out of his way. And so when you read these few verses, there's just only like 3 sentences. They really are amazing because they give us the Jesus view of people. Chapter 9 of Matthew's gospel verse 35 to 38 3 sentences. They really show us the heart of Jesus.

And so just for a few minutes, I want us to think about that. First of all, here's my first point. Just the work of Jesus, the workload of Jesus. Look at verse 35 again. Jesus went through all the towns and villages teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness.

He went through all the towns and villages. All the towns and villages. Now I I looked that up. And Josephus, who's a Roman historian, reckons that in that area of Galile, I'm I'm quite amazed by this. He reckons that there's about 3000000 people, and they lived in 204 towns and villages.

3000000 people, 204 towns and villages. Jesus went to every town and every village. Yeah. That's amazing. If he did 2 villages a day, remember he's gotta walk and get there and eat and talk to people and everything.

If he did 2 villages a day, it's gonna take him 4 months to cover the whole lot. I mean, that is an exhausting exhausting preaching tour. If if any of you have ever preached, you know how draining it is. It really is very, very draining. But not only is he preaching and teaching to 204 villages and towns and 3000000 people.

He's got people coming up to him with all kinds of issues and problems. And we see that he doesn't deal with them like those American evangelists who sort of do their hands and everybody falls over and is supposed to be healed or something. He never does that. You see, Matthew will often talk about the crowds come to him, but then they he slows down the story, and he shows us how Jesus deals with the individuals in the crowd, and he gives them time and space and discussion and heals them. And, I mean, it's just an extraordinary, load, workload that he's doing here.

And they're not only on top of that. He's got his enemies coming up to him, the paparazzi, writing stuff about him, twisting the meaning of of what he says. I don't know whether you've ever had people twist your meaning and twist what you say and pick up on all all the things you say and then make it mean something out. It's a really horrible thing to have happened. And that's exhausting in itself.

So here's Jesus, his workload is extraordinary. First 35, Jesus went through all the towns and villages teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom, and healing every disease and sickness. Now why did he do it Why did he work that hard? Yes. Is it because, you know, he wanted to, you know, promote his latest film or book or podcast or something?

Well, we know we know that well. We know that's not true. He's not there to get. He's there to give. When he saw the crowds, he saw the crowds.

He had Lookaverse 36. When he saw the crowd, he had compassion on them because they were harassed and helpless like sheep without a shepherd. He's not a leader, that sort of pronounces idealistic sort of proclamations from a stage where there's all his supporters there clapping him. He he doesn't just go and get a baby because he wants votes and he kisses the baby or goes to the hospital, with a whole entourage of cameras around him. But he's never been in a hospital before in his life.

He's he's not doing that. He's actually healing the sick. You know, he's the ambulance, if you like. He's the paramedic. He's the he's there doing stuff.

He's he's in your face with people, loving them. He's not there to get votes. He's there to teach to preach, to interact, to heal people. Now I want to say that that hard work, it makes it even harder to stick at the work because it's so easy, particularly when there's all crowds around you, it's so easy to actually sort of do something else, say, well, I'm I'm gonna finish with that. I'm gonna I'm gonna promote something else.

And the church very often has got distracted from this vision of Jesus. Hard work to reach the people. And it's amazing how we as churches, just got distracted. You can go right back to, William Carey. He's supposed to be, you know, the father of modern missions.

He's back in, the eighteenth century over to the nineteenth century. And there was this young man William Carey, and, he stands up in his church, in the north of England and says that, you know, I need to go to China. We need to reach the lost. And and then the the church members said The elders of the church said, if god wanted to the heathen saved, he would do it without your help, young man, sit down. I mean, what's up where?

Where where did it how did the church get to to that position. I mean, it sounds like, oh, god. It's the sovereign 1, and he can do what you like. He doesn't need your help, but we never read it like that in the Bible. How is the church?

You know, sometimes it it's so naval gazes It's so looking at itself all the time that it it forgets the world, or there's all kinds of other agendas that come in. You gotta do this. You gotta do that. You know, and it's extraordinary how easy it is that I know as a church leader because I get this stuff coming all the time. Here's an agenda here.

This is a good thing to do. And some of it is good stuff to do, but it's hard work to stick at the agenda. Of being what Jesus is here, a herald. He's a herald, and a herald is someone who has a message from a king, and the herald's duty is not to dilute that message or debate that message or to give other messages, but he's very simply to proclaim the certainty of the message. So look at verse 36.

Jesus went through all the towns and villages teaching in their synagogues, preaching the good news of the kingdom and healing every disease and sickness. Jesus's job by the preaching of the gospel is to turn this cursed world back to blessing. That's what Jesus is about. And do you know sometimes it's just hard to keep at that task because of other distractions. And we certainly need to hear these certainties today.

We certainly need the clear signpost of the good news of the Christian message. This world certainly needs it. As I'll show you how confused it is in a minute. So that's his first 1. This hard work, but not only doing the hard work, the hard work of keeping the right vision of being a herald.

So that every town, you know, I could've guessed someone says, why don't we try something different? No. No. No. No.

What about something, you know, no. No. I'm gonna do this. That's my first point. The second point is the compassion of Jesus.

Or the guts of Jesus would be a better word, the guts of Jesus. So this hard work comes about through verse 36. When he saw the crowds, he had compassion on them. And as many of you know, because Matthew uses this word compassion a lot. The word compassion is a very, very, very strong word.

It's a strong word for pity, but it it's more than that. It's gut wrenching. It's emotional. It has a sense of an emotional disturbance about it. When he saw the crowd, they weren't sort of, you know, hell just in the way.

They weren't, oh, no, not another long. I need to get a bed. They he had this disturbing, emotional, gut wrenchy, hard to eat when he saw the crowd. Why? Well, look at verse 36 again.

Because they were harassed, and helpless, unlike sheep without a shepherd. And that's how we've got to look at people. That word harassed, again, these are, you know, originally written in Greek. These are these are strong words. It's worried.

It's troubled. It's overburdened. You know, people with massive anxiety. What are we told today? Yeah.

Is is there a young people with massive anxiety? It's a tragedy, isn't it? Young people won't even go out the house. What what's going on? That's that should break us.

That should break us. In fact, the Greek word there is, was used for a corpse that was mangled. That was was sort of ripped apart. It's used for people that are just exhausted. They've got such busy schedules or they're filling their life up with such stuff that doesn't really feed them.

They're actually knackered. They're exhausted. They're confused. They're ripped apart. They're skinned alive.

There's a devastation about this word. So when Jesus looked out, he saw these people that are running after stuff that's just wearing them out. It's not feeding them. They're ripped apart, exhausted. I was talking to our our media team, this afternoon, a and just reminded of, the TV program.

It's a very, it's a very, very good series called I am. And it comes from a sort of women's perspective. It's I am Victoria. I am Ruth, and I I can't remember the other ones. Is it channel 4?

I think they're worth watching. And, this 1 was, the act the actress in it was, Kate Winslip, with her daughter acting as her daughter in in in the play. And it was it really hit me. I I I don't I don't know why because I knew this stuff happens, but it just just was really well done. The daughter was very intelligent, but not doing well at school, was going introvert, was in her bedroom all the time, and we found out, of course, she was on social media.

And what she was putting up on self med media were pictures of herself. And she basically got 2 responses from blokes of for of the pictures of herself she put up. 1 was you ugly old cow, that sort of stuff. And the other was get your get your kit off. I may speak honestly.

So it was those 2 responses from blokes that were coming. And this was breaking her she then tried to make herself up and make herself look more pretty, but the more she put up, it was either you you're you're ugly, or we want to see more. And then this whole play got to a point where she was so devastated, and there's this really moving scene where the mother and her are together. And then she suddenly breaks down and she says this word. Mom, I'm lost.

I'm lost. And that blew me away because that's a Christian word. That's this word here, harassed, lost, trying to to get people to like her and get likes. Lost. Just lost ripped apart.

People saying these things about her. That's the world that Jesus sees. He looks out and he sees so many. Just putting a mask on and they're harassed. And look at this other word, helpless.

That word means to be thrown down. It means to be totally helpless. It means to feel like you're of no use whatsoever. And then look at this little phrase here, like sheep without a shepherd. Now if you know anything about sheep, You know they need a shepherd.

And sheep without shepherd are going to starve to death or get into trouble or die through wolves or starvation or, you know, animals killing them. They're they're useless sheep. They're just useless. And they need a shepherd. They need protection.

They need sheep dogs to get them into the right places, and they they need care and protection in so many ways. Sheep without a shepherd. They get maggoty bottoms. Sheep. They need the shepherd to pull the maggots out.

Otherwise, the maggots will eat into their bottom and lay more eggs. It's a it's a revolting thing. This is this is a great service, isn't it? Yeah. Do you wanna go home?

But, you know, they're they're just so needy. And what they need is a good shepherd. But Jesus is saying that these are helpless. They're harassed. They're weary.

They're vulnerable. And when he looks out, he sees this. Now the religious leaders were claiming to be shepherds, and Jesus is furious about their shepherd, their shepherding. If you have a Bible, go to ezekiel chapter 34. We're gonna start a series in ezekiel next week next Sunday morning.

And, this is a crazy book, but it's wonderful. But here's what god says about false shepherds. It's ezekiel 34 1 to 5. If someone's got a page number, then you could shout it out. 8 6 5.

8 6 5. 8 6 5 ezekiel 34. The word of the lord, that's the sovereign god. The word of the lord came to me. Son of man prophesy against the shepherds of Israel.

So these are the religious leaders. Prophecy and say to them, this is what the sovereign lord says, woe to the shepherds of Israel who only take care of themselves. Should not shepherds take care of the flock? You eat the curds, clothe yourself with the wool and slaughter the choice animals. But you do not care for the flock.

You have not strengthened the weak or healed the sick or bound up the injured. You have not brought back the strays or searched for the lost. You've ruled them harshly and brutally so that they are scattered because there is no there was no ship it. And when they were scattered, they became food for wild animals. You tell me young people aren't like that.

Look, look at the media. I mean, People are now questioning whether young people should be so early on smartphones and stuff. Are they saying, oh, yes. Let's have a look at this. Do you know what they're saying?

I saw a program last night. Do you know what they're saying? Oh, no. We just need more time. It's it's happened too quickly.

In Australia, that law's coming too quickly. Well, how long have we had smartphones? Too quickly? There's there's leaders out there, and all they're doing is taking and feeding and feasting on the flock. There's no giving like Jesus.

There's no caring. They're seeing them as ways of making revenue, ways of scamming them, ways of getting them into addictions so that they can use them. That's the world we're in, isn't it? And so when we look out at the world, we need to see it like this, see it like Jesus. There needs to be a good shepherd.

And you think of the religious leaders. Think of the the the the the things that religious leaders have been up to and what religion's been up to. And it's take and use and abuse. We need the good shepherd And Jesus is the good shepherd and how you know he's a good shepherd, why? Because the good shepherd does what lays his life down for the sheep.

There's a giving. There's a sacrifice. So when we see harassed and helpless people and people without a shepherd, then we should, as a church, wanna be like the lord Jesus Christ. Help us lord. Help us to be good shepherds.

Help us to stick at the task of proclaiming the good news of Jesus even when there's all kinds of other messages even when people are turning the good news of Jesus and saying, we don't like that. That's bad news. This is the message we have to keep proclaiming and sticking at and speaking out with more and more vigor. Because people are lost. They're lost and harassed.

What a marvelous message we have, which is the lord Jesus Christ. My third point then. The prayer of Jesus. See verses 37, 38. Then he said to his disciples, the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few.

Asked the lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into the harvest field. So Jesus gave himself to people because he loved them. He had compassion. He gave himself to people because he saw their terrible condition. He gave himself to people because he could see that there was a harvest time.

It's very important. In Matthew 13, we get to that. We we we see that he tells a parable about harvest. A number of parables is about the harvest. There's a harvest time coming.

Paul, the writer of, 2 Corinthians in the New Testament says, since we know, what it is to fear the lord, we try to suede people. And he's talking about a harvest. There's there's a sense of the fear of the lord. There's a harvest time coming. And therefore, our job is now we know there's a harvest coming, and our job is to persuade people with the good news of Christ.

Because people are so addicted to the bad stuff. It's gonna cost us. We're gonna be seen as the bad guys if we try to bring this good news to people. Religious people saw Jesus as the bad guy because he was overturning their money making, and they're they're they're ugly powers. So we've gotta go and and and see that there's a harvest and there is a harvest coming and a great harvest coming.

And Jesus says that peep there's a harvest coming, but, you know, a sheep need a shepherd to lead them, and gray grain need workers to pull in the harvest. That's his point. Otherwise, it goes rotten. And so when Jesus sees the crowd, he sees that there is need to harvest to bring people in, to bring people into the barn, to bring the sheep back into the fold, to bring people into the barn. But the amazing thing about Jesus is he's not pessimistic.

He's not pessimistic about this task. It's gonna be hard work. It's gonna be costly. There're gonna be all kinds of people suggesting things that we should be getting on with, and we have to say no to, and it's hard work just to stick at heralding this gospel. But he's not a he's not a glass half empty bloke.

Is he Jesus? He says the harvest is plentiful. He says you can look out at your neighbors in Kingston, and you can see many people coming to Christ. You know, they can do. There's a fantastic harvest.

So just look what he's saying here because he's trying to get us into this. There's a fantastic harvest. That's the potential, but the work is a few. That's the problem. So there's a great harvest, but there's a problem.

The workers are few. So what do we do when we have a problem? Well, we ask the lord for the solution, which is to raise up workers. It's a very interesting thing, isn't it? Cause again, god doesn't just wave a magic wand to achieve his aims.

He doesn't work like that. He uses people like you and me to be his workers, and he uses people like you and me that rely on him the prey. That's why we have a prayer meeting. Come to it. Let's pray together.

Let's ask the lord to help us to raise up harvesters that we would actually see people of Kingston as potentially the lord's even those wicked people. You know, all of the the the knowledge people have got in scamming people, if that bloke was a follower of Jesus and was converted, He'd use all of that ability to get the gospel out to to to throw the seed of the word out, wouldn't he? And when you start seeing people like that, They're less your enemy, but more like what a potential. If only you were following Jesus, all that potential could go into being a good shepherd instead of the bad 1 that you are. So So let's pray.

Let's pray that the lord will bring a great harvest in. And then, of course, and we're gonna see this next week. He, he says pray that the lord would, would, raise up workers. And then when you go into chapter 10, which we'll see next week, we'll see the team Jesus. We'll see that Jesus says, okay, if you're gonna pray that prayer, then I'm now gonna use you, and you will see team team Jesus coming up.

So brothers and sisters, here we are at being a guinea. I mean, we're a quarter of a way through the century. It's extraordinary, isn't it? I mean, it's unbelievable isn't it? You know, I was born a lot another century ago.

It's amazing. Halfway through that century I was born, and now we're caught all the way through this next 1. Yeah. You know, am I gonna get to the next century? Why are you laughing?

You know, we're a quarter way through, and we've got a job to do. And we've gotta keep coming back to that job of wanting to take this good news out to a lost nation and using our gifts and our abilities to do just that. Let's be praying we're doing that. That's why we put on, you know, things like authentic and things like, the holiday bible club. And, can you just give me that?

What's that, thing? Taste and see. Yeah. Can I just have 1 of those? So, this is a little taste and see.

So the idea of this is really for those that are not used to church or have had a bad relationship with church or or or whatever, is to come to an evening, at the hub. It's Thursday evening, the sixteenth of January. We've done 1 of these already, a sort of month or so ago, and people invited their friends. It's just a simple meal. If people want to eat, they don't have to eat, And then Tom, opened up a a a passage of the Bible just to explain Jesus and then there's question time.

It's a very easy thing to come to, and it was brilliant last time. And so we've got the we put on things like this or just invite them to church. The the harvest is big says Jesus, but the work is a few of we're all going out working. We might get some more grain in. And some of those lost sheep to hear the word of god.

So have a look at that. Think about who you might want to invite to that, and, let's go into this year with revigorated to be good shepherds in a world of such bad news. Father god help us we pray in these things, to be like Jesus, amen.