The Compassion of Jesus - Matthew 9:35 - 10:8

 Grace to you and peace from God our Father and from our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.

“When Jesus saw the crowds, He had compassion for them, because they were like sheep without a shepherd.”

Jesus had been journeying through countryside, teaching in synagogues, proclaiming the Good News, and healing diseases and afflictions and Matthew notes that Jesus had compassion on the crowds. It wasn’t the people who gathered to hear Him, or even the deaf, the blind, and the lame that made his guts hurt. It was the crowds, the people of God. They lacked spiritual leaders who cared for them and strengthened them with the Word of God. They were like sheep without a shepherd. They made his guts hurt. That’s what compassion means – His stomach hurt for their situation.

What do shepherd-less sheep look like? Lost, wandering, and in danger of being picked off by wild animals. What do shepherd-less people of God look like? Remarkably the same: lost, wandering, and in danger of being picked off by satan.

I suppose there were many things He could have done. He could have stayed right there and shepherded them Himself – after all, Jesus identifies Himself as the Good Shepherd. He could have called the scribes, pharisees, Sadducees, and priests to task and then showed them how it was done. He could have even miraculously provided in ways that we cannot even begin to imagine.

But, instead, Jesus speaks to His newly commissioned and called disciples, telling them “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore, pray to the Lord of harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.”

Prayer is often treated as “the Christian thing to do.” When we don’t know what else to say, we drop our voice a half-octave and utter solemnly, “We will keep you in our prayers.” It has become so trite that even comedians now make it part of their schtick about “thoughts and prayers.” For Christians, prayer has become a refuge of last resort. Several years ago, a man I know got a bad concussion. While in the ER, some friends stopped to check on him. His wife said the doctors had done an Xray, CAT scan and MRI. I suspect one of the friends was quite uncomfortable in the setting and, looking for a sanctified escape, uttered “Well, I guess all we can do now is pray,” to which the man replied sarcastically, “Oh, no! Is it that bad???”

Jesus calls the newly minted disciples to pray to the Lord of Harvest. It’s a bit of a mixed metaphor, jumping from sheep and shepherds to harvesting, but in an agrarian society that understood all blessings come from God, the disciples would have understood this to refer to God Himself.  Their prayers, invited and commanded by Jesus Himself, will be heard and answered the God.

Have you ever prayed for something, only to discover that your prayers are answered in ways you could never have imagined? I suspect that was the case for the twelve, here. After instructing them to pray, and what to pray for, Jesus takes the Twelve and sends them out as the very workers they were to pray for.  It’s as if Jesus is saying, “Pray for harvesters. Guess what, guys: God is providing whom you have prayed for with you.”

Last week, we heard Jesus call Matthew to discipleship with the simple command and invitation, “Follow me.” Matthew seems to fill out the ranks of disciples because today’s Gospel follows almost immediately after and we have named, for the first time, the men we come to know as The Twelve. Each was called by Jesus to follow Him.

Follow is an interesting word in our modern world. When I was a boy, it meant to be close, to be near someone. Since it is Father’s Day, I’ll use the example of, when I was a little boy, following in my Dad’s footsteps while he stomped through the fresh Iowa snow. Children learn by following – kids follow their parents’ speech, mannerisms, and ways of doing things. There is a physical connection, a closeness to following someone. Now, we use the word mostly, it seems, to describe social media interaction. We follow someone on Facebook, Instagram, Snap Chat, or YouTube. But, it’s a different kind of following, isn’t it? It’s at my leisure; I choose whom to follow when I want and often they never know it. It’s impersonal; it’s distant; it’s a rear-window view into someone’s life. And, because of that separation, there is little risk in me following someone. If I like you, I follow you. If you bore me, or I disagree with you, I click “unlike” and disappear into the ether-world.

Often, at least in today’s world, that’s how people engage with the church. They chose to follow a church, whether that’s on social media or in person. They engage – from a distance; they follow – at arms’ length; they participate – minimally. Jesus, the Church, discipleship, they can all be changed or altered or passed by with just a click of the mouse, changing an address on the GPS, deciding it’s just not for me and following something or someone else instead.

Following Jesus is up-close, personal, and intimate. It’s less about the follower and more about the One who is followed. Leading is active; following is passive, but in an extra-ordinary, following Jesus is also transformative. The Word does that. The Word penetrates deep and changes you from the old adam into Baptized conformity with the Father through the Son by the power of the Holy Spirit. Jesus’ call to follow me moves you from “out there” to “in here,” into fellowship, into oneness into the body of Christ, the Church. Jesus calls the Twelve, not just to follow and go along for the ride, but to be active, transformed instruments in the work of the Kingdom. They are to comfort those who were discomforted by a lack of a shepherd. They are to tell about the One who is the Good Shepherd who comes into the world to save.

Remember – this is still early in Jesus’ ministry. The disciples don’t get it all, yet. They are still – as we would say – in training. They have much to learn. They will go out, and they will preach and teach in His name and with His authority. That’s the key word, here: His authority. Only in the name of Jesus and by His command can they heal the sick of every affliction. Only with the name of Jesus will demons submit to their command. Only with the name of Jesus will death be driven away. Only with the name of Jesus will true comfort be found. They’ll think it’s about power and authority and the miracles and the crowds. But Jesus will have more, much more to teach them about exactly Who He is and what it is that He must do.

Recall Jesus instructions to the disciples: “Pray to the Lord of the Harvest.” If you have ever planted a seed, you know this: for there to be a harvest, first, the seed you planted must die. This is true whether it is the smallest of seeds like mustard seeds or a large seed like a peach pit. When you put that seed in the ground, it must die. In its dying, new life forms and from that new life comes the harvest – ten, twenty, fifty fold more than the original, single seed.  So, in praying to the Lord of the Harvest, Jesus is pointing ahead to His own death. In the Gospel of John, later in His ministry, Jesus uses this image to speak of Himself to teach the disciples what must happen. “Truly, I say to you that unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit,” (John 12:24). Christ will die. He will be buried in the ground. And it will seem that all is lost: there is only death and still, silent earth. But, on Easter, the Harvest springs forth. Life abounds. Joy erupts. Christ is risen, raised as the first-fruits of the Great Harvest that is to come. St. Paul will pick up this image in 1 Corinthians 15 – make that your devotional reading this week. Paul proclaims, “20 But in fact Christ has been raised from the dead, the firstfruits of those who have fallen asleep. 21 For as by a man came death, by a man has come also the resurrection of the dead. 22 For as in Adam all die, so also in Christ shall all be made alive. 23 But each in his own order: Christ the firstfruits, then at his coming those who belong to Christ.” It will be a resurrection harvest that we can only begin to imagine.

But it begins with praying for the Lord of the Harvest to send out workers. Its no secret that the Christian church is struggling right now. Any poll will tell you that, outside the massive mega-churches, almost every denomination in North America is on a downward slide. The Lutheran Church – Missouri Synod is no exception. Not only is there a decline in overall church membership, but there is a shortage of pastors and church workers. I cannot speak for all denominations, but in the LCMS, we are expecting a significant shortage in the next ten years with about a 4-to-1 ratio of pastors retiring to those entering the ministry. In the twenty years since I graduated, we went from 196 men graduating our two seminaries in 2000 to just over 70 this year. I think it was something like 40 churches who attempted to call a graduate to be their pastor did not receive one. The average length of vacancy in the Texas District is now about two years. To put some skin on that, using that statistic, St. Paul, Groves – who called me this spring to be their pastor – will not have a pastor until Easter, 2025.

Pray the Lord of the Harvest to send workers into the field. The people of God who are shepherd-less need the Lord’s under-shepherds to care for them so that they don’t wander, stray and become lost. The Lord will have compassion on us, His people – not just the LCMS, but the entire Christian church on earth. And, who knows how the Lord will answer your prayer. Perhaps it will be your son who becomes a pastor, your daughter who becomes a deaconess, or a grandchild who becomes a Lutheran school teacher, a nephew or niece who becomes a missionary in the inner city, a foreign nation, or down in the brasada of the Valley so that these people, these lost, wandering shepherd-less sheep might also know the same love of Jesus and the forgiveness of sins that you and I know and receive by grace through faith.