Matt. 9:36-38
Now when Jesus saw the crowds, he had compassion for them because they were troubled and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. Then he said to his disciples, “The size of the harvest is bigger than you can imagine, but there are few workers. Therefore, plead with the Lord of the harvest to send out workers for his harvest.”
“Unreached People Groups” “The 10-40 Window” “The Unfinished Task” These are all various names people in the mission world use to describe those who have not met Jesus and because of one reason or another, may not ever even meet a Jesus-follower. In this day and age of social media and smartphones that seems remarkably hard to believe. But here we are in 2023 and over 42% of the world’s population falls into this category. An overwhelmingly ‘unfinished task’ indeed.
As daunting as this may seem, this passage in Matthew shows us how Jesus responded to this very same situation.
“Now, when Jesus saw the crowds…” My first observation is that Jesus saw the crowds. It may seem like a small thing, but I think about how easy it is to go about my day and not ‘see’ anyone. I can check off things on my to-do list, run errands, even do churchy things, and get to the end of the day without truly seeing another person. To see someone implies that Jesus understood their situation. Our first step is to ask Jesus to open our eyes. If there are 7,400 unreached people groups ‘somewhere, out there’, what can we do to bring them a little closer to home? The Joshua Project is a wonderful tool that provides detailed information about unreached people groups. I encourage you to check it out and just start seeing a few of them.
“…he had compassion for them because they were troubled and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd…” Jesus was working- he was preaching, teaching, and healing. Yet instead of being frustrated by these sheep-like people, (which, if you recall from Pastor Ryan a few weeks ago, is not a good thing!), he had compassion on them. Compassion is the right response to those who do not yet know Jesus.
“…plead with the Lord of the harvest to send out workers for his harvest.” Jesus then tells his disciples to pray. The task is daunting- but think about how much more so back when Jesus gave this instruction to his disciples. This should be part of our prayer for every unreached people group or place. Ask the Lord to stir the hearts of his people and send them to areas of urgent spiritual need. Eventually, we want indigenous believers making disciples and multiplying churches, but until then, pray that the Lord would send workers from near and far to make Christ known.
(If you would like to join a group that prays regularly for unreached people groups and workers, check out our Global Focus Groups that meet on Monday and Wednesday nights)
The Outreach Team