"Do you not say, 'There are yet four months and then comes the harvest'? Look, I tell you, lift up your eyes, and see that the fields are white for harvest."...
"Even though many today will be wearing black, they're truly white (or ripe) for a harvest. We must begin to look in places where traditionally the church would never go, for the spread of the gospel." (Cole 76).
This is a hard one for me. I naturally fall into legalism. It's easier for me. It also feeds my pride.
Today I listened (for the second time through) to Driscoll's sermon "A People of Tension". Hit on the same idea. Such a hard balance between the two... between going to far into sin, or too far into legalism... which is also sin. It's frustrating. And it's so hard for me to humble myself into associating with 'those people.'
John 17:15-18... "I do not ask that you take them out of the world, but that you keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; your word is truth. As you sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world."
What did Jesus do. He didn't avoid any appearance of evil. You would have to not read Scripture to think that he avoided every appearance of evil. Bad translation, bad lack of studying what words really mean. Yada yada ya... We are to be in the world, not of the world. What does that practically mean.
And yet we must get the gospel to these people who are running, running, towards hell. Because God has his elect, and some of them are in the bar, and some of them are whores, and some of them are the most hateful people you will meet. But they are his, and the gospel must be preached to them.
And because Jesus passionately pursued these people, we, too, must passionately pursue them with the gospel. And we will fail, but Jesus is our perfect righteousness. We're free to fail.
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