The Harvest Is Plentiful

“The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few, therefore ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into His harvest field (Matthew 9:37-38).” The Lord has spoken this verse into my mind and heart during the past three years over and over again and it’s a request I lay before Him daily. But it wasn’t until about midway through this past trip that the Lord finally allowed me to get a crystal clear picture of just exactly what He meant.

The morning started off with our brother and friend, Baa Japen, arriving at our house early in the morning to pick us up for a day out in his goon, a place where the Aukaners plant their crops (Its pronounced go-n; like g plus own). We went with his wife, Sonya and three kids: Melvin, Jargon and Agwana. The big task for the day was to repair the 2 year old thatched roof masanga (a small hut at the planting ground used for rest, shade and a place to hide from the rain).
Most families have their planting grounds far away from their village so as to have more land to plant various crops: cassava, rice, beans, corn, watermelon, and tons of other vegetables and to have a little personal space. So we headed out in the boat and after thirty minutes of sitting in
awe of the beautiful morning sky and amazing jungle (in never gets oldJ) while riding up the river, we finally arrived. We gathered all our things and then headed into the jungle for a 20
minute walk on a path that had been cut by hand. After hiking around a mile or so we finally made it to a huge clearing….their goon.

Now the jungle here is a little different than I had originally thought. When I use to think of jungle, I thought of nice open spaces to walk while enjoying a cool canopy of shade produced by huge trees with big green leaves. While that is true for some pieces of land here, its better understood when you think in the realm of a rain forest. As for the nice easy walking, that’s not the case. The path is cut for a reason. If you didn’t have one, you’d need a bulldozer to wrestle through the thick vines, brush, trees and other obstacles. It was surprising enough to see this handmade path, but even more amazing when we found out that the clearing for the goon was also all cut down, cleared and burned by hand. That’s how they make their fields. They simply start hacking away and hours, days and maybe even weeks later, you have a place to begin planting. After everything is burned, they have their “harvest field.”

Now that you have been through Goons 101, we’ll move along with this story. Once the hike along the path was complete we all sat down together under the old masanga and ate “pre-lunch”, which consisted of fish and rice, a common dish here. We then started working away on the masanga. Everyone stayed there to work, except for Sonya, who headed off to start picking rice. After about four hours of intense sun, lots of laughs and lots of work, the roof was almost finished and still no sign of Sonya. After several shouts from the kids, she finally heard that we were almost done and she came back for about a 15 minute break before heading right back out to start picking more rice.

I couldn’t believe she was going back out so soon to continue working. I decided since we were done with most of the hard work on the masanga, I’d go see if I could find her for a little 101 myself on rice picking. So I started off, winding through another series of small paths amidst the tall weeds and small brush that had grown back up since the first clearing/burning. After walking about 5 minutes, there she was, all alone in another clearing. This is where the Lord blessed me with the most beautiful picture of what “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few” really looks like.

I’ve never seen rice growing before, and in case there are some of you who are in the same boat as me, I’ll try and explain just exactly what I saw: I stood on top of a felled tree that never completely burned when the field was made. This put my eyes a little over the tops of the heads of ripe rice. I stood there looking over this miniature field all sectioned off for the growth of this staple food. I stared out across about 50 feet of rice stalks that were about four and a half to five and a half feet tall. Through it all, I was beginning to make out the image of a dark skinned women hard at work. With a batch or previously cut rice in one hand and a knife in the other, she methodically made her way to the next uncut section of rice. One head at a time, she continued on. She never stopped to sit down. She hardly stopped moving at all. Under the hot sun, after already working for hours upon hours, she walked on; all by herself picking rice that was ready to be harvested.

The harvest was plentiful and the workers were very few, only one worker to be exact. Praise the Lord; before I started to head over to lend an uneducated rice cutting hand, He kept me standing right where I was. I felt him urging me to not quickly forget what I was looking at. What a beautiful image.

I’ve always understood this verse, but have never really captured just what it looks like to see a vast field full of a crop just sitting there ready and waiting to be gathered, but not able to be, because there was simply not anyone there to do it. Even with all the hours of work Sonya did and the little bit of “help” that I offered, we left that field with tons of rice that never got picked.
An encouraging reminder to me that there is still a lot of work to be done among us as Gods chosen people. There is still a story to share with those who have never heard and there are people who are ready and ripe for hearing the gospel of grace. And no matter how few the workers are, better one than no one at all. There’s always room for one more. I hope I never forget that picture God showed me standing there on that tree gazing out among all that rice with only one worker harvesting it. That harvest represented all those around the world who are hungry and thirsty for Jesus Christ, but they simply don’t have anyone to tell them of His precious love.

I wish I had more room to write about everything else that we learned that day; like how to actually reroof the masangaJ, how to eat a tree (not just any ol tree), how to use vines and leave stems as ropes, how to make oil out of a big brown seed we found called maipa and also how to live, laugh and love with a brother from a completely different culture.

Please join me in praying to the Father that He continue to send workers out into His vast harvest field! Thank you all for the prayers for me and Ryan and for our people. Thank you for your love, support and words of encouragement. God is so good and so big. He is teaching me and challenging me day by day by day. Continue to set apart your hands and heart for the work of the Lord! I look forward to continue running this race with you. Go bring in the harvest! Take care and God bless.