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Speaker 1: Life Audio. Thank you for listening to your Daily Bible Verse,

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Speaker 1: the podcast that examines one verse each day to learn

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Speaker 1: more about God and his will for our lives. I'm

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Speaker 1: your host, Kyle Norman. After a brief message from one

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Speaker 1: of our sponsors, we will continue with today's verse. Today's

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Speaker 1: verse can be found in Matthew chapter nine, verses thirty

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Speaker 1: seven and thirty eight. Then Jesus said to the disciples,

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Speaker 1: the harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. Ask

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Speaker 1: the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into

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Speaker 1: his harvest field. Let me tell you about Alice. For

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Speaker 1: about a day decade, I led a weekly Bible study

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Speaker 1: at a local senior's residence. Alice was ninety four years old.

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Speaker 1: She couldn't see very well, she couldn't hear that well,

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Speaker 1: but she loved this Bible study. Every week she arrived late,

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Speaker 1: and the reason she arrived late was because she would

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Speaker 1: ride the elevator from the top floor to the first floor,

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Speaker 1: stopping at every floor. If somebody came on, she would

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Speaker 1: say to them, I'm going to Bible study. It's really fun.

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Speaker 1: Would you like to come with me? And by the

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Speaker 1: time she got down to the ground floor, if she

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Speaker 1: hadn't talked to anybody. She would then ride back to

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Speaker 1: the top floor and do the whole process again. When

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Speaker 1: I think about people being sent into the harvest field,

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Speaker 1: I often think about Alice. Matthew describes how Jesus went

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Speaker 1: through all of the towns and villages teaching in synagogues,

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Speaker 1: preaching the good news of the Kingdom. He healed every

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Speaker 1: kind of diseases. Importantly, Jesus walked around home turf, and

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Speaker 1: in his travels, Jesus noticed the abundant need that was

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Speaker 1: all around him. Amid the physical and social needs, there

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Speaker 1: was this spiritual vacuum that also needed to be filled. Jesus,

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Speaker 1: it says, has compassion on people because they were harassed

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Speaker 1: and helpless, like sheep without a shepherd. People everywhere, on

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Speaker 1: every street, in every park. They needed to know the

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Speaker 1: presence of God. And so Jesus tells the disciples the

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Speaker 1: harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. What does

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Speaker 1: it mean for us, as followers of Jesus to enter

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Speaker 1: the harvest field? What does it mean for us to

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Speaker 1: see ourselves addressed by today's verse? I think it means

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Speaker 1: two things. Firstly, it means prayer. Jesus calls the Disciples

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Speaker 1: to pray that God send workers into the harvest field.

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Speaker 1: I noticed the Disciples are asked to pray to the

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Speaker 1: Lord of the harvest. See, God is already at work,

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Speaker 1: and so we are to pray that God send people

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Speaker 1: to participate in that work. Given that there is such

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Speaker 1: a need for people to know God's loving presence, we

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Speaker 1: are to pray that God send them people who can

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Speaker 1: touch their lives. Because even today people feel lost. Even

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Speaker 1: today people wander around like sheep without a shepherd. And

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Speaker 1: so what does it mean for us to pray that

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Speaker 1: God send disciples out in ministry and service. Our prayers,

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Speaker 1: says the Book of James, are powerful and effective. There's

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Speaker 1: a story of the evangelist D. L. Moody who kept

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Speaker 1: a list of one hundred friends who were not faithful people,

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Speaker 1: but that he would pray for daily that they come

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Speaker 1: to know Jesus. By the time of his death in

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Speaker 1: eighteen ninety nine, six of those people had become Christians,

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Speaker 1: and as the story goes, the final four came to

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Speaker 1: faith at D. L. Moody's funeral. At Disciples, we are

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Speaker 1: to be praying people. So where are you called to

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Speaker 1: pray for the people around you. Where do you see

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Speaker 1: those in need? Where do you see people who need

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Speaker 1: compassion or healing, those who need a testimony of forgiveness

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Speaker 1: or redemption. Where do you see people who need to

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Speaker 1: know that they are loved by God and surrounded by

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Speaker 1: His grace? And what might it look like for you

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Speaker 1: to begin to pray that God sends somebody to that

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Speaker 1: person to address that need. But that's not where things end,

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Speaker 1: because often when we begin to pray, Jesus begins to

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Speaker 1: work in us. It's significant that in every gospel where

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Speaker 1: Jesus mentions the harvest field the the very next thing

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Speaker 1: that Jesus does is send out the disciples. Jesus says,

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Speaker 1: ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers

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Speaker 1: into his harvest field. And then the very next verse

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Speaker 1: Matthew Chapter ten, Verse one, Jesus calls the twelve disciples

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Speaker 1: to him and he gives them authority to drive out

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Speaker 1: evil spirits, to heal every disease, and he sends them out.

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Speaker 1: Jesus tells the disciples to pray for workers to do

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Speaker 1: the work, then he sends them to do the work.

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Speaker 1: Here's the thing. Sometimes, as spirit empowers us to be

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Speaker 1: the answer to our very own prayer. We are empowered

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Speaker 1: to pray, yes, but we're also sent So where might

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Speaker 1: Jesus be sending you? Where might Jesus actually be empowering you?

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Speaker 1: So often we think that ministry is dependent upon the

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Speaker 1: size of the workers, and if the workers are few you, well,

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Speaker 1: then we can't really do very much, can we? And

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Speaker 1: we think this way individually. I'm just little me, what

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Speaker 1: can I do? But we also do this corporately as

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Speaker 1: a church. In a world that favors the big and

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Speaker 1: the grand, we think that God only uses the big,

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Speaker 1: mega structured churches to accomplish impact in this world. But

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Speaker 1: if God is already at work in the harvest, then

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Speaker 1: the size of the worker is never an issue. So

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Speaker 1: to be sent into the harvest field is to participate

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Speaker 1: in what God is doing in this world. There are

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Speaker 1: opportunities all around us to share the good news of Christ.

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Speaker 1: The harvest is plentiful, and the workers are you and

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Speaker 1: I