A day off

It's Saturday morning and I'm sitting in the staff kitchen in the villa at the Castle in Austria.  Had the opportunity to lead our staff devotional time yesterday which was a great blessing.  The thing that the Lord put on my heart was that He sometimes brings an unexpected harvest in our lives.  In the fourth chapter of John's gospel we read that Jesus needed to go through Samaria.  Most of us are familiar with the account of Jesus and the woman at the well and how she comes to know her Messiah along with many others in the Samaritan village of Sychar.  The interesting thing is that Jesus' disciples are oblivious to what is going on.  They go off to buy food and return somewhere in the middle of the whole thing.  They were in a sense preoccupied with meeting their own physical needs.  Jesus takes the opportunity to turn this event into a teaching moment for His disciples, pointing out that while there may indeed be a material harvest in four months' time, the spiritual harvest is now.  The fields are white.  Jesus knew that there were people who would receive Him in Sychar and went there accordingly; for the disciples, it was an unexpected harvest.
     About five summers ago I was taking my evening walk on the boardwalk in Ocean City, New Jersey.  On this particular evening, I noticed a man doing boardwalk evangelism and I felt a strong leading of the Holy Spirit to go over to him.  I looked at my watch and it was getting late so instead of stopping I headed to my car.  As I walked on, I started arguing in my mind with the Lord that it was getting late and I had things to do the next day and that it was really inconvenient and that sort of thing.  The impression of the Spirit got stronger and stronger to the point that I knew if I didn't turn around I was going to miss a blessing.  So I turned around and headed back.  As I approached the man, he was sharing the gospel with a woman on one side and being heckled by another man on the other side.  I felt the Spirit tell me to just stand by the railing and pray, which I did.  After things died down, I went over and introduced myself to the man who was doing the evangelism.  He was a pastor from a church about 30 minutes away.  I stood with him the rest of that evening and for what turned into the next four summers as we shared the gospel and prayed with many young people.  I am not an evangelist.  I am one of the more reserved, introverted people that you might meet.  But God wanted to bring an unexpected harvest into my life.  I would have missed out on those four years of blessing had I just went to my car and not turned around that night.  I believe that the Lord wants to bring an unexpected harvest in all of our lives.  Jesus declares in Acts 1:8 that His followers "shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth".  What a glorious thing that is.  How wonderful it is when the true and the living God brings a harvest and allows us by His grace to partake in it.  Be open to the unexpected harvest that the Lord may have for you!

     I had mentioned that there are many practical things to do around here when there are no conferences.  This week we ripped out a sink room that will be converted into a bathroom.  As we ripped out the drywall, there were Scripture verses written all over on the framing.  This must have been done by some of the earlier Calvary work teams who got the Castle up and running in the early 90's.  It was kind of neat to see that- thinking about the fellowship in Christ that took place 25 years ago on a construction project and now we are enjoying rich fellowship in the same room so many years later doing similar work.  Also spent some time this week repairing chairs, splitting and hauling firewood, and yes, going to the local dump.  It's been very busy- nice to have a day off today!  Praise God from whom all blessings flow.  Thank you as always for your prayers!

Wednesday

It has been a whirlwind of activity since I arrived here; the European CC Pastors conference started on Monday but guests started arriving on Saturday so I pretty much hit the ground running.  Been doing everything from railway station pickups to washing dishes, shoveling snow, splitting firewood and whatever else is needed.  The fellowship has been wonderful amongst like-minded servants.  Things should slow down a bit after the weekend.  Thank you for your prayers!