The Wednesday after the Twentieth Sunday after Trinity Sunday
Posted on October 16, 2024 by under
Scripture: St. Matthew 9:35-38 (NKJV)
9:35 Then Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people. 36 But when He saw the multitudes, He was moved with compassion for them, because they were weary and scattered, like sheep having no shepherd. 37 Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few. 38 Therefore pray the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into His harvest.”
Devotion
In yesterday’s reading, the landowner sent out his own son to the vineyard. Today, we read that God has sent His Only-Begotten Son into the world to preach the Gospel to all, taking away both their spiritual disease of sin and their physical diseases.
We often, and rightly, focus on Christ’s work of atonement, His priestly office. By sacrificing Himself on the cross He prepared for us a great feast of salvation, and garments of righteousness, made white with His Blood. But Christ also performs a prophetic office. He did not just send out others to announce the Gospel. He Himself preached and urged people to receive the remission of sins that He was about to accomplish. He spent a full three years preaching and teaching before His crucifixion.
But, neither does Christ wish to work alone in the preaching of the Gospel. In His wisdom, He has chosen to send out laborers into His harvest, that is, pastors. Through them He continues His prophetic office and calls all of us into the Church. Their invitation is His invitation. Their Gospel is His Gospel.
What Christ says—“the harvest truly is plentiful, but the laborers are few,”—is just as true today as it was then. There are not enough faithful pastors. Throughout our country there are vacant churches that are weary and without a shepherd. Pray the Lord would have compassion upon us and raise up faithful pastors to preach the Gospel.
Collect: Grant, we beseech Thee, Merciful Lord, to Thy faithful people pardon and peace, that they may be cleansed from all their sins, and serve Thee with a quiet mind; through Jesus Christ, Thy Son, our Lord, Who liveth and reigneth with Thee and the Holy Ghost, ever One God, world without end. Amen.
Scripture taken from the New King James Version®. Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson. Used by permission. All rights reserved.
