Wasted harvest?

He said to them, ‘The harvest is plentiful, but the labourers are few; therefore ask the Lord of the harvest to send out labourers into his harvest.  Luke 10:2

As I opened the box I knew what I'd find even before I saw the contents.  It had been sitting on our counter for longer than I want to admit, and I'd set it aside to "deal with it later".  Sure enough, inside the box were dozens of shriveled, rotting and moldy hot peppers that I'd harvested earlier.  I had dried some, but set the others aside for later.  Later never came in the storing of these peppers.

Up to this point in this growing season, I was quite proud of our track record.  In years past, due to our own busyness, my husband and I grew things in the garden, and they would sometimes go past prime.
This year, with my daily jaunts (ok, slow trudging circuits :-)  of the garden, we kept up with the harvesting better.  Until the bumper crop of hot peppers. 

I'd like to say that part of the issue was, we didn't know what to do with them, as I'd already frozen plenty, dried plenty, smoked 6 mason jars full, made salsa, and tried making hotsauce, then cooked with some, and now we were faced with many more. I'd like to say that not knowing wat to do with them was the problem, but we have several pecks of apples that I bought specifically for applesauce and pies sitting on the same counter hoping not to face the same destiny, so you can see this is a pattern with me.

Certainly part of the picture is that I've had a rough fall, physically.  However, the bigger stumbling block for me, it seems is my own wrestling with not being able to work and do things.  I go from wanting to take on projects that will help our family and safe money to believing that my efforts won't make a difference.

Jesus' words in Luke came to me this morning as I peered into the pepper box.  The harvest is plenty but the laborers are few. Obviously Jesus wasn't talking about hot peppers. He was talking about human souls.  I have been one of those scarce laborers in the past and in the present.  It used to be that I used my busyness with the church as an excuse to not keep an eye out for the 'ripeness' of people's faith.  I was too busy running from one thing to another to see the growth and struggles people were having. 

Now I have the time, but often the energy and concentration escapes me.  But a larger piece that plays into this, is the major hit my self-identity received when I became ill.  I think "Ok, the harvest is plenty, but how does he plan to use me to reach others? "  I feel too broken, too useless, too irrelevant some days because I can barely get out of bed, or my head spins from the lightheadedness.

However, Jesus never said, 'the harvest is plenty and the laborers are few so we'll take only the strongest and brightest and best.'  Jesus said the laborers are few, (and later in the book of Acts he says), the people who are willing to share God's kingdom with others will be empowered to spread the message 'to the ends of the earth.'

We see in the gospels that Jesus worked through the most unlikely to spread the good news.  He chose people that no one else did, fishermen, the Geresene demoniac (who lived in the graveyard), the woman at the well who got water in the heat of the day because she was so outcast, and many others.  Jesus worked through these folks (and works through us!) precisely because of what they (and what we!!) experience.  Their own unique experience of the world opens up doors for others that would normally not hear the Word in their daily lives.

The experiences that you and I face daily open up doors for people to hear God's message in ways that other people can't share it.  For a long time I've wrestled with the idea that God's harvest is wasting on my watch.  It is not.  God continues to choose and empower those who will help the kingdom break in.  If we are willing, God can and will work through us.   By God's grace, God can uniquely utilize the gifts we have today-- right now.  The harvest is plenty, the laborers are few. Let us remember that we are able to harvest, and none of us is without gifts to share, no matter our condition. 

Lord of all, as people fighting chronic illnesses, we are sometimes overwhelmed by the lack of energy or ability we have to do the things we used to do.  Please utilize us in your wise, gentle ways to be able to spread the Gospel.  Amen.