Share Jesus Now

Share Jesus Now! (John 4:31-39)

Share Jesus Now Is a Sustaining Necessity for Travis Avenue

"Jesus, tired as he was from the journey, sat down by the well" (v. 6). The disciples left Him thus, utterly weary, fatigued with the journey. He sat on the curb of the well, exhausted with the trip. Ministry does tire.

But when they returned there as a difference, transformation, almost a transfiguration. Absent was the fatigue, gone was the weariness. Jesus' face was animated, His eyes were kindled, there was fresh vigor and new energy. Obviously something had brought about a metamorphosis of His whole person.

The disciples' request—eat something. They urged, begged, and pleaded with Jesus to eat something. They did this repeatedly, all together, and each one of them.

The Master's reaction—a contrast between what sustained Him and what sustained them. "I myself have bread which you yourself did not know" (v. 32, author's italics).

The disciples' response. They did not respond to Him. They knew that their mystical Master often spoke in metaphors they did not understand. They knew He often spoke on two levels, so they did not dare to interrupt Him. When you are not involved in Jesus' agenda it is difficult to understand His meaning.

The Master's reply and reason—to do His will and finish the work. His resource, refreshment, renewal, recharging came from doing the will of God. The will of God was to win to Himself those like the Samaritan woman.

Jesus was tired in the midst of ministry. But He found fresh food, surprising sustenance, resurging resources in winning a woman to Himself.

Jesus has never once promised to keep us from fatigue, exhaustion, or burnout when we are running along with our own agenda and not His. We are trying to feed the body of Christ with that which cannot sustain it. Everything short of sharing Jesus now will turn to ashes in our mouth and be like grit between our teeth.

But our Lord Jesus says, "Make my agenda your agenda and you will be transformed."

Share Jesus Now Demands a Present Urgency

Our Lord turned the disciples from the inwardness of hidden food to the outwardness of white fields. He began with a prohibition. A prohibition against procrastination. This may have been a precise note of time but was more likely the repetition of a proverb of procrastination.

In all of creation only human beings procrastinate. But procrastination becomes more serious when it is a matter of the harvest. The same is true of spiritual harvesting. Any generation can lose the harvest if we do not act NOW.

Our difficulty is not evangelism or Christology, it is procrastination. We know how to do it. Our problem has never been information, it has been procrastination.

Our Lord calls for an observation—Look a careful, deliberate gaze. The whole of Jesus' mission can be summed up in the words look, pray, and go, in that order.

Physical vision is a mystery. But there is a greater mystery than physical vision. How will we look at Texas? Better, how do we look at our neighbors?

We can look with indifference. We can look with curiosity. We can look with pride. We can look with disgust.

We can see a harvest. As Texas Baptists, Share Jesus Now calls us back to what we do best—win to Christ. That is what we do best. Back to what we used to do!