A German Lutheran evangelist’s message to the Berlin congress
An Unexpected Commission
The cradle and the grave are two great obstacles to fulfillment of the Great Commission. Every day, a new multitude is born, and a vast prospect list vanishes; in the United States alone, there are 11, 227 births and 4,970 deaths daily.
But the lack of dedicated witnesses compounds the Church’s problem, and when death removes devout workers of evangelistic zeal the loss is felt doubly. On June 20 Christ “summoned home” one of this century’s outstanding German evangelists, the Rev. Wilhelm Busch, who had carried on a youth ministry in Lutheran churches abroad for thirty years. His remarks prepared for the World Congress on Evangelism (reprinted here) were in the form of a devotional Bible study—on the theme, ironically, of the need for more workers. Willy Busch, as his friends called him, knew—as do all those invited as delegates to the World Congress—that the task of global evangelism must rest upon the shoulders of every professing believer in Jesus Christ.
Born in 1897, Busch was one of eight children of a preacher in Wuppertal-Elberfeld. He attended the classical Lessing-Gymnasium and during World War I was a lieutenant at the front. “My comrades and I lived far from God, under the dismal dominion of the idols Bacchus, Venus, and Death,” he confessed. But amid the horrors of war he found God. “Beside the corpse of a friend God spoke to me. I was on my way to hell until I held a Bible and read that ‘Jesus Christ is come into the world to save sinners.’ ” He became a theological student in Tübingen. “Schlatter had me under his spell. Then Karl Heim. With Heim we forgot that we were hungry, and that no dinner awaited us.”
His Christian commitment led him to the Ruhr—first as minister in a mining district, then as youth minister in Essen from 1931 to 1962, when he devoted himself to itinerant lectures. “I have a message that must be taken seriously,” he said often. “It is: God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. That’s what I live by.”
The World Congress on Evangelism will be deprived of the physical presence of Willy Busch. Perhaps the Lord of the Church desired for his message a wider audience than it would have had in the Berlin Kongresshalle. His Bible study follows.—ED.
But when Jesus saw the multitudes, he was moved with compassion on them, because they fainted, and were scattered abroad, as sheep having no shepherd. Then said he unto his disciples, The harvest truly is plenteous, but the laborers are few; pray ye therefore the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth laborers into his harvest [Matthew 9:36–38].
How many people are gathered here today? Even if we counted them very carefully, we would find in the last analysis that we had miscounted by one. This One we do not see. Everything, however, depends upon him. He is the most important Person at our gathering.
This One is the living Lord Jesus Christ. He is in our midst. And thus, as we see him and hear him in our text, it is he who acts and speaks among us. His words and works are always new and always of the highest relevance.
What Jesus says and does is not at all what we would expect but rather singular and astounding.
1. His eyes perceive things differently than do ours
“But when he saw the multitudes”—so begins our text.
Obviously, Jesus’ preaching enjoyed great outward success. It was public knowledge that he spoke with power, and that a word from him could even heal the sick. People came together in a great throng. I am convinced that the setting of our passage is a mass meeting.
We all know how exciting big gatherings are. Empty chairs and half-filled halls have a depressing effect upon us. But when multitudes gather, our hearts become glad. To see a vast crowd of people feeds the ego. A crowd elates and transforms the speaker.
But how differently the Lord approaches this throng! In fact, he doesn’t even see crowds; he sees only individuals, all kinds of them. And he sees each person’s needs, his dreary obligations, his unsatisfied desires, his sorrows and despair, his accusing, uneasy conscience, and his heavy heart.
“… he was moved with compassion on them.…”
I am certain that Jesus sees people today in exactly the same way. The incident in our text occurred almost 2,000 years ago. But what it says about people then is just as true of people today. The poet Goethe said: “Mankind is always progressing, but man as an individual never changes.” And so it is!
May I point out that right now, at this very moment, the Lord sees us, too, as we really are. In his eyes, such a congress as this is surely no impressive affair. He sees us—each individually—in our needs, in our unresolved personal problems, and also in our guilt and helplessness.
This is very comforting. In these days let us not be merely great missions strategists! Let us instead be people who are once again open to our great Helper and who learn anew to rejoice in him. “… he was moved with compassion on them.…”
At this point the Greek text uses very strong words to express how Jesus sees people: “… they were oppressed and trodden underfoot.” This is hardly an encouraging sight.
It happens again and again that persons are deeply impressed by the utter wretchedness of mankind. But they look upon their fellow men with cold detachment and refuse to become involved. Consequently they become cynical. I shall never forget one little experience I had when I became a pastor. “You will come to know men in their wretchedness,” my godly mother told me. “Be very careful that you never become a cynic!”
The wise of this world, the intellectually sophisticated and spiritually arrogant, have expressed such contempt again and again. Said Horace, the Roman poet: Odi profanum vulgus et arceo (I hate the masses and keep them at a distance). And the Pharisees in Jesus’ time said: “This people who knoweth not the law are cursed” (John 7:49).
Jesus, the Son of the living God, is the only one who has the right to view us humans at a distance, for he is the only one who could say of himself: “I am from above, you are from below.” He is the only one who has no share in the degradation of mankind. And more profoundly than any wise and any spiritually eminent one, Jesus sees all of mankind’s suffering and misery. After all, he knew man before the Fall. He knew and knows how God intended man to be. He sees the actual depth of our fall.
Yet this One views our suffering with neither the arrogance of the Pharisees nor the haughtiness of Horace. “… he was moved with compassion on them.…”
Here in the Greek we find an unusually strong word. It could be translated: “His heart turned within him.” Yes, his heart was so moved with compassion that he identified himself completely with the “oppressed and the downtrodden.” Never, in the last analysis, was anyone so despised as was Jesus in his Passion. And the misery of the world broke his heart as he died on Golgotha’s cross.
“… he was moved with compassion on them; because they were oppressed and downtrodden like sheep that have no shepherd.”
What has become of the impressive crowd? Now we see only individuals whom the devil has oppressed, betrayed, and seduced, who have been disillusioned a thousand times in the race toward oases that proved to be only mirages. Here now are men who have lost their original divine image. Here are men who—perhaps without being aware of it—are suffering under the burden of their guilt. Guilt before God is indeed a reality. It is a burden, even if man does not recognize it as such.
The Danish philosopher and theologian Sören Kierkegaard tells how as a boy he often took walks with his father. Sometimes the father would stop, look thoughtfully at his son, and say: “You poor child! You’re walking in a kind of quiet desperation.” Jesus is aware that all men are walking in quiet desperation.
And now we read something terrible: “… they are like sheep that have no shepherd.”
Everywhere and in every age appear leaders who are ready to assume the office of shepherd. Here by one mighty utterance of God they are felled and humbled. We too are pushed aside. No man, no one at all, is in a position in which he can really help, because no man can repair or reverse the Fall.
But we cannot stop here. We must elaborate upon our text. He who thus evaluates man and sees us in this way is indeed himself the God-sent “good shepherd.” He has come—now I use his own words—”to seek and to restore the lost, to heal the wounded, and to offer life and fullness of joy.” He is the one who, through his coming, death, and resurrection, repairs the effects of the Fall.
He is truly this poor world’s only hope!
We must point out one particular item concerning Jesus’ vision. With great insight into the meaning of our passage, Luther translated it: “… they were scattered like sheep that have no shepherd.”
Our age suffers conspicuously from separation, from division. Individuals have no contact with their neighbors—and become isolated. Nations, races and social classes are separated. Churches are separated, as are individual Christians. They are “scattered like sheep that have no shepherd.”
At the Julier Pass in Switzerland I once met a shepherd. He told me how, one day, at an altitude of 8,000 feet, he was surprised by a sudden snowstorm. The sheep became terrified and ran wildly in all directions. In the thick mist and driving snow they did not see the abysses, and many fell to their deaths.
I then asked the shepherd: “What did you do?” He answered: “I climbed on a rock and shouted. Those sheep which heard my voice gathered around me, were united into one flock, and were rescued.”
We can enlarge upon our text by saying: Jesus the good shepherd stands in this our world and lets his voice ring out. The shepherd’s voice should be heard in all our speaking and preaching. Jesus says: “My sheep hear my voice.” In him alone will we be united.
I once heard the late Russian evangelical leader Ivan Stepanovitch Prochanov give the following impressive illustration. All of us, as it were, are running aimlessly about in a circle. No one overtakes another. We remain scattered. But as each one, on his own accord, travels along the radius of the circle to the center, we come closer together. The closer we come to the center, to the God-ordained center—namely, the Lord Jesus—the closer we come to one another.
In the one “Good Shepherd” we are united.
To summarize:
a. Jesus sees men as they really are, and we should learn to see men through his eyes!
b. He alone can help. And our service must consist in pointing men to him.
c. New men, united men, have their source in Jesus.
2. He views our prospects differently than do we
Here the Lord Jesus says something quite baffling: “The harvest is great.” We might think that this assertion was applicable 2,000 years ago. But—does it still apply in our day?
“The harvest is great.” Let us notice that Jesus does not say: “The field is great.” We could say a great deal about that. But here he is speaking about the harvest, which is ripe and ready to be gathered.
The fourth chapter of John’s Gospel records how the Lord Jesus had a personal, spiritual conversation with a frivolous woman at a well in a Samaritan city. The woman was so deeply moved that she ran into the city and told the people about Jesus. Thereupon they streamed out to meet him. When Jesus saw the multitude, he said to his disciples: “Lift up your eyes and look upon the field; it is already ripe for harvesting.”
In our passage, the masses flocked to Jesus without benefit of publicity. They came without the invitation of posters or loudspeakers. Here he could truly say: “The harvest is great.”
But how is the situation today? Church attendance in Christian countries is frightfully small. Young people are so preoccupied with their political, social, and economic problems that witnesses for Christ have a hard time getting a hearing. And so we are tempted to lose heart.
Its All Greek To Me
In reading about the New Testament, Christians are sometimes puzzled by citations of Greek words. Here is a beginner’s list of New Testament words along with Bible references showing their use. Try matching the words with their definitions. Use the references if you are in doubt. Answers are listed below.
ANSWERS
JAMES LEWIS LOWE
Philadelphia, Pa.
In my country there are Christians who maintain with all seriousness: “The time for missions and evangelism is gone. Our only task now is to prepare our congregations for the return of the Lord.”
But “Jesus says something different: “The harvest is great.” Such a sentence goes against our reason. And we ask ourselves whether we will believe statistics and lose heart, or whether we will believe the word of our Lord and be convinced that the opportunities for evangelism are tremendous. The world hungers for God and his salvation. And we may be sure that the world is waiting for our message.
In his book A la decouverte et an service de l’humain, Henri Ochsenbein tells of a project undertaken by a prominent Swiss publication. Reporters were placed in the Zürich railroad station to interview fifteen people at random as they stepped off the train. Promising a considerable remuneration and absolute confidentiality, the reporters were to inquire what problem at the moment was weighing most heavily on these people. The result was shattering. It became clear that almost every person suffered deep, painful conflicts which gnawed at the very roots of their being and for which they sought help and a valid solution.
Yes, the world hungers for God.
As a young pastor I was assigned to a mining area in the Ruhr district where people had totally abandoned the Church. The situation seemed hopeless. Here were no heathen who had yet to hear the Gospel. A harvest here seemed impossible. This was a truly post-Christian world. These men seemed to have left Christianity behind them.
I set out and went from house to house. Usually people tried to slam the door in my face and often shouted hatefully: “We don’t need a preacher!” But I already had my foot in the door, and I declared: “That’s true! You don’t need a preacher. But you do need a Saviour!” At that they were taken aback, and they opened the door.
A year later I needed only to go out on the street. Men and women came to me with their needs and cares—and also with their sins.
Once when I was conducting a very difficult evangelistic campaign in a small industrial city and was beginning to feel somewhat discouraged, a young coworker burst into the room where I was collecting my thoughts and shouted: “All signs point to victory!”
He didn’t concern himself with the men who came or didn’t come; rather, he saw his risen Lord. And it was in the overwhelming joy of the triumph of His resurrection that he shouted the glorious statement: “All signs point to victory!”
No doubt he bore in mind that the Lord will indeed return. And he remembered that we are not to perform our service as if what we contend for would collapse without our frantic efforts. The final outcome has already been decided. For this reason all signs do indeed point to victory. “The harvest is great.”
Let us be about our harvesting and rejoice like farmers who have been blessed with an abundant crop! Labor in the hot fields will entail hard work and sweat. But the harvest is plentiful and ripe. And it stands waiting in the fields.
3. He gives us an unexpected commission
In view of what has gone before we might now expect Jesus to say: “There are indeed few workers in the harvest. The situation is bad. But in order that at least something gets done, you must now go out and gather in God’s harvest.” Surely that is how Jesus’ discourse must continue.
But that is precisely what Jesus does not say. What he does and says runs counter to our way of reasoning. One other time Jesus did indeed send out his disciples as harvesters; the account of this is in the very next chapter. But here, where we might expect such a commission, he says something completely different: “Pray the Lord of the harvest, that he will send forth workers into his harvest.”
I can imagine impetuous Peter thinking at this moment: “Lord! Here are twelve strong and willing harvest workers! Why should we be asking for workers when we’re just the people for the job?!”
But this is what Jesus says: “Ask the Lord for workers!” Perhaps then the meaning occurred to Peter: “Pray for yourself, that you may become a true laborer. As yet you are not the kind of harvester that the Lord requires.”
I don’t think that we, we who are gathered here, should be so almightily convinced that we are usable harvest laborers. We are indeed harvest laborers. But whether we are usable is often very doubtful.
As a student I was once in a village where grain was still being cut with a scythe. I wanted to help, and so I joined the reapers. But after five minutes I had to quit. I couldn’t handle the scythe correctly.
Today we lay great stress upon comprehensive training. Well, I have nothing against that. But even if I had been trained as a reaper, I still would not have been able to keep up with those men, because I did not possess their muscle strength.
Harvest laborers for Jesus Christ need more than training. They need divine power. Their own strength must be broken. They need to be spiritually equipped by the Lord.
“Pray the Lord for laborers!” This brings us to say, therefore, “O Lord! In our present state we are completely unqualified. Make us into true, empowered, cleansed, selfless, ardent, and zealous workers in thy harvest! Forgive us our constant presumption in thinking that we are just the ideal persons for thy task. We are nothing of the kind. Therefore do thou thyself prepare us for thy service!”
And then, of course, Jesus’ command clearly means that we should pray for more witnesses. I do not believe that Jesus means that we should pray particularly for more professional preachers and ministers. He is concerned about reviving slumbering Christians. We are to pray that men and women become alarmed at people’s misery and according to the measure of their strength do something for Jesus.
What can we expect as the result of such prayer?
“Pray the Lord of the harvest!” If we read the New Testament carefully, we discover that strange things happen to those who pray. Almost always their impassioned prayer receives a negative answer or none at all.
We remember the woman who ran after Jesus and cried. “My daughter is demon-possessed!” (Matthew 15: 22). Jesus merely answered that she did not belong to the people of Israel and that it was to these alone that he was sent.
Or there is the story of the government official who pleaded for his son. Jesus answered forthrightly: “Unless you see signs and wonders you will not believe” (John 4:48).
Near Jericho a blind beggar sat and cried for help. But for a long time Jesus acted as though he didn’t hear him.
Other examples could be cited. Jesus himself told a parable about a man who at night knocks at a friend’s door and asks for bread. But the neighbor shakes his head and says that it’s really quite impossible to fulfill such requests at night.
While all these pleas were finally answered, it was only after some obstruction was overcome.
If the Lord is here commanding us, his disciples, to pray for workers in the harvest field, no doubt we may encounter a similar situation when we pray. Our request must be so heartfelt and so filled with awareness of the need in the harvest field, so persistent in behalf of its great concern, that we overcome the obstructions and obstacles. Then the “Lord of the harvest” will answer us.
What an impact would be felt if this gathering would unite to pray unceasingly for the quickening of Christendom and the awakening of laborers in the harvest fields!
Recently a major newspaper carried an article about the possibility of blasting the projected new Panama Canal out of bedrock with but one thrust of atomic power. Vividly the journalist painted the picture: as the President presses a small, insignificant button, suddenly enormous forces, forces beyond comprehension, are released that chart new paths for the ships of the world.
Much greater and mightier achievements will be released when, finally united, the disciples of Jesus obey the command stated here. With their feeble praying they will unleash a force and quickening far more powerful than that which all other efforts can accomplish.
Lord! Grant us the spirit of prayer. Give us eyes open to the great possibilities of our times. Grant us thy eyes, which see men as they really are and see them with compassion! Amen.
