Have you every believed that God was calling you to share the Gospel with someone who you thought would never repent and believe?
Or even perhaps harder, have you ever felt called to help someone in serious trouble who rejected your help? Have you ever reached out with God’s love, pouring yourself out for someone, only to have them respond in anger and cruelty? Has anyone ever taken your time and money even as they railed against you and continued making the same bad decisions that got them into trouble in the first place?
Today we gather to examine an essential aspect of our faith: the call to witness and reach into the lives of others, even when we expect no positive response. We find a powerful example of this in the life of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.
As we walk through today's Gospel reading (Luke 19:41–48), we see Jesus on His way to Jerusalem, knowing full well the fate that awaited the city.
And when he drew near and saw the city, he wept over it, saying, “Would that you, even you, had known on this day the things that make for peace! But now they are hidden from your eyes. For the days will come upon you, when your enemies will set up a barricade around you and surround you and hem you in on every side and tear you down to the ground, you and your children within you. And they will not leave one stone upon another in you, because you did not know the time of your visitation.”
And he entered the temple and began to drive out those who sold, saying to them, “It is written, ‘My house shall be a house of prayer,’ but you have made it a den of robbers.”
And he was teaching daily in the temple. The chief priests and the scribes and the principal men of the people were seeking to destroy him, but they did not find anything they could do, for all the people were hanging on his words.
Here, Jesus mourns for Jerusalem, a city that would soon face destruction because it failed to recognize the time of God’s coming to them. Jesus knew before He ever entered the city what the response of the inhabitants would be. He knew that He would be rejected. He knew that the people He loved, the people He came to save, the very ones who would shout “Hosanna” one minute would turn on him the next and offer Him up to be crucified. That’s a hard price to pay to be a faithful witness. It must have been hard to bear that kind of betrayal.
Despite this knowledge, Jesus did not turn away. Instead, He entered Jerusalem and went straight to the temple. He cleansed the temple, saying, “It is written, ‘My house shall be called a house of prayer,’ but you make it a den of robbers.” He also continued to teach and heal He continued to reach out with a selfless love, a sacrificial love so far beyond our concept of love that it’s difficult to fathom and impossible to emulate.
What can we learn from this profound example of love and commitment to God’s mission? Perhaps one lesson we can learn is don’t give up. No matter how impossible the task God gives you seems to be, no matter how low the odds of success, don’t give up. Jesus didn’t withhold His message even though He knew they wouldn’t receive it; instead, He engaged with the people out of compassion and obedience to the Father. He sowed seeds of truth and grace, knowing that God’s work would continue beyond immediate visible results.
This reminds me of a time when Joanne and I were heavily involved in the pro-life cause. We were asked to take in a young, poor, unmarried woman who had decided to keep her baby. We lived in a small townhouse in Manassas with our two young children. My son and daughter each had a very small bedroom, and to accommodate the young woman, my daughter volunteered to move in with my son. Although she agreed, she wasn't very happy about it.
The young lady moved in with us, and we did our best to treat her as a family member. However, she was not very open to the Gospel and really had trouble accepting our house rules. We tried to explain that the rules, such as not allowing her to entertain her boyfriend in her bedroom, were in place because we loved and respected her. We wanted her to learn to respect herself. We wanted her to see herself as Christ saw her. She wanted none of it. She chose to move out. She still, thank God. held to her plan to keep the child. While we were happy that the baby lived, we were saddened that she was not open to changing her life and accepting Jesus.
Years later, she called to thank us and tell us that she had accepted the Lord Jesus into her life and was working as a drug counselor. She thanked us for holding the line with her and modeling how a Christian family works.
We were floored. We thought we had failed miserably.
But God was not done with that lovely lady, and we had been faithful in the part we had been privileged to play in her life. There have been other times when we didn’t see the results we prayed for, but this experience taught us that, no matter how impossible it seems, the Holy Spirit is at work. On this side of the resurrection, we will not fully understand how our faithfulness works out in the world. We are instruments of God’s grace. We are called to be faithful, not successful.
Our witness is not just in words but in actions—sometimes sacrificial actions. After Jesus rose from the dead and before He returned to our Father in Heaven, He told His disciples, “But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you, and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the end of the earth.” Our mission is clear: to be witnesses of Christ’s love, not just to those who are eager to receive it but also to those who seem indifferent or even hostile. We are to reflect Christ's love in all we do, planting seeds of hope and truth.
Importantly, our motivation matters. Sometimes it isn’t about what we do or the success we see but why we do it. Our motivation must be to love like Jesus loved. We are called to act out of genuine love and compassion, reflecting the heart of Christ. As the hymn "Lord, I Want to Be a Christian" says, "In my heart, in my heart, Lord, I want to be a Christian in my heart." This should be our prayer—that our actions stem from a deep desire to embody Christ’s love in our hearts and then show it in every aspect of our lives.
It's normal to sometimes feel discouraged when we reach out to others and don’t see any fruit for our effort. Yet, the Apostle Paul reminds us, “And let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up.” Our role is to remain faithful in our witness and trust God with the outcome. We can come to God and bring our disappointment, discouragement and complaints with us: God’s okay with us whining to Him as long as we pick ourselves up and try again.
Moreover, Jesus encourages us, “In the same way, let your light shine before others, so that they may see your good works and give glory to your Father who is in heaven.” Our good works are a testimony of God’s love flowing through us, and they can speak volumes even when our words fall on deaf ears.
We are called to witness through our actions, love, and perseverance, even when we don't see immediate results. Let's embrace this calling with joy and faith, trusting that God is working through us to touch lives and plant seeds of transformation. May we be encouraged by Jesus’ example and remain steadfast in our mission to reach into the lives of others with His love and truth. Let’s do the work we have been given to do, encourage one another in the work of the harvest and trust that God will do the rest. Amen.