Sermon Quotes: "A Heart for the Harvest"

“His response is described by the strongly emotional Greek verb splanchnizomai, which speaks of a warm, compassionate response to need. No single English term does justice to it: compassion, pity, sympathy, and fellow-feeling all convey part of it, but ‘his heart went out’ perhaps represents more fully the emotional force of the underlying metaphor of a ‘gut response’…It is a verb which describes the Jesus of the gospel stories in a nutshell.” R.T. France

“This is the supreme motivation for mission, to see the need of those who are perishing outside the kingdom. Motivation comes when you see people harassed by pressures, exhausted by the pace of life, going nowhere, and being led astray by many false ideologies…The Gospels repeatedly tell us that when Jesus saw, he had compassion. Perhaps we do not even look, let alone care.” Michael Green

“If you would sum up the whole character of Christ in reference to ourselves, it might be gathered into this one sentence, ‘He was moved with compassion’…His tender heart pities all the griefs of his dear people. Still doth he look upon their imperfections and their infirmities, yet not with anger, not with loss of patience, but with gentleness and sympathy, ‘He is moved with compassion.’” Charles Spurgeon

“…a prayer that is as urgent today as it was when Jesus original disciples heard his words.” ESV Study Bible

“The one will lead to the other and those who pray for laborers will turn out to be the ones who go in answer to that prayer.” R.T. France

“Ah, my brethren, there is no time for us to waste in the salvation of the sons of men. They will not live forever…Today the sure destruction of the unbeliever speaks with pleading voice to the humanity of every quickened heart. “We are perishing, will you let us perish? You can only help us by bringing the gospel now; will you delay?” Charles Spurgeon