Go to the Ripe Fields First!: Focusing Outreach on Receptive People

This book is about harvest. The harvest metaphor in the New Testament originated with Jesus. He talked about harvest a lot, using illustrations from the agrarian culture of which he was a part. Seeds, soil, sunshine, rain, predators, weeds, harvests, and etc. became the analogies Jesus used to illustrate people’s hunger for God. In short, when it came to their response, Jesus said some people are “ripe” (i.e. open and receptive) and others are not (i.e. indifferent or even hostile). “Go to the Ripe Fields First!” develops and explores this harvest idea. Using examples of real “harvests” from around the world –China, Guatemala, India, Korea, Sri Lanka and more – where thousands, sometimes millions of people have given their allegiance to Jesus Christ, this book explores both the theology of harvest (what the Bible says about the subject) and the sociological implications (what causes people to become receptive or remain resistant to the Christian message). “Go to the Ripe Fields First!” explores the spiritual (prayer and witness) and the natural (war, racism, natural disasters, poverty) influences that lead people to become hungry for God, and makes a case for gracious but unapologetic focus on them.