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"His Harvest Field"
by Tom Goodman
February 23, 2006
Jesus said, “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” (Matthew 9:37-38)
As leaders at Hillcrest, we have to see what Jesus sees. He looks at our community as his Father’s harvest field. In other words, it belongs to him and he has prepared people within his field to respond to the gospel in a
plentiful way.
Today I got a clearer picture of his harvest field immediately around our church. I was preparing a postcard that will promote the upcoming sermon series, “The Da Vinci Code Breakers.” (You can view the card here.) The series begins the Sunday after Easter, so the card will be personalized to include our two service times and styles. Over
27,000 households will receive the postcard, distributed through 84 postal carrier routes within one mile of our church.
It’s amazing how much information the direct mail company has on the households within these routes:
The median age of the adults in each carrier route varies from 42 to 54, with the majority of carrier routes comprised of adults 44 years of age.
Regarding marital status, some carrier routes have as few as 39 percent of the population married, some routes have as much as 52 percent of the population married. Most carrier routes have about 42 percent of the
population married.
Of the percentage of the population under the age of 18, some carrier routes have as few as 12 percent, some routes have as many as 18 percent, while most report about 16 percent of each route’s population under the
age of 18.
Median family income varies between carrier routes. Within a one mile radius of our church, some carrier routes report a median household income of $42,837, some routes report a median income as high as $91,537, while most
routes fall into the upper 50s in median income.
Now, this is a look at only 27,000 households within one mile of the church, because my budget limits me to expanding the mailing. But what do these 84 postal carrier routes tell us about God’s harvest field he’s made us responsible to
reach? As I understand the information, we have about 4300 children and youth around us. Based on the average age of the parents, it seems most of these children will be in the upper grades of elementary school and the younger grades of
high school. Less than half of our surrounding population is married (42%), and the median income puts most people in the middle class.
As Hillcrest leaders, however, the most important fact about those 84 postal carrier routes is that they belong to God’s harvest field. Jesus said that the harvest is plentiful but the laborers are few, and we can surely identify with that
reality. But Jesus gave us the simple solution to this problem:
Ask.
He told us to ask his Father to send laborers into his harvest field. Take a moment to do that right now.
—Tom
P.S. If you missed last week’s edition of LeaderLines, it wasn’t the fault of your e-mail program. I failed to get it written in time! Apologies!
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