Having a Passion to Reach the Lost World — K.P. Yohannan

Jesus’ Life and Dependence on the Father

This is a very critical passage, John's Gospel, Chapter 4, because we have the man, Jesus, living on earth with all the temptations we face, everything you can possibly imagine you and I had to deal with, emotional stress, pain, loneliness, agony, every kind of temptation, Christ, the man, faced and lived as a man on earth.

And you find him, because I took a pencil one time, I went through the four Gospels only looking for the man, Jesus, because the scripture says, I am called to live right now as Jesus lived on earth, in total dependence on the Father, the Holy Spirit, to live this life.

And how Jesus responded and behaved, and that chapter, you see Jesus using a normal daily event in life to instruct his disciples, and by the way, at home, if you open your Bible and looking at it, maybe particularly you're looking at from verse 28 on through verse 28, that is a passage where we have Jesus sitting by the well, and the disciples went off to buy a hamburger and French fries, and they come back and they find him talking to a woman, and they are confused about it, because he is not supposed to do that, it's just like we have on the mission field, the social restricting, men and women don't sit together like, you know, they don't usually talk to each other in public, but they didn't do much about it because he's the boss, as you know, so then when they tell him, Master, please eat something, then he responds saying that, I have food to eat that you have no clue about, translated, oh, I already ate, and I am sure the disciples are confused, because it says there, they said to themselves, this is strange, that's not the word correctly, but I would say they said something like the Californian, oh man, that's a real bummer, we went through all this chaos to bring this food, and we want to eat our food, and he says he already ate, did someone bring him something to eat, I mean, only a normal rational question, and Jesus said, no, I have something more significant, my food is to do the will of him that sent me and finish his work, in other words, he's saying, when you went off to buy food, I run into this woman, and she's lost, unforgiven, on the way to hell, and her life, and her story became the story of multitude's harvest, and the realization of the lostness of people that I made in my own image, ruined my physical appetite, best illustration I have about this is when my mother died, she was 84, I was home in India, for three days, I couldn't think straight, I couldn't eat, I couldn't drink, my brothers had to force me, say, you have to eat something or drink something, I was so emotionally destroyed, I'd never been through anything like that in my life, Christianity becomes sinful, and we abuse God and the Bible, when we read this stuff, and we cannot enter into it, but rather we look for Greek and Hebrew and some theologian who is dumb in his head because he doesn't know God either, and tell us, oh, that means this, that means that, you have to be rational, like the preacher recently said, oh yeah, that woman brought the most precious ointment and poured it at the feet of Jesus, that means you are given the privilege to buy the most expensive stuff in the world, and enjoy it, God wanted to have all these things, and after this, you'll be taken to heaven with the golden streets and all the mansions, what on earth?

Seeing the Lost World Through Jesus’ Eyes

We are living on earth, and I say this to you because Jesus, who walked before us as a forerunner, he sees this, his heart is broken for the lost world, but there are four words I'd like to point out in the next 10, 12 minutes, I know some of you are saying, four points, that's four hours, someone back there, by the way, when I'm about to, you know, five minutes before I should end, you raise your hand, do that, and I punish you for doing that too, no, just please do that, I just want to make sure I don't go over time, in the passage, you'll find Jesus says, well, your problem is you don't understand what I'm dealing with, I want you to be like me, to do that, he says, look, lift up your eyes, and look, I tell you, open your eyes and see at the fields, that word, look, it's a deliberate action, it's deliberate, you know, just the other day I was coming from, parked my car and walked in the office, and you know, walking on the stairs, and I paused just for a fraction of a second, right on the wall, there is some flowers, I've been in this building from the Garden of Eden, but I never saw that flower there, I just stood there and said, this is weird, this has been here all the time, I said hi to Betty and walked up, keep thinking, if this is the case, how many things are around me that I do not see, because every time I come down there, I mean, I must have walked up there a thousand times, I'm just walking up, but not looking, and this is something that it takes a deliberate decision for all of us, for me, to look for something specific, idols, the Bible says they have eyes, but they don't see, they have ears, they don't hear, they have legs, they don't walk, when our hearts become cold and stony, we see, but we don't see, you look back over the years and many years ago, when you heard about half a million people dying, or 5 ,000 people died overnight in a flood, or 100 ,000 people washed away in Bangladesh, or stuff like that, somehow something happened on the inside, but we hear the same things, our hearts are not moved, it's all a matter of fact, my eyes are dry, my faith is old, my heart is hard, my prayers are cold, and I know how I ought to be, alive to you, and dead to me, oh, what can be done with an old heart like mine, soften it up with oil and wine, the oil is you, your spirit of love, please wash me anew in the wine of your blood, Keith Green.

I've been in this journey now well over 40 years serving the Lord, but I confess to you, how often I must repent, hundreds of times literally, because I'm the one who hear news all the time, what's going on in the mission field, but often it's all information, to share with somebody and talk about this, but I find so few times it drives me to my knees, emotionally moved and hurting, I see it, I hear it, but I don't see it, and I think it has to do with the condition of our heart, you know something strange, my 62 bug, I don't mean bug that bites you, but my Volkswagen, that's the one good thing Hitler did, and when I'm driving anywhere, if there is a Volkswagen 10 million miles away, I will see it, I'm not thinking about looking for Volkswagen, but somehow my bug is in my conscience and subconscious, and without me thinking and looking, I see it, somebody's wearing something that you like, without you knowing, you see it everywhere, Jesus lived with passion and passion, rejecting everything and anything and friendship and any involvement that take away from the commitment to his father to go to live and die for the sake of the lost, and that emotional, that feeling always kept him on the narrow road, he was not allowing a thousand things to distract him, so his eyes, his ability to see was clear, and I pray that in the midst of everything that happens somehow, we will be able to see clearly, and that clouds our vision, it is our self-centeredness, it's not all about us spending three hours on computer looking for this and that and Facebook and all the other things going on, but honestly, how much time it takes to look for things that we can pray for, look for ways that we can do something about the need and the opportunities.

Prayer as Faithful Participation in the Harvest

The second thing, Matthew 9, with the harvest, not only you see it, but also you pray, and tonight, in the amazing thing, I remember as an 18-year-old praying for Albania and Bhutan and Burma and Mongolia and places I'd never been to, never even had any understanding about it, but people like me, not knowing even much, but prayed and prayed and prayed, and you see what God has done, and so when we pray from here, you will be surprised what God will do as an answer to prayer, and the best prayers we offer are prayers when we don't feel like praying, you know why?

Because that is a prayer of faith, not of feelings. And so, then the third thing, Jesus said, I send you, go. So you look, you pray, then you go, and tonight, like Gisela said, of the 20 ,000 villagers ministering among these struggling women, missionaries, we are thinking about the privilege we have to pray and help them go, but then, there are times God calls us to go.

When I was in California speaking at a meeting, two young people came to me, so happy and joyful, and said, oh, so glad we came to hear you tonight. I said, yeah, I'm glad, tell me. He said, you know, we both are studying to be medical doctors, to finish our studies and be doctors and go to Africa to serve God and be missionaries there, and tonight we found out that maybe we can be doctors and make a whole lot of money and support so many more missionaries.

I said, you are making the biggest mistake of your life. I said, did God call you to go to Africa? He said, yes. I said, I don't want your money. God is not looking for your money. If the Lord called you to go somewhere, my recommendation, get a one-way ticket, get your degrees and be a doctor, go anywhere and invest your life and He will know what to do with your life.

He has a plan. Who will go for me? Our response should be, here am I, send me. It is not simply going to India or China or Mongolia or, you know, Tibet or Afghanistan. No. Either you go or you are back home, you sit in your home.

Our commitment must be, Lord, while I live on earth here, my life is involved in going and sending and praying, doing anything, everything in the world, because all other things basically are incidentals.

The real call is for us to be His witness while we live on earth, and Jesus did that. And finally, because the brother did this to me, and I'm going to get him, Jesus said, I send you to a harvest that you have no clue.

The Harvest Beyond What We Can See

You didn't do much about it, but it's all yours. Can you imagine the day we stand before the Lord with the multitudes that no man can number from communities we are praying for? The Muslim countries and the tribals and women and children and slums and all these people around the throne that no one can number them, because too many.

And there you find some people living in the most remote community in Nepal that took eight, nine days for one of our brothers to climb up there to be a missionary. And you find 500 or 1 ,000 people having their hands raised, worshipping the Lamb that sits on the throne, and they will say, you have no clue.

You were a part of that mission. In the Gospel of Aish, and you traveled and spoke in meetings. You worked on the computers, and you just prayed, and you've been doing this, and you had no clue we even existed here.

But just wanted you to know, now you look and see all things as they are, no more through dark glass. We are the fruit of your journey and the harvest. Why people work eight hours a day and five days a week, year after year after year, whatever people do.

I mean, I ask the question at home, why are you working? The answer is to make money and to build your home and whatever else. But as I always say, we need to have our needs met, and we need to live here, and God will take care of us.

But really, what we live for is something beyond time, materialism, approval, and achieving a whole lot of stuff for this life, because it's not going to survive. So, we are given tonight the opportunity to spend this night in prayer, and so to you, my brothers, okay, streaming and all that stuff is there, but I just wanted to know, tonight, or morning times, or Tuesday night, and your private times or prayer room there when you pray alone, the prayer request, and I somehow like you to know that the incredible possibilities that we have, even through our prayers while you're in half-sleep, which you will not, I know, mean so much, and the times and things we are praying for is going to mean so much tonight.

Building the Lord’s Kingdom Through Going, Sending, and Praying

You know, John shared about the PayPal thing, that's right? Yeah, people can support missionaries and all that, and volunteers. I mean, I can tell you, some sister, some brother, you know, like you said, in the TV land, you know, you're watching us, and if God can use you to tell someone about Revolution World Missions and go to our website and start reading materials, can you imagine, one of them decide that they will help one of these children, or a sister, or a missionary, can you imagine that missionary, maybe the one that I talked about in Nepal, able to win hundreds and thousands to Christ, all of us doing whatever we can, either we are going or sending praying, all this means that we are building the Lord's kingdom, and I pray tonight that we will look upon this as the tremendous privilege the Lord gave us, and He says, I am asking you to be involved with this, and He lived for this.

Praying for God’s Heart for the Lost

Alright, let's have a prayer before we continue with more prayer requests, and as I pray, would you pray that the Lord will give you His heart? Because whatever we are going to be praying tonight, you know, the Holy Spirit must burn our heart, and He can do that, we can't do it for ourselves, and as, you know, Bob Pierce, in the early days of his life in China, seeing the multitudes, he was so broken hearted, he was weeping on the streets of China, and I saw him in Singapore many, many years ago, he opened his Bible, and he said, I took my Bible, and on the leaf of the Bible, he wrote these words, Oh God, let my heart break the things that break your heart, let me see things, oh Lord, as you see, let me feel your feelings, let me pray with your burden, and let's pray for ourselves, and right after that, we will move forward with the rest of the prayer meetings, let's pray.

A Prayer for Compassion, Holiness, and the Nations

In silence, we wait before you, oh Father, forgive us for the times we see things, but we don't see, in a thousand ways on a daily basis, you cause us to see stuff on television screen, and magazines, and emails, we hear things, yet oh Lord, we remain cold and distant, and as your saints in the past often prayed, we too repeat those words to you, oh Father, and ask that you will take eternity, and stamp on our eyes, let our hearts break, with the things that break your heart, Lord, those of us with our children and grandchildren, and our family, and all of us, Lord, we are grateful for the provisions that we have, house to live in, clothes to wear, food to eat, vehicles, and bicycles, and motorbikes, Lord, how blessed we are, even this building, we are sitting in, it's air conditions, and comfortable chairs, and carpet, yet oh Lord, we are aware, even right now, some 62 million children, living in abject poverty, living in the slums, and wandering on the streets, as child laborers, just in India alone, we think about half of the world, that wait to hear your name, for the first time in their life, Lord, I pray that these things will not end up producing guilt, and condemnation, but rather Lord, that we will see how much we need you, how much we need to become like you, dear Master, you are not looking for workers, you are looking for sons and daughters, those will share your passion, and I pray these words for myself, for I know how often my eyes are dry, my heart is so cold, everything so rational, and logical, oh Lord, stare our hearts, move us, that we will move away from externals, and pretends, but rather Lord, our hearts are deeply gripped by your love, and your pain, for the lost and dying world, and thank you for what you're doing, and the tremendous privilege you gave us to have a small part, in seeing multiplied millions hear the gospel, and give their lives to you, and they become part of the local church, thank you, thank you, that day we look forward to, when we stand with you, and before you, along with the multiplied millions that no, no man can number, oh Lord, for that day, let it be, oh Lord, that we will, every single day of our life, we will live with our eyes fixed, on that day, and we thank you, now Lord, I pray that you lead us tonight, during this season of prayer, I know Lord, there's some of us sitting here, we have our struggles, and concerns, and guilt, and all kind of remorse, and failures, Lord, none of us are strong, yet you assures us, your forgiveness, and your grace, please Lord, answer praise tonight, heal those who are not well in their body, and their mind, then Lord, I pray that you will move us from ourselves, and from the environment of being with others, into your holy presence, use our feeble lives, and then Lord, I do pray for my brothers and sisters, that are streaming tonight, from many, many nations, and Lord, I pray you are here, the same way Lord, you are there with them, in that living room, in that kitchen, in the hospital room, wherever they may be, I pray dear Jesus, may your precious presence, be really felt, Lord, I really mean that, that they will truly feel Jesus, you there with them, and then you give them your burden, your passion, especially tonight, to pray, to change a world that so much in need, thank you that you brought us together, from all over the world, as a family tonight, during this time of prayer, we say this in the name of Jesus our Lord, Amen, Amen.