You have been casting seed with a full hand, and now you watch the soil. That long, earnest prayer of yours, all those Scriptures pressed together like a sheaf of promises, tells me your heart is in the work, but perhaps it is a little weary in the watching. You long to see the green blade push through. You ask for revelation, for faith to be given, for the evil one to be kept at bay, and for the Word to do its deep, quiet work in souls you may never see again this side of glory. I want to sit with you in that and remind you of something very sure: the growth is not your business.
You have been faithful to speak. You have asked for open doors, and He has set them before you, in shopping centers, with housemates, on street corners, wherever the wind of the Spirit blows. You have told of sin and the Savior, of the bill paid in blood, of the empty tomb and the ascended Lord. That is the Gospel. And if you put the true bread into a poor man’s hand, you need not fret yourself sick over whether his stomach will digest it. The bread is good. The Bread is Christ. The giving of life is His domain.
Think of the farmer. He breaks the clods, he drops the seed, he covers it over, and then he goes home and sleeps. He does not sit up all night fretting over the furrows. He cannot command the rain or manufacture the sun. And yet the grain swells in the dark, and the rootlets take hold, and in time a harvest nods its head. So it is with the Word you have sown. The life is in the seed itself, it must grow, because it is living and incorruptible. Christ’s own Word cannot return to Him void. You may not see the blade yet. The work may be all underground, in the hidden places of the heart, where nobody but God can measure it. But if there is life there, it will make its way upward in due season. You can leave that with Him.
I know the enemy troubles you. You pray against the snatching away of the seed, and that is right. But remember to whom you pray. The strong man armed keeps his house until a stronger than he comes upon him and overcomes him. Christ has already bound that strong man. Satan is a chained foe. He may growl, but he cannot finally pluck from the Master’s hand one soul that the Father has given to the Son. The blood of Jesus speaks better things than the roar of the accuser. When you pray, “Deliver them from the evil one,” you are asking what the Son Himself asked, and He ever lives to make intercession for us. The sheep are safer than you sometimes feel them to be.
And do you not sense, perhaps, a little trembling in your own soul over whether this simple message is enough? You quoted that wonderful phrase, the “foolish plan of preaching.” The world scratches its head at it. Even our own hearts sometimes want something more polished, more reasoned, more likely to persuade. But a love letter is no less loving because it comes in a plain envelope, perhaps even one with a black border. The message is the power. The Gospel is the power of God unto salvation. Do not let your mind run down the path of “What if they need a better argument?” If you have held up Christ crucified, you have held up enough. He will draw all men to Himself. A poor woman with a tin cup can give a cool drink to a thirsty man as truly as if the cup were of hammered gold. The water is what matters. Christ is what matters.
So rest your heart, dear fellow laborer. Your work is to scatter; His is to water and to give the increase. The angels He has charged concerning you and those you love are not idle. The Spirit who first brooded over the deep is brooding over the hearts you have touched with the Word. I would not be surprised if, in the day when all things are revealed, you find that a word you barely remember speaking took root in some soul and has flourished into a great tree of faith. He is able to do exceedingly abundantly above all we ask or even think.
Let us entrust it all to Him now.
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Lord Jesus, You who are the Sower and the Seed, the beginning and the end of our salvation, look upon Your servant. Quiet the anxious questioning of the heart and grant a deep, calm confidence in Your own power to save. Water the seeds that have been sown in so many places, in homes and in cell blocks, among family and strangers. Let Your Word not return empty. Hold the hearers fast; keep them from the evil one. And until the harvest is gathered home, give Your child the peace of a laborer who trusts the Lord of the harvest. Amen.
Father, thank You for the Wisdom of the "foolish plan of preaching the Power of God" 1 Cor 1:18-31, Rom 1:16. Reveal Righteousness by faith Rom 1:17, Faith from Hearing, Rom 10:17, so Salvation by Grace through Faith is Freely Received, Eph 2:8-9, Bring others to Water Seeds, 1 Cor 3:6, Glory to You who Invented the Plan of Salvation, Saved and Taught us The Message, Gave us Any Ability to Do Anything of Real Value, John 15:5, You are The One Who Gives Growth 1 Co r3:7, Grant Spiritual Hunger 1 Pet 2:2, Wisdom and Revelation in The Knowledge of You, Eph1:17 Protection from the evil thief Mk 4:15 Jn 10:10 John 17:15 
Angelic Protection until Salvation Beheld, Ps 91:11-16, Heb 1:14...
Father, we thank You for these who've been praying for grace to witness in the face of trials and opposition, 1 Thes 2:1-13. We thank You for wide doors for effective service being opened despite adversaries, 1 Cor16:9, for divine appointments with housemates, in shopping centers, in cell groups, cell blocks, in churches, street corners, restaurants, with fathers, mothers, stepmothers, children, family, friends, enemies, wherever the Spirit blows, Jn 3:8, Give us what to say and HOW to say it, Jn 12:49.
Your arm is NOT too short that it cannot save, Isa 59:1, Numbers 11:23. Remind ALL that have ever heard, especially recently (and remind us, kindly) of our humanity, sin, the gospel of free grace by the bloody death of Jesus on the cross for our sakes, His death for payment of sin, Rom 5:23, with analogies of bills being paid, therefore nothing owed, it is finished, Jn 19:30, His resurrection, His appearing to many witnesses, His ascension, and sending of The Holy Spirit, Acts 2:32-33, and the correct response of repentance and continued discipleship, Jn 8:31-32.
This Jesus who was sinless BECAME sin for us, 2 Cor 5:21 (was judged to death as The Lamb, Jn 1:29, to break the curse of sin, Gen 2:17, John 11:50-51, Gal 3:13-14) so we could be made the righteousness of God on His behalf, as His ambassadors, 2 Cor 5:20, through the Word of reconciliation He's committed to us, 2 Cor 5:19.
Thank You for those who've heard, we've prayed with and for, and WE trust YOU Holy Spirit to continue to do His work until the day of Christ Jesus, Phil 1:6. Keep them and us all from the evil one, Jn 17:15, who attempts to snatch away the seed of the Word, Mk 4:14-15. May prayes render him as being bound, and having his goods plundered, Mk 3:27, as the late evangelist said, "we plunder hell to populate heaven."
Water the seed of the word and let them grow, provide more chances to share and grant us all full faith and repentance, turning from all sin with grief and hatred of it, wholly endeavoring to new obedience, trusting Jesus who has become for us wisdom, righteousness, continued sanctification, and redemption, 1 Cor 1:30. Thank you in advance, even now, in The Name of Jesus, Mk 11:24, Amen.
