June 13, 2024

Trusting Jesus and Casting Our Nets into the Water

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When Jesus called his first disciples to follow him, he commanded them to cast their nets into the water after a long night of catching nothing (Luke 5). They obeyed his word, trusting Jesus, and cast their nets once again—and were astonished to find not only a great catch but so many fish that their boats began to sink. Then, after his resurrection in John 21, Jesus again met his disciples fishing. Like before, their initial attempts yielded no fish. But upon Christ’s command, they cast their nets once more to find a haul so big they couldn’t bring it all in.

For the entirety of Jesus’s earthly ministry, he was teaching his disciples a vital lesson—“apart from me, you can do nothing” (John 15:5). But with Christ’s blessing, the harvest he wants to yield through his people is more abundant than anything we could’ve expected. He simply wants us to keep trusting Jesus and casting out our nets at his command.

A New Website

This is what we’ve been seeking to do in 2024 at Harvest USA. On January 26, we successfully launched our new website. The new site is not simply an aesthetic makeover, but an opportunity to launch multiple new initiatives to bring the hope of Jesus Christ to more and more people around the world impacted by sexual struggles.

Dangers and foes assail us on many fronts regarding God’s good design for sexuality and gender, and future generations are relying upon the church today to remain steadfast and biblically faithful.

I’m particularly excited about two new features. First, we developed topical landing pages that pull various resources from our site on specific issues like pornography, same-sex attraction, transgenderism, spousal unfaithfulness, a struggling child, and more. We also launched our new online course platform so individuals and churches can receive teaching and training from our staff anywhere at any time. We currently have two courses for parents seeking to raise sexually faithful children in a gender-confused world, with over 1,000 people registered already! We aim to continue developing new courses that will speak to a variety of issues for men, women, spouses, parents, and church leaders. Most importantly, thanks to your generous donations and financial support, we’re able to offer these courses at no charge.

Marketing as Spiritual Fishing

But it does no good to launch new courses if no one knows about them. This is why we’ve engaged in the largest marketing effort of our entire 40-year history. We want to raise awareness about our new resources to a wider audience. So far, we’ve engaged in partnerships with World Magazine, Tim Challies, Becket Cook, Westminster Theological Seminary, Compass Classroom, The Reformed Forum, SpurgeonBooks, and Lighthouse TV. We hope this is just the beginning. Our marketing efforts have included podcast, radio, and television interviews, audio spots, magazine ads, email campaigns, and sponsored social media posts. All of this is our way of casting out our nets. Apart from Christ’s blessings, our rally cries will fall on deaf ears. But, as we pray and seek to humbly follow the Captain of our faith, we’re already seeing the fish come into the net. We expect an even more abundant haul in his timing.

Trusting Jesus in Discipleship

The fish are not only coming in through our equipping efforts; we’re seeing record numbers seeking discipleship. For the first time, we have waiting lists for our men’s, women’s, and wives’ ministries. There is simply more demand than we can meet. This is obviously a sad commentary on the pervasive destruction of sexual sin, but it’s also a great encouragement that God’s people have not given up hope. Every man and woman who reaches out to Harvest USA is fighting to believe there is hope found in Jesus, and we have the great privilege of pointing them to their Savior.

With Christ’s blessing, the harvest he wants to yield through his people is more abundant than anything we could’ve expected. He simply wants us to trust him and cast out our nets at his command.

Just the other night, I had the joy of attending the graduation of five men finishing our men’s Discovery program. One by one, they shared their testimonies of God’s grace in their lives. Their consistent theme was increasing hopelessness, despair, and discouragement regarding their sin until they got involved at Harvest USA, when the new hope of Christ’s redeeming power rushed into their lives as they plugged into our groups.

The Need Is Great, but Our God Is Greater

We are at a critical juncture as the church in America. Dangers and foes assail us on many fronts regarding God’s good design for sexuality and gender, and future generations are relying upon the church today to remain steadfast and biblically faithful. Harvest USA is working harder than ever to spread the message of truth, hope, and grace found in God’s Word regarding these matters. But we need your help to continue this vital effort.

As we come to the end of our fiscal year on June 30, thank you for prayerfully considering a special gift that will enable us to continue to produce and disseminate new and needed content for Christ’s Bride as well as hire new staff to handle the growing demand from individuals and families reaching out to us for help. The need is great, but our God is greater. I look forward to continuing to share news of the abundant catch that Christ alone can bring in.

Click here to support the work of Harvest USA today.

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Mark Sanders

President

Mark has been President of Harvest USA since October 2022. Mark holds an M.A. in Counseling from Westminster Theological Seminary, Glenside, PA, and a B.A. in Communications & Integrated Media from Geneva College,

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