Acres Of Diamonds
“Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields: for they are white already to harvest.”
(John 4:35)
In his classic speech, “Acres of Diamonds,” Russell Conwell reminded his audiences that the greatest opportunities often are found in one’s own backyard. He told of a man named Ali Hafed who was so obsessed with the desire to find a diamond mine that he sold his farm and wandered over the world in search of riches until he had lost both his wealth and his life.
The man who bought Ali Hafed’s farm was feeding his animals one day when he discovered a diamond in the garden brook. In this way, the most fabulous diamond mine in the world was discovered.
As Christians, we do not always have to travel to faraway countries to fulfill the great commission. There is abundant work for all of us in our own backyards. This is not to minimize the necessity of foreign missions, but to encourage a local view and well as a world view.
We all have the habit of thinking things would be a lot different if we were some other place. “The grass is greener,” so to speak. But it has to be mowed too. Never minimize an effort simply because it is not on a gigantic scale, or in a faraway place where people are more receptive.
Local opportunities are unlimited. There are family members, friends and associates, neighbors, etc., etc. The fields truly are “white already to harvest.” Jesus prefaced that statement in John 4 with these words, “I tell you, open your eyes and look at the fields.”
So, as someone has so aptly advised, “Let down your bucket where you are.”
Charles Cash
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Charles Cash, Devotional
on September 18th, 2008
