35 Jesus was going through all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every kind of disease and every kind of sickness. 36 Seeing the people, He felt compassion for them, because they were distressed and dispirited like sheep without a shepherd. 37 Then He said to His disciples, “The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. 38 “Therefore beseech the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into His harvest.”

Matthew begins to shift focus from the crowds to the few, the twelve who followed Jesus most closely. Chapters one to four were the introduction of Christ to the world. Chapters five through seven comprise the Sermon on the Mount. Eight and nine view the Lord’s ministry to the multitudes. Our present passage forms a transition into His discipleship ministry with the twelve.

By this time the disciples had observed Jesus in numerous situations, so that seeing His compassion was nothing new. But now it becomes a backdrop for a foundational stage of Christian discipleship—having the heart of the Master. The ministry of Christ was one of compassion for the human felt-needs of people. The early post-resurrection disciples embraced this mindset (see for example Acts 4:32-35, Gal 2:10). He is still mindful of suffering today.

The word “compassion” means to “feel with” another. It differs from empathy in that while the latter is an emotion, the former is an impetus to action. James 2:15-16 makes it clear that empathy not leading to active compassion renders faith useless and dead. Discipleship, following the example of Christ, means hands-on doing something about the human needs of others.

The larger vision of discipleship, though, is to see more than just the human felt needs. The real need of lost people is that they are without divine guidance in their lives, like sheep without shepherds. The needs go deep—inner distresses and discouragements in life. What people need is a Good Shepherd, One Who lays down His life for the sheep, Who came that they might have an abundant life (John 10:10-11). Discipleship requires faith to see in the faces of the non-believing world that there is a harvest ready for reaping, perceiving that peoples’ lives are not as complete and put together as they seem on the surface.

Finally, a real issue of discipleship is the relatively few who take up the challenge. Those who are already disciples need to constantly pray for more to share the burden of reaching the lost with the life-changing message of Christ.

Lord, help me have the same compassion the Lord Jesus has for the lost. Bring more Christians to discipleship to help in this mission.