Called to follow…blindly?
Sermon
Lectionary Texts: Mark 1:14-20 & Jonah 3:1-5, 10
Our passage this week is a familiar one. And of course NOW I have a plethora of ideas for what we could pull out of this story. But, when I first read it...I drew a blank. So I decided to take a look at the Scripture we read from Jonah. Here is what I noticed: Both describe a call being followed, a moment of obedience. You don’t NEED to have them but, feel free to grab your Bibles. We are going to do a little bit of investigating/digging
I’ve heard this section of Mark preached on many times before. Those verses removed from the rest of the story seem to speak of a blind faith. “Jesus went to the lake, told the fellas to come with me and they just followed! Wow...what faith!” Maybe you’ve experienced teaching like this before, from a church, from parents, bosses...in politics...This “do what I say not what I do” kind of leadership.
It made me think of this meme I saw this week:
“I CAN DO ALL THINGS THROUGH A VERSE TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT.”
We get in trouble when we cherry-pick scripture, when we remove a story from its context, its setting and culture, the characters. Out of context, this seems to present a model celebrating the faith it takes to blindly follow. But in context, we see something different...IN CONTEXT we see that Jonah KNEW God, and Simon, Andrew, James and John KNEW Jesus.
While we are called to follow Jesus and God, there are times we may also be called to follow a person...to sit under someone else's leadership; where we must choose who we are following, and we are not called to follow blindly!!! In any of these cases, we are not called to follow blindly. Even God and Jesus provide evidence and witness of who they are. From our texts, we can glean some tools for deciding who we choose to follow.
In our reading from Jonah, we see him respond with obedience to the call to go to Nineveh. He responded this way because by this point he KNOWS God and God has revealed his character to him. I don’t necessarily recommend taking the same route as Jonah… We’ve probably heard the story of Jonah. At this point in the story, he chooses to obey after God sent him to timeout in the belly of a whale. But if we read closely, we learn that Jonah knew God even before that. We don’t have to go far to find that Jonah knew and worshipped God:
Jon 1:8 NIV - "So they asked him, "Tell us, who is responsible for making all this trouble for us? What kind of work do you do? Where do you come from? What is your country? From what people are you?""
Jon 1:9 NIV - "He answered, "I am a Hebrew and I worship the LORD, the God of heaven, who made the sea and the dry land.""
Jonah knew and worshipped God. So how does this apply to the story of the first disciples? How do we know that Simon (Peter), Andrew, John and James knew Jesus?
This is where context is important! The Bible provides us multiple tellings or perspectives of this story if we investigate the Gospels (Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John). It provides us a fuller picture. We’ve heard Mark’s version of events and Matthew’s version of events was very similar. But, Luke and John give us some more pieces to add to the puzzle.
If you have your Bible, let's turn to Luke 5 to see what information Luke can add:
Luk 5:1 NIV - One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, the people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God.
Luk 5:2 NIV - He saw at the water's edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets.
Luk 5:3 NIV - He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat. Simon hears Jesus’ teaching. In all likelihood, Simon had already probably at least heard of Jesus and his ministry through word of mouth...
Luk 5:4 NIV - When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, "Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch."
Luk 5:5 NIV - Simon answered, "Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets."
Luk 5:6 NIV - When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break.
Luk 5:7 NIV - So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.
Luk 5:8 NIV - When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees and said, "Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!"
Luk 5:9 NIV - For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken,
Luk 5:10 NIV - and so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon's partners. Then Jesus said to Simon, "Don't be afraid; from now on you will fish for people."
Luk 5:11 NIV - So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.
What pieces of the puzzle can we add here?
They had probably heard of Jesus’ ministry
Simon had heard him teach
They witnessed a fishy miracle
What more can we learn from John? We’re turning to John 1. Last week we talked about where Jesus calls Philip. Well, this is the segment of scripture right before that...more pieces of the puzzle ...painting in some of the details…
Jhn 1:35 NIV - The next day John was there again with two of his disciples.
Jhn 1:36 NIV - When he saw Jesus passing by, he said, "Look, the Lamb of God!"
Jhn 1:37 NIV - When the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus.
Jhn 1:38 NIV - Turning around, Jesus saw them following and asked, "What do you want?" They said, "Rabbi" (which means "Teacher"), "where are you staying?"
Jhn 1:39 NIV - "Come," he replied, "and you will see." So they went and saw where he was staying, and they spent that day with him. It was about four in the afternoon.
Jhn 1:40 NIV - Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, was one of the two who heard what John had said and who had followed Jesus.
Jhn 1:41 NIV - The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him, "We have found the Messiah" (that is, the Christ).
Jhn 1:42 NIV - And he brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, "You are Simon son of John. You will be called Cephas" (which, when translated, is Peter).
What pieces do we gather from John’s version of events?
John who baptised Jesus (Matthew 3:16 As soon as Jesus was baptized, he went up out of the water. At that moment heaven was opened, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. 17 And a voice from heaven said, “This is my Son, whom I love; with him I am well pleased.”)
John tells Andrew
Andrew tells his brother Simon a.k.a. Peter
The first disciples had testimonies from others and witnessed for themselves who Jesus was before making the choice to follow.
Jesus gives us free will, He gives us the choice to follow and believe. And, He gives us evidence with which to decide if we will! (That is theology!...there’s a whole course of study called systematic theology. It sounds intimidating but we all do it...it is simply the practice of making statements about God and Christianity based on the ENTIRE Bible.) And if we are given tools to decide whether or not to follow Jesus...shouldn’t we look for similar evidence in deciding who we follow in earthly leadership?
I believe that January 6th and so much that lead up to those events were the results of a lot of people blindly following. People blindly bought into following people who spoke what sounded appealing...but their actions spoke otherwise. This is why context and listening to and believing multiple reliable perspectives is important! The information we gather and are given is an important part of discerning who we follow. When we don’t, we can become blinded and sometimes we choose to be blind. We are experiencing the consequences of a large part of our population blindly following. So what causes people to buy into that kind of leadership?
Power
Agenda
Bias / prejudice
Ignorance
Selective perspective
Selfishness
Greed
So, we are given tools to use for discerning who we follow!
We need to look at the whole picture. Jesus says in Luke:
Luk 6:43 NIV - "No good tree bears bad fruit, nor does a bad tree bear good fruit.
Luk 6:45 NIV - A good man brings good things out of the good stored up in his heart, and an evil man brings evil things out of the evil stored up in his heart. For the mouth speaks what the heart is full of.
What are questions we can ask as we discern?
What do their words/actions/decisions say about a person's character?
We look for fruits of the spirit:
Bad Fruits
Gal 5:19 NIV - The acts of the flesh are obvious: sexual immorality, impurity and debauchery;
Gal 5:20 NIV - idolatry and witchcraft; hatred, discord, jealousy, fits of rage, selfish ambition, dissensions, factions
Gal 5:21 NIV - and envy; drunkenness, orgies, and the like. I warn you, as I did before, that those who live like this will not inherit the kingdom of God.
Good Fruits
Gal 5:22 NIV - But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, forbearance, kindness, goodness, faithfulness,
Gal 5:23 NIV - gentleness and self-control. Against such things there is no law.
Ultimately, we must remain steadfast in recognizing that God is who we depend on for provision. He is where we ground our faith, our hope...
Rom 15:5-6 NIV - May the God who gives endurance and encouragement give you the same attitude of mind toward each other that Christ Jesus had, so that with one mind and one voice you may glorify the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.