Jamie McDonald is a name you are probably not very familiar with, but his story is an amazing one. It all starts when he tells his friends that he is going to join them while they run a marathon. The problem was Jamie really didn’t realize what a marathon involved. He even joked in a later interview that when he committed, he really didn’t understand that running was involved. His race went just as you would have expected. The first little bit went just fine but as the race continued, Jamie began to run slower and slower to the point he ended up laying out on the sidewalk hardly able to move and strangers had to feed him orange slices to get him back to his feet. He finally finished the race, hours behind his friends and made a promise “I will never run again!”. As he sat at home over the next few months, he realized that the reason he struggled so much wasn’t because of the running itself but because he actually liked running, but it was because he did not realize what was required of him to be a runner. He had been trying to run a marathon on his own terms and that is why he failed. Therefore, from that point on he began to take running seriously, taking the time to learn what was required of him in order to be a world class endurance runner. Once he started to follow through with the requirements he took upon himself the name “Adventureman” and used his new found running prowess and identity to raise money for sick and disabled children. Through his adventures as Adventureman he has run over 5,000 miles across Canada and 5,500 miles across America. He broke a world record by running on a treadmill 20 hours a day for 7 days to cover over 550 miles. For good measure he bought a second hand bike and biked 14,000 miles from Bangkok to his home in England. While he did all of these amazing feats, he raised over $1 million dollars for children around the world. All of this happened because he finally realized what was required to be an endurance athlete and he sold out to follow through with what was required. When I first heard his story it got me thinking, what if we as Christians are struggling and frustrated in our Christian lives because we are a lot like Jamie, we really don’t understand what is required of us. Sure we have ideas of what we should do, but if they are not what God wants, we are always going to fall short of His plan for our lives. Therefore, maybe we need to ask ourselves this question as we begin this morning, “What does God require of us?”. I’m sure when you think about this question you have a variety of answers going through your heads — I know I did. However, as I examined each of my answers I realized that most of those were byproducts or fruits of what God really requires from us. So this morning I want to start a new sermon series in which we will explore what God does require of us, how to see if we are fully committed to that call, and to see what God can do through someone totally sold out to Him. My plan to start this series was to share the entirety of this morning's sermon in a brief 5 minute introduction, but God had other plans. So I will preach that sermon next week and speak this week on three simple verses that will lay the groundwork in our understanding of what God truly requires of us. So if you have your Bibles this morning turn with me to Mark 1:16-18.
Mark 1:16-18
One day as Jesus was walking along the shore of the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew throwing a net into the water, for they fished for a living. Jesus called out to them, “Come, follow me, and I will show you how to fish for people!” And they left their nets at once and followed him.
The answer to the question, “What does God require of me?”, can be answered by the simple request Jesus made to Simon and Andrew — “Follow me”. Obedience to that simple call is all God wants from us and total obedience to that call will bring forth every other fruit that God wants from our lives. This call to be a follower of Jesus is very much akin to being a disciple of Jesus. As a matter of fact if your Bible has subheadings, you can look at the subheading above verse 16 and it probably says something like, “The first disciples” or “Jesus calls His first disciples”. To begin to understand what is required of us, we are going to need to understand how Simon and Andrew would have understood Jesus’ call to them. As we do we will start to get a clearer picture of what it is to be a disciple or follower of Jesus.
What is a Disciple?
The idea of being a disciple or discipleship was not foreign to first century Jews, Greeks, or Romans, it was something that was seen all throughout their culture. Therefore, Simon and Andrew would have known exactly what Jesus was asking of them. A disciple was a learner, a student of a master, and this was something that was seen at all levels of society from the politicians, the scribes, to the craftsmen. They understood that to be a disciple was not to be a student like we might understand students today. Jesus wasn’t giving them an invitation to come and sit in a classroom for semesters on end and learn through books and lectures, but He was inviting them to learn by doing. They were to follow the master in the real world, to understand the things they would be taught and how they lived out day by day. This call to discipleship was a call to intimacy with the master. There was a Jewish idea that a disciple was to follow their master so closely that they would be covered in the dust of their sandals. I’m sure you have experienced this to some degree in your life, I recently experienced this while forging a knife. I have zero experience or knowledge of how to work around a forge, but me and my son decided it is something we would like to try to learn. Therefore, we went to a forge and signed up for a lesson with a blacksmith. When we arrived the blacksmith didn’t sit us in a room and give us a book or lecture us for a time, instead he took us straight into the forge, provided us the materials, took materials for himself, and said ok now follow me. I’ll show you what to do and in a little under 2 hours we had forged a couple of really cool knives. No injuries, no burns, just a new understanding of how you really forge things because we were following the master. I couldn’t even imagine how bad things might have been if he would have just handed us a book, told us to read and follow these rules, and then stuck us in the forge. It would have been a nightmare but instead he called us to follow him and we learned by doing. This is the same with the calling of Jesus. It is not a call to just follow His rules, but it is a call to come and let Him show you how to live life the way God designed from the beginning. This is the reason we say that Christianity is not about following rules, but it’s about a relationship. It's about the relationship with the Master. As Simon and Andrew responded they knew to answer this call would mean they would be learning and doing at the feet of the Master. This call to follow Jesus is a call we see many times throughout the New Testament and it’s the same call Jesus extends to each of us. Jesus is not looking for converts, He is not looking for admirers, He is not looking for those interested in just an academic knowledge of Him. He is looking for those who will follow Him in word and deed and be His true disciples. Is this easy? No, it’s not easy. As we will see throughout this sermon series, it will be one of the hardest things the disciples or you will ever have to go through. Therefore, I think a better question would be not, “Is it easy?”, but rather, “Is it worth it?” To answer this all you have to do is look at the book of Acts. These same men, who were many times scared, usually undereducated, and always a mess followed Jesus for three years. The entire time watching, listening, and participating in the ministry of Jesus and then when they were filled with the Holy Spirit, they continued in what they had learned from Jesus and turned the entire world upside down. The same can happen through us. All we have to do is follow Him and this leads us to our next point, a disciple and their mission can never be separated. They must be accomplished.
What a Disciple does.
The mission of a disciple should always be at the forefront of a disciples mind because that is always the goal you should be working toward. It's why you are following the Master in the first place. That is why Jesus' call to follow Him, was coupled with their mission as well. If you come and follow me, come and be my disciples, then I will make you “Fishers of Men”. The mission that Jesus lays out for these disciples is more than just a clever play on words because they were fishermen. Instead it’s an idea that is rooted in the Old Testament. Although they were just fishermen, Simon and Andrew would have more than likely understood this mission on a deeper level because they were Jewish. When you go into the Old Testament prophetic writings of Jeremiah, Ezekiel, and Amos you will find this idea of “Fishers of Men” multiple times. However, each time you see it mentioned it’s in the context of Divine Judgment, therefore the idea of judgement and fishing for men would have been understood, but not exactly in the way Jesus meant it. Jesus wasn’t calling them to fish for men to bring them to judgment, but to fish for men to save them from judgement. That was Jesus’ mission and as His followers that was their mission as well. We see this in John 3:16-17 as Jesus says, “For this is how God loved the world: He gave His one and only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him will not perish but have eternal life. God sent His Son into the world not to judge the world, but to save the world through Him.” This was Jesus’ mission during His three years of ministry and it was the mission that Simon would continue to carry out once Jesus had gone. Listen to what Simon (Now Peter) tells the religious leaders, the same men who had seen Jesus sentenced to death and were now threatening him with death as well. Acts 4:13, “There is salvation in no one else! God has given no other name under heaven by which we must be saved.” He was still carrying on his mission, even in the face of adversity, persecution, and possibly death. Peter was sharing the same Good News with those who sought to hurt him that Jesus is the only way to be saved from their sins. A disciple is always about the mission given to them by their master, and this is the same with us as well when we follow Jesus. Our mission is the same as those first disciples and is reiterated and summed up in one of Jesus’ last earthy words given to those disciples as recorded in Matthew 28:18-20, “Jesus came and told his disciples, “I have been given all authority in heaven and on earth. Therefore, go and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Teach these new disciples to obey all the commands I have given you. And be sure of this: I am with you always, even to the end of the age.” Our mission is to be followers of Jesus who make other followers of Jesus; disciples who make disciples, which is what is required of us. However, before you panic about our mission, I want to reassure you by briefly sharing a nuance that is found in Greek in Jesus’ statement. What Jesus is literally saying is that when you follow me, you will BECOME “Fishers of Men”. He was telling them it is a process and it is not something that happens overnight. You aren’t going to be perfect at it immediately. It’s going to take time as you follow and imitate Jesus, which is exactly what happened with those disciples as well. As you read through the Gospels you will see that even though they answered Jesus’ call they still struggled, they still stumbled, they still made mistakes, and guess what? You will too. You are going to struggle as you follow Jesus and carry on His mission, but just because we know we are going to struggle doesn’t mean we give up or don’t even try. We have a Good Master whom we are following, and it is He who corrects us as we make mistakes and shows us by His own actions how we are supposed to live our lives as followers of Christ and how to make disciples ourselves. Our mission needs to be at the forefront of our minds and during this sermon series. I think we are going to need to ask ourselves two questions as we look at how Jesus is leading us. #1. How am I imitating this part of Christ in my life? #2. How am I helping others to do the same? This is the beginning of being a disciple who makes disciples.
Who a Disciple Follows.
I don’t think Simon and Andrew had a lot of information about Jesus when Jesus came calling. We are told very little about Jesus’ life in the first 15 verses of Mark, but what was contained within those few verses was enough for them to drop everything and follow Him. The One who was calling them to follow is revealed as the Messiah, the Christ (1:1), we are told He is the Son of God (1:1), the Lord (1:3), the mighty One (1:7), the worthy One (1:7), the One who baptizes with the Holy Spirit (1:8), the Spirit-anointed One (1:10), the beloved Son (1:11), the One who pleases God (1:11), and the One who brings the kingdom of God (1:15). This caused Simon and Andrew to respond in faith and follow Jesus. Yes this call was unique because this was usually not the way it was done in Jewish society. It was the students who asked the teacher if they could follow not the other way around, but this was just the start of Jesus turning the status quo upside down. The call of Jesus is unique because He is unique. There is no one like Him, there never was and there never will be. He is the King of Kings and the King of Kings has no one to share His throne with because there is no one who is His equal. This same unique call is the same call extended today — follow me. We will talk more about this call next week and we are focused on the One whom we follow throughout this entire series. However, we have to understand that the One who calls is the One who makes the difference. It wasn’t Simon or Andrew that brought anything to the table. It was Jesus who empowered them to accomplish the impossible. All they had to do was respond in faith and follow Jesus and this is just the same with us as well. I hate to break it to you, but you bring nothing to the table when it comes to the calling of Jesus to follow Him either. It’s just a promise that God in flesh will be there to lead you, to never leave you, and to sustain you until He comes back or calls us home.
So this morning, I guess we need to ask ourselves before we really begin this sermon series, are we really following Jesus? Are we following Him with everything that we have, willing to leave everything behind because Jesus has called us to something greater? That’s a scary thing, but something I think that is worthy of the prayer, “Lord I believe, help my unbelief”. Are you ready to truly follow Jesus, to be His disciples and carry out His mission starting today?
