Life of Peter: Called to Follow

Exeter Temple Message notes 9^th November 2014
Bible Readings:  Mark 1:14-20   John 1 35-42

Preachers can sometime give the impression that becoming a disciple is something we should do out of a duty of gratitude to Jesus for all he has done for us despite the fact that living with him is a bit boring and takes the fun out of life.  However the first disciples were captivated by Jesus and Simon later called Peter is no exception.  He followed Jesus for a number of reasons.

a) Relationship rather than religion. 

Religion can be about bricks and mortar, budgets and job descriptions - programs and denominations, rules and boundaries.  When Jesus came to Simon Peter He did not ask him to accept a concept or adopt an ideology, a philosophy or an institution.  He just kept on talking about Himself. “Follow Me,” “Come to me, come with me, come after me,”
 

b) Refreshing attractiveness of Jesus                

There will always be people in our lives who will ask us to go with them, follow their lead or make a claim upon our allegiance.  However their asking and our going are not automatic. There must be something about them that strikes a chord with us, which attracts us to them.                    
Surely Jesus must have had a refreshing attractiveness about Him.  Sometimes the image that is presented of Him is of someone nice, inoffensive and deadly serious.  We forget that in three years ministry He was accused of going to too many parties, changed water into wine, called the Pharisees and Sadducees names, told jokes, said that Capernaum was worse than Sodom and Gomorrah, cursed fig trees and behaved in a disorderly manner in the Temple.   

 “Jesus mesmerized them, captivated them, intoxicated them, made them laugh, made them hang awestruck upon his every word, made them feel a million dollars. Absolutely nothing would be allowed to stop them going with this man who was the first real man they had ever met, a man full of God.”   Richard Giles

c) Reliability of his teaching.                                                                                 

 

When someone offers us something - we are not always sure of either the validity of their offer or their ability to deliver.

“Was Jesus reliable?
In Mark’s gospel the way the story is presented makes it look like Jesus just happened to be passing by, spotted two likely candidates for His mission and by this chance encounter asked them to join up. But actually when we piece together the other narratives about the calling of the first disciples it happened a bit differently.
From what we read in John 1.35-42, this wasn’t the first time Simon Peter and his brother Andrew met Jesus. Andrew had evidently been following John the Baptist and was impressed when John said of Jesus, "Look the Lamb of God!" (v. 36) He had already spent a day with Him and he was keen to share this great discovery with Simon Peter.  A meeting was arranged.
After John was put in prison, Jesus moved from Nazareth went to live in Capernaum and started preaching.  Simon and Andrew lived in Capernaum and it is highly likely that they heard Jesus preach. In other words Andrew and Simon had time to make an assessment of Jesus before this definite decision to leave their jobs and become disciples.
Simon was not as impulsive as we sometimes make him out to be. We cannot accuse him of an emotional whim in saying yes to Him. 
What really impressed the first disciples and the crowds was that Jesus spoke with an authority, a natural authority flowing from total integrity, the mark of someone who doesn’t just know about God but who knows Him. 

d) The reality of a supernatural God                                                                

When they were near Jesus, they sensed God was near. When Jesus spoke it was as if God was speaking. When Jesus came upon a need He didn’t sympathise He called upon God to meet the need and the need was met, often in miraculous ways.  When Jesus faced evil He faced it with the confidence of God and conquered it. 

f there is nothing supernatural happening in our midst we can call ourselves a club, a society, a discussion group or a charitable organisation but we cannot call ourselves a church.   
Being around Jesus means that we are put in touch with the reality of a supernatural God.  What is happening among us, what positive changes are taking place in some of us and in our circumstances and lives that we cannot account for apart from God Himself being at work?  If they are not happening is that because we have pushed Jesus to the margins rather than him being our focus?

e) Room for ordinary, unqualified people

Having come to the conclusion that Jesus had all the qualities needed to fulfil all Peter’s dreams about the coming of a new kind of faith and his hopes about the coming of the Messiah,  Simon then has to ask, “Why would such a man be interested in having someone like me as His disciple”. 

Simon was an ordinary person. He was not trained in the Jewish religion, as the Scribes or Levites or Priests. He was not a Rabbi, a Pharisees or a Sadducees. He was a fisherman. That didn’t mean he was stupid or gullible but in calling Simon it is as if Jesus wanted to make a statement that anyone could be used by Him for His purpose. Jesus wasn't looking for the "cream of the crop." He was looking for ordinary people.

"For consider your calling, brethren, that there were not many wise according to the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble."  

1 Corinthians 1:26

What have we done to the message of Jesus Christ that He has ceased to be good news for many people? 

Maybe because instead of magnifying him we have reduced him, thinking we are making him more palatable and less demanding. 
“
It is time to recognise not only who Jesus was in his own day, despite the failure of his contemporaries recognize him but also who he is and will be in our own. “He came to what was his own wrote one of his greatest early followers and his own people did not accept him. That puzzle still continues. Perhaps indeed it has been the same in our own day. Perhaps even his own people this time not the Jewish people of the Western world have not been ready to recognize Jesus himself. We want a religious leader not a king! We want someone to save our souls not rule our world! Or if we want a king someone to take charge of our world what we want is someone to implement the policies we already embrace just as Jesus contemporaries did. But if Christians don’t get Jesus right what chance is there that other people will bother with him?”

“We have reduced the kingdom of God to private piety, the victory of the cross to comfort for the conscience and Easter itself to a happy escapist ending after a sad dark tale. Piety, conscience and ultimate happiness are important but not nearly as important as Jesus.”

(Simply Jesus NT Wright)

 We have reduced the spell-binding mystery of union with God and each other through the irresistible seduction of the bride of Christ, to a cheery, Sunday morning therapy session where the main question put to newcomers is: “Did you like it?” as if it were a meal at a restaurant or a newly released movie.”  (Geoff Ryan)

 

Blessings
Carol