The Gospel of Mark, Pt. 7 - Called to Follow

There’s a story of a young woman who wanted to go to college, but her heart sank when she read the question on the application blank that asked, "Are you a leader?" Being both honest and conscientious, she wrote, "No," and returned the application, expecting the worst. To her surprise, she received this letter from the college: "Dear Applicant: A study of the application forms reveals that this year our college will have 1,452 new leaders. We are accepting you because we feel it is imperative that they have at least one follower."

There are countless books on building and becoming effective leaders. We go to conferences and workshops to sharpen our leadership skills. Churches and other organizations will invest countless resources trying to develop strong leadership. And yet, we’re so quick to effectively ignore the value and importance of being a follower. And yet, I think its safe to say that some of the greatest leaders in the last two thousands years, including kings and presidents and CEO’s and those who were leaders in their respective fields of expertise were all actually followers - followers of the Lord Jesus Christ. And today we’re going to be introduced to four early followers of Jesus, two of whom eventually became significant leaders in the early Christian Church.

Last week we considered the message of Jesus as he began his public ministry in the surrounding areas around the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel. This was a message of the announcement and introduction of the kingdom of God, and for people to repent and believe in the gospel so as to ender into that kingdom. And today we’re going to consider one of his early methods of ministry, namely, to call followers, or disciples to himself whom he would teach and develop close relations with in order to prepare them for future ministry of their own.

So if you have your Bible, please turn with me to Mark 1:16–20 “Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on a little farther, he saw James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, who were in their boat mending the nets. And immediately he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired servants and followed him.”

Let’s pray.............

I am fully convinced that the pinnacle of the Christian experience during our lifetime here on earth is not the moment we get saved, but the lifetime of sanctification and discipleship that follows. In fact, I think the Christian life would be a total drab if our salvation experience was as good as it gets, and then it simply goes downhill from there until we enter into glory. Rather, I think God has designed the Christian experience within the context of discipleship so that our experiences over time become richer and more fulfilling as we learn more about Jesus and become more like him. Because that’s what discipleship is all about, and that’s what each and every one of us is called to. We’re called to follow Jesus, but not just in some vague, superficial, once-a-week style of Christianity, but rather a deep and abiding and intimate relationship in which the goal of the student is to become more like their master each and every day. And so in our time together today, we’re going to consider a few different principles of discipleship that we can glean from the text and hopefully use to examine our own personal walks with the Lord and see if in fact we’re following the biblical picture of what it means to be a Christian.

So notice back in verse 14 that Mark mentioned that Jesus “...came into Galilee...”, which means one thing......he was somewhere else before. And if we reference the other gospels, particularly the gospel of John, we know that before Jesus began his public ministry in Galilee, he was in Jerusalem and spent some time going back and forth between Jerusalem and Galilee. Furthermore, Jesus’ coming into Galilee following John’s arrest as mentioned in Mark 1:14 means that everything we read about from John 1:19 all the way through the end of John 3 took place between verses 13 and 14 in Mark 1. That means the wedding in Cana where Jesus turned water into wine.....Jesus cleansing the temple in Jerusalem.....Jesus’ famous conversation with Nicodemus about becoming born again in John 3.....all of that happened before our passage here in Mark 1:16 and following.

So what does this all mean? Well, for one, we know for a fact then that Jesus’s encounter with Simon and Andrew and likely James and John as well here in verses 16-20 wasn’t the first time these men encountered Jesus. Consider the story we read in John 1:35–42 “The next day again John was standing with two of his disciples, and he looked at Jesus as he walked by and said, “Behold, the Lamb of God!” The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. Jesus turned and saw them following and said to them, “What are you seeking?” And they said to him, “Rabbi” (which means Teacher), “where are you staying?” He said to them, “Come and you will see.” So they came and saw where he was staying, and they stayed with him that day, for it was about the tenth hour. One of the two who heard John speak and followed Jesus was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his own brother Simon and said to him, “We have found the Messiah” (which means Christ). He brought him to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon the son of John. You shall be called Cephas” (which means Peter).”

Again, if we just read Mark’s gospel, it seems as though Jesus met these men for the very first time as they were fishing alongside the Sea of Galilee, and they just immediately followed him. But that’s hardly the case. These men had multiple interactions with Jesus. These men were also disciples of John the Baptist, so they had heard of Jesus long before this encounter in Mark 1. And this teaches us a very important principle about Christian discipleship.....the first of a few that we’re going to consider for today.......... (SLIDE) We don’t follow Jesus to be saved; we follow Jesus because we’re saved.

Its all too common in our modern church context to put the cart before the horse so to speak. We try to get people to come to church....or to attend a Bible study.....or to get involved in various ministries or outreaches. And all that stuff is good. But if we’re not careful, we’ll begin to think that a person’s involvement in the life of the church signifies that they’re genuinely a part of the family of God. And what we’re often left with is a bunch of active, unsaved individuals who have been made to think that involvement in ministry equals salvation in Jesus. And that couldn’t be farther from the truth. Our first priority should be to evangelize, and then we disciple. That’s the order we see in the Great Commission in Matthew 28.....Go, baptize (evangelism), teach (disciple).

From John’s account, it seems as though Andrew and Simon Peter were already saved before Jesus called them to follow him in Mark 1. Considering again their first encounter in John 1, Andrew admits to his brother Simon that they had found the Messiah, and so he brought Simon to Jesus. And then we’re told that Jesus changed Simon’s name to Cephas, or Peter - which was something we see in the Bible, both in the OT and NT, that is connected to a person’s faith in God and a transition or transformation in their relationship with God with respect to God’s call on their life (Abram to Abraham......Jacob to Israel. So Andrew and Simon Peter put their faith in Jesus as the Jewish Messiah, some time had passed, and now Jesus was calling them to something deeper....something more personal.....something more transformational that will change their lives forever.

And from here, we’re going to see a couple more discipleship principles in the text. Look again at verses 16-18....(SLIDE) “Passing alongside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” And immediately they left their nets and followed him.” Andrew was the one who first chose to follow Jesus, and he was the one who would introduce his brother Simon to Jesus. But notice that Mark mentions Peter first. Remember, it was Peter who Mark got his information from for this gospel narrative, and it was Peter who would play a more significant role not only in the partnership ministry with Jesus and the other disciples, but certainly at the onset of the early Church following Pentecost. And so Simon Peter seems to hold the more prominent position here, where Andrew is described as the brother of Simon, not the other way around.

Nevertheless, Jesus calls out to them both while they were actively fishing alongside the shores of the Sea of Galilee. And notice Jesus’s statement - “Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.” This brings us to our next discipleship principle......(SLIDE) Christian discipleship is the work of God empowering faithful obedience. How many times do we get stuck or even frustrated with where we are in our walk with Jesus? We look around and it seems like so many others have figured it out.....they have a ministry.....they seem to know their calling......they’re thriving in their walk and everything just seems to work out for their good. And so its easy to wonder.....what’s wrong with me?

But I hope we can all find encouragement from Jesus’s statement here in verse 17. He begins by saying “Follow me......” Who or what are you following these days? If we’re honest, we’re likely following people and things other than Jesus, at least part of the time. We follow the news.......we follow trends......we follow our parents or our friends…..we follow our own desires and feels......we follow social media influencers. Do you know who the most followed individual is in the world of social media? The most followed individual on Instagram is the (SLIDE) international superstar soccer player Cristiano Ronaldo with 652 million followers. The most followed user on Tiktok is (SLIDE) Khaby Lame, with 162.5 million followers. And the person with the most followers on Facebook is actually (SLIDE) Ronaldo as well, with 170 million followers. Jesus likely influenced hundreds, or maybe at best thousands, in his lifetime. But I want you to think of this crazy statistic.....in the year 33 AD, when Jesus died, was buried, and resurrected from the dead, its been estimated that there were about 247 million people living on earth. That means Ronaldo has influenced over 2.5 times as many people than all who were alive in Jesus’s day.

And since 2020 with the onset of COVID, social media influencing has exploded due to its potential for fortune and fame. And so today, its so easy to be influenced and to follow so many more people than was possible just a generation ago, let alone centuries ago. But the call of Jesus remains the principle call for anyone who identifies as a Christian.....He’s saying to all of us.......Follow me. Interestingly, although Jesus was a Jewish Rabbi in some sense, it was not customary for rabbis to ask people to follow them. It was tradition for a young man who wanted to become a rabbi to interview with an existing rabbi and ask to come under his teaching and discipleship. So in the traditional Jewish context, the individual follower sought out the master. But in the case of Jesus, the master seeks out his followers.

But he’s not seeking them to follow him in a superficial sense, like we follow others on social media. We don’t really know them.....and we’re certainly not in deep, personal relationship with them. But to follow Jesus is exactly that - intimate, personal relationship with the one whom we’re seeking to emulate and become like. And we see this precedent in Christian discipleship throughout the NT. The apostle Paul says in 1 Corinthians 11:1 to follow him as he follows Christ. In the ESV, it’s rendered this way (SLIDE) “Be imitators of me, as I am of Christ.” And so Christian discipleship at its simplest form is following Jesus by imitating him and imitating those who are likewise following Jesus.

However, those actions cannot be accomplished on our own. After Jesus commands Simon Peter and Andrew to follow him, he says (SLIDE) “...I will make you become fishers of men.” Jesus will make them what he intends for them to become. And the same applies to you and me today. God makes us into that which He desires us to become.

Christian disciple is entirely the work of God through the power of the Holy Spirit. Its never just on us to turn ourselves into followers of Jesus, as our salvation experience from justification to glorification is not due to human effort but God working in us and through us. And yet, in the midst of the beginning and the end, we’re actually called to partner with God in this symbiotic relationship with the Holy Spirit called sanctification. Paul describes this relationship in Philippians 2:12–13 (SLIDE) “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.”

Interestingly, Paul is equating obedience to God as working out your salvation with fear and trembling. And that’s how obedience can seem some time. Sometimes its hard to be obedient to God because it can be scary to talk by faith. We don’t always know what we’re doing or where we’re going, and that can be hugely uncomfortable at times. Obedience to God can be hard work, but that’s why sanctification is so important, and yet so beautiful and so powerful to behold. So sanctification involves our active obedience to the will of God as we work, but also as God works in us. Its God the Holy Spirit who is at work in us.....he changes our hearts and our minds......he transforms our desires and ideals.....and he conforms us into the image of Jesus.

So as we follow.....as we obey......as we walk in faith......Jesus (through the Holy Spirit) makes us become that which he has intends us to become. Simon Peter and Andrew were merely fishermen, but faithfully following Jesus would make them become fishers of men. And this brings up another principle of discipleship.....(SLIDE) Christian discipleship is less about what you’ve been, and more about what God is making you become. According to the world, you are either defined by your past, or....if there’s any hope to break of the past, its only going to come on the heels of what you make of your life. In others words.....its all about trying harder....and its all on you! And that is the basis for all empty human religion and spirituality - the emphasis on the self.

But following Jesus is entirely different. I think its safe to say that had Andrew and Simon and James and John not met Jesus......there’s no way they would have envisioned themselves following a new way of life that would have literally changed the course of history. They were fishermen.....their fathers were likely fishermen, as were their fathers’ fathers......and that was their supposed future as well. And this is what happen when we open up ourselves to following Jesus without hesitation and without compromise and being willing to leave everything else behind to follow the Lord. When that becomes our heart-posture.....Jesus makes us into the people he wants us to be. And often times, God will use our past to effect our futures.

Again, think of Andrew and Simon.....and James and John. Andrew and Simon were actively casting their nets when Jesus called out to them. They were doing what they did and knew best. And then look at what they became....especially in the case of Peter. Jesus took their past and reshaped and transformed it into something that would bring him glory and build the kingdom of God. Andrew and Peter were used to working hard to catch fish, but following Jesus would take those skills and now apply them to catching souls with the gospel. Now Peter had a lot to learn in those few years of ministry with Jesus, and even afterwards, he struggled in his flesh because of his past habits and former ways of thinking. But look at the power of his preaching following Pentecost. He preached some of the most impassioned and theologically rich sermons, and look at the result....masses of people responded by putting their faith in Jesus. And it was Peter who gave us the hallmark Bible verse when it comes to Christian apologetics and evangelism and fishing for souls - 1 Peter 3:15 (SLIDE) “...but in your hearts honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you; yet do it with gentleness and respect,...”We should always be prepared to offer reasonable and logical reasons for why we believe in Jesus.....and we should always be prepared to do so with a gentle and humble and respectful disposition.

And then look at James and John, the sons of Zebedee. Apparently they were quite a handful and were possibly prone to emotional outbursts or being argumentative. We certainly see that play out in the gospel narratives. But consider what they were doing when Jesus called them. They weren’t fishing, but were with they dad and servants in a boat and they were mending the fishing nets. Over time, nets would tear and rip, and if the holes got too big, they would effectively become useless. And so mending the nets was an important task and skill to have. The Greek word that is translated as mending is (SLIDE) katartizo = to make adequate or sufficient....to mend and restore.

That same word is used in Galatians 6:1 where Paul says (SLIDE) “Brothers, if anyone is caught in any transgression, you who are spiritual should restore him in a spirit of gentleness.” Or in 2 Corinthians 13:11 (SLIDE) “Finally, brothers, rejoice. Aim for restoration, comfort one another, agree with one another, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you.” James and John were skilled in mending and restoring fishing nets so they could be put back into good use after having incurred some damage. Likewise, when our lives and relationships are damaged because of sin, we are called to restore and mend those relationships.

Now I don’t want to read too much into the text and make up something that the original authors never intended, however, consider James and John, who would later become two of Jesus’ closest disciples, and along with Simon Peter, would make up Jesus’ most inner circle of friends and disciples. It was these three who were at the transfiguration and the garden of Gethsemane and were specifically mentioned as being present with Jesus in many other instances in the gospels. John would become known as the disciple whom Jesus loved, which was a title he gave himself. And I used to think that was an arrogant and prideful thing to say about yourself, but then I thought.....wait a minute.....is it wrong to self-identify as someone who Jesus loves? That’s not arrogant.....that’s good theology and knowing your relationship with Jesus!

Furthermore, John would would onto write the theological and Christological gem that was his gospel letter, which is packed-full of some of the best arguments for the divinity of Jesus - which is quite a fitting thing coming from a guy who liked to argue! But John would also write 1, 2, and 3 John, which are some of the richest letters about love - namely the love of God and how we too are to live lives of love toward God and one another. And what greater mender and restorer of relationships is there....but love? Could it be that John’s familiarity of mending and restoring fishing nets would enable him to be better equipped to show us how to mend and restore relationships with one another? Afterall, we’ve been restored to right relationship with God through the love of Jesus, and now we’re called to partake in that mending and restoring process with one another as the love of God in Christ flows through us.

And then lastly, let’s consider one final Christian discipleship principle (SLIDE) Christian discipleship will reward you with infinitely more than it will cost you. Its very common when talking about Christian discipleship that we talk about counting the cost.....which is the thoughtful consideration of what you’ll have to give up in order to follow Jesus. Andrew and Simon gave up their livelihood and James and John gave up relationships and maybe even a certain level of luxury as they had hired servants.

Now when it comes to you and me, we may not be called to give up our jobs or our family and friends to follow Jesus, but maybe we might. However, the call of discipleship and the cost to follow Jesus remains universal......deny yourself, take up you cross. and follow Jesus. In other words.....put to death all your personal, inward desires and passions and motivations, and follow Jesus wherever he takes you. And all too often, we’re fine with those demands, at least in theory, in the very beginning of our walks with Jesus, and then time passes.....life wears on you......new temptations and new opportunities come our way. And then the whole “take up your cross” metaphor means something entirely different.

Because when we’re offered the pleasures of this world, sometimes it can be unbearably difficult to resist. And that’s why Jesus’ question in Mark 8:35-36 is so important to ask ourselves from time to time......(SLIDE) “For whoever would save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake and the gospel's will save it. For what does it profit a man to gain the whole world and forfeit his soul?” Its tempting to want the high-paying job......the financial security......the nice home and the nice vehicles. But its not just material stuff that tempts us....it can also be relationships. How many times are we led astray because of our desire to be in relationships with others? Or maybe its because we fear change, or we fear commitment....we fear breaking out of our comfort zone and trying something new or challenging. Whatever it may be....the cares and the temptations of this world can be so enticing, but rest assured that when we give into them, we forfeit that which builds and edifies our very souls. In others words, we sacrifice eternal reward for temporary pleasure.

So yes, Christian discipleship will cost you. But it promises to reward you with so much more! So many people struggle with FOMO - the fear of missing out. And so they attend as many social gatherings as possible, even at the expense of their own souls and sanity. Others have serious FOBL - fear of being lazy. And so productivity and activity equals importance and significance. And so they’ll have their hand in a million different pots, taking them in a million different directions because of the demands of the life they’ve created, which may not even be the life Jesus has called them to. And so again, at the expense of soul and sanity, they continue on.

But remember the story of when Jesus visited the house of Mary and Martha. The two women took two very different approaches to the visitation of Jesus, which still offers us an important lesson. Martha was corrected because in all her busyness, she neglected the one greater thing.....the thing that Mary in fact embraced.....sitting at the feet of Jesus. Mary had her priorities in order, and as a result, her reward was great!

Yes, following Jesus in intimate, personal discipleship will cost you.......it may cost your job.....it may cost you your comforts and conveniences.....it may cost you relationships.....it may cost you your future hopes and dreams. But you get so much more in return.....namely......you get Jesus. Yes, our eternal rewards in heaven are too immense and too numerous to even count. But if we’re going to be honest, its difficult to think of those things and stay our minds on them when we’re in the toughest stages and deepest desperations of life. But in this life, we’re promised Christ , and if we abide in him, our lives will bear much more fruit than we could ever dream of producing on our own. And so this is THEE question when it comes to Christian discipleship......

(SLIDE) IS JESUS ENOUGH????

Apparently those early disciples knew that he was. Again, Mark’s common description of these events tells the story.....Jesus called, and immediately they followed. Like we just sang......they decided to follow Jesus....and no turning back. It was a no brainer for them. They saw the miracles.....the heard the preaching.....they were becoming well-familiar with the person and work and character of Jesus.....and he was enough for them.

So is Jesus enough for you? Or are we going to be like so many other Christians today and say in our minds - yes Jesus is enough.....but in our actions and behaviors....its more like Jesus and........