3rd Sunday after Epiphany –
Mark
If you have been carefully following the Epiphany Season
- and remember that its focus is to make known that Jesus, the Son of Mary is
also the Son of God, the Savior of
It is right here.
Don’t you see it? “At once they left their nets and followed
him.” “They left their father Zebedee in
the boat with the hired men and followed him.” This is as much a miracle as Jesus’
omniscience! This is as much a miracle as
healing people’s sicknesses or driving out demons. This is as much a miracle as the feeding of
the five thousand. You see, Jesus is
revealed as the divine Savior, the Son of God, when simply by the power of His
word, the hearts of these men are convinced to forsake all and follow Him. In fact, every time any sinner is moved to
hand his heart to the Lord, the power of Christ is made known.
With this clear understanding, we proceed to study this
Epiphany text with this Epiphany theme: The Epiphany Lord calls you - to a life
of total commitment; to a life of glorious service.
This was not the first time that the men of our text had
met Jesus. We are informed in the Gospel
of John that Andrew had been a disciple of John the Baptist. At the Baptist’s direction, Andrew and another disciple left John and follow Jesus. The first thing Andrew did was to find his
brother Peter and bring him to Jesus. As
these men talked with Jesus, and as Jesus explained to them that he is the Son
of God and their Savior, these men were led to place their trust in Jesus. They became his disciples. However, this discipleship did not yet
include following him full time. So they
returned to their professions as fishermen on the
At first, our attention is naturally drawn to the
response that these men give to Jesus’ invitation. Immediately they leave business, family,
home, and everything familiar in order to live a life with Jesus which they
really know nothing about. Yet, we are
missing the point if we marvel at their obedience and readiness to follow
Christ. After all, they did not obey
Christ’s call because of their righteousness or daring, but because of
Christ’s mercy and the power of his word.
These were sinful men just like you and me. Peter would one day deny Jesus. All of them were slow in understanding why
Jesus’ came. No one remained in
No, these men were called and convinced to follow solely
by the power of Jesus’ Word. It was the
Old Testament word of Jesus which had brought them to believe in a promised
Savior and the new words Jesus had spoken to them earlier that brought them to
believe Jesus was that promised Savior. Simply
put, discipleship is a gift of grace.
So, instead of marveling at the response of these ordinary fishermen,
let us marvel at the mercy and the power of Christ’s word. And that isn’t only the case for these four
men; it is the case for us hundred some men, women and children sitting here
today. We do not follow Christ today,
confess our faith in him, or stand confident in forgiveness and salvation
because of our righteousness or doing. We
too were born of sinful parents and thus inherited a sinful nature. By nature that sinful nature made us hostile
to God. It prevented us from be able to
or even wanting to follow God. It left
us spiritually dead. And as spiritually
dead individuals by nature, we were powerless to awaken even the remotest part
of our heart to love Christ. There
wasn’t even the faintest spark which could ignite in order to set our hearts on
fire for Christ. We brought nothing to
the table but sin when we were brought to faith. We didn’t make a decision for Christ. We didn’t prove ourselves worthy to be a
Christian. It wasn’t that we were only a
little resistant. We were dead pieces of
clay that God shaped to be his beautiful children through the message of Jesus
Christ crucified for sinners. Now, as
his children, what has he called us to?
The Holy Spirit, working through the words of Jesus had
persuaded these men to follow Jesus. Following
Jesus, however, would mean more than tagging behind their master on his trips
to
To follow the Lord means first of all to subordinate
everything to him. It means giving yourself
– heart, mind, and soul – to Jesus. It
means that work, wealth, and family will and must be secondary to following him. And be sure, these thoughts are not my
thoughts. These aren’t just suggestions
coming from your pastor as he stands in the pulpit. These are the very instructions of Jesus, who
was not silent on what it means to follow him.
“No one can serve two masters.” Jesus said, “Either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted
to the one and despise the other. You
cannot serve both God and Money” (Matthew
To follow the Lord also
means to simulate the Savior’s ways.
Jesus is holy, so we are to be holy.
Don’t let the fact that it is impossible to be perfect allow you to make excuses for sin. Every fiber of our being along every step of
the way is to be struggling and striving to do exactly what God desires. We never have an excuse for sin! And the Holy Spirit certainly did not give a
license to sin when he inspired Peter to write, “But just as he who called you is holy, so be holy in all you do” (1
Peter
To follow Christ also means to share his cross. To share Jesus’ cross means to willingly
accept whatever hardships come our way because we are a believer. If it means giving up riches because the way
we get them isn’t compatible to what Christ says, we do it. If it means suffering physical or emotional
injury because we continue to speak against the wickedness of this world, we do
it. Keep in mind Jesus’ words, “Anyone who does not take his cross and
follow me is not worthy of me” (Matthew
These truths of what it means to follow Christ were put
into words in an old gospel song entitled, “Where
He Leads Me” in which the chorus goes like this: “Where he leads me I will follow, Where he leads me I will follow,
Where he leads me I will follow, I’ll go with him, with him all the way.” Yet, don’t we at times have to admit that our
human nature wants to change that to say: “I’ll go with him till the summer,
I’ll tag along until I’m tempted, I’ll follow if the cost is cheap, If not, I’ll say so long all the way.” This portion of God’s Word confronts us with
some very important questions. Will we
put Christ first in our lives? Will we
take up the cross daily? Will we follow,
no matter the cost? Which chorus are we
singing?
Oh, it’s easy to sit
here and say that we are singing the chorus “where he leads me I will
follow.” But are we really? When we look into our lives is that really
what we always see? Certainly for those
of you whose worship is infrequent at best, and you know who you are, that
certainly can’t be said. For those of us
who find that devotion and prayer is an afterthought and only when we get a
spare moment type of thing, that certainly can’t be
said. For those of us who would never
let people know our salary and then know our offerings because we would be far
too embarrassed, that certainly can’t be said.
For those of us who keep that little mental list of wrongs only to use
them against that person at some later date, that certainly can’t be said. Where, really, does our love lie when we
choose wrong over right? Where, really,
does our love lie when teenage children are allowed to
Brothers and sisters we
need to repent. We must mean what we say
when we confess, “Holy and merciful
Father, I am by nature sinful and I have disobeyed you in my thoughts, words,
and actions. I have done what is evil
and failed to do what is good. For this
I deserve your punishment both now and in eternity. I am truly sorry for my sins.” Then, with eyes of faith, we must turn
and look to Jesus Christ. And what do we
see: our substitute; our sacrifice; our Savior.
We see his arms stretched out on the cross as he says, I do this for
you. We see the agony on his face as he says, God’s anger at you and your sin has been taken out on
me. We see the blood run down his face
as he says, I pay for your sins. We see him standing next to the empty tomb as
he says, see, God accepted my payment, your sins are forgiven, your salvation
is secured. Then he reaches out, takes
our hand, and says, “Come, follow me…and
I will make you fishers of men.”
You see, to follow
Christ also means to share this message of Christ. And how can we not? This message of Jesus Christ - our Savior,
our substitute, our sacrifice – has made us who we are. We would still be dead in our transgressions
and sins if the message of Jesus hadn’t reached our ears and hearts and made us
alive. We would still be enemies of God,
unable to enter heaven, unwilling to follow him, if the good news of God’s
forgiveness through Jesus Christ had not set our hearts on fire with love for
our Savior. How can we help but share what
has made us alive? There are still
hundreds, thousands, millions in our world today who are dead men walking. They do not know that Jesus died to pay for
their sins! They do not know that heaven
has been opened through Jesus Christ. They
do not realize that they cannot save themselves. They do not know how serious their sin
is. Or, if they feel the burden of their
sin, they do not know how to get out from under that despair. But we do!
We know it! We believe it! Now our Savior calls us to share it. We may not be as eloquent as the Apostle
Paul, but that’s ok. Right now we might
take the approach of Philip and simply say, “Come and see,” that will be
fine. It doesn’t matter whether you are
a pastor, teacher, missionary, stay at home mom, factory worker, in an office
cubicle, nurse, dentist, or retiree. It
is a privilege and responsibility God has given to all of us, and he has given
us the tool. It is not a net, it is not
human wisdom, it is the good news of Jesus Christ, the
power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes. You
spread the word, he will do the work.
On a Southern
battlefield a soldier had an artery of his arm lacerated severely by the
fragment of a shell and was fast bleeding to death. A passing physician bound up the artery and
saved his life. As the physician turned
to leave, the man asked, “What’s your name.”
“Oh, no matter,” said the doctor.
“But doctor,” the man said, “I want to tell my wife and children who
saved me.” We want to the world who it is that saved us!
We start in our own homes, we reach out to neighbors, friends, and
co-workers, we expand to communities we can reach, and we support the work done
in places we will never go. Christ has healed
our disease of sin, he has brought us from death to life, he has bound our
broken hearts, he has called us through his Word. Now, by the power of that Word go and live a
life of total commitment to Jesus, putting him first, following his example,
carrying your cross, and sharing his message.
Amen.