In previous posts we’ve looked at the when and where of God’s calls. This post will begin exploring responses to His calls.
The central point we’ll look at today is that our initial skepticism and later missteps do not disqualify us from faithfully responding to God's calls.
Let's start by prayerfully reading these scriptures describing the callings of Jesus' first disciples.
The next day as John stood there again with two of his disciples, Jesus went past,36and John looked towards him and said, 'Look, there is the lamb of God.'37And the two disciples heard what he said and followed Jesus.38Jesus turned round, saw them following and said, 'What do you want?' They answered, 'Rabbi' -- which means Teacher -- 'where do you live?'39He replied, 'Come and see'; so they went and saw where he lived, and stayed with him that day. It was about the tenth hour.40One of these two who became followers of Jesus after hearing what John had said was Andrew, the brother of Simon Peter.41The first thing Andrew did was to find his brother and say to him, 'We have found the Messiah' -- which means the Christ-42and he took Simon to Jesus. Jesus looked at him and said, 'You are Simon son of John; you are to be called Cephas' -- which means Rock.
43The next day, after Jesus had decided to leave for Galilee, he met Philip and said, 'Follow me.'44Philip came from the same town, Bethsaida, as Andrew and Peter.45Philip found Nathanael and said to him, 'We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and the prophets wrote, Jesus son of Joseph, from Nazareth.'46Nathanael said to him, 'From Nazareth? Can anything good come from that place?' Philip replied, 'Come and see.'
47When Jesus saw Nathanael coming he said of him, 'There, truly, is an Israelite in whom there is no deception.'48Nathanael asked, 'How do you know me?' Jesus replied, 'Before Philip came to call you, I saw you under the fig tree.'49Nathanael answered, 'Rabbi, you are the Son of God, you are the king of Israel.'50Jesus replied, 'You believe that just because I said: I saw you under the fig tree. You are going to see greater things than that.'51And then he added, 'In all truth I tell you, you will see heaven open and the angels of God ascending and descending over the Son of man.'
As he was walking by the Lake of Galilee he saw two brothers, Simon, who was called Peter, and his brother Andrew; they were making a cast into the lake with their net, for they were fishermen.19And he said to them, 'Come after me and I will make you fishers of people.'20And at once they left their nets and followed him.21Going on from there he saw another pair of brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John; they were in their boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them.22And at once, leaving the boat and their father, they followed him.
As he was walking along by the Lake of Galilee he saw Simon and Simon's brother Andrew casting a net in the lake -- for they were fishermen.17And Jesus said to them, 'Come after me and I will make you into fishers of people.'18And at once they left their nets and followed him. 19Going on a little further, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John; they too were in their boat, mending the nets. 20At once he called them and, leaving their father Zebedee in the boat with the men he employed, they went after him.
Now it happened that he was standing one day by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the crowd pressing round him listening to the word of God,2when he caught sight of two boats at the water's edge. The fishermen had got out of them and were washing their nets.3He got into one of the boats -- it was Simon's -- and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.
4When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, 'Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.'5Simon replied, 'Master, we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.'6And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear,7so they signaled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled both boats to sinking point.8When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, 'Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.'9For he and all his companions were completely awestruck at the catch they had made;10so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. But Jesus said to Simon, 'Do not be afraid; from now on it is people you will be catching.'11Then, bringing their boats back to land they left everything and followed him.
A. Jesus didn’t write Nathaniel off because of his snide remark about Him. John 1:45-46. Nor did God pass on Moses, Gideon, Jeremiah, or Peter when they initially made what turned out to be specious objections to their calls. See Exodus 3 & 4, Judges 6:11-24, Jeremiah 1, Luke 5:8. In fact, in Luke 5:4-7, Jesus even provides a great blessing to Peter after Peter expressed doubt about one of His directions.
B. God sticks with those committed to serving Him even when they mess up. That is demonstrated by the lives of two of the guys involved in these passages, Peter and Phillip. Both made later missteps or otherwise failed to “get” what Jesus was up to, but God continued to use them. Consider Peter’s response to Jesus’ prophecy of His passion, Matthew 16:21-23, his reaction to Jesus washing his feet, John 13:6-9, his sleeping through Jesus' agony in Gethsemane, Mark 14:32-38, his reversion to fishing in John 21:1-3, his incorrect focus on what Jesus assigned to other disciples, John 21:20-22, and his difficulties handling the acceptance of gentiles into the Church. Acts 10:14-16, Galatians 2:11-14. Similarly, consider Phillip’s skepticism of Jesus’ proposal to feed the multitudes, John 6:5-8, and his seeming obliviousness to what Jesus was doing/going through in John 12:21 et seq, and John 14:8-9. Jesus continued to use these men—and use the greatly—in spite of those missteps. We see the same thing elsewhere in scripture; God continued to use Abraham, Moses, and Elijah even after they had missteps or misunderstood what God was doing. See Genesis 12:10-20, Genesis 20, Numbers 20:2-13, 1 Kings 19:9-21.
C. Instead of writing us off when we mess up, God helps us recover from our missteps. We see that In Jesus' response to Nathaniel’s snide remark, John 1:45-51, and His response to Peter’s skepticism. Luke 5:4-11.
D. While we should obviously try to avoid missteps, we shouldn’t let our emotional reaction to them when they inevitably occur overwhelm us. Peter, Isaiah, and Elijah each experienced emotional reactions to their real or perceived inadequacies, but God helped them push through them. See Luke 5:8, Isaiah 6:5, 1 Kings 19. Likewise, 1 John 3:19-20 and common experience tell us that they are not the only ones who have experienced—and overcome—such emotions. As Proverbs 24:16 puts it: “though the upright falls seven times, he gets up again” (NJB).
E. The fact that even great servants like Abraham, Moses, Elijah, Peter, and Phillip had missteps also tells us that we must extend great grace to our brothers and sisters when they mess up. Otherwise we’ll miss the wonderful blessings God wants to deliver through them. That’s probably one of the reasons Jesus commands us to extend great grace to each other in Matthew 18:21-22 and Luke 17:3-4.
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Other posts about God calling folks to the purposes He created them for are collected at What we can learn about God's calls from Jesus calling His first disciples--collected
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