Has Jesus Called You?

If you take your Bibles and please turn with me to the Gospel of Matthew chapter 4, we'll be starting at verse 18 and reading on through verse 22. If you're using the pew Bible, you'll find it on page 842, Matthew 4, 18 through 22. Now here the word of God. As Jesus was walking beside the sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon called Peter and his brother Andrew. They were casting a net into the lake. For they were fishermen. Come, follow me, Jesus said, and I will make you fishers of men at once. They left their nets and followed him. Moving on from there, he saw two other brothers, James, son of Zebedee and his brother John. They were in a boat with their father's Zebedee preparing their nets. Jesus called them and immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him. May the one who inspired these words today make this truth very, very plain to our hearts and to our lives. Let's return to Matthew chapter 4, as we continue this morning in our study in the book of Matthew, the life of Jesus is seen through the eyes of that tax collector, former tax collector Matthew, before we look at that passage, in this passage, that's right, and let's ask to Jesus who is there in that passage, calling those men, who's here this morning in his calling. Let's ask him to speak to us, let's pray. Our Father in heaven, people in this congregation, come from different backgrounds, we come with different personalities. Our Father, some of us are introverts, and some of us, Father, like to walk out along the edge, some of us are quiet, some of us are loud, some of us like art, like music, and others of us love business. Our Father, some come here this morning with very heavy hearts, hurting more than they've ever heard on the inside, some our Father come here, elated, almost dancing, it's been a good week, last week, and this week begins, they're looking forward to it. Our Father, you're able to speak, Christ is able to speak so that each one of us hear him where we are, I can't teach that way. No one that stands behind this desk is able to teach that way, and so we pray in these next few minutes that we each would hear his voice in our lives where we are, and I pray that it would make a difference. Our Father, it would be a dreadful thing for him to speak to us, for him to be able to say an eternity, I was there in September, and I spoke to you, don't you remember? You did dreadful thing for him to say that, and for us to hear him, and forget what he said. Our walk away, and treat it as nothing, O Father, I pray that His words would affect our lives, and it would be a profound way in Jesus' name we pray, amen. As Jesus called you, we have all heard this passage, follow me. You've all seen the picture, even from earliest days in Bible school, maybe it was on one of those flannel boards with those figures, and we saw all these men fishing, and Jesus came and He said, follow me, we all have heard of that, and it's easy, and it's easy to pass over, so Jesus called these men, and their lives were never the same again. We like to say, I'm a Christian, Jesus has called me, we like to lay claim to the call of Jesus Christ, and say, He called me, but has He indeed, has He? Have our lives been profoundly changed by His call? Have we been affected so that we're never the same again, has the world around us been affected? Some Christians say, Jesus called me, I'm with Him, but honestly, when we look at their lives, there's no evidence. Some ministers say, Jesus has called me, we all know people that are in the ministry, and we wonder whether Jesus has really called them or not. Sometimes we hear, someone say, Jesus called me to do this, did He really? What is the evidence? Now it is a right, it is a good, it is a relevant question to read this passage, and honestly ask ourselves, each one individually, has Jesus called me, has He, has He called you? I want us to look at the principles of His call, the principles that were offered to this, He called these disciples, and ask ourselves that question in this few minutes. I want us to first see in this passage that Jesus calls us as we are. Jesus calls us as we are, look at verse 18, as Jesus was walking beside the sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers, Simon called Peter, and his brother Andrew, they were casting a net into the lake for they were fishermen. They had not been to seminary, they had not studied theology in any official capacity, they were fishermen. If you had been choosing Jesus' disciples for Him, these men would not have been even on your long list. You know, we assume that people in the Bible, especially these disciples, were very, very, very qualified. This was not the case. These men were fishermen. They had no thought of being theologians. They had no thought of being, quote, religious, unquote, men who would literally change the world. They were fishermen, and they intended on being fishermen the rest of their lives. A few years ago, someone wrote a fictional letter, a fictional letter to Jesus, and it was written from the Jordan Management Consultants, some of you have used consultants in choosing personnel for your firms, and this is what this Jordan Management Consultant wrote to Jesus. Two Jesus son of Joseph, Wood Crafters, Carpenter Shop, Nazareth, 25922 from Jordan Management Consultants. Dear Sir, thank you for submitting the resumes of the 12 men you have picked for managerial positions in your new organization. All of them have now taken our battery of tests, and we've not only run the results through our computer, but also arranged personal interviews for each of them with our psychologist and vocational aptitude consulting. The profiles of all tests are included, and you want to study each one of them carefully. As a part of our service, we make some general comments for your guidance. Much as an auditor, we'll include some general statements. This is given as a result of our staff consultation, and comes without any additional fee. It is a staff opinion that most of your nominees are lacking in background, education, and vocational aptitude for the type of enterprise you are undertaking. They do not have the team concept. We would recommend that you continue your search for the persons of experience and managerial ability and proven capability. Simon Peter is emotionally unstable and given the fits of temper. Andrew has absolutely no qualities of leadership. The two brothers, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, place personal interests above company loyalty. Thomas demonstrates a questioning attitude that would tend to undermine morale. We feel that it is our duty to tell you that Matthew has been blacklisted by the greater Jerusalem business bureau. James the son of Altheus and Thaddeus definitely have radical leanings, and they both registered a high score on the manic depressive scale. We wish you every success in your new venture in similar years, Jordan Management Consultant. Folks, the letter is fictional, but whoever wrote that letter was not just passing some time in some silly way. He was making a point. That letter is quite accurate. He was saying, look, Jesus took these people, Peter and John and Andrew, James, he took them where they were. Jesus did not wait until Peter became the great leader of the church to call him. He called Peter when Peter didn't look like much. John was not the great reflective thinker. He was not the great theologian when Jesus called him. He called fish for a living and playing to do it the rest of his life. You know there are people who are waiting to become Christians until they become better. They say, oh, before I become a Christian, I've got to become better. That's like saying, I'm not going to take a shower right now because I want to get clean before I take a shower. There are some Christians. Some of us Christians are waiting to serve until we become very, very, very good in our position or at that position. And we miss the operating principle that Jesus calls us as we are where we are. This is a lesson for us in another way. We want people to meet our qualifications of excellence before we accept them. You know, it's hard when you're like that. It's hard to be around Jesus because Jesus keeps bringing people around us. People that he's called, that he's accepted like they are and we're sitting there saying, Jesus, why don't you accept the sky? He's unacceptable to me. I'm reformed, very, very reformed. That means that I look at, that I believe that what the Protestant Reformation, the theology that came out of the Protestant Reformation is the best description of what the Bible teaches. It's most accurate of all theology about what the Bible teaches. And I want to tell you that Jesus likes that because he's reformed too. He really is. Some of the baddest doctors in those, not, but he is because you know what Jesus keeps doing? He keeps bringing people into our lives and in the malice that are not reformed. Why? Because he takes people where they are. Let me tell you, some of you are sitting there this morning and you've been waiting, you've been waiting to become Christians until you become better, no, you don't wait, he takes you where you are. Now, that's how he calls you. Don't miss his call because you're waiting to become better. Some of you are waiting to keep Sunday's school, are you waiting to sing in the choir? Are you waiting to do something with young people? Are you waiting to do something with your family? Are you waiting to do something out there in the world for Christ where you are and you're waiting until you become better at what you don't know, Jesus calls you as you are. Jesus calls us as we are secondly in this passage. I want to see that Jesus usually calls us in our vocation. Look at verse 19, come follow me, Jesus said, and I will make you fishers of men, at once they left their nets and followed him. Now, there has been much false teaching that has been derived from those two verses. Jesus called, did mean that these men ultimately left their vocation and fishing. They were fishermen. They left it. What does it say? They left their nets and followed him. Now, they came back to their nets from time to time, put this in real life situation. They came back to the sea of Galilee and they fished commercially from time to time for support. But the leaving of their nets that day marked the beginning of the end of their career in fishing. Now, from this, many have talked that Jesus, when Jesus calls us, he calls us to leave our vocations. A lot of people become Christians, some of you are really excited about being a Christian. And you really indeed want to leave your vocation. I want you to know that usually Jesus is not called the fisherman to leave their nets and they become ministers, but then work that way. I want you to turn with me to Luke chapter 3. This is terribly important, especially in the evangelical church. Luke chapter 3, John the Baptist is preaching, and people are responding from all walks of life to his preaching, Luke chapter 3, verse 12. I want you to understand that when Jesus, usually when Jesus calls us, he calls us in our vocations and he calls us to stay in our vocations. Luke chapter 3, verse 12, tax collectors came also, this is coming to John the Baptist, came also to John the Baptist to be baptized. Teacher they asked, what should we do? And John the Baptist said, don't collect anymore than you're required to. He didn't say, stop being tax collectors, now tax collectors that day was just about as low as you could get. People looked at all tax collectors as being thieves. They were traders, they were Jewish folks who worked for the Roman government and they looked at them as being traders, traders to their country, they looked on them as being thieves. But John the Baptist did not say he's been stopped being tax collectors, what did he say? He said, be tax collectors, but do it like God, want you to do it? Do it right, look at the next verse, then some soldiers ask him, what should we do? He replied, don't export money and don't accuse people falsely, be content with your pay. He didn't say, get out of the Roman army. He said, be soldiers, but be a soldier like Christ, be a soldier, don't use your power to export money, don't use your power to abuse people. Do your vocations, God, want you to do it? That's how God usually calls us. Now many people labor under the false guilt, some of you this morning are laboring under horrible guilt and you say, you know how to be doing something in church, how to be teach us good, how to be singing, how to be doing something in the church because out there in the world where I work, it's just a necessary evil and it's nothing. I do, I had somebody recently tell me, look me and I, and I knew, I knew that he was a Christian businessman in a wonderful job for Christ in the work world and he looked at me and he said, John, I don't do anything for Jesus Christ and he was wrong. I know this man, he does much, much for Christ and he really consistently serves him and understands what it is to serve him out in the world. But this guilt trip has been laid on him that says, you know, to really be serving Christ, you've got to be in the pulpit or you've got to be teaching us, I'm just good class, you've got to be singing the choir, you've got to be helping with the youth group or something of that nature, not so. When Jesus calls us to serve him, he usually calls us in the vocation where we are, we're to be out there in the world saying to the pagans that are doing our job here, let me show you how Christ does this job. Henry of the very was a king and he had grown very, very weary of being a king and all the burdens that came with it and he decided that he would enter a monastery and serve Christ in a monastery for the rest of his life. And so he left the throne and he went to a nearby monastery where there was a leader called Pryorichard and the Pryor there, Pryorichard listened to Henry's request, he said, I want to lead the throne and I want to be served the Lord in this monastery for the rest of my life and Pryorichard said in this monastery, you must learn obedience, absolute obedience, you've been a king, you've been used to getting orders now, you must take orders, do you think that you can really do that? And he said, I, the Pryor said, I, in the head of this monastery, that means that whatever I say, you must do and serve Henry of the very, you took a solemn oath that he would do whatever the Pryor told him to do and as soon as he finished the oath, the Pryor looked at him and said, King Henry, here is my command, you go back to your throne. He said, God has called you to be a king for him to leave the throne, would be to disobey Christ. What did Pryorichard understand? He understood that Jesus usually calls us in the vocation where we are. Jesus calls the butcher and the baker and the candlestick maker, listening to me as much as he does, the missionary and the minister. There was a young man who had just become a Christian and he was so excited, he was a young farmer and he was plowing in his field, he was working in the corn field and looked up in the sky and he saw a sign in the sky, two letters and one letter was P and the other letter was C and he said, that means that I am to preach Christ and so he left his plow in the field and he went and began to preach Christ all over the county and he became a preacher. But he was a horrible, horrible, horrible failure and soon it became even obvious to even him that he was a failure and so he went to this wise, oh elder and he said, I saw Pseed in the sky and I know I meant preach Christ and yet it's just terrible and the elder said you made a mistake, he said, Pseed for you did not mean preach Christ and the young men said what did it mean? He said it meant plow corn, you understood Jesus usually calls us in our vocation, he calls us as we are, he usually calls us in our vocation, thirdly Jesus calls us through a process. You know I used to read this passage, Jesus welcomed me up to the water and he just used to fascinate me, say these guys have never seen Jesus and Jesus has walked us and they found me and said what power this man must have had, well you need to know that man had power but you also need to know that this was not the first time that Peter and Andrew and James and John had seen Jesus, they had known him for quite some time, they had talked with him and conversed with him and I'll show it to you right now, some of you are going to learn something about the New Testament you didn't know, turn to John chapter 1, verse 35, John chapter 1, verse 35, the next day, now this is John the Baptist again, John chapter 1, verse 35, the next day John was there again with his two disciples. When he saw Jesus passing by I said look the Lamb of God, when the two disciples heard him say this, they followed Jesus, turning around Jesus, saw them following and asked what do you want, they said rabbi which means teacher, where are you staying, come he replied and you will see, so they went and saw where he was staying and spent that day with him, it was about the 10th hour, Andrew, Simon Peter's brother was the one who heard what John had said and who followed Jesus, the first thing Andrew did was to find his brother Simon and tell him we found Messiah, that is the Christ and he brought him to Jesus, Jesus looked at him and said if you are Simon son of John you will be called seepus which is translated Peter, this event happened several months before the event we read about Matthew chapter 4 this morning, two separate events, most of all one happened, the one we read first from Matthew chapter 4 was at the Sea of Galilee, it was where Peter and Andrew and James and John lived, this event with John the Baptist, John the Baptist headquarters were mainly down in Judea, down in Jerusalem which was south of Galilee, it was like Galilee, New York, Galilee would be New York or Connecticut up in the north and Jerusalem in Judea would be Virginia or North Carolina down in the south and John was down in the south and we learned two things from this, we learned that the core of Jesus disciples Peter and Andrew and some of the others were John the Baptist disciples before they were Jesus disciples, it's not only that John the Baptist prepared the nation for Christ, John the Baptist actually trained some of Jesus early disciples, but also we learned that the core of Jesus was a process, look at verse 43 of John chapter 1 after he talked with Nathaniel, I mean excuse me with Peter and Andrew, verse 43 the next day Jesus decided to leave Galilee to leave for Galilee, it's in Judea, he's going north again finding Philip, he said to him, follow me, so he gets Philip, he already has Andrew and Peter and he may have had all James and John, James and John were friends with Peter and Andrew and they might have all been together, but they walked back to Galilee, that was months and months and months before Jesus walked up to the late side and said follow me, you see the call of Christ, the call of Jesus is a process, he was no stranger when he walked up and said follow me, they knew him, they had talked for the wee hours, day after day and week after week, when Sammy Graham who was one of our deacons gave his testimony and his decon, his examination for decon, he spoke at the time when he became very serious about his faith and he said, he became serious about his faith, it was tempting to look at that and isolate it and say look what God has done but he said when I look back, I saw that before that it was like a blueprint, God had been at work in my life, it was like a map and you could see it, what was he saying, he was saying the call of Christ is a process in our lives,

this week I spoke to a young man who had listened to our tapes from independent, he did not go to church here, he did not live in Memphis, I did not know him, he did not know me except few tapes, he had never heard of our church before he got those tapes that a friend of his had been killed and another friend had given him these tapes and said you need to listen to these and this weekend I was in Knoxville and he just happened to be where I was, isn't that a coincidence and you could see what was fascinating as I said and talked to him and I had this message in mind you could see the process of God's own going call in his life, his God brought things together and was changing him, this says to us, listen to me, Christians make a terrible mistake, this says something to us about these folks, about when we say that the call of Christ is like this, something happened today and Christ has called me and it's right now, it's hurry, hurry, hurry, make a decision now, now, now, no, not usually, you ought to be aware of such things because usually it's by a process that Jesus calls us, I can remember when Durant Fleming sat in my office, he was a young man in business here in Memphis and he said to me, John I believe God, he was in our college and career ministry said I believe God's calling me into the ministry and you gotta be careful what you tell people like that because they'll go and do it and I said look Durant you don't know whether he's calling you and I knew the call of God's process and you go to your back to your business and you work for a year and you be successful and you do a great job and you make money and then you come back here a year later and see tell me that Christ is calling you into the ministry and you know what he did what I said couldn't believe it and he came back a year later and he said well I've worked and the Lord's blessed it but I believe God is calling me into the ministry and then I set up and I said maybe because Jesus Christ calls us through a process. Jesus calls us as we are, Jesus usually calls us in our vocation, Jesus calls us through a process. Fourthly, Jesus calls us to reorient our lives around him. Look at verse 19 he said come follow me we've heard those words all of our lives we know them by heart but do you know that most of us do not have any idea what they mean. When I was young I looked at this and I thought this was a geographical command come and go with me while I'm going leave this area and they did lead their immediate environment and they followed him but that's not what Jesus meant he was calling them to a life he was calling them to a way of living a way of living that they had not been living he was calling them to reorient their lives around him he was saying walk with me he was saying be like me show the through the spirit in your life like I show the through the spirit of my you see this is the difficult part sometimes I've heard people say and you have to you know if Jesus had called me and said follow me I would go with him to the ends of the earth that would be simple to do come on it would be simple to follow him to Russia or to China or wherever he calls us geographically that's nothing let me tell you what's tough is when he says be like me follow me walk with me stand where I stay and say what I would say because you see his life is going that way and the world's life and our lives are going this way and it means a complete change of direction a complete change from the inside out if you think that it is natural and easy to follow Jesus Christ you have no idea about the bit of our own souls and the greatness of his own life this is exactly what Jesus calls us to do he called these guys and he says come on be like me and follow me it's what he calls us to do you know we want to talk about forgiveness we want to say oh Jesus has called us to the cross to be forgiven oh Jesus has called us in his grace oh Jesus has called us in his life it's a wonderful thing we're saved and we're forgiven we love to talk about that but we don't like to talk about the sacrifice of service we don't like to talk about becoming like him and a world that's nothing like him calls us to reorient our lives around him that's why folks the evangelical church is lacking the power in our day we want to talk about his salvation his grace that we're forgiven is comfort but we don't want to talk about the service where's the service where's the standing where he stands where's the saying what he would say where's the obedience it actually makes the world a tremble and exactly the great set out to conquer the world and he was a man well equipped to do that job before the age of 34 he had conquered the known world one day down in Persia a long way from home he came to this huge city wall city well fortified and he went up to the wall and the king came to the wall and he demanded that the king and the city surrender and the king looked at him and said Alexander you are a long way from home Alexander the people in the city outnumber your army and we are well fortified city why should we surrender to you and Alexander took the challenge and he said I'll show you why and he gathered a group of his soldiers squadron of his soldiers and he put them in single file order and he began to give them commands to march this way and that and soon he had them marching single file toward a sheer cliff and without breaking striding without hesitation the first soldier went over the cliff and in the next soldier and in the next soldier and in the next soldier and after ten soldiers Alexander after six soldiers had fallen to their death Alexander gave the order hot and then he rode back to the wall and he looked up at the king and he said that is why you had best surrender and the king the city people the world is not seeing that kind of follow him Christ from his people they're not seeing that kind of obedience where the people of God have been powerful in the world where the people of God have been world-changing in the world the world has trembled when it has seen the obedience the reorientation of life around Christ that says you may do what you want to do you may go away you want to go but here is where I stand and here is what I say and it doesn't matter because here's where Christ is see Jesus call calls us to read here you see why this is important you think Jesus easily claimed to the call of Christ isn't it I'm not sure I want to lay claim to that call Jesus calls us where we as we are Jesus usually calls us in our vocation Jesus calls us through a process Jesus calls us to reorient our lives around him fifthly Jesus calls us to depend on his power I've missed this before look at verse 19 and we're through come and follow me Jesus said and I will make you stop right there I will I always thought about everything every commentator ever read concentrated on the fishers of men forget the fishers of men he said I will make you people it's not his call unless it depends on his power he did not say come and follow me Jesus did not say come and follow me your talents and your gifts will make me Jesus a great man he did not say come and follow me without your gifts and talents my calls will fail he said you come and follow me and I will make you one of the great failures the evangelical church in our day as we've not been dependent upon his power we used our own weapons our own ingenuity we've looked at the corporation we've looked at excellence and leadership out in the world and we've copied everything we can power lies in the presence of Jesus Christ in our lives he says I'll make you I'll make you I'll make you I'll make you Oswald Chambers put it this way it's not a question of our equipment but of our poverty not that what not what we bring with us but what he puts in us I love the story about Paterrasky the pianist the composer a mother took her a small son to hear him play the piano was there on the stage there was a great crowd there and she was talking with some people the lights were up and she lost her son she just wasn't paying attention to him and as the lights began to go down she looked for him and then she began to hear and people began to hear notes and the piano and she looked up and it was every mother's horrible dream there in front of the whole audience in that theater was her son little son sitting on the piano and he was leaning on the piano and he was plucking with one finger twinkle twinkle little star she didn't know what his sink down in her seat and crawl out of the theater or go getting but then something remarkable happened Paterrasky walked on the stage and without turning to the audience he sat on the bench beside the little boy for his arms around him and he whispered to him he said son keep playing don't stop playing and little boy kept plinking out twinkle twinkle little star and Paterrasky began to play and he played all around what that little boy plucked out and he turned a little ditty of a child's melody into a great composition oh people don't kid yourself sometimes we see that we're doing something great for God sometimes he's out when it is something great for God someone's and we look at somebody and we say they did something great for God no no a thousand times no no one has ever done anything great for God no

our efforts are nothing more than a childish tune plucked out an index finger small simple childish tune feeble efforts is Jesus who comes and he sits down beside us in our lives and he changes a simple melody into a concerto if you don't get anything else from this message you get this follow me and I will make you a man