Tag Archives: disciples

Forty Days of Praying the Word of God: Day 12

“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 send you out to fish for people.” At once they left their nets and followed Him.”

Matthew 4:18-20

Jesus, I pray to be a fully abandoned follower, willing to abandon my current pursuits, my current way of life, to leave all I know in order to obey Your call to “come, follow Me”.

And I pray it for Your Church. May we hear Your voice call out to us to follow You into what You’re doing in the earth right now, and I pray we will be willing to drop our programs, drop our goals and plans, let it all go for You. May we drop our nets that have caught followers of ministries, followers of performances, followers of popularity. Call us again, Jesus. Call out to Your Church to drop everything and follow You, so that You can make us fishers of people for You, not us.

Make us an abandoned people, God, abandoned to obedience, abandoned to our first love, abandoned to Your Spirit. Abandon us to the Gospel, Lord, and fill us with power and a burning desire to see the lost enter into Your Kingdom, to see those You are pursuing step into eternal life.

Call us again, Jesus, bid us to follow You and be transformed again. Call us to drop everything that would keep us rooted in place, so that we can be free to truly be Your disciples.

In Your Name I pray. Amen

I am not enough

disciples

Reading the words of John and I knew I was missing a point somewhere. So I did what I do when I’m stuck in this age. I went there to that age, to that mountainside. I put myself among the ragamuffins and I looked at what they saw and I listened to what they heard. And the point I was missing found me.

 

Then Jesus went up on a mountainside and sat down with His disciples. The Jewish Passover Festival was near.

When Jesus looked up and saw a great crowd coming toward Him, He said to Philip,“Where shall we buy bread for these people to eat?”  He asked this only to test him, for He already had in mind what He was going to do.

Philip answered Him, “It would take more than half a year’s wages to buy enough bread for each one to have a bite!”

Oh Philip. Come stand by me because we both see the same thing here.

You and I see impossible. There’s just too much here to fix. Too many, too much and not enough. Pockets and heart are both kinda empty so how on earth can these ‘too many’ hungry ones be fed? How can so many be helped when there’s not enough to give?

When our eyes are on the great crowd of need and not on the Bread of Life, impossible is all we see.

 

Poor people in Ethiopia keeping their hands up.And sometimes we don’t realize that the testing of our faith is a test of Who we see in the midst of seeing impossible.  And I have been overwhelmed of late. My eyes have been fixed on the crowd with their heads down and their hands out and my not enough keeps getting bigger.

And Jesus took a little boy’s not enough and made it more than enough but I’ve stopped offering up my not enough. Because just like ragamuffin Philip all I see is the hunger while I am right there in the presence of the Bread.

I see broken and hungry and lost and hurting but I don’t see an answer and Jesus is wondering if I see Him.

Because every need I see is a need for Him, not me.

 

two-fish-300x200

I am not enough for the sea of needs around me. I am not enough for the outstretched hands and hearts that clamor for filling. I am not enough to fix what is broken or heal what is hurting.

But every need I see is a need for Him, not me. That’s the point that found me on that mountainside as I looked at the impossible with Philip.

Five loaves and two fish was not enough. It will never be enough. But placed into the hands of Jesus it will be more than enough.

 

John 6:5-7

i have to leave

“Come, follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.”

light-blue-background-3

That line makes it sound so easy, like all they left was nets. But I know better. We who have done some leaving to follow Jesus, we know.

I know they didn’t just leave behind their fishing gear, but their way of life. I know, because the call from Jesus for me to follow Him wasn’t just to leave drugs, but to leave a life of drugs. And then it went deeper still. Following Him meant leaving a life of numbing my pain. A life of seeking my own comfort. None of that leaving was easy, but all of that leaving was worth it.

But there are some nets that are harder to leave than others and I find myself wishing and waiting for Him to just take the stupid nets because then I could leave. Then I could follow.

As much as I want Him to just take this pride away from me, to relieve me of the burden of carrying around my selfishness and desire to have things my own way…I am going to have to face the truth.

Jesus didn’t take their nets and He won’t take mine. 

And I remember the last time I had this conversation with Him. Feeling like I just couldn’t keep going and wondering why following Him was so backbreaking hard. Finally getting brave enough to tell Him that it was just too hard. I didn’t get shamed by Him. He didn’t turn away from me. He just spoke hard truth.

“It’s hard because you’ve tried to follow without leaving.”

Following Jesus means we have to leave something. Every. Time.

Two years ago I, along with my husband, left our home, our church and our friends to follow Jesus to someplace we’d never been. I left the comfort and security of earning a living doing what I know, to go into full-time ministry doing what I’d never done. Leaving those nets was scary hard but I’ve never regretted leaving them.

Another year is coming to a close and I’m looking forward to what is coming, but I am also looking at what needs to be left behind so that I can follow Him into a new year. What are the nets I’ve held onto, continuing to cast them out to try to meet my own needs? What self-comforting, self-centered, self-sustaining ways do I need to walk away from so that I can walk in His ways?

I want to leave these insecurities that keep me from following with my head up and not down.

This comfort zone living keeps me from new places of trust.

Old ways and habits that smell like death keep me from following Him into the fullness of life.

If I can’t leave my fear then I will not follow Him in peace.

“Come, follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.“

His promise is to make me a person who lives for a purpose beyond myself.

It won’t happen if I won’t leave.

Matthew 4:19-20

the things of God

He was in our midst. Listening. Watching. Whispering. None of us saw him there, except Jesus. Jesus heard. Jesus knew. 

“From that time on Jesus began to explain to his disciples that He must go to Jerusalem and suffer many things at the hands of the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that He must be killed and on the third day be raised to life.  Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him. “Never, Lord!” he said. “This shall never happen to You!”  Jesus turned and said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; you do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”

 Then Jesus said to his disciples, “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross and follow me. ” Matthew 16:21-24

We like to wonder. We wonder if Satan knew from the beginning that Jesus’ death would bring about his defeat. I’ve sat in on numerous discussions of wonderings. “No, he couldn’t have known. He is not omniscient.” “He knew. That’s why he was trying to kill Jesus ahead of time, to stop Him from going to the cross.” “He probably knew some things, but he didn’t know the whole plan.” We wonder, and then we move on.

But today I couldn’t move on. I stood there listening to Jesus address the unseen one speaking through Peter. Whether Satan knew the whole plan or not, Jesus had just announced part of it. Satan knew that it was the will and the plan of the Most High God for Jesus to go to Jerusalem, be killed and then be raised to life.

And surely Satan knows that any plan of God’s will not end well for him.

And so I wonder. What has Satan tried to stop in my life? What part of my destiny has he overheard, and whispered “No!”, because he knows that my destiny fulfilled will not be good for him?

How has he tried to convince me that sacrificing myself on behalf of someone else isn’t in my best interest?

How many times have I been persuaded that doing the hard work of dying to my own needs and wants isn’t what God requires?

Dying to self. Loving the the one undeserving of love. Showing mercy instead of judgment. Praying for the one who hurt me. Doing what is right instead of what is easy. Fighting for a relationship I would rather walk away from. Turning the other cheek. Giving when I have little to give. Pushing through when I’d rather give up.  Being open and vulnerable when I would rather hide and self-protect. Believing for the impossible instead of settling for the possible. Choosing brokenness and humility over my pride.

Picking up my cross. Losing my life for Christ.

The things of God and the things of men.

And in the midst of God’s people, there is one who is whispering “No! Never!”.

May I, may we, the Church, learn to discern. And may our voice be heard echoing through the realms of darkness…

“Get behind Me, Satan!”

would I go?

I tried to imagine myself among the twelve men Jesus called and then sent in chapter 10 of the gospel of Matthew. As I read the scriptures, I pictured myself standing among them, hearing these instructions for the first time with them. I then wondered how I would receive His instructions today, in the world I inhabit, in the Church as it is today. What follows are my thoughts as I read chapter 10 as though I am standing with the twelve. In all fairness though, these are not just my own thoughts. I have heard the same kind of thoughts expressed by others, so I can’t take all of the credit (or the rap) for what follows.

“Heal the sick, raise the dead, cleanse those who have leprosy, drive out demons.”   What if it doesn’t work? What if I don’t have enough faith in that? What if I pray for them and they don’t get healed or come back to life? Then I’ll look like an idiot, and I’ll make people doubt Your power.

“Do not take any gold or silver…take no bag for the journey or extra tunic or sandals…”  No provisions? No money? That doesn’t seem very prepared to me. What if there’s an emergency? How can I wear the same clothes the whole time? Is it wise to depend on the generosity of the people we are being sent to?

“Be on your guard..they will hand you over…and flog you.” Beg your pardon?  Surely there is some other, less dangerous way to do this.

“All men will hate you…when you are persecuted, flee…”  I don’t want people to hate me. I work very hard to make sure people like me. And I can’t run very fast. Seriously. I can’t.

“Do not  be afraid of those who kill the body  but cannot kill the soul.”  Don’t be afraid? I’m already afraid. I was afraid when you said “flog”. Now you’re saying I might die. I don’t know about this. I have a family to think about. 

“Anyone who loves his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than Me is not worthy of Me.” There must be some other meaning to that statement.

“Whoever finds his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for My sake will find it.”  I don’t know. This all sounds extreme. I’m going to have to pray about this. You can’t make this kind of commitment without a lot of prayer and counsel. I need to be wise and figure out if I am really being called to do something this radical.

I wonder. If Jesus chose 12 of us today, how many of us would still be standing there at the end of His instructions? Would there be one who would say “Here I am. Send me.”?

We don’t know what those disciples were thinking or feeling.  What we do know is this. Because of the commitment of the early followers of Jesus, you and I received the good news. The willingness of a few to lay down their lives for Christ completely changed the world. We also know that the world still needs to hear about Jesus.

As I put myself among them, hearing the instructions Jesus sent them out with, I marvel at their courage. And I am inspired by their love for the One sending them. I am also very aware that I don’t really know if I would have remained standing there. I need to search my heart and examine the strength of my love and commitment to Jesus and the radical way of life that comes with being His follower. And then I need to get at His feet and ask Him to strengthen that in me that feels so weak at the moment.

I should probably also stop trying to figure out just how much a flogging would hurt. I think I may be obsessing.