For this, I gave up... (blank) ?

A friend has this excerpt up on a wall in his office... and it caught my eye. As I read it I was struck by the implications. I also began to wonder which person I most identified with (John or the leader).

Jack Deere in Surprised by the Voice of God tells a true story of a new believer who starts going to church. He begins reading the Bible and is fascinated with Jesus Christ, the one who heals, teaches, performs miracles, and teaches his followers to do the same. He goes to church excited and expecting to be apart of this, but is met with something different:

Finally, after weeks of reading a miraculous Bible and attending monotonous religious services, John walked up to one of the lay leaders and asked, "When do we get to do the stuff?"

"What stuff?" asked the leader.

"You know, the stuff here in the Bible," said John, as he opened the New Testament and pointed to the Gospels. "You know, like the stuff Jesus did - raising people from the dead, healing the blind and the paralyzed, you know, that stuff."

"Well, we don't do that anymore," the man said.

"You don't?"

"No."

"Well, what do you do?" asked John.

"What we did this morning."

"For that I gave up drugs?" John was incredulous that the experience of the people of God today was so different from the experience of the people in the Bible. However, church leaders were able to get him over his disappointment. The key was just not to expect too much.

Then, this morning I was reading in Matthew's gospel, chapter 4, verses 18-20, and was struck by what occurs (taken from The Message by Eugene Peterson):

^18-20Walking along the beach of Lake Galilee, Jesus saw two brothers: Simon (later called Peter) and Andrew. They were fishing, throwing their nets into the lake. It was their regular work. Jesus said to them, "Come with me. I'll make a new kind of fisherman out of you. I'll show you how to catch men and women instead of perch and bass." They didn't ask questions, but simply dropped their nets and followed.

Jesus invites Simon and Andrew to come with him, in another translation the word "follow" is used in addition to the "come with me." This come and follow is associated with the Greek word aphentes, which refers to the words let, left, or leave. In this case it appears in the present tense, and so Simon and Andrew being called to leave or let their nets behind, and follow.

The other interesting aspect of this exchange is that Simon and Andrew are invited to be catchers of men and women. In leaving and following Jesus, Simon and Andrew will become people influencerers as students of Jesus. What they don't know is that as students of Jesus they will be participating in miracles because Jesus did more than preach (teach), die, and rise... he made disciples. Disciples that did more than relay his teachings (ethics - kingdom ways) and stories (parables, miracles preformed, and death & resurrection), they became miracle and ministry workers, too. And then, passed on the baton of miracles, ministry, and kingdom news to us.

I also wonder if following Jesus for Simon and Andrew would have turned out differently, as in if the following Jesus looked like daily scripture and law studies to make sure their behavior was right and true with attempts to becoming another competing voice of control and power that does really nothing to lift people out of the status quo to a life full of right relationships with the Creator and fellow creations. If this turned out to be the case would they (Simon and Andrew) have turned to themselves and said, "For this I left my nets?"

So, again, am I more like John or the leader in this excerpt? Sometimes both honestly. What have I left to follow to become a student of Jesus? And is the followship I am living worth it?

I gotta go listen to my Teacher and find out. Hope you do the same.

Grace and Peace to you.