Welcome to The MHB Podcast. This is Michael Baun. And welcome to my 184th episode. In this episode we’re going to continue our study of the book of Matthew. We are in chapter 4. This chapter has shown us the conclusion of John the Baptist’s work and the beginning of Christ’s ministry. John said, “Christ must increase, but I must decrease.” It is as when the sun rises and the morning star disappears from its light. The beginning of chapter four walked us through the threefold temptation of Jesus and how He rebuked all three of Satan’s attacks. We see the ministry of Jesus begin with His teachings and we are given some insight into the locations where He preached. The subject of Christ’s preaching matched that of John – or rather John’s matched that of Jesus: repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand. The remainder of this chapter is going to show us Jesus calling His disciples Peter, Andrew, James and John. We’ll get to read about Jesus doing miracles like curing diseases, and the crowds of people who flock to Him in an effort to be healed and taught by Him. What an honor it must have been to have lived during such a time as this. Let’s begin with verses 18-22:
Mat 4:18 Now as Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee, He saw two brothers, Simon, who was called Peter, and his brother Andrew, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen.
Mat 4:19 And He *said to them, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of people.”
Mat 4:20 Immediately they left their nets and followed Him.
Mat 4:21 Going on from there He saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee, and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets; and He called them.
Mat 4:22 Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed Him.
One of the reasons Jesus took disciples was for them to be witnesses to His teachings and to His miracles, and then to give testimony about Him. They began as hearers of the Word and developed into preachers of the Word. This passage shows us the first disciples Christ took into His ministry. When you hear pastors or ministry leaders tell you they have a calling on their life, they’re referring exactly to what we see unfold here. The preaching of Christ presented a general calling to all people in the form of encouraging repentance and alerting them the kingdom of God is at hand. But the effectual calling we see here is special and specific to these particular individuals who were given to Jesus by the Father.
The proper response to such a calling can only be obedience and a willingness to trust in Jesus for His powerful influence. A big part of this obedience requires patience and the faith to walk forward without knowing where your path is leading. When you realize Christ is calling you, the invigorating excitement can sometimes lead to rushing in without the power of the Holy Spirit. This is a mistake for two reasons and the first is not as bad as the second. The first is that if you try to do ministry on your own power you’ll likely stumble and fail, becoming discouraged and resentful along the way. The second and more dangerous possibility is that you will succeed on your own power and then you’ll be deceived by pride. You’ll think you can please God without faith or that you can effect eternal change without the power of His Spirit.
When Jesus calls the disciples He’s essentially ordaining them and appointing them for the work of ministry. You can think of Jesus as the Almighty Teacher and Founder of a great school which has been shaping the world for 2,000 years. His calling of disciples is His first work of instituting other teachers who can carry His message. He poured into them gifts and wisdom so they could pour into others who would then pour into even more. It is the famous multiplication model at work.
Jesus was in Capernaum and Capernaum was situated near the sea of Galilee. Many people consider this territory holy even today because of how much time and how many miracles Christ did there. You can imagine Him walking on the banks of the sea in deep contemplation. It’s striking that Jesus chose this place to meet and call His disciples instead of some place more famous like Jerusalem or the court of kings. Certainly King Herod had mighty men who, from a conventional perspective, would have made good recruits. Jerusalem had priests who were both literate and well-educated in the Scriptures. But Jesus chose lowly fishermen to be His emissaries instead – and that’s because God does not see as man sees.
Attending to impoverished, illiterate fishermen and trusting them with His divine plan is an example of how God often chooses to work through the poor of this world. This choice is not meant to glorify poverty or illiteracy, rather He does it because His own glory is made more clearly manifest by redeeming people who otherwise would be fully incapable of doing His work. God loves the humble because the humble are quick to honor Him in their victories. Jesus chooses to work through the foolish things of this world because His doing so confounds those who are wise in their own sight.
So we see two pairs of brothers being called by Christ in this passage. Peter and Andrew; James and John. It’s likely that these men had some kind of acquaintance with Christ before but now He was calling them into closer discipleship. They had already been students of John the Baptist which illustrates for us how submission to the doctrine of repentance prepares a person to be brought into the faith. Christ probably would not have called them to follow Him if they had no interest in repenting from sin. It’s no small detail that these men were brothers either. One of the greatest blessings of a household is when a family is united both by blood and through their spiritual allegiance to Jesus. Contrarily, to have a family who is divided at the level of belief can be one of the most difficult challenges in life.
We understand by looking at their occupation that these men were not wealthy. Wealthy people may have taken up fishing as a hobby but they didn’t do it for a living. Jesus doesn’t measure a person’s value based on their financial worth and neither should we. Sometimes it’s the poor people who Jesus chooses to honor above others. Next we observe that these men were definitely not educated and quite possibly illiterate. Whatever qualification God uses to determine the measure of spiritual gifts He endows with each person, intelligence doesn’t seem to play much of a factor.
But I want to be careful here. It’s very common for uneducated or complacent pastors to use the illiteracy of Christ’s disciples as a justification for their own ignorance in the ministry. I think this is an abusive interpretation of the text. It’s true that otherwise unqualified men were called and became great speakers of the gospel – but they were by no means untrained. They had to develop competent measures of ability and understanding before exercising their God-ordained gifts. You shouldn’t expect God to speak through you on a Sunday morning if you are untrained in the Scriptures and pay no regard for the Word of God.
Being fishermen, these disciples likely had a strong work ethic and a value for labor. Not everyone has to be a pastor. You can have a perfectly normal occupation and if you conduct yourself with diligence and honesty you will please God through your work. In fact if you’re waiting for God’s calling it’s probably a good idea to put yourself to work in some other area until He opens the door for you. Moses was keeping Sheep and David was following ewes when God called them to service. There are many reasons to put yourself to work in an honest trade, but one of them is because idle people are more laid open to the temptations of Satan. Being fishermen also taught the disciples how to endure hardship. Their jobs were very labor intensive and they spent many hours wet and cold. The waters they fished were dangerous and there was no shortage of occupational hazards. Men and women who allow themselves to be developed such that they can navigate dangerous and difficult lives competently are also the ones who are most fit to become good soldiers of Jesus Christ.
In this passage we see Peter and Andrew using their nets and James and John mending their nets. As fishermen they probably had to make their equipment last as long as they could. It’s commendable when a person does what he can to extend the life of the tools he needs. They could have gone to their father Zebedee and asked for money to buy new nets, but they were trying to be good stewards of the business. The brothers James and John attended their father Zebedee and did what they could to make his own job easier. It’s a godly practice to honor your parents and to be careful to help them where you can. These brothers were all very busy when Christ came to them, and we should seek to be the same when Christ comes to us. There are effectively two questions you’ll want to be able to answer when Jesus returns: first and most important is whether or not your faith is in Christ, and secondly is whether or not you’re in your calling.
Just because Peter and Andrew were doing the fishing doesn’t mean James and John got to sit idly by. It’s good to rest when you need to, but by and large there is always work to do for the kingdom. A minister should always be occupied in either teaching or studying, but they also need to set apart time to mend their nets which means ensuring that their own hearts aren’t becoming corrupt. Take the vacation when you need it. Make sure you stay on top of your own house and are caring for your loved ones. Do not sacrifice your family for the work of the ministry.
You’ll notice there’s a twofold calling which happens with the disciples. First they are called to follow Jesus and then they are called to the ministry. All human beings are called to follow Jesus – even though many will not respond to that call. But within the masses of Christ-followers there are some who are called to a much closer attendance in the form of ministry. It’s interesting how Jesus calls them fishers of men. He didn’t call them pastors, He didn’t call them bishops or superintendents – He just called them fishers. Obviously this is an allusion to their former occupation but it also illustrates how the disciples were forbidden to be proud of their new calling. They had no place for arrogance because they were still merely fishers. They need not be afraid of what Christ is calling them to do because they are still only fishers.
This is a crucial point for all Christians, and especially pastors, to understand. You’ve been called to participate in God’s eternal work of redemption. It’s the most important work you could ever do but you’re not the most important part of it. If you’re in Christ then you’re a new creation, yes, but you’re still merely human. You’re not the hero of the story you’ve been called to define your life by. Understanding and accepting this takes tremendous humility but it’s entirely worth it in the end. You don’t want to live under the pressure of believing you’re the chosen one. You don’t want to set up a community of deceived people who also believe you’re the chosen one. You don’t want others anchoring their faith in who you are as a person. No mere mortal is sufficient to handle that kind of pressure appropriately – it is reserved for God and God alone. He is the first and final Author of salvation and whatever ability you have to win others over to Christ originates in Christ Himself.
We also see what the disciples are called to do in order to become fishers of men. They must separate themselves from their current identities and take up a humble imitation of Jesus Christ as their Leader. There’s a process described here which is very important if you wish to be successful in your calling. First is that anyone whom Christ chooses to employ must first be developed for the task. If you’re called to preach the gospel of Jesus then first you need to develop your knowledge of Jesus. The disciples who went on to become apostles were prepared for their work by the sheer amount of time they spent with Jesus. They accompanied Him almost everywhere He went. If you wish to advance the kingdom of God you should read the Scriptures with the same zeal which characterized the disciples’ attendance upon Christ. There was no kind of education which could better equip them for the work than following Jesus Himself. And today there is no education which can make wise the simple and renew the mind to the same degree that Scripture does. Scripture is sufficient.
When Jesus called Peter, Andrew, James, and John we notice that all of them leave everything behind and follow Him. This idea illustrates the importance of keeping Christ as your highest value. To be successful in ministry you have to be willing to make it the most important thing in your life. That’s why Paul encourages ministers to remain single if they can handle it. If you get married and have a family you should not neglect them for the sake of the ministry. The same is true for Christians who aren’t ministers. If you notice yourself neglecting your home life so that you can spend all your time serving in the church then you’re doing it wrong. But there remains a distinction between doing ministry and following Christ here. If your spouse or your family asks you to stop following Christ then you should disregard their request. You need to be very careful about whatever thing in your life competes with Jesus for the top spot in your hierarchy of values.
Anyone who knows anything about recruiting for service in a church knows how impressive it is that Jesus, with a simple word, causes all four of these men to get up and leave what they’re doing to follow Him. This is a demonstration of the power of the Creator God’s speech at work. His call to the disciples carried the same power as when he called forth the stars during the creation. It’s the same power which was resident in His call for Lazarus to come out of the grave. God speaks and it is done. It’s still true that the disciples had a choice as to whether they would follow Jesus. Jesus wants obedience rather than compulsion. All four of these men would have been perfectly reasonable to raise objections about abandoning their current livelihood, their families, the challenges which lie ahead, and their own insufficiency to take on such challenges. But they chose to follow Christ with child-like faith to wherever He would lead them.
Just like Abraham, these men didn’t know where Jesus was going to take them, but they knew they could trust in Jesus Himself. Every faithful person is called to do the same today – to trust Jesus and be willing to go wherever He leads you. Before we move on to the next passage it’s worth noting how these disciples were all relatively young and how the apostles did their work during the prime of their lives. Often in the western church congregations are hesitant to come under the leadership of a young pastor. They think the person hasn’t lived enough life to be able to lead from experience. It’s true that younger people have less experience than older people – but it’s also true that Jesus chose younger people as His disciples and it’s also true that scripture has the power to make wise the simple regardless of age or life experience. Let’s read verses 23-25:
Mat 4:23 Jesus was going about in all of Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every disease and every sickness among the people.
Mat 4:24 And the news about Him spread throughout Syria; and they brought to Him all who were ill, those suffering with various diseases and severe pain, demon-possessed, people with epilepsy, and people who were paralyzed; and He healed them.
Mat 4:25 Large crowds followed Him from Galilee and the Decapolis, and Jerusalem, and Judea, and from beyond the Jordan.
If we ever need an example of a strong work-ethic and faithfulness to the ministry of the Word – we can look to Jesus. His labors took Him throughout all Galilee and into many synagogues where He delivered the Good News. He was telling them about the Kingdom of Heaven which is a kingdom of grace and glory. The Kingdom of Heaven surpasses all earthly kingdoms in greatness and permanence. The great Roman Empire, once considered to last forever, declined and fell. The Western World today, for all its military might and economic prowess, may also see a day where it fails. But the Kingdom of Heaven is everlasting.
The gospel which Christ preached – the same gospel we preach today – is like a charter for the Kingdom of Heaven. It tells us who Jesus is and crowns Him as the King of kings. The gospel reminds us that Jesus graciously pardons and protects us as subjects in the Kingdom of Heaven – laying down His own life to this end despite being infinitely powerful Himself. The fact that Jesus prioritized preaching the gospel is reason enough to confirm our faith in it as well as motivate us to continue the work of delivering it.
Jesus chose to preach in synagogues because they were public places already filled with people seeking to practice religious worship. The Old Testament scriptures were read in synagogues which made them prime locations for exposition which opened the door for introducing the Kingdom of Heaven. Trustworthy teachers will usually proclaim their ideas publicly without fear of others hearing and challenging them. On the other hand, false teachers will claim to have secret knowledge and will work to employ means of censorship in order to prevent the truth from shining light on their deception. A person who shares information freely in the marketplace of ideas is one who has enough conviction in what he believes that he’s not afraid of being challenged.
Jesus could have summoned all the people of Galilee to come to Him but in a display of humility He traveled to them. According to the historian Josephus, there were more than two hundred cities and towns in Galilee and Jesus visited almost all of them. Observing Christ’s ministry shows us the model of the itinerant preacher. He traveled from town to town doing good things and seeking sinners who might be reconciled to God. An effective pastoral ministry really only needs two things: acts of service motivated by self-sacrificial love, and an undying readiness to preach the Word of God wherever you go and in whatever season of life.
One of the names by which Jesus is commonly known is the Great Physician. This is because as He traveled He healed many people of all manner of diseases. Whether it was mental illness, physical illness, or ideological possession which resulted in both, Jesus could heal them all because He is sovereign over every part of the human condition. His word was used to both teach and heal. It didn’t matter if the person suffered a chronic illness resistant to conventional medicine – the word of Jesus would heal them.
These healings were miraculous because they involved maladies which would typically be permanent like blindness or lameness. But He also healed people who suffered acute illnesses like fevers which undoubtedly would have killed them under normal circumstances. Some of these were diseases which even our own modern medicine of the 21st century would not be able to overcome – but Jesus healed them all with just the speaking of a word.
Imagine a physician who was relatively easy to access, who accepted no payment for His work, who was certain of success, whose cures took effect immediately, whose treatments involved no pain, no suspense, and no difficult recoveries. It didn’t take long for word to spread and for the sick to flock to Jesus. There were people from all over the land hearing about this and trying to make their way to find Jesus. People from Jerusalem and Judea, which was quite far from Galilee, came to Jesus to seek healing. All of the people among the Jews began to hear about Him and even neighboring nations received reports of His fame. Christ had a twofold purpose in performing such miracles – one is simply because He loves us and wanted to heal the people around Him, but another is because the fame of His miracles helped prepare the nations to receive His gospel.
The proper response to witnessing a life changed by Jesus is not cynicism but rather curiosity. It’s in keeping with God’s pattern to transform the lives of those around you in order to get your own attention so that you might receive the gospel as well. The Queen of Sheba came to visit Solomon because she had heard of his fame. The fame of Jesus beckons to you in the same way as it challenges you to come and see for yourself. The people who came to Jesus for healing were healed but they were also given instruction for spiritual peace through reconciliation to God. And this is generally the case for people who come to Christ with an open mind and an honest heart – they find more in Him than they expected. In the Old Testament there’s a story about a Syrian called Naaman who is healed of his disease and as a result devotes himself to God.
It’s important to remember the healings of Jesus were miraculous in nature. They were born of supernatural power and functioned to demonstrate the authority of His ministry. The healings of Jesus went beyond the capacity of natural remedy. Only the Creator of and God of nature Himself could perform such works. Jesus healed people of all ages. They didn’t have to be part of His inner circle because He healed complete strangers. He healed them regardless of their background whether cultural or ethnic.
He performed the miraculous healings openly and publicly and many who would have never believed it were able to see it with their own eyes. None of His cures ever came undone and none of them were ever reversed. The healing ministry of Jesus proved Him to be a Teacher come from God and Jesus Himself referenced His own miracles as testimony to the credibility of His gospel. The prophet Isaiah predicted the Messiah would work miracles of healing and Jesus satisfied that prophecy when no one else in history could boast the same. The healing work of Jesus saved the physical body and confirmed the teaching work of Jesus and the teaching work of Jesus saved the soul.
It’s also interesting to note how much different the miracles of Christ were from the miracles God used through Moses to confirm His word in the Old Testament. The miracles worked through Moses were judgments leveled against Egypt for Pharaoh’s hardness of heart and unwillingness to release Israel from enslavement. They were miracles meant to inspire a fear of God which is the foundation of wisdom. The miracles of Jesus were more interested in building people up in love and grace which is the essence of the gospel. The healing work of Jesus didn’t scare people into following Him – rather it attracted them and drew them in.
Delivering the gospel through grace and love is much the same method we need to be using as the Church today. This is not to say we cease speaking about Hell, sin, and the dangers thereof. But it is to say that if we don’t first love people then we should not expect any fruit of our ministry at all – regardless of how much work we put into it or how proficient we become at it. Jesus used acts of kindness and love to show the world that kindness and love is what His gospel is all about. The miraculous nature of His work served to prove His doctrine as faithful. The merciful nature of His work served to prove His doctrine as acceptable. The miracles of Jesus were both awe-inspiring and beneficent. Jesus showed us that we should do good to all people at every opportunity and we should use our fullest capacity toward this end. Jesus showed us that love is the essential stem of Christianity upon which all other branches depend.
And finally the physical healings of Jesus functioned as prophetic tastes of the real healing He came to work upon us: the healing of our own spirits. Jesus is the divine converter of sinners and He is therefore the Great Physician of souls. Sin is a sickness of the soul. When sin is left to fester and spread its wages are death. But Jesus came to take away our sin. His free gift of healing and the true permanence of it are reflections of the healing wrought upon your own soul when you come into relationship with God. You are made different forever. Those who were physically healed cried out in praise to the name of Jesus. And when your soul is healed and sanctified you too will give honor and praise to the glorious Redeemer, Who with everlasting wisdom has known you since before you were born. And Who with everlasting love has forgiven you your sins.
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