The Master's Men, Part 2-A

Jesus is preaching in a Samaritan town, and the citizens refuse to believe the message Jesus delivers, refuse to believe in him, and following their refusal to believe, James and John are the ones who say to the Lord, let's give it to him. Let's call down fire and burn this town to the ground. I mean, how's that for an evangelism strategy?

Believe or you're toast. I think that'd be fairly effective. They thought it would work too. In Luke chapter six, we read about Jesus choosing and calling 12 men. Those followers formed the group that we know as the 12 disciples. As Stephen works his way through this passage, he uncovers some timeless principles that we can use in our own walks as disciples of the Lord. For example, one of the principles we'll see today is that Jesus didn't choose these men because of how smart they were or because of what they knew. He chose them because they were willing to be taught. We'll take encouragement from what we see in these men as we humbly accept God's calling for our lives today.

Here's Stephen with today's Bible lesson. I have read that Longfellow could write a few rhyming lines on a piece of paper and move a generation. We call that poetic genius. Rockefeller could sign his name to a blank check and it would be worth millions.

We call that powerful affluence. Monet could splash paint on a canvas and it would become a masterpiece. We call that artistic brilliance. None of that compares to the life-changing mastery of Jesus Christ who will take ordinary disciples and transform them into co-laborers and, as we've sung, co-reignees, future heirs of the kingdom. We could call that amazing grace, couldn't we? Let's go back to Luke's Gospel where the Lord has determined in chapter 6 to spend the second half of his ministry developing, composing, investing, we could even say painting his grace all over the lives of 12 men. In this paragraph, Luke gives us one of four lists that appear in the New Testament of these disciples. As we've learned, in each of these lists, the disciples are listed in order of the prominent role they'll play.

Peter is always mentioned first, Judas is always mentioned last, and that is intentional. But all of them are ordinary men. In fact, William Barclay, in his commentary on Luke's Gospel, wrote 50 years ago, he said, they are 12 ordinary men.

That's all they were. But they've been called to begin wearing the dust of their master, right? They're going to walk so closely to him as disciples should that we all essentially wear the dust of our Lord, kicked up by his sandals.

Now, we made a couple of observations in our last study, and I want to repeat them just to sort of get a running start. The first observation was this. Jesus chose his disciples not because he needed them, but because they needed him. And secondly, Jesus chose his disciples not because of who they were, but because of who they would become. And Simon Peter and Andrew, and that's as far as we got, illustrated this so well as you track their relationship with the Lord and then their ministry into the days of the early church. Now, let me begin by adding a third principle, and then we'll introduce a few more.

In fact, we've got to get to six of them today, so forget lunch, all right? Thirdly, the disciples were not chosen because of what they knew, but because they were willing to be taught. Now, among the 12, Jesus chooses, and Luke lists now, two more fishermen, another set of biological brothers who definitely have a lot to learn, James and John. The oldest of them was James.

Even though he's older, if you track your way through the New Testament, he will never appear in a scriptural setting alone. He always shows up alongside his younger brother, John. Most of the time, James and John are seen together, and so I want to introduce them sort of as a package deal here. James and John are the sons of Zebedee. Luke tells us earlier in chapter 5, Zebedee seems to be a man of influence and perhaps some wealth, stature in the community. He's more than likely the owner of this fishing enterprise managed by his two sons.

They're fishing partners, as you may have remembered our other brothers, Simon Peter and his older brother, Andrew. Zebedee's entire family seemed well to do and well connected, perhaps because of generous contributions to the temple, we're not told. But we do know their connection because John was known to the high priest who admitted him into his courtyard after Jesus was arrested, John 18. We often overlook the fact that John was in that courtyard along with Peter, along with those nosy people and that noisy rooster, right?

There is evidence from early church records that Zebedee was a Levite and in fact related by blood to the high priest's family. I say all that to point out that James and John are going to leave a prospering business. They're going to leave whatever good standing they have in the religious community, that's all gone. And they become disciples of this itinerant, unconnected, fairly impoverished teacher. And what's more, they become among the closest of the Lord's disciples. We'll encounter them often in Luke, in Luke's writings, but for now he records for us that James and John are the ones invited into that little girl's bedroom and they're allowed to watch Jesus raise her from the dead.

You can imagine they never forgot that. Luke 8. They'll be invited by the Lord to join him on the mount where they will witness his transfiguration. That's that brief moment in history where the Lord just kind of pulls back the veil and he's revealed in this brilliant splendor for who he is, Luke 9, a staggering display of his deity. In fact, on the way down from that mountain, Mark's gospel sort of adds the fact in chapter 9 that Jesus tells Peter, James, and John not to tell the other disciples what happened until after the resurrection.

Now the trouble is, all of this close proximity and now this confidentiality went straight to their heads. In fact, they will spend the next five hours walking to Capernaum, arguing all the way with the other disciples about who will be the greatest. I'm obviously the greatest. No, no, no, I'm the greatest. No, I'm the greatest. Can you imagine?

Yes, we can. Somewhere in here, the mother of James and John gets involved. That's why we call them mama's boys. She comes along and she asks Jesus to let her boys sit on the thrones on either side of his throne. Really, the other disciples are upset.

They didn't think about that. So they're all mad at each other. Where's their mother?

Got a love mom here. Now I will add that there's evidence that the mother of James and John was related to Mary, the mother of Jesus, perhaps even her sister, which would make them first cousins. And isn't this, you know, this is the way it works. You use every connection you've got to, you know, get to the front of the line, you know, to get that promotion to, you know, to make it to the top.

It happens today. Perhaps where you're working, everybody's pulling whatever string they can to get promoted. Washington insiders, I've read, call it Potomac fever.

One senator wrote that whenever a new president is elected, he said, we're all waiting, we're all negotiating, we're all coveting, we're all working out so that we can get some position, some appointment, some plum promotion. Well, James and John have Potomac fever. Luke also tells us that these brothers are not just ambitious, but they are somewhat ruthless. They'll earn the nickname from Jesus. Luke nine will tell us the sons of thunder.

And that wasn't necessarily a compliment, by the way. Jesus is preaching in a Samaritan town and the citizens refuse to believe the message Jesus delivers, refuse to believe in him and following their refusal to believe. James and John are the ones who say to the Lord, let's give it to them. Let's call down fire and burn this town to the ground. I mean, how's that for an evangelism strategy?

Believe or you're toast. I think that'd be fairly effective. They thought it would work too. I mean, why wait really for the fires of hell later? Let's give it to them now.

It's what they want. This fiery, passionate, rash, unkind spirit is going to be transformed over time. It's going to turn into perseverance under great pressure.

It's going to turn into a commitment that will refuse to give in or back down or give up. James will be the first disciple to die. He's imprisoned by Herod Agrippa. The church is barely 10 years old and he becomes the first of the 12 to be martyred. But the disciple who wanted fire to fall from heaven on the enemies of the gospel was already a different man. We learn from Clement of Alexandria who writes that the Roman soldier who brought James into the courtroom of Herod to be tried and he stood there and heard James defend his faith, that he was so personally moved and convicted that as he was leading James to the place of execution, he turned and asked James to forgive him. Now earlier James would have said, you're going to burn.

But now he says, yes I will. Peace be with you. Which so convicted that Roman soldier that he professed faith in Christ and Clement said that two men that day were executed for their faith. Now John, his brother, will live longer than him. In fact, John lives longer than any other apostle. John will be the last one to die. He will go on to write the Gospel of John, 1st, 2nd, and 3rd John, and the book of Revelation while suffering there on the island of Patmos. As a 90 year old, as best we can estimate it, your old man, he describes in Revelation his tour of heaven, the singing hosts of the redeemed, the glorious throne of God with lightning flashing around it as it rests upon a sea that looks like glass, the glory of the Father's house made of gold and gems.

John writes it down. What's missing in this old disciple is ambition and pride. In fact, John eventually developed a brand new nickname over the years, a nickname used by the early church and to this day he is known not as the son of thunder, but as the apostle of love. John will use the word love in his writings more than any other New Testament author more than 80 different times. One author summarized what he described as John's theology of love.

John is the one who writes that God is a God of love, 1st John 4.8. That God loves the world, John 3.16. That God the Father loves his son, John 5.20. That God the Father loves his son's disciples, John 14.21. That Jesus, God's son, loves his disciples, John 15.12. That the followers of Jesus love Jesus in return, John 14 as well. That all believers should love one another, John 13.35. In fact, that the distinguishing mark of a disciple of Jesus Christ, John said, is what?

Love for one another. So the dominant theme of a man who earlier wanted to incinerate unbelievers, who argued and coveted to get the throne closest to Jesus, becomes a gracious, caring, loving old man. But you want to grow old like John.

They wore well the dust of their teacher. Next, Luke mentions here in his list a disciple by the name of Philip. Let me introduce him by giving you another principle to tuck away for encouragement. The Lord chose his disciples not because of their impressive ability, but because of their availability.

Maybe you were like me as I grew up, my mother sort of drummed that into our hearts, that availability is the greatest ability. No other disciple probably fleshes that out any more or any better than Philip. Now you might confuse Philip with Philip who plays a prominent role in the early church. In the early chapters of the book of Acts, chapter 6, he becomes one of the deacons.

This Philip does. And then in chapter 8, he becomes a rather famous evangelist among the Samaritans, holding rallies, performing miracles. Hundreds of people come to faith in Christ and then that particular Philip is whisked away by the Spirit of God.

Remember that Ethiopian who's puzzling over that passage in the book of Isaiah and Philip shows up suddenly and explains it to him and the man is converted. Don't confuse that Philip, the evangelist deacon, with this Philip, the apostle. Philip the deacon was a lot more dynamic and seemed to do a lot more for the gospel. In fact, we actually know very little about Philip, the apostle. The only thing we really know about him is from four brief sentences that are scattered through the gospel by John. John's the only one who mentions him.

Chapter 1, chapter 6, chapter 12, and chapter 14. In his classic work on the disciples published in 1937, one of my favorite authors, G. Campbell Morgan, writes that Philip was simply an unimpressive man. He came from the same town as Peter and Andrew, more than likely, then attended the same synagogue, would have been known to them.

It's quite possible they would have wondered why Philip was chosen. He seems, in these four brief sentences, slow to catch on to facts, the physical reality of things. He's quick on that, I should say, but he's slow to pick up on the miraculous possibility. He's what one author called a facts and figures kind of guy who went by the book.

When we see him appearing, he wants to figure out whatever's going on. He was, one author said, the bean counter among the disciples. If a calculator had been invented back then, Philip would have owned two of them. He would have owned the one that has all the things.

I still don't know what they mean to do all those calculations. In fact, there is one classic scene where he shows up individually and has an opportunity to demonstrate faith in the miraculous, in the power of Christ. In fact, Jesus is about to test him personally. Now don't mistake Jesus.

This test is not to discourage him. It is to develop him, but it shows up in John six where Jesus is preaching in the open air to as many as 15, perhaps 20,000 people. If not more, the men alone are estimated by the apostle John to number around 5,000. In John six, verse 10. Well, it's getting late. You more than likely know this account and the massive crowd has had nothing to eat. And so Jesus turns to Philip.

There's always something that happens. He turns to Philip and Jesus, the text says, said to Philip, where are we to buy bread so that these people may eat? He said this to test him for he himself knew what he would do. Philip, in other words, where in the world are we going to buy enough bread to feed all these people? And Philip's probably wondering, why am I getting this pop quiz here? And more than likely, you know, Jesus did ask him because he was from that region. He knew where the bakery was. But even more likely, he had become the apostolic administrator.

He was the one who worked on what you could figure out. That was the limit. So you kind of see Philip, you know, pulling out a scratch pad. Let's see 5,000 men carry the tooth. Lord, we don't have the money.

We can't do this. And right about then, Andrew shows up and says, hey, I found a little boy who's willing to donate his lunch. Let's see, he looks inside the sack, got five little pieces of barley bread and two little pickled fish. And Philip, I think he's wondering, Andrew, you're out of your mind. Look at the facts. That'll never work.

Why even bring up a lunch? It's almost, there are more reasons, but it's almost as if Jesus aims this miracle at the heart of Philip. It isn't what you can see. It isn't what you can calculate. It isn't what you can add up. It isn't what you can figure out. It isn't how much you have in the bank.

It's what you place in the hands of the master artist by faith in him. Maybe you came in today and this is for you. Lord, I can't, I can't figure this one out. There's no way through this dilemma. There's no way around it. I've got all the facts in front of me. I've done all the pros and cons.

I've calculated all the options. This isn't going to work. The Lord moves with the smallest gesture of faith. I mean, this offering, this is a ridiculously inadequate suggestion.

There's a kid with a lunch. The Lord doesn't need impressive offerings. He doesn't just use impressive people. He's not looking for impressive faith, just availability and the offering of something so simple like five little pieces of coarse barley bread and a couple of pickled fish to help it go down. Thanks for joining us today here on Wisdom for the Heart. Stephen Davey is working through a series called The Master's Men. This was the second lesson in that series and there's one more to go. You can learn more about us if you visit our website, which is wisdomonline.org. Once you get to our site, you'll be able to access the complete archive of Stephen's Bible teaching ministry. He's been pastoring for over 35 years and all of that teaching is available to you. The archive of Stephen's teaching is available on that site free of charge.

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