What Are We Going to Do? Pt. 1

Used under a CC 2.0 License courtesy of Fr. Stephen, MSC

Scripture Reading: Matthew 4:12-23

Today’s passage features Jesus calling the first disciples. He tells Simon Peter and Andrew, “I will make you fishers for people.” In a similar scene in the upcoming movie Son of God, Jesus tells Peter on the boat to “follow me.” Peter asks him “What are we going to do?” And Jesus responds “Change the world.” It may be a bit of artistic license or putting words in his mouth, but that is in fact what the carpenter’s son, who was the Son of God, did. And it’s what we are called to do today as well. How can we change the world? Well, let’s look at what’s going on in this passage.

First, when Jesus calls the disciples, they respond right away. When God calls, we are to answer immediately. In the OT when the Divine Council was wondering who to send, Isaiah did not hesitate to say “Here I am. Send me.”  Hebrews 3:15 tells us “Today, if you hear his voice, do not harden your hearts…” Kyle Idleman, in his book Not a Fan, says “When Jesus calls us to follow, he means right now. He means today.” When Jesus told Peter and Andrew to follow him, they immediately left their nets and followed him.  When he called to James and John, sons of Zebedee, they immediately left their nets AND boat AND father and followed him. You have to understand, these men left everything to follow Jesus. They left their livelihoods. They were dependent on the sea for life, because on land there was little to hope for. They left their families. They left everything without hesitation. Not because they were special, but because the message of Jesus was special. It was, and it still remains, something worth dropping everything for.

Contrast today’s passage with Luke 9:59-60. There, Jesus tells the man “Follow me,” but the man says “Let me bury my father first.” In other words, not yet, Jesus, I have to do something first. The man isn’t opposed to following Jesus, but he’s kind of lukewarm about it—he has things he needs to do first. Tomorrow, Jesus. And we don’t get that man’s name, because he doesn’t follow Jesus. If he had, we’d know his name, and there’d be another disciple. As it is, he puts it off and Jesus replies “Let the dead bury the dead,” indicating that the man is spiritually dead.

You can try to resist the call. You can argue with God, you can try to ignore God, but I can tell you from experience that God will not stop calling you, and your soul will not be truly satisfied until you heed the call. And think about what you might miss while you are waiting to follow. Idleman talks about a man who first heard God’s call when he was in high school, but he said “Not yet, Lord, let me finish high school first.” Then the man was in college, and heard the call again, but he said “Not yet, Lord, let me finish college first.” Then it was getting a job, getting married, letting things settle down while he started a family. He kept putting God off. The good news is today he has listened to God’s call, but it took a broken marriage, losing custody of his kids, and becoming an alcoholic before the man listened to God. How might his life have been different if he had just listened in high school? What did he miss out on? But at least he finally listened—Idleman says that the “most dangerous part of following Jesus tomorrow isn’t what you will lose between now and then. That’s not the worst thing that can happen. The worst thing that can happen is that tomorrow might never come. The truth is the longer you put him off, the more likely it is that following him will never happen.”

To Be Continued…