John was a fisherman, as seen in Matthew 4:18-22, along with his brother and his father. So, Christ did not see him in an unusual place when He asked him to “follow me!” . John must have been used to being in an aprenticeship role, having learned the trade from his dad. From what we know from Scripture about how they made disciples back then, John probably went out on the boat with his dad and fished with him, learned how to drop and lift the net in the proper way so as not to lose fish, etc. So, when Christ says “ I will make you fishers of men” , it wasn’t a foreign concept to him. But, the thing that set John apart from the other 10 disciples was that he and his brother “ left their father and their boat”( verse 22).
Jesus’ definition of apprenticeship seems a bit more like Christian boot camp then hands-on- learning. In Luke 9:1-6, Jesus first gives the twelve people who agreed to leave everything and everyone behind the ability to do what He had been doing: to drive out demons and heal the crowds. Then he tells them to take nothing with them, rely on the people that they minister to and that there will be people who won’t welcome or like them. The response? They did it! The twelve, including John set out for the villages, fully aware they were preparing for their slaughter.
I always wondered how someone made the cut to be in Jesus’ circle of disciples. The bible tells us there were many people who followed Jesus and whom he called disciples. In one of Jesus’ daily journeys into town to meet the needs of the people there, he tells one who called himself a disciple: “ Follow me, and let the dead bury their own dead.” (Matthew 8: 22). Jesus’ definition of a disciple and theirs were completely different. I believe what separated this disciple from the twelve that knew Jesus was their desire. They were willing to give up family, friends, jobs, money, security and the safety of their current situations for nothing more than the hope of becoming more like a man who raised people from the dead, cured the sick and gave hope to the hopeless.
The essential ingredient to making a disciple is for someone who not only has the knowledge and experience in that field but also the willingness to share that knowledge with someone else. In fact, anyone who takes the apprentice role in any situation must have a desire to learn the trade. If that is missing, the mentor- apprentice relationship falls flat.
John did not simply learn from Jesus and keep what he learned to himself. He continued on with Christ’s example and took what he learned and invested it in the lives of others, particularly Peter. The four gospels mention John being linked with Peter more than nine times. I can only imagine the kind of conversations that went on between these two on their journeys with the Lord. Anytime someone spends an extended amount of time with someone, a deeper relationship is bound to flourish. No doubt John and Peter were teaching each other about what it meant to be a disciple.
Since John was an apprentice and later became a pastor, shepherding was in his blood. The art of taking people under his wing and teaching them all he knew was a natural part of who he was. To deny this character trait was to deny the very person of John.
Peter was a great person to have by his side. John records Jesus’ reinstatement of Peter in John 21:13-17. In this account, Jesus asks Peter to become like a shepherd and to “ feed his sheep”. Jesus states plainly that in order to be His disciple, He must care for the people Jesus had spent three years caring for: His church
No comments:
Post a Comment