Mark 1:14-20

The Calling of the First Disciples

14After John was put in prison, Jesus went into Galilee, proclaiming the good news of God. 15"The time has come," he said. "The kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe the good news!"

16As Jesus walked beside the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake, for they were fishermen. 17"Come, follow me," Jesus said, "and I will make you fishers of men." 18At once they left their nets and followed him.

19When he had gone a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John in a boat, preparing their nets. 20Without delay he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.



BACKGROUND READING:


Matthew 4:18-22




Luke 5:1-11




John 1:35-42



Dig Deeper

In our society, most of us do not have the same job that our parents had. We foster a mindset of independence and exploration of one’s own gifts and passions that was largely unknown in the ancient world. In the time of Jesus, it was probable that fishermen like Andrew, Simon, James, and John were taking part in the family business. Most likely, their families had been involved in fishing in that area going back more generations than they could remember (although being that they were far more aware of their heritage than we are, they might well have known who the first fisherman in the family was).


When we understand the culture that this account takes place in, we realize the full shock of what Jesus was asking them. By the second century, It would be normal for families to take their young children to a rabbi to ask them to train their child in Torah (the books of the law of the Old Testament). The rabbi would pick the best of the students and train them in his interpretation of Torah. Those who could not make the cut as rabbis-in-training went back to the family business. The degree to which this would have been fully in place by the time of Jesus is left to some conjecture, but this system would still not have been unknown or unusual at the time of Jesus.


What Jesus was doing, then, was common in one respect, but quite radical in another. These men had possibly not made the cut and had returned to the security of the family business. This is what they would do for the rest of their lives, and most likely, what their sons would do. Jesus begins to gather disciples around him, which was not unusual in his society, but it was quite unusual for the teacher to go and call the students. He was calling them to do something crazy: Leave your security, your family business, and your family (family solidarity was an important part of Jewish life). He was asking them to leave the certainty of their current lives for the uncertain future of this new kingdom movement that he was announcing.


There are also echoes in this account of the bigger story of Israel, the people of God. Just as Abraham, the ancestor of God’s people, was called to leave his country and family to follow God’s call, so Peter, John and the others are answering this new call from God to leave their family. Mark is dropping hints that the old way of being the people of God needs to be left behind, that following Jesus is the new way to be God’s true people.


Jesus’ timing in beginning all of this is no accident. With John out announcing the coming of the kingdom, Jesus does not need to act, he can bide his time. As soon as John is arrested, however, Jesus swings into action. It is clear that Jesus would have waited upon the Father for a sense of the right time, and this seems to be the clear indicator that his time has come. With John in prison, it was time for Jesus to go public with his vocation as the kingdom announcer. His ministry had officially begun.


The message that he begins to announce is to repent and believe the good news. If we were to walk through the streets of our cities today, telling people to repent, they would probably think we meant something somewhat different than what Jesus’ first-century audience would have understood. We tend to reduce the word ‘repent’ to solely the concept of ceasing to sin. Of course, Jesus wanted people to stop sinning but there was more to it than that. He wanted them to turn away from their whole concept of what the kingdom of God was and how it would come about. They had a social and political expectation that was waiting for the kingdom to be led by a great military leader who would defeat Israel’s enemies, allow for YHWH to return to Jerusalem, and would set up Israel as the ruler of the nations. Jesus wanted them to abandon that ruinous and fruitless way of thinking. They needed to completely recalibrate their thinking as to what the kingdom of God was. Jesus was also calling them to return to a true loyalty to YHWH. They had come to trust many other things rather than God: their ancestry and family identity, their possession of the land of Palestine, their Temple, and their laws.


Jesus was announcing the message that it was time for Israel to repent, to change their way of thinking of what the kingdom of God was all about. He was calling them to trust that God was working in a wonderful new way. To be a part of this, they would have to cut the old ties of what it meant to be God’s people. Jesus, then, was calling Peter, Andrew, James, and John to do in their own lives what he was calling the rest of Israel to do on a large, national scale. Jesus was, in fact, beginning the process of gathering a new and reconstituted people of God around him.



Devotional Thought

Truly following the way of God’s kingdom means to completely change the way we think, the way we view the world, and often the way we expect God to work. What are the areas of your thinking and worldview that Jesus is still calling you to change in order to truly fit into his kingdom? Spend some time thinking about not only how you need to change your thinking, but how you can actually accomplish the needed changes in your life.