Matthew 4:18-22

&nb= sp;

The call to relationship and mission =

requires a response.

A sermon preached by

Dr. William O. (Bud) R= eeves

First United Methodist Church

Hot= Springs, Arkansas

September 7, 2008=

Though I am not a fish= erman, I enjoy a good fishing story, especially a true one—though those are = few and far between. But hereR= 17;s one. Jens Oveson was fishing = for salmon in central Norway's Gaula River when he was swept away by a strong current. Kjell Wilhelmsen, 55, spotted t= he man's struggle. Wilhelmsen had fished the river for 25 years and knew where= the current would carry Ovesen. Wilhelmsen ran across a bridge, waiting for Ove= sen as the current carried him under the bridge.

Wilhelmsen later told a newspaper, "He seemed paralyzed. Only his face and the tips of his boo= ts were above water. I decided to start casting."

His homemade lure hook= ed Ovesen's rubber waders on the first cast of about ten yards. But Oveson wei= ghed nearly 250 pounds. Wilhelmsen used every trick he knew to reel in the big m= an without breaking his light line. After a long struggle, he landed the freez= ing, half-conscious man and hauled him onto the shore. Both men survived the ordeal.= = [1]

I don’t think th= at is exactly what Jesus had in mind when he called the disciples to fish for peo= ple, but hey…if it works, it works! Another fish saved, another child of God free to live and serve the Lord—that’s what it’s all about.

As we begin our journe= y into the New Testament this week, I thought it would be a good idea to start at = the beginning of Christian discipleship—the first four disciples that Jes= us invited to take part in this adventure of faith. Peter, Andrew, James, and John wer= e the first to follow Jesus, and they always retained a special bond with him.

It all started one day by the Sea of Galilee. Jesu= s was walking along the shore, and he saw the brothers Peter and Andrew tending to their business, which was fishing. He said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” “Immediately,” the Scripture says, they left their nets = and followed him. A little furthe= r up the shore, Jesus saw James and John, also brothers and fishermen, mending t= heir nets with their father Zebedee. Jesus called to them as well, and they left their father in the boat= and went with him. Matthew does n= ot record Zebedee’s reaction. That’s all there was to it, except that their lives were never= the same again.

Jesus calls us to a relationship and a mission= , we have to respond. Let’s = talk about that this morning.

Being a disciple is a = matter of CALL. For Peter, Andrew, James and John, discipleship began with the call. Jesus called them to follow him.&nb= sp; That’s the way it works. God takes the initiative to call us until we hear the invitation to follow. John Wesley called th= is “prevenient grace,” the grace that precedes each step of faith = we take. The call is the work of= the Holy Spirit, opening the doors of our heart so Christ can come in.

If our call comes from= the God who made heaven and earth, and his Son who died on the cross for us, and the Holy Spirit that set the believers on fire on the Day of Pentecost, what kind of a call do you think that is going to be? Will God call us to something smal= l? Will he call us to piddle away our= lives and then die? I don’t t= hink so. The call may not be something that= makes us large in the world’s eyes—fame and wealth and power and all = that stuff—but I believe God’s call is going to be big. God calls us to greatness. Jesus calls us to make a differenc= e, to do something with our lives that is important and significant and meaningfu= l. He never calls us to waste the tim= e he has given us here on earth.

There was a fairly fam= ous encounter between Steven Jobs and John Sculley that amounted to a call. In 1985 John Sculley was a top exe= cutive with the Pepsico Corporation, making the big bucks with all the trappings of success. He was safe and happy…and bored. One day Steven Jobs, the head of Apple Computers, paid Sculley a visit. Jobs had pioneered the Apple and Macintosh computers, but the company was in trouble, and he needed Sculley’s management expertise to turn the company around. Sculley was unwilling to leave the security and prestige of his position with Pepsico, until Steven Jobs asked= the question that changed his life: “John, do you want to spend the rest = of your life selling sugared water, or do you want a chance to change the world?” Presented with = those options, Sculley chose to change the world. He left Pepsico to become the CEO = of Apple.= [2] He entered a new relationship.

Jesus calls us to a ne= w RELATIONSHIP. Jesus says, “Follow me.” He does not say, “Follow my religion. Ag= ree with these principles. Give a= ssent to these propositions of truth.”&nbs= p; He simply says, “Follow me.” The Christian faith is not a relig= ion; it is a relationship. People = turned it into a religion. The heart= of what Jesus was all about was not a system of thought, but a relationship wi= th our heavenly Father through a relationship with him. He did not say, “I can show = you the way, the truth and the life.”&nb= sp; He said, “I am the= Way, the Truth, and the Life.” It’s all about relationship.

Rev. Wayne Cordiero is= the pastor the New Hope Christian Fellowship in Honolulu, Hawaii= . In a sermon, he told about receivi= ng a nice gift from a church member—a gift certificate for him and his wife Anna to go out to a really nice, romantic restaurant. The certificate was for $100. So they found a free evening, made= a reservation, and prepared to make a big event out of this dinner. He even washed and waxed his Ford = Pinto so it would look good for the valet. They had a lovely dinner overlooking a moonlit bay in Hawaii. The setting couldn’t have been any more romantic. Since they had the gift certificat= e, they ordered whatever they wanted, from appetizers to dessert.

When the bill came, Wayne asked Anna = for the certificate. She didn’t= have it; she thought Wayne had it. He said no, it was always the wife’s job to have the gift certificate. She said, “= ;I don’t have it.”

Wayne thought, “We are in deep yogurt. Here we are. We look rich; we act ric= h; we even smell rich. But if we don’t have that certificate, it invalidates everything.” In= his sermon he said, “There are times in our lives when we can look holy, = we can act holy, we can smell holy. But without a relationship with the Lord, we’ve forgotten something. It’s relatio= nship that validates everything else.”[3]

What makes us rich tow= ard God, the only thing that counts with him, is relationship. The only question that ultimately matters is, “Do you know him?” Not “Do you know about him or= do you know the right words to say or do you understand the theological concep= ts or have you done enough good things in your life?” That’s all well and good, but it’s like an empty billfold; the only thing that pays the ticket is y= our relationship.

If you don’t have one of those yet, let = me tell you briefly how to get one. You repent of your sins. You believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God who was raised from the dead. You confess your sins to God, and = you accept the offer of his grace. It takes two minutes tops. The preparation of your heart may take minutes or years; the Holy Spirit works = with each person differently. But = then the moment comes, and you make a conscious decision to follow Jesus. Have you done that? Then the rest of your life is a pro= cess of working out that salvation.

Working out the relati= onship we are called to have with Jesus is our MISSION. Jesus said it all when he invited the disciples and said, “I w= ill make you fish for people.” When it comes to our faith, the reason is relationship, and the purp= ose is people. We are called to minister to people, to reach out and heal hurts and offer Christ in any way= we possibly can. That what sets = us apart. That’s how they = know we are Christians—by our love.

The late Dr. Albert Ou= tler perhaps knew more about John Wesley than Wesley knew about himself. Outler once said that the signific= ance of Wesley’s so-called conversion experience in Aldersgate Street was that it moved Wesley from a passion for the Gospel to a passion for people. Before Aldersgate, Wesley had a relationship with God, but he was more concerned about the rules being foll= owed and the concepts being right. After Aldersgate, his primary emphasis was on loving people and caring for their needs. That was when the fire= of the Methodist movement began to blaze.

We a= re called to follow Jesus, and this relationship calls us to fish for people.<= span style=3D'mso-spacerun:yes'> That means we have a mission to se= rve people in his name, to reach out and share the good news of Jesus Christ in= a lost and broken world. Do we = do that?

On July 4, 1854, Charl= ie Peace, a well-known criminal in London, was hung. The Anglican Church, which had a ceremony for everything, even had a ceremony for hanging people= . So when Charlie Peace was marched to the gallows, a priest read these words fr= om the Prayer Book: "Those who die without Christ experience hell, which = is the pain of forever dying without the release which death itself can bring."

When these chilling wo= rds were read, Charlie Peace stopped in his tracks, turned to the priest, and shouted in his face, "Do you believe that? Do you believe that?"

The priest, taken abac= k by this verbal assault, stammered for a moment, then said, "Well…I…suppose I do."

"Well, I don't,&q= uot; said Charlie. "But if I did, I'd get down on my hands and knees and cr= awl all over Great Brita= in, even if it were paved with pieces of broken glass, if I could rescue one pe= rson from what you just told me."4=

The problem with invit= ing people to know Christ is not a lack of receptivity on their part, but a lac= k of passion on our part. We know = the Good News of salvation in Jesus Christ. Lost people don’t know this. = They are bound for eternal death if= they don’t find it out. Do we really care?

That’s why I thi= nk Jesus chose fishermen for his first disciples. He didn’t pick the influenti= al leaders of the community, the wealthy people, the well-educated rabbis, or anyone of that social class. = He chose fishermen. Why?

I’m not a fisher= man, but I’ve known several, and I’ve noticed something about most of them—they’ll try anything once. You can be out in a boat, and a co= mplete stranger will motor by and say, “If you’ll cast over on the oth= er side, you’ll do better.” Where will the fisherman fish? On the other side, at least for a little while. Or you can be in the bait shop, an= d the clerk says, “Hey, I’ve got a crazy lure here that nobody has ev= er tried, but I believe it will catch some fish.” You gotta have it, and try it, just once.

The other characterist= ic of fishermen is their patience. = The main reason I’m not a fisherman is because after 30 minutes of watchi= ng a cork or casting a line, if I’m not catching anything, I begin to thin= k of productive ways I could be using my time.&= nbsp; But a real fisherman will stick with it, persevering for hours on en= d, catching nothing but a cold, but persisting nonetheless. Hot or cold, rain or shine, luck o= r no luck, it's all part of the adventure.

That’s why Jesus called fishermen first. To be= a part of the new Kingdom of God, he needed people who were open to new things and would stick with it. So he walked up to Peter, Andrew, then James and John, and said, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” I can just imagine them stopping w= ork, looking at one another and saying, “Hey, we’re fishermen, we’ll try anything once.” And away they went.

The call of Jesus to relationship and mission requires a RESPONSE. Maybe Peter and Andrew and James a= nd John already knew Jesus. They= lived in the same area; maybe they had heard him speak before. Maybe the ground had been prepared already. It doesn’t matter. When the call came, t= heir response was immediate. It wa= s like it was the one thing they had been wanting to do all their lives, and they = had just been waiting for the invitation. They dropped their nets and followed Jesus. That’s what made them heroes= of faith.

Do you want to be a he= ro of faith today? Then listen for God’s call to greatness in your life. Live in relationship with Jesus Christ. Have a passion for th= e mission of fishing for people. And re= spond whenever you get the opportunity to make a difference for the Kingdom. Come to this table; feed your spir= it; and go fish! Amen.