Once upon a time there were 12 nobodies from nowhere who made themselves available...

Hey GCT:  Sometimes you really cannot believe what God has done in the history of redemption until you read it from Scripture over and over again.  Then while reading the Holy Spirit reveals truth.  Many times when that happens we have to deprogram our traditional thinking of what we think about God or how we think He is working and submit to the truth of Scripture.  So often we make our own truth and fully believe it.  We bank on it and it really is not the truth.  We go down the path of believing a lie.  That is why over and over again the Lord calls us back to Scripture to make sure we are getting this story of redemption and restoration correct.  This week is one of those weeks where we need to strive to get God’s story right and return to Scripture over and over again.

This Sunday as we look at Luke 6, and Jesus' calling of His twelve Apostles we see Jesus more and more clearly.  Jesus knows from the recent response of the Pharisees that His days are numbered.  He knows that He needs to get a band of believers together that will carry on His mission with all of His authority to get the Gospel to the ends of the earth.  He needed believers who would move forward with passion, zeal, ambition, courage, boldness and preparedness to come up against the corrupt system that Judaism had become.  These believers would be solely responsible on this Earth for the Gospel after Jesus was gone.  Wow, that is a heavy responsibility.  Man, who is able to fill that bill?

So… Jesus had a really big problem!  There were no qualified people on the planet.  Nobody was qualified in Israel or out of Israel.  Jesus had to start with the unqualified nobody from nowhere to prepare them to be the foundation of the Church.  And so Jesus chose twelve men who were absolutely unworthy and unqualified for the task ahead.  When Jesus told His Apostles in John 15:5 “apart from ME you can do nothing,” it was really the truth!  Jesus does not choose any Rabbi, Priest, Pharisee, Sadducee, or other religious representative from Israel.  Jesus chose four fishermen, a recovering liar, thief, embezzler, a mama’s boy, a person with an anger problem, a recovering legalist, one who struggled with problems with his mouth, one who was the quiet shy type, and another who was basically a negative drain on the world.  Jesus chose some nobodies from nowhere and to be the foundation of the Church.  He chose these unqualified to get the Gospel to the world and to you and me.   He called them His Apostles which means “sent ones”.  These Apostles will also come to judge the twelve tribes of Israel (Luke 22).  And Jesus also says, their role is so important and crucial that I am going to carve their names in the foundations stones of heaven (Rev. 21).

There is so much here.  Jesus says, these twelve men make up the New Israel, the New Wineskin, He says, just as the twelve sons of Jacob formed the Old Testament people of God, so also the Apostles will establish the foundation for God’s new people in Christ. To this day the Church is called to rest upon their ministry (Ephesians 2).  God always chooses nobodies for their great dependence upon Him.  God called these nobodies so that they would not rely on their own abilities.  What abilities did they have at this point?  Only Jesus.  Jesus was their only hope and after Jesus’ death their only hope was the Holy Spirit.  Look at what these nobodies from nowhere empowered by the Holy Spirit accomplished in God’s story.  These nobodies were simply available!  God seeks available men and women to carry on His work as “sent ones”.   Are you available?  The Church and the Gospel continues to rely on nobodies from nowhere who simply make themselves available.

I look forward to worshipping with you Sunday, Steve

PS - Don’t forget about the Father’s Day Biscuit Bash before worship at 9am.  Come and get some meat and biscuits with your Father or child’s Father.