Understanding Why God And Jesus Chooses Ordinary People

There's something at times that feels really holy and sacred when someone shares their story. When they open their life up and they're vulnerable, and they share the things that are going in their life, there's something really unique about that. I appreciate Jen, and her willingness to share her story.

I'm glad you're here today. Whether you're here in-person with us or watching online today, we're walking through the Gospel of Luke. Paul and I really appreciate the positive affirmation we've gotten about this series. We weren't really sure how people would respond to us saying, "We're going to teach through the entire Gospel of Luke."

We've had wonderful response. In particular one that's been encouraging to me. I've had several people say, "It's like you're helping me connect some of the dots about my faith and who Jesus is." We all remember like being in preschool when you would like literally connect the dots to make the picture.

What I've also learned and observed through the years is when it comes to understanding the Bible and understanding Jesus's Life, all that works together. Sometimes this is what it looks like to connect the dots in the Bible. You feel like, "I need some help doing this." What kind of picture do I actually get when I do this?

Our goal during this series is to really help you connect those dots. Two weeks ago, when I kicked off my portion of this series, I shared with you what I felt like was the overarching umbrella of the story of Jesus. Here it is, that Jesus is establishing a revolutionary new nation, that is the kingdom of God.

There are certain things, qualities about this new nation, this kingdom that he's bringing in that if you are watching, as you read through this, you'll begin to be able to connect some of those dots. Here's some things about that kingdom. If you weren't here, I want you to hear these for the first time.

If you were here a couple weeks ago, this will be a refresher. In Jesus new nation, you're going to experience these things. Forgiveness and restoration is his purpose. To bring reconciliation between man and God through the forgiveness of sins. Also, restore people because of the fact they've been sinned against, and they've also have been broken by their own sin.

The second thing in this kingdom God's will is the way. Jesus teaches us to pray this prayer. "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven." To live in this new kingdom means that's your prayer. And you see to live that out every day of your life you want to do God's will on earth as it is done in heaven.

The third thing is this: the law is love. Jesus once again reiterates the great commandment, love the Lord, your God, with all your soul, all your heart, all your mind and all your strength, and love your neighbor as yourself. Here's what he says, he adds something to it. He says all of the law and profits that is the Old Testament and the New Testament hang on this one commandment.
They're all expressions of this. One thing, love is the law. Here's the next thing that's important about this new nation. Jesus is the king. He is the Lord. He is the King of Kings and the Lord of Lords. He is the one who leads this new kingdom and here's the last one and this is really important. The key to eternal living.

Here's what I want you to understand. Heaven is out there for us if you are a follower of Jesus, but the Christian life is meant to be way more than just praying a prayer, punching your ticket to heaven and going on and living your life however you want to. Then, one day when you die, you get to go to heaven. No, eternal living begins now.

As one of my favorite writers says, "Eternity is already in session." This eternal quality of living is available to each of us. Now, when we have an allegiance to the king and to his purposes in the world. Now, when it comes to connecting dots, one of Paul's and my favorite writers is Dallas Willard. We actually get some criticism from people because we Dallas Willard often.
In fact, there's a rumor that our staff has actually created a drinking game for whenever we quote Dallas Willard, of course, they're drinking tea. There is a quote I want to share with you from Dallas Willard that really connects the dots from me, and I hope it does for you as well. Here's what he says.

"Jesus objective is eventually to bring all of human life on earth under the direction of his wisdom, that is Jesus wisdom. His goodness and power as part of God's eternal plan for the verse." This new kingdom, this new nation that he's starting. "We must make no mistake about it in sending out his followers, Jesus set afoot a perpetual world revolution. One that is still in process and will continue until God's will is done on earth as it is in heaven."

As this revolution culminates, all the forces of evil known to mankind will be defeated. The goodness of God will be known, accepted, and joyously confirmed." Is what that should read. "In every aspect of human life. He has chosen to accomplish this." Here's what I want you to not miss.

"He has chosen to accomplish this with, and in part, through his followers." That's what Luke is about. That's what we're going to talk about today that each one of us has been called invited to join Jesus in this revolution that he's creating that one day will culminate in all the goodness and the grace, and the mercy of God being a part of all of existence.

All evil will be vanquished and we will live with him forever, but we get to be a part of that now. That's what my message is going to be about today. What I'm going to do is I'm going to begin by sharing with you three stories that reveal how Jesus calls people to join his revolution. Now, I'm just going to go through them quickly.

Then I'll come back later and unpack them a little bit more. There are three calling stories that I want you to be aware of. If you have your Bible, whether it's your analog Bible like mine or your digital Bible, go ahead and pull it out. We're going to be focusing a lot on Luke chapter five today. We'll also going to skip over to Luke chapter eight.

My first story is really the story of the calling of Peter and it's found in versus one through 11. Jesus is teaching and preaching once again on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. Here, you're going to see a map again. You will see up there, Capernaum is circled, but right below Capernaum is Gennesaret.

Many times the Sea of Galilee was actually called the Sea of Gennesaret. This was a particular area that was incredibly fertile. A lot of people gathered there. Jesus has gathered there. People are coming. They're all of a sudden starting to press in on Jesus. He realizes people are going to have a hard time hearing.

He says, "If I can get out on the water, the water will amplify my voice. He looks over and he sees two abandoned fishing boats with their owners off, washing their nets nearby. Now, here's something interesting in 1986, they literally found in the Sea of Galilee a boat that carbonates exactly the time of Jesus. This is what the hole looks like.

It's about 25-feet long, seven and a half feet wide. The draft is about four and a half feet. If we can project what that looked like, here's what a fishing boat looked like at that time. That's what Jesus sees pulled up on the bank. Probably, as he's talking, he catches Peter's eye and he nods to him and how he goes.

He gets on the boat and he sits down and he pushes off a little bit out on the lake and he sits down and begins to teach them. Well, after he is done teaching, he wants to be grateful and to show his thankfulness to Peter. He says, "Peter, come here, buddy. I want you to get on the boat with me. Here's what I want you to push out a little bit further, let down your net for a catch."

Now, here's the thing they used trammel nets in that day. They were made of linen, and they were very visible in the water during the day. That's why they fished at night so the fish would be unsuspecting. Now, when Jesus says to Peter, Hey, Peter, I want you to put out into deeper water and put your nets down for a catch.

I'm sure Peter's going, "Yeah, there's a carpenter telling a fisherman how to fish." He does it. He says, "Lord, because you say so, I'll do it." He puts down the net, he gets a monster catch. There are so many fish he can't get them in. He calls her backup from James and John, his partners in business.

They bring all the fish in two boats. It almost sinks both of them. He finally gets it back to shore. When Peter realizes what has happened, he has this visceral reaction to this incredible catch. He kneels down in front of Jesus, and he says, "Depart from me because I'm a sinful man." Jesus looks down and says, "Peter, don't be afraid."

Then, he says something that will literally change the trajectory of Peter's life. He says, Peter, from now on, you're going to fish for people. The text says that Peter left everything and followed Jesus. Now, scroll down a little bit further into verse 27 through 32. You're going to see the story of the calling of Levi.

Levi worked at a told booth. He was considered traitor by the Jewish people. He was working for the Romans. Remember when there were actual toll booths on the Dallas, north tollway over there. If you didn't have a toll tag you had to stop and pay. Well, there were actually toll booths on the highways and the roads between certain towns.

That's what Levi's doing. He is at a toll booth and Jesus comes, cuts to the chase and says, "Levi, I want you to follow me and be my disciple." The text says that he left everything and followed Jesus. Now, Levi was so excited about being invited to become a disciple of Jesus, he throws a party at his home and he invites his rowdy crowd of tax collectors.

They all bring their plus ones and they don't tend to be plus ones of a good repute. It's a rowdy crowd there and they're having this party. Jesus is the guest of honor. All of a sudden the religious police get called. They come and they break up the party and they put the squeeze on the disciples and say, "What in the world is Jesus doing hanging out with scum like this?"
Jesus overhears the question. He says, "Well, I did not come for those who are well, I have come for those who are sick." People who don't think they're sick, don't need a doctor, but people who know that they are sick, they need one, and they'll appreciate one. That's the story of Levi.

Now, the third story, you have to go ahead and turn over to the eighth chapter of Luke versus one through three. This is really the story of scandalous disciples, scandalous women who are following Jesus. Here's the thing, this is not simply a calling, but it's more of an observation of a call that has already gone out.

When you look at this text Jesus is traveling with his 12, that he has called to be his official apostles, but also with him are a group of single and married women, and that is a scandalous surprise. It turns out that these women had either had Jesus cast out evil spirits from them or had healed them that as they had been made well, or whole by Jesus.

Now, out of gratitude, they are following Jesus, traveling with him, and they are supporting him financially. We'll talk more about them in a second. Here's what I need you to know, this practice, this reality that Jesus is a part of is more scandalous than mixed bathing at a Baptist summer camp. This is really big.

It is more scandalous than serving bacon at a Bar Mitzvah. It is more scandalous than facing west on a prayer mat, all that together. This is really a big deal. These are three calling stories. If you look closely and begin to process and what you really, this in them are the three essential questions about what it really means to follow Jesus and to be called to discipleship.

We're going to talk about those three this morning. Here's the first one, what is it that Jesus is really calling us to? It's very important that we're clear about what Jesus actually calls us to when he calls us to be a disciple. Let me pick up in reading the story of Peter.

When Simon Peter realized what had happened, he fell to his knees before Jesus and said, "Lord, please leave me. I'm such a sinful man." He was awestruck by the number of fish. They had caught as were the others with him, his partners James and John, the sons of Zebedee were also amazed.

Jesus replied to, "Simon, don't be afraid from now on, you'll be fishing for people." Now, the original Greek word there literally means catching alive. When you fish for fish you like to kill the fish. What Jesus saying is when you catch people, you're catching them alive. As soon as they landed, he left everything.

They left everything and followed Jesus. This is the call to discipleship. What is the calling? Here's the first thing, Jesus calls us to beat his decide by being with him. That little phrase is used by the gospel writers to designate those who are officially Jesus disciples and followers.

Here's an example of that in March chapter 3:13, "Afterward Jesus went up on a mountain and called out the ones he wanted to go with him and they came to him." Being a disciple essentially means that you are going to make a commitment to be with this teacher, with this rabbi you are going to follow him.

Now, the Mishnah compendium of writings of the rabbis from 200 BC to 200 AD. Even much of Judaism is practiced today based on the Mishnah. In one of the early is text of the Mishnah we read that a new follower, a disciple is to let the dust off the feet of his rabbi cover them as they walk with them.

Meaning that a disciple is to walk and be so closely connected to their teacher that the dust of his feet are going to get on him and settle on him. The essence of being a disciple is to be with Jesus. Now, in Jesus' day Peter and Levi and these women, they could drop their livelihood, their profession, and literally go and be with Jesus 24/7.

How do we do that in our day? What does that mean for you and me to be with Jesus? Well, there are several ways. One of the ways you're practicing even right this moment, that is we can't sit at his feet literally, but when we sit and we study the God, his story, his teaching, we are sitting at his feet and we are with Jesus as we are learning even now in his presence.
The second thing is this, as you read through the New Testament, you begin to cure things like this, that now that when you trust and place your faith in Christ, the spirit of Jesus is in you and we are in Christ. When you begin to understand that, what that means is this, you let that reality frame the way you live and see your day.

That is I recognize that Jesus is in me and with me every moment that I'm alive and conscious, and even when I'm not. He is with me in every conversation and every decision in every activity. He is there to encourage me and to comfort me and to guide me and to reveal himself to me. There's another wonderful quote of Dallas Willard.

Here's what he says. He says, "Prayer is nothing more than talking to Jesus about what you're going to do today." I love that. That's what it means to be with him. We can do that even now. Now, we make the commitment to be with Jesus, two additional things happen. The first one is this, being a disciple implies that we will grow to be like him.

The more we are with him, the more we'll become like him. We all understand that this is a psychological truth. As we know that we become like, talk like, act like people that we value the most, or hang out with the most. Remember when you're in high school and you have that really bad haircut?

Well, you have that really bad haircut because all your friends had it. You talked a certain way and you use a certain language because that's the way your friends talk. We become like the persons that we value the most and spend the most time with. The more we are with Jesus, the more we will think like him, see life like him, love people like him.

Grow to be like him. Not some toxic masculine, John Wayne Jesus concocted out of a mesh up of Old Testament characters. I'm talking about the Jesus. That's revealed in the New Testament. A man of impeccable integrity. A man who is a selfless servant of other people, a man who's willing to sacrifice his life.

It takes courage to do that, to sacrifice his life for someone for the people that he loves. That's the kind of man that we will become man or woman in terms of our character. The kind of man, who's very presence of love and grace transforms people. That is the quality of his presence and his person that has this power.

You and I can have that too. We grow to be like him when we spend time with him. Here's the second thing, we will then go and carry on his mission for him. In Jesus' day, when rabbis were teaching, they always had an agenda. Either to help their students understand what the good life was or how to restore the hope of the nation of Israel.

Jesus had an agenda. We've already talked about what it is. To establish this new borderless nation in which forgiveness and restoration is the primary goal. That love is the law of this nation and God's will is done on earth as it is in heaven. Jesus is leading us as our king. He invites us to carry on in this work.

That's what he says to Peter, "Peter from now on, you're going to join me and you're going to fish for people. You're going to be about this work of helping people experience, forgiveness, and reconciliation with their creator. Help them to be restored emotionally and physically, and relationally with others."

He's inviting Peter to join the revolution. That's what happens when you spend time with him. I think that is the same call to you and to me. That is, as we are with him, we become like him and we get the opportunity of going with him to carry out his mission in the world.

That's the first question. Here's the second one, who does Jesus call? It's really important to understand this. Well, I believe Jesus calls the ordinary, the outcast, and the unexpected to be with him. The ordinary, the outcast, and the unexpected. Peter was the ordinary. He didn't really shine when he was going to Torah school as a young boy.

That is, none of that really elite rabbis had him on their draft list. When he aged out, he had to go back and really be a blue collar worker. He was going to be a fisherman. He actually worked hard and lived day to day, and because of the purity laws of his religion and the nature of his profession, he probably wasn't a big synagogue attender.

He was consciously aware of his sinfulness and he felt unworthy in the presence of Jesus. Here's the thing, anybody in here ordinary? I think that's all of us. We're really ordinary. Here's the thing, most of us are aware of our broken places. If Jesus were here in front of us many of us would feel unworthy right now to be with him.

Well, if that's you guess what? You're invited, you're called. Here's the second thing, there's Levi, the outcast. In Luke 5:27 through 30. We read these words, "Later, as Jesus left the town, he saw a tax collector named Levi sitting at his collector's toll booth, "Follow me and be my disciple." Jesus said to him.

Levi got up, left everything and followed him. Later Levi held a banquet in his home with Jesus as a guest of honor. Many of Levi's fellow tax collectors, and other guests also ate with him. The Pharisees and their teachers of religious law complained bitterly to Jesus, "Why do you eat and rank with such scum?" Now, what's going on here?

In calling Levi, here's what Jesus is doing he is blowing up the boundary markers by which the Jewish leaders determined who was in their club and who was outside of their club. When Jesus ate a table with this rowdy crew, he was communicating kinship and friendship and acceptance of them, and unity with them. In essence, what he was doing?

He was withdrawing the lines of permissible social engagement. He was doing away with those boundaries and saying, it doesn't matter what anyone's religious purity is or their status is, they're invited. Now here's something I want you to know that we don't often think about is that the Jews drew these boundaries per primarily not because of pride, but because of self-preservation.

Now, what does that mean? Well, the Pharisees, the word Pharisee literally means the separated one. If you go back and read the Levitical law, you'll see there if you want to stay clean, that is richly clean, you couldn't touch certain things. If you touched a dead body, if you touched a woman in her period, if you wore some fabric that had three different threads in it you became unclean.

The Pharisees practiced salvation by separation that is they avoided sinful people, outcast people, because if they touched them, they would be polluted. They saw people outside of their group as contagions. Here's what Jesus does, he totally flips that.
Now, there are still a lot of Christians today who practice this, "We want to kind of get our Christian huddle together. We want to do church. We have our Christian school. We want to have our Christian athletics. We're going to have Christian everything so you can all do everything in a Christian bubble, because if you're out there in the world, you might get contaminated."
Here's what Jesus does. He flips that and here's what he is telling us that his grace and his love and his mercy, and his power is more contagious than sin. That is we can be in the world with the affirmation and understanding that we can be infectious for God. That's what he's calling us to.

Then, there are the women, the unexpected. Here's what Luke 8:1 through three says, "Soon afterward Jesus began a tour of the nearby towns and villages preaching and announcing the Good News. He took his 12 disciples with him." There's that phrase along with some women who had been cured of evil spirits and diseases.

Among them were Mary Magdalene from whom he had cast out seven demons, Joanna, the wife of Chuza, Herod's business manager and Susanna, and many others who are contributing out of their own resources to support Jesus and the disciples. Here's the thing, what Jesus was doing was absolutely unheard of.

If I had time, I could read you the teachings and the writings of certain rabbis that would make you so angry about what they said about women, but even in the upright religious homes of that day women were sequestered away. They were rarely allowed out
of their home even to be in the presence of a male relative.

They were not to even be out on the street unless they were accompanied by their husband. There was a sentiment back then is that women were more prone to promiscuity than men and men were just not able to control themselves when it comes to lust. They had to push women into the background.

Here's what Jesus is saying. He is saying, "You know what, I have a life for you as a man where you have the power and the freedom of deliverance to become your lust so that women don't have to hide in the background. We don't have to keep them separate, so that now women can emerge and they can be our sisters and our friends in his work in the world."

If you're a woman today, I want to reassure you and remind you that you too are called fully into this life of discipleship with Jesus. That's who he calls. Now, one of the things about his calling is this the most responsive people to Jesus calling are those who know they need him the most.

Look at verse 31 and 32. Again, Jesus, answer them, "Healthy people don't need a doctor, sick people do. I have come to call not those who think they are righteous, but those who know they are sinners and need to repent." Now, Jesus meaning is really clear who thinks about a doctor when you're healthy.

If you start exhibiting some symptoms, you might think about a doctor. If your symptoms get worse, really painful or debilitating or frightful, what do you do? You call the doctor. You might even call 911. What Jesus is implying here is that every one of us is sick. Sickened by sin, our brokenness, but there are some people who don't think that they're sick.
They just think everybody else around them is sick. Jesus is saying, "I can't help those people, but if you know you're sick and you know you're broken, and you know you have your issues. I can help you a lot." That's why [inaudible 00:29:06] we used to say this more often than we do now, there are no perfect people allowed here.

The reason why we say that is because it's imperfect people who will really respond to this good news of Jesus. If you think that your life is the perfect picture of spiritual health we really can't do anything for you. That's exactly what Jesus was saying. That brings us to the last thought. The last question, what does it mean then to say yes to Jesus calling?
Again, let me read to you from Luke chapter five and the experience that Peter has. Jesus replied to Simon. "Don't be afraid from now on you'll be fishing for people." As soon as they landed, they meaning Peter and James and John left everything and followed Jesus. For Peter, it was a big thing.

Here's the thing, when it comes to saying yes to Jesus I would break that down into three different things. Saying yes in Jesus implies three things. It implies to believe, to leave, and to join. To believe, to leave, and to join. When Peter experienced that huge catch, he was going, "Oh my gosh, this guy's different. There's something about his him."

He began to believe in him. We're not exactly sure why Levi did, but surely there was something going on, but certainly Mary Magdalene and Joanna, and Susanna, they had had demons cast out. They had been healed. They were going, I believe in this person, and because they believed in him they're willing to leave their livelihood, and follow him.

Then, they are also willing to join him. The women followed, the women contributed, the women served they're about his work in the world. Now, here's the deal, what does that mean for you and me today? How do we believe and leave, and join Jesus? Well, we can believe because of a number of things that is the teaching of scripture, that is that Jesus is the Son of God.
That he died as an expression of God's incredible love for us. He was resurrected as a means of validating that. We believe that in actuality the resurrection confirmed who Jesus was, and actually happened in history. Started this movement in history that has literally changed the world. We realized that there's no way that could have happened apart from him.

Maybe you've been like Peter, God has done something miraculous in your life. Maybe like Jen, or like one of the women, God delivered you from something or rescued you from something and you believe. You're ready to say yes in that regard. Then what does it mean to leave everything?

Here's the definition I like the most that means something to me, maybe it will to you. That leaving now means walking away from any loyalties that you have that would compete with your loyalty to Christ. To leave everything now means to put everything on the table of your life.

Your positions, your possessions, your dreams, your aspirations, all that you have and say, "Lord, they're yours. I leave them to you." With that same open spirit saying, "Lord, because I've left those things. I am all in and joining you in your work in the world. I want to be a part of helping people experience forgiveness for the kinds of sins they never believe God would ever forgive them for."

To see their hope and their life and their spirit come alive because they've experienced forgiveness. I want be a part of seeing you restore marriages and friendships and communities in broken people. I'm all in on that. John chapter 5:17, Jesus says this about God. He says, "My father is always working and so am I."

That means that no matter where you live or where you work or where you play or go to school, God is already at work. There's a book that's about three decades old by Henry Blackaby called Experiencing God. Then he says this, "Our task as followers of Jesus is to find out where God is at work and go and join him in it." If you believe that God is at work at Preston Trail, join us, serve, grow, give your life because God is at work here.

If God's at work in the lives of some people that you work with and you see that he's doing something in them and through them, join with them. If you live in a neighborhood and God's at work with some of your neighbors, join with them. If you're at a school or go on a team and you're seeing God is working among some of the players or the classmates, join with him.

Be a part art of this revolution in the world. Here's the great promise that I believe totally, that when you do that, when you're willing to be with him and grow to be like him, and carry on his legacy, you'll soon discover that your fundamental sense of meaning and belonging is now going to be found in your relationship with Jesus, and those who are with you in this revolution.
In this incredible opportunity that we have to give our lives to something larger than ourselves. Something that is eternal and affects people forever. If I could for Jesus today, I want to invite you to follow him, be with him. The Christian life is not just praying a prayer and checking your box so you go to heaven when you die.

It's about following Jesus and saying, "All I have is open to you and I'm in wherever he leads." Some of you might need to leave your livelihood. You might need to change professions. I don't know. I might want to call you to do some things you never dreamed or imagined, but I believe this Spirit's at work in our lives today.

I want to invite you to take a moment with me and listen and maybe do some business with God that you've never have done before. Maybe you've been a check the box Christian. Now, you realize that he's calling you to weigh more than that. Maybe you're not ready to say yes to that yet, but it's a process.

I'm going to ask us to bow our heads right now and close our eyes. We have asked Warren to come back and sing a reprise of the song we sang earlier. As he sings quietly, just allow the spirit to speak to you. No one moving around, please. People are really dealing with life-changing decisions. I just want to invite you to be open to Jesus and what he's calling you to today. Warren, would you sing for us, please?

(singing)

Father, thank you for that very call. Lord, I'm so grateful for the beloved people in this room and those who are watching online. We are sons and daughters of you, our creator. I pray that you will be patient with us. That you'll challenge us to follow you, to be a part of this incredible revolution of grace and love and mercy that this world so desperately needs.
Father, I pray that the moments and the days to come more and more of us will say yes to this incredible call. That's our prayer Lord, in Jesus name. Amen.



Recorded in Frisco, Texas.