January 25, 2026

Sermon Transcript

Immediately they left their boat and their father, and followed him.  (Matthew 4:22) 

Today’s reading from the Gospel of Matthew reminds me of something that happened to me a long time ago.  It is an incident that could have been disastrous.  I will never know, but I will always wonder.  I was in the first grade at a place called Columbian School, in East Orange, NJ.  The year would have been 1969.  One rainy day after school as I was waiting at the street corner for the crossing guard to allow us to go.  A car pulled up, and a man I had never before seen rolled down the window and asked if I wanted a ride home.  Something within me registered caution.  This was not right, so I said “no thank you” to the man, and he drove away.   

Today I could take you to the very spot where I stood, and I don’t know why I remember the scene as vividly as I do.  But still I wonder: who in the world was this person?  Why did he single me out from all the other children beginning their walk home?  Where did he want to take me?  Did he simply want to get me out of the rain and drive me home?  I doubt it.  When I arrived home after my short walk, I remember that my mother was vacuuming the living room.  I told her about the man who offered me the ride.  She turned off the vacuum, and with a look of grave concern, said I had done the right thing.  “Never accept rides from strangers,” she said.  That’s pretty sound advice for living in a dangerous world as we do. 

This brings me back to today’s reading from the Gospel of Matthew.  It tells of an incident that has always bothered me.  It was a typical day on the shores of the Sea of Galilee.  A man named Zebedee ran a somewhat successful fishing business there with his two sons, James and John.  One day Jesus came to where Zebedee and his sons James and John were in their boat mending their nets.  Jesus called to James and John, and immediately they left the boat and their father, and they followed him.  So it was that these two brothers all at once dropped everything, and without question they accepted the ride and became followers of Jesus.  Does the scene bother you?  It bothers me, because the manner in which we usually interpret the calling of the disciples back then leads to a number of assumptions about what it means for us to be followers of Jesus today.  I think these assumptions may blanket the truth.  I think these assumptions may cover and obscure the path Jesus calls us along, as the snow today is covering the roads and sidewalks.  Allow me to explain.   

The first assumption we normally make is that the disciples of Jesus left their various trades, never to return to them as long as they were in the company of Jesus.  Whether they were fishermen, tax collectors, farmers, carpenters, or toolmakers, Jesus presented them with a higher calling.  No longer would they have time for these less important occupations.  Jesus would lead them to the places and people where real ministry needed to happen.  So for the next three years, seven days a week and twenty-four hours a day, the twelve disciples would be walking in the company of Jesus: following him, hearing his teachings, and witnessing his miracles. 

The next assumption logically follows: the disciples of Jesus, upon hearing his call, left their families just as quickly and decisively as they left their trades.  James and John left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired hands: not a word of good-bye, not a feeling of remorse.  Poor Zebedee.  I’ve always felt badly for him.  We can imagine that James and John had probably tagged at his heals since they were toddlers.  Once they were old enough to work, Zebedee was probably proud to pass on to them what he knew of life and living.  But loyalty to Jesus will leave no more room for particular friendships and family relationships.  They are, again, less important.  “If anyone comes to me and does not hate is own father, and mother, and wife and children … and, yes, even his own life, he cannot be my disciple” (Luke 14:26).  These are the marks of the true disciples of Jesus: they have left everything and everyone to follow him. 

The last assumption we make is, I think, the most dangerous of all.  It is the belief that Jesus was so obviously the Messiah – so radiantly divine – that people fell into a spell in his presence.  They followed him without any hesitation.  Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.  Real disciples don’t ask questions, they don’t doubt, they just follow.  Something within us registers caution.  This isn’t right.  Don’t get in the car with this man.  Spiritually speaking, you can step into the wrong car, with a nefarious driver at the wheel.  It’s no wonder why many people today – Christians included – secretly have reservations about Jesus.  God we can handle.  God is immutable, logical, easy to keep at arm’s length, and minds his own business while we mind ours.  But watch out for Jesus!  If you see him coming, hide your lunch money.  If he singles you out to be a disciple, it will be at the expense of your family and your livelihood.  Don’t let him take you for a ride.  Just say “no thank you” when he comes calling.   

These are the conclusions people have reached regarding the calling of the disciples and the life they subsequently led.  I believe we can draw different conclusions.  I believe we can and we should and we must take a different look at what it meant to follow Jesus then, and what it means to be one of his followers now, today.  The first thing to say is that Jesus wasn’t some glassy-eyed guru who appeared out of nowhere and beckoned people to follow him.  He wasn’t a cult leader.  He didn’t cast a spell over people so that they would follow him with the blank stare of the brainwashed, or the fanatical fire of the fundamentalist.  Rather, the Gospels strongly suggest that James and John already knew Jesus quite well.  Their mother was a woman named Salome, who many believe was the sister of Mary, the mother of Jesus.  If indeed Salome and Mary were sisters, then James and John were first cousins of Jesus.  Imagine: Jesus came to them not as some strange mystic offering to take them on a ride to oblivion.  He came to them as someone they knew.   

Furthermore, though James and John left Zebedee at that particular moment, we see the disciples, and even Jesus himself, continuing in their family relations.  Jesus healed Peter’s mother-in-law.  You heard that right: Peter, the Vicar of Christ and first Pope, had a mother-in-law.  Thirty years ago, when I acquired a mother-in-law, I also acquired a wife.  My mother-in-law, God rest her soul, was a saintly woman who occasionally had good things to say about me.  But Stacie, my wife, was always the better part of the deal.  If Peter had a mother-in-law, then Peter had a wife.  Peter and Andrew many times are listed as brothers, as are James and John.  So their sibling relationships, with all the rivalry, loyalty, and affection continued.  James and John continued to have contact with their mother, Salome, who once asked Jesus if her two sons might sit on each side of him in heaven.  Jesus also spent much time with his mother, Mary, and with his brothers and sisters.  Jesus had brothers and sisters, and even though those relations were at times strained, still they continued.  All of their family relations continued, even though, at that moment, they left their boat and their father and they followed Jesus.   

Finally, I believe it is unrealistic to think that the disciples never had a minute, or a day, or a week, or even a month to themselves during the three years they followed Jesus.  Not only did Peter have a wife, he also had a house and a boat.  Here I’m speculating, but could it be that during the three years of his ministry, Jesus would periodically call the disciples together for a specific mission, after which they would return to their homes, families, and occupations?  I think it’s a possibility that might account for all the varying “call” stories in the Gospels.  It’s a possibility that suggests Jesus called people to be his followers in the midst of their lives.  The lives they were living, the families they were loving, and the trades they were practicing all mattered to Jesus.  Everything from the way they conducted business, to the way they mended their nets, to the domestic chores of changing diapers, raising children, and deciding whether or not to observe the Sabbath mattered.  These were among the places where Jesus would have his followers then and now introduce and practice the ethics of the kingdom of God he spent so much time teaching them.  The simple places.  The everyday places.  If they couldn’t be followers of Jesus there, they probably weren’t much use to him anywhere else. 

What does it mean to follow Jesus?  In the Collect of the Day we have prayed for the grace to answer readily the call of our Savior Jesus Christ.  Hopefully this sermon will serve a purpose similar to the dedicated snow removal artists who will be hard at work today.  Hopefully, we have plowed away some of our snowy misunderstandings or reservations or fears about what it might mean in practice to be a follower of Jesus.  Trust me, the way needs to be shoveled and plowed.  You will hear from some quarters that to be a real follower of Jesus you have to go to some war-torn land as a missionary, or live like a monk in a monastery, or march in the latest demonstration, or sign up with the latest politically charged wing of the church – be it “Chloe’s people” (1 Cor. 1:10-17) or any other network of self-appointed true believers.   

Some will say you aren’t a true believer unless you vote a particular way, or witness publicly to strangers, or wear a clerical collar around your neck, or at least walk around feeling guilty about most things – if you’re really a disciple.  Granted, a few people really should walk around feeling guilty about the way they are living their lives, and Jesus does call some people to strange places.  But for most of us, the calling to be a disciple of Jesus happens right where we are, within the relationships we have, doing the work we are doing.  No matter how ordinary, or mundane, or routine our lives may be, this is where the real ministry of Christ needs to happen.  If we can’t be followers of Jesus in these places, we probably aren’t going to be much use to him anywhere else. 

What does it mean to follow Jesus?  From my English literature classes in college, I recall a particular novel by Charles Dickens, entitled Bleak House.  One chapter of the book is named “Telescopic Philanthropy,” and it tells the story of a Mrs. Jellyby.  Mrs. Jellyby lives in Victorian England, and is consumed twenty-four hours a day with the worthy cause of helping the natives in the far-flung land of Boorioboola-Gha in Africa.  To this end she sends enormous sums of money, she writes and receives hundreds of letters, she organizes most of the ladies of the community around the project, all the while preaching about the “Brotherhood of Humanity.”  By all appearances, she is one who has left everything and everyone, and answered the higher calling of Jesus.   

But the trouble is, her philanthropy is so telescopic that she fails to see – right at her feet – her own eight neglected, malnourished, ill-clothed, undisciplined, unsupervised children living in squalor in her own impossibly unkempt house.  If Jesus were to say “follow me” to Mrs. Jellyby, where do you think he would lead her?  I suspect her calling would be not to the far-flung corners of the earth, but to those who are right there, under her nose, all the time. 

If Jesus looked you in the eye and said “follow me,” where do you think he would lead you?  I believe he leads us to the simple places, to the everyday places, to be his disciples among the most difficult crowd of all: the people we know.  The people who see you every day.  The people right under our noses, all the time.   

“Follow me,” said Jesus to James and John.  “Follow me,” says Jesus to you and to me.