Sunday Reading: Matthew 4:18-20
Key Verse: Matthew 4:19
19 And He said to them, Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.
Devotion:
Unless we study to find out what is behind many of the things that are said in life we will get a very strange view of it. If we only hear half of what is actually said then we will only know half of the truth. When I was first introduced to this passage I thought that it was a bit strange that these two brothers should immediately drop their livelihood and follow Christ after a simple saying “follow Me and I will make you fishers of men.” But the more you think about it the more logical it is that Simon and Andrew actually knew a fair amount about Jesus at this time already.
We are fairly certain that they knew of Jesus through the teachings of John the Baptist and that they themselves were taught until their teacher was taken into prison; whereupon they returned to their fishing. So when the opportunity came to them that Jesus should invite them for further teaching, how could they say no? And yet we look at the world around us and we see so many people being given that same opportunity to follow Christ and they continue to reject Him day after day. What is it in this world that could ever seem anything like as good as what God is promising us? The sad truth is that sin is something so very deceitful that it looks far better from the outside than what it actually is.
God gives us the truth and He gives us opportunity, He gives us time and He has supplied the place… What we do with these things will govern our lives with Christ. If we are willing to drop our worldly ways and pick up His ways, then we shall enjoy all the privilege that that will bring to us. If we, however, turn our backs on Christ then we may well have missed the boat. Jesus made sure that the path that He walked was one which would lead to meeting the right people at the right time, giving them the truth, opportunity, time and meeting them at their place. When He makes things happen in our lives, if we are not listening we will miss out on much of which is said and even done. We need to be ready to take up the challenge that Christ gives us and follow Him, leaving behind those earthly trimmings that we have longed for for so long. Following Christ is not just something we say we do but should be something we do after we say yes!
Points to Ponder:
Have you said Yes to Christ?
Are you continuing to say Yes to Him?