Divine Strategy
Mark 3:7-19
7 Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and also from Judea,
8 and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon, a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him.
9 And He told His disciples that a boat should stand ready for Him because of the crowd, so that they would not crowd Him;
10 for He had healed many, with the result that all those who had afflictions pressed around Him in order to touch Him.
11 Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they would fall down before Him and shout, “You are the Son of God!”
12 And He earnestly warned them not to tell who He was.
The Twelve Are Chosen
13 And He went up on the mountain and summoned those whom He Himself wanted, and they came to Him.
14 And He appointed twelve, so that they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach,
15 and to have authority to cast out the demons.
16 And He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter),
17 and James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means, “Sons of Thunder”);
18 and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot;
19 and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him.
In order to be truly successful, you must not only know where you want to go, but how you want to get there. In other words, you must not only have a goal, but a plan to reach that goal. You might call that plan a strategy. Strategy comes before success, both in the dictionary and in life.
Jesus had a strategy, a divine strategy, for reaching the world. His life and ministry on this earth was part of that strategy, but only the introductory phase. He had more in mind than simply His life and ministry for those short years almost two millennia ago. What would happen when He left? How could the work of the Kingdom be carried on in the ages to come?
The divine strategy of Jesus is still unfolding today. As a matter of fact, you and I are part of that strategy. Therefore, it is important for us to understand just what that strategy is and how we fit into the picture. Our text today give us a sense of Jesus; strategy.
7 Jesus withdrew to the sea with His disciples; and a great multitude from Galilee followed; and also from Judea,
8 and from Jerusalem, and from Idumea, and beyond the Jordan, and the vicinity of Tyre and Sidon, a great number of people heard of all that He was doing and came to Him. (vv. 7-8)
The word was out: Jesus was healing people of their sicknesses. He was casting out demons. Mighty miracles were being performed for the first time in many, many years of Israel’s history. And people were finding genuine relief from their problems.
So the multitudes came. Our text tells us that they were great multitudes. They had heard that Jesus was doing great things. Such news could not be kept quiet. The sick were healed. Demons cried out and got out. The news spread like wildfire.
You see, the need was great in the lives of these people. That is why they came. The need is still great today. And that is why many will still respond if only the word only gets out.
People with real, deep, unmet needs can be desperate people. Desperate people do desperate things to have their needs met. As the crowd swelled in size and sought to press in to get to Jesus, Jesus had to take measures to keep from being literally crushed.
9 And He told His disciples that a boat should stand ready for Him because of the crowd, so that they would not crowd Him;
10 for He had healed many, with the result that all those who had afflictions pressed around Him in order to touch Him.
11 Whenever the unclean spirits saw Him, they would fall down before Him and shout, “You are the Son of God!”
12 And He earnestly warned them not to tell who He was. (vv. 9-12)
Jesus called for a boat that He might push out from the shore aways, stand in the boat, and preach to them. The crowd was growing because here was a man whose reputation preceded Him. This was no mere rumor. This was reality. This man had the power and authority of the claims which preceded Him. When He encountered the forces of evil and those possessed by demons, the very demons would cry out in confession that the one they hated was the Son of God. Whenever He touched the sick, they were healed. The Kingdom of God was among them.
So this is where we begin today, with the great crowds coming from as much as 100 miles away, with the hope that their needs would be met. Multitudes were coming to see this one man.
It is in this context that Jesus chose His twelve disciples. And in His choosing, we see the divine strategy of Jesus for meeting the needs of the world. We see His strategy for expanding the Kingdom of God through multiplication of His own ministry in the lives of others. Today, we will focus on the calling, conditioning and commissioning of disciples.
The Calling
13 And He went up on the mountain and summoned those whom He Himself wanted, and they came to Him. (v. 13)
Notice first the sovereign desire of our Lord. It says here that He "summoned those whom He Himself wanted." Jesus called those whom He desired. This is the election of God. It is a manifestation of the greatness of God. On that basis, He calls us; on the basis of His desire for us. I think that is a miracle in itself. That God would desire me is incredible to me. That the all holy God, who is of purer eyes than to look upon iniquity, would desire the fellowship of creatures whose very natures are twisted by sin, is pure grace.
We see, in the desire of Jesus, a manifestation of the love of God for each of us. If there is any fact of history that should be irrefutable, it is the love of God demonstrated through the sacrifice of Christ. Written across every page of holy Scripture is the phrase, "God loves." The Bible has been called "God’s love letter to us" because it in itself is a revelation of the divine plan of God for the redemption of mankind. Jesus desired them. He desires us today. It all begins with God; with His heart’s desire for us.
But not only is there a sovereign desire, there is a spiritual calling. Where there is the desire of God for us there is also the call of God. He did not merely see men for whom He could desire great things. He called them to those things. He made those things possible for them. You see, there are many for whom you could desire great things, even though there was no way they could achieve them.
There are many people who fit that description today; people you desire to see become something they are not; people you desire to overcome the problem which holds them back; people you would like to see victorious and full on in their commitment to Jesus. But you have no confidence that it will ever be so, at least based on past experience with them. And you have no real way to make them change.
Not so with Jesus. Where He desired to see men become what He wanted them to be, He made the way for them to do it. He called them to a life which He wanted to see them live. He called them to Himself, to give them the power to become sons of God. And He made the first move. He chose us. Later on, He would tell His disciples, "You did not choose me, but I chose you."
It begins with a sovereign desire, proceeds with a spiritual call, but it must conclude with a serious response. You see, many are called but few respond in faith to that call. These men knew that Jesus was teaching radical things, which ran against the grain of the current tradition of the religious leaders. They knew better than we do that to follow Him was to risk running headlong into serious conflict with the authorities.
Yet the call had been issued to them. Jesus desired them. They had a decision to make: Would they come to Jesus? It would mean forsaking all the worldly things which they held dear, to follow a man who would likely get them into serious conflict. Would they, could they identify with such a man? That is the same question people are facing today. They are being asked to count the cost.
These men did not have very much going for them that the world considered highly. They were not well educated. They did not have great wealth. They were not from noble families. They were not prominent men. But they had something going for them which Jesus counted more highly than any of these things. They had a love for Him and a desire to identify with Him. So they came to Him. And in the same way, we must come to Him today. There must be a serious response to the considered call of Jesus if we would be His disciple.
The Conditioning
Not only is there a calling to be Christ’s disciple, there is a conditioning process by which He prepares us for ministry.
14 And He appointed twelve, so that they would be with Him and that He could send them out to preach,
15 and to have authority to cast out the demons. (vv. 14-15)
In this passage of Scripture, we see three important reasons why Jesus calls us to Himself. As with these disciples, so it is with us, that Jesus calls us to Himself, that we might share His life, share His work, and share His power.
When Jesus called the twelve, the Scripture says He called them, "That they might be with Him." In other words, He called them to share His life. He wanted to involve them in intimate communion and fellowship with Himself. He called them to be in relationship with Him. He desired for them to share their lives with one another and with Him. But more importantly, He desired to impart His life to them.
Jesus saw the need of the multitude and He saw the need for the multiplication of His ministry. He was going to reproduce Himself in these disciples. But He knew that the only way this was going to be accomplished was to impart His life to these men. The only way life can be imparted is to spend time sharing that life.
There are many today who want the authority and power of God without following the path which leads to attaining the authority. Having been called out of the world, they forget to stay out of it. Having been called to a relationship with Jesus, they neglect to spend time communing with Him. Having been commissioned to share the Good News, they spend all their time looking to their own desires in life, instead of looking to His desire. Yet, they expect the power to be there when they want it to be. But if we would have the authority, we must pay the price.
The first priority we have is fellowship with Jesus. He called these early disciples to be with Him. He desired fellowship with them, and they needed fellowship with Him. If we would make real progress in our own Christian lives, we must partake of the life of Jesus by being with Him. Apart from spending time with Jesus in fellowship through His Word and prayer, we simply will not grow. There is no shortcut. There is no easy way. Jesus calls us to communion with Him to share His life.
But He also calls us to share His work. Our text says that He not only called them to be with Him, but He called them "That He might send them out to preach." Jesus Himself proclaimed the Good News, and He was reproducing Himself in the lives of these men. They would also be heralds of the truth of the Kingdom of God. And so should we.
Nothing changes in this regard for the people of God. All have been called to herald the Gospel message by what we do, by what we say, by our example, by our priorities, by our commitments. We are to speak loudly to the watching world concerning the Kingdom.
Let me ask you a question. Are we really Kingdom oriented? Do our lives speak to the world about what it means to be in the kingdom? We are called to fellowship with Jesus in order to proclaim this message.
He has also called us to share His power, to have authority. Our text says that He called them to be with Him, to preach the Good News, "and to have authority to cast out the demons."
Did you know that we may possess the delegated authority of Christ as His ambassador. This is the end of what Jesus is preparing us for. The symbol is clear. They were not only given power over the demon spirits of the day, but we, and all of His disciples, are given authority over the powers of darkness. The victory we possess in Christ is such that we have authority over the empire of Satan. Satan is a defeated foe to those who know their God. "They shall be strong and do exploits," Daniel says.
The key, again, is that we know our God. It is not enough that we know about Him. We must know Him intimately. This is what Paul meant in Philippians 3. He knew that His main priority in life was to know Jesus Christ. And that is our priority as well. As we come to know Him, we will have authority. God intends it to be so. He has called us to share His life, to share His work, and to share His power.
The Commissioning
16 And He appointed the twelve: Simon (to whom He gave the name Peter),
17 and James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means, “Sons of Thunder”);
18 and Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot;
19 and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him. (vv. 16-19)
I would like for us to notice, concerning this passage, three words which characterize those whom Jesus calls. They are plurality, diversity and individuality.
Notice first the plurality of His calling. It is interesting that Jesus called a group of men. There is the symbolism of the twelve, corresponding to the twelve tribes of Israel, indicating that there was a new order of the Kingdom being inaugurated. But even in the old dispensation, the Kingdom was a community of believers. Here we see that Christianity begins as a group.
Christianity is the relationship of an individual to the Lord Jesus Christ. But that is not all. Jesus never intended that we should live out our lives in His Kingdom in isolation. As a matter of fact, we cannot. Apart from being stranded on some desert island, God will not provide the grace to go it alone. He has designed us to function and grow in grace in relationship with other believers in the Church which He founded. It is there we mature. It is there we live out the true life of Christ. It is there God will meet us in a very special way.
Someone may say to you, "Well, you don’t have to go to church to be a Christian." That is true. It is also true that you don’t have to live in water to be a fish -- but it helps. God intends fish to live in water, and He intends Christians to live in fellowship with other Christians. The fate of a fish out of water is the same fate of the Christian out of fellowship – death. Like a fish mounted on the wall, many Christians hold up as a trophy a time years ago when they made a commitment to Christ. But a framed certificate of baptism or membership without a daily living out of that reality in the community of God’s people is as dead as that fish mounted on the wall. It is only a memory.
God not only calls us to live out our faith in plurality. But He calls us to live it out in diversity. The group Jesus called was a mixed group. Look at the group He chose and how diverse they were: there was a publican, Matthew, who was hated as a government official. There was a patriot, Simon the Zealot, who hated the yoke of Roman government. In this group, there were men of diverse background fused together by Jesus, and that is what He has in mind for the Church.
Only as we come together in Him on the basis of His common life in us are we going to experience Christian fellowship. What most people experience is a cheap imitation. All they really have is what the world has. If we only fellowship with those of our choosing, those who like us, those who are on our socio-economic educational level, then what do we more than the Pharisees? What do we more than the Publicans? What do we more than the world?
Jesus created diversity, and it is only as diversity comes together in harmony that we get the beautiful music of the symphony. What if all were trumpets? What if all were drums? What if all were flutes? What if all were any one instrument? We might enjoy it for a while if we like that instrument. But we would miss the beauty of the whole. That is what Jesus has in mind for the Church. He desires that we might be a symphony of His people, playing His tune for the world to hear in all of its parts.
That brings us to our third word, individuality. The diverse plurality of God’s people is a group that must live out its ministry as individuals. Each member has an important part to play. Like a symphony, each one of those Jesus calls must play His individual part in harmony with the whole.
It is interesting that Jesus surnamed some of His disciples. In our text we see that He named Simon "Petros," or Peter, the rock. It was not that Peter was so rock-like. He may have been the opposite. There were to be times in the future where He would seem very unlike a rock in His shaky denials of Christ. But the potential was there and Jesus saw it. So He named him. He also named James and John a name meaning, "Sons of Thunder." Was it because of their natures? Or was it their destiny in His plan to thunder forth the truth of His salvation? We know that James was one of the first martyrs. He was martyred for the stand he took for Christ. And we know of John’s proclamation of the truth in His gospel and letters. In them, he thundered forth the Good News as well as defended the faith against heresy.
The message for us is that when Jesus calls us, He assumes the responsibility for us. He knows what we can become. And He has committed Himself to us to make us what He desires us to be. So there is an encouragement and a warning here. The encouragement is that if we give ourselves to Him, He will provide the training, the wisdom, and the power for us to become what He desires us to be. The wisdom is that there was a Judas in the group. We are under no obligation to obey. We may choose to obey in word only, as Judas did, but His heart was not with Jesus. He said he was faithful, but he proved otherwise. What Christ is looking for is not the crowd, but a few good men and women willing to be His disciples.
What God sets apart, He prepares for His service. He does not call us, condition us and commission us only to leave us to our own resources to accomplish His work. Along with the call comes the power to be obedient.
And as we respond in faith, coming to Him to be with Him, to commune with Him, to give our lives to knowing Him, we find His life reproduced in us. His character becomes our character. His love becomes our love. His life becomes our life. His authority is delegated to us to use as He directs. Our defects are swallowed up in His grace, and He begins to make a new creation. He assumes the responsibility for our growth and progress and the things of the Kingdom.
He may even give us a new name. Let me ask you: what would you like to be known by if you could pick a name to be called by Jesus. What is your weakest area? What would you most like the victory over? Call yourself by that name. "Hello, Lord, this is Patience here. Thank you for making my impatience patience." "Lord, this is Forgiving here. Thank you for that grace." "Self-control here, Lord. Thank you for the victory over my desires." Claim it. Work toward it. Become it in Christ. If it is His desire toward you, you can do it by His strength.
Jesus calls us, but He also conditions us, in order that He might commission us to be His disciples.
Based upon a sermon by J.D.Hoke
