Puzzling Appointments Series

Jamie Buckingham is one of the great preachers and authors whose books have sold in the millions.

What I like about him is that he makes so many comical blunders in his ministry that he makes other

pastors feel less threatened by their human errors. If you sometimes feel like your life is a comedy

of errors, you will be relieved to know you are not alone. In one solemn service where he was

piously leading his people to a point of silence, he bowed and heard laughter rippling across his

congregation. It suddenly dawned on him as his mind replayed what he had just said: "Please bow

your eyes and close your heads."

On another occasion he was to officiate at a formal wedding, and he came into the sanctuary

directly from the restroom. He did not realize until he was in front of all those people that stuck to

his shoe and trailing behind was a eight foot stream of toilet paper. Seldom to never is this fitting for

formal occasions, regardless of the beauty of the pattern. Even more embarrassing, if that is

possible, was when he put his hand on a casket at the front of the church, and the flimsy stand it was

on gave way. It was not the send off he had planned.

Most laughable of all, because it has come close to happening to many pastors, is the time he

baptized a very large woman on an Easter morning. She displaced far more water than he had

anticipated. The overflow rushed into his waders, and filled them to the brim. When the woman

came up, the water went down leaving him stranded in the middle of the baptistery with 400 pounds

of water in his boots. He was rooted to the bottom of the baptistery and could not budge. Before an

entire Easter congregation he had to lower his suspenders and crawl out of his boots in his

underwear.

Have you ever wondered why God chooses the people He chooses, and why He lets the leaders of

His people do so many strange, foolish, and embarrassing things? They could be multiplied by the

millions you know. Maybe it is just because God loves a good laugh, and the angels never blunder,

and so He has to get His enjoyment through men. I do not doubt that God is entertained by the silly

mistakes of His people, just as we are by those of our children and grandchildren. But I think there

is another reason for why God chooses men who fumble and blow it time after time. I think the

reason becomes more and more evident as we study the 12 men that Jesus chose to be His special

disciples who would become the 12 Apostles.

You do not have to examine these hand picked men for very long before you realize they were a

fallible lot who added their share of blunders and folly to a world already in the flood stages of this

stuff. We must assume that these 12 were the creme of the crop, but it seems incredible how soon

they begin to exhibit that they are often sour cream. We all know about Judas, of course, and that is

a whole issue in itself. The rest of these men are not exactly paragons of virtue, and knights on

white horses in shining armor.

The fact is, some feel that the greatest miracle Jesus ever performed was His endurance of these

men as they blunder their way through to the point of their final desertion of Him as He goes to the

cross. Never did 12 men ever change the course of history like these 12, but never did a noted

leader ever have more trouble with His followers than Jesus had with these 12. I do not like to be

critical of the judgment of Jesus, but the New Testament evidence forces us to ask, why in the world

did Jesus choose this bunch? Did they lie on their resumes, and did Jesus not check them out and

call former employers? Did Jesus turn off His deity, and go only by His human feelings in making

these choices? These questions are motivated by the New Testament evidence, which reveals to us

that which we want to study.

THE NATURE OF THE 12.

If there was anything extraordinary about these men, it is not evident to the naked eye. Jesus was

debating theology at 12 years old, but none of the 12 were sharp theologians. They did not

understand what Jesus was teaching most of the time, and He was perpetually giving them private

tutoring to help them grasp His parables. In Mark 4:13 Jesus said to them, "Don't you understand

this parable? How then will you understand any parable?" Then He went on to explain the parable