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Weimar University

Don Mackintosh

Following and Soul Winning

And then we'll look at another text together.

Father in heaven, Lord, thank you for the opportunity to come today and worship you.

Our hearts are already full as we've heard your voice speaking through your servants to us today.

And we ask that your voice would speak to us through your word.

Over the last several weeks, I've been really just talking about very straightforward but core text.

I think it was 2 weeks ago, seek ye first the kingdom of God and his righteousness and all these things will be added unto you.

Kind of a basic thing, seeking as a first priority the kingdom of God.

It's not just your life but a kingdom full, seeking God's kingdom and his righteousness, not your righteousness, but his righteousness.

And as that's imputed and imparted, and then imparted through you, Then you receive everything you need and you expand the kingdom as well.

And all these are imperatives, they're commands.

You know, God in our next message, and we looked at abiding in Christ and he will abide in you and you'll bear much fruit.

So it's an interesting thing that there is this combination of a command or expectation, but then the realization that it's up to you to decide.

So this week's text is the same thing and I'm going to call it following and fishing.

That'll be the name of our message or following and soul winning.

And as Wade just read there in Mark chapter 1, verse 16 through 20, passing along the Sea of Galilee, he, that is Jesus, saw Simon and Andrew, the brother of Simon, casting the net into the sea, for they were fishermen.

Follow me, and I will make you become fishers of men.

Immediately they left their nets and followed him.

And going a little further, he saw James, the son of Zebedee, and John, his brother, who were in their boat, mending the nets.

Immediately he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat, and the hired servants, and they followed him." So what do we make out of this?

A few points that we can think about this text.

First of all, Jesus is pictured here coming to seek and save the lost like we learn in Luke 19.10.

And he's pictured in the Old Testament in interesting ways.

In Jeremiah for instance 16, look with me just for a minute there.

Jeremiah 16, verse 16, well verse 14, therefore behold the days are coming, Jeremiah 16, verse 14, saith the Lord.

And it shall no more be said, the Lord lives who brought up the children of Israel from the land of Egypt, but the Lord lives who brought up the children of Israel from the midst of the north, from all the lands where he had driven them, for I will bring them back to their land, which I gave to their fathers.

Behold, I will send for many fishermen, says the Lord, and they shall fish them.

And afterward, I will send for many hunters." we have a few hunters here, but he wanted many hunters.

They shall hunt them from every mountain and every hill and out of the holes of the rocks or some texts say out of the crevices.

And so there's this idea in the Old Testament that God is a fisherman and he is fishing for souls.

In this case, it's people that were saved, then were lost, but then saved again.

His own people who rejected his teaching.

And so this metaphor of a fisherman is not just focused on the lost outside Israel, outside the church, but it's actually in the church.

And here is this picture of God where he is figuring out where you are, and he is actually finding you in the rocks and in the crevices.

He's going to where the fish have fled, and he's saying, I want to bring you back to your land.

Then there's a great controversy of fishermen actually.

Nahum Habakkuk, Zephaniah, Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi.

After picturing God as having pure eyes and you know addressing wickedness in the context of Babylon, it then pictures Babylon in verse 15.

They took, They take up all of them with a hook.

Therefore they sacrifice to their net and burn incense to their dreg net because by them their share is sumptuous, literally fat, and their food plentiful.

So they therefore empty their net and continue to slay nations without pity." So here you have God pictured in Jeremiah as a fisherman trying to get people out of Babylon.

But here in Habakkuk you have Babylon itself being a fisherman society and actually seeking for souls and trying to catch them with a net.

You know, the gladiators used to fight with nets.

So they would have a net, and they would try and catch people with a net.

And you know, they'd throw the net over you, and then they would pull you in.

This picture in the Bible is not of a rod and a reel.

That's not the kind of fishing they did back then.

And in the New Testament, then Jesus is taking these metaphors of the Old Testament.

He's saying, look, there's a great controversy of fishermen.

I'm trying to get you back and Babylon's trying to get you.

And I want to win that controversy and to do that, I need help.

And this is why Jesus says, look, I'm the great fisherman, but I need other fishermen to work with me, combine harmony so we can bring souls into the kingdom.

How many of you wanna join Jesus on his side of the fisherman competition.

How many of you ever watched the fisherman competition where they have these boats and everything else?

I was in someone's home 1 day and they were avid fishermen and they were watching this cable channel of all the different things.

I mean thousands, millions, billions of dollars are spent every year like figuring out how to fish for actual fish, right?

And buy this and buy that and they have expensive equipment to figure out where the fish are.

They have different things to help them know where to be, what to do, and how to act.

And there's a great controversy today of fishing for souls.

Is there a sophisticated attempt to drive people into the net of Babylon today?

And are there many people enlisted in that that team effort?

And so God calls his disciples in this passage and he says, help, I want you to become fishers of men along with me.

Now in Greek, the word follow means to be in constant fellowship.

That's not an occasional spasmodic, I go to church for midweek service, then I go on the weekend, no, no, no, no, no, no.

When he said follow me, that's an imperative, and it actually literally meant every hour of the day and night.

It wasn't like, okay, I've got this I'm going to do, then I'm going to do that.

It was like eat, drink, sleep With Jesus and do what Jesus did So this this this call was not like being a Facebook follower a follower on social media I learned on social media that 3.2 billion people have someone following them on social media.

How many of you have followers on Instagram or on social media?

Well, even if you don't, there's people following you, I can assure you.

So, followers, but You know, I've noticed that Facebook followers are kind of superficial.

Even though 42% of the population has followers on Facebook or on social media, these are kind of superficial followers.

They might like, how many of you had someone like a comment you made on social media?

They're kind of following you and they like it.

Or they might have that, you know, that compassionate emotive or that wow or, you know.

These are what we're reduced to on social media.

But you have these superficial followers.

But I noticed that when you ask people, I asked this week, I said, look, my birthday is on Monday, so I'm going to, I want to raise money for a cause because they have this thing on my media site, which I use this media site many ways for Weimar essentially, but recruiting some staff that are here, some students that are here, whatever.

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Following and Soul Winning

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