Now, as He was walking by the Sea of Galilee, He saw Simon who was called Peter,
and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea for they were commercial
fishermen. And Jesus called to them, “Come, follow Me, and I will make you
fishers of people!” And immediately they left their nets to follow Him.
Continuing on from there, Jesus saw two other brothers, James and John, the sons
of Zebedee, who were in a boat with their father, repairing their nets. Jesus
called to them, and they also immediately left the boat, their father, Zebedee,
who was in the boat with their employees, and left to follow Him.
(Matt. 4:18-22; Mark 1:16-20)
As we have seen previously, Jesus had already met both Peter and Andrew. John the Baptist had pointed Jesus out to Andrew near the Jordan River the day after John had baptized Jesus, whereupon Andrew went in search of his brother, at the time called Simon, to bring him and introduce him to Jesus (John 1:35-42). It was at their first meeting that Jesus indicated that He would call him Cephas, or Peter. Even at this first meeting, they had believed that Jesus was the Messiah, so it is not surprising that when Jesus invited them to join Him they immediately left their nets to follow.
Too, it isn’t hard to imagine that they would have been in the audiences when Jesus began preaching to the people. It is entirely possible that they were already followers without invitation. But now they were hard at work. Peter and Andrew were standing in water to their knees. They would have cast the fishing net as far as they could into the water, where it would sink by the weight of the lead sinkers. The fishers would then draw the nets toward the shore and thereby gather up the fish. But this day they see Jesus standing there watching them. Then comes the invitation they were waiting for: “Come, follow Me, and I will make you fishers of people!” That’s all they needed to hear. They dropped their nets and left them where they were.
As the three of them moved further down the shore, they came to the brothers, James and John, their father, Zebedee, along with some of Zebedee’s workers. They were very busy repairing their fishnets. Again, Jesus calls and as with Peter and Andrew, James and John drop their nets, bid their father good-bye and leave to follow Jesus.
Who were these people? Unfortunately, the gospels offer comparatively little information about them, but we’re not totally bereft. We do know that fishing was a strenuous, tough, often unrewarding job (Luke 2:5). James, John, Zebedee and Simon Peter were business partners (Luke 5:10), working along with Andrew. Fishing was big business in the area, as fish was the chief staple of the people. Too, fish could be preserved with salt, then exported, some as far away as Rome.
These men would have been rough and crude. Most likely, they had had little formal education. Because fishing could be dangerous, they would have had to have been courageous, if not completely fearless. Fishing required a lot of patience, and the fishers had to learn to live with disappointment. They had to endure the elements–from the blazing, hot sun of a summer’s day, to the bitterly cold wetness of fishing during a rainy winter.
We know that Andrew had been a disciple of John the Baptist, and may have even left his fishing for a time to travel with John. When John pointed Jesus out to him, calling Jesus the Lamb of God, Andrew took his leave of John to follow Jesus, and spent an entire day listening to and speaking with Jesus. He also went and sought out his brother, Simon (Peter), to bring him to listen to Jesus.
By the time of this invitation, Andrew had already been present at and witness to Jesus’ first miracle at the wedding at Cana, as well as the Passover in Jerusalem, where Jesus had attacked the merchants in front of the Temple. Each time Andrew had returned home and to his fishing. Until now. Now Jesus called him to leave his livelihood and join Him in ministry. And leave he did.
Simon, brother of Andrew, was married, and was also a fisherman. The gospels show that Peter was quick-tempered, and impetuous, prone to “shoot first and ask questions later.” (John 18:10). At their first meeting, Jesus laid the groundwork for Simon’s future position among the disciples when He changed Simon’s name to Peter. Peter (Petra) means rock in Aramaic, upon which the Christian Church was built.
The sons of Zebedee, James and John, were given by Jesus the nickname, Boanerges, which is Aramaic for sons of thunder, no doubt in recognition of their dynamic personalities (Luke 9:54). In the gospels James is mentioned before his brother every time but once, perhaps because he was older, or the preeminent member of the family. However, it is this John who is believed to have been the author of the fourth gospel, and the one who would come to be called, “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”
The outstanding thing that we may note about the calling of the first disciples is that the people Jesus called were not the great minds of the first century. They were not people with wealth, power or prestige. They were not religious authorities or scholars. They were simple, ordinary people. They were hard workers. And when Jesus called, they left everything they had to follow Him. They were called to entirely new careers: they would become fishers of people. It is important to note that they weren’t called to be preachers or teachers. They were called to ministry. They were called to discipleship. They would become companions and students of Jesus. And they would give to others that which had been given to them.
This ends today’s study.
Points to Ponder