CROSSroads -- The CROSSroad of Readiness -- Matthew 4:18-22

Introduction
Back in the late 1990’s, I used to watch a little CMT and got hooked on the Dixie Chicks. Later on they did the music for the movie “Runaway Bride” and one of the songs was “Ready to Run” The song’s implication was that the girl walking down the aisle was not ready to marry but ready to run from the marriage and have some more fun before tying that knot.
I think that we all want to be ready to have a little fun. It doesn’t take much to pull me away from something and to get me going down the path of jocularity.

Describing the Biblical Text
As we look at this text this morning we see 4 fishermen and a number of people hard at work trying to make a living.
Yet as they were trying to make their living, they were confronted by a calling to follow Jesus and to serve Him.
Jesus was walking by the Sea of Galilee which makes some sense considering that his ministry headquarters was in Capernaum.
So, as He passed through a fishing village the boats were in the water and some were fishing and some were preparing to fish but Jesus was not interested in Fish; He was interested in people.

So he called the fishermen from the life of catching fish and mending nets to a life of reaching people and building the kingdom of God.

Narrate the Contextual application
For the last 3 weeks, we have been looking at people who were called to follow God and to serve Him in ministry.
Some followed willingly and some did not.
Some were indued with vision and some were not but in every case, God clearly expressed to the called what they were to do.
This calling is really no different but in this case, there was three years of schooling involved to see how to serve and what to do.
Another thing that we might point out at this point was that we see the calling of Jesus’ inner circle.
Peter, James, and John were His confidants and those who received the special instruction and training.
Andrew was the one who brought people to Jesus to become followers.
But as we look at the text, we see that they quickly responded to the call of Jesus.

Life Application (thesis)
The question we need to ask this morning is this.
If we are called to serve Jesus how quickly would we respond and how willingly would we go?
Several months ago, we had a message in this service that called on us to respond if we were willing to do whatever it takes to see this church grow to reach the next generation for Christ.
I wrote the respondents to that message down and prayed for them.
That list is in my office at home and they are waiting to be called to a task and I am praying for the right task or that Jesus would just call them into service.
But, since they came forward that Sunday, I believe they are ready for that calling and they are looking for that whatever it takes moment.
A calling from God requires us to be ready at all times.

SO WHAT!! (Outline)
Being ready at all times, that would be hard wouldn’t it?
When we think of people who are ready at all times, we think of people with expectations.
Several weeks ago when we looked at availability, I told you about my wife’s obstetrician who made himself available to us by giving us his home phone number. When we think of readiness we would expect that he would be ready to be called at a moments notice when a mom goes into labor.
How about a police officer who is on duty, He might be sitting in a parking lot writing the night’s reports when the radio blares out his unit number and he has to be ready to roll into whatever situation he might find at the address given by the dispatcher. My dad was a policeman and he said that he did mind any call except on and that was the domestic disturbance. But he still had to be ready.
So we need to be ready for Jesus to call us into his service and we can take a couple of steps to make sure that we have come to that place of readiness.
I cannot allow my life to distract me from hearing the voice of God.
I think of all the distractions that we can have, life is the most significant.
Life is something that often times we don’t notice happening around us yet it is always happening and sometimes it keeps us from seeing things that are truly important.
There was a song called 2 Sets of Joneses by Big Tent Revival that came out in the mid 90’s.
Here is a quote of a verse from that song.
Evelyn's daddy was proud of young Rothschild,
He worked the late hours to be number one
Just newly weds and their marriage got rocky,
He's flying to Dallas; she's having a son.

In looking at our text, we see two families involved in the family business of fishing.
Simon Peter and Andrew bar Jonah were actually casting the nets seeking a catch of fish in the Sea of Galilee.
They were hard at work on their jobs.
Think about our own jobs when we are hard at work. On Thursdays, I am spending most of the day in the office working to get Sunday’s sermon finished so my Friday and Saturday can be spent with my family. Sheila screens my calls on Thursdays a little more carefully for that reason.
But here we see two men in the boat actually pitching the nets for the fish and Jesus says follow me and I will make you fishers of men.
So they rowed to the shore, actually, it doesn’t say they were in a boat. They may have been pulling a seine.
They rolled up the nets; they moored the boat, kissed their wives goodbye and left.
Bonnnnnk
Nope, not the way it happened
Look at verse 20, “immediately they left their nets and followed Him.”
There were no meeting no, decisions about where to leave the net, no goodbye kisses.
They just left and followed Jesus.

We move to the next situation.
These boys are not fishing but they are in the boat.
They are mending or repairing their net.
What else do we see about their situation that is significant?
There is some money involved here since the Zebedee family had a boat and they had something else we don’t see with Peter and Andrew: Servants
In this case we see them not only leaving jobs to follow Jesus, they are leaving the family fortune.
Again, where is the discussion?
Where is the debate?
It’s just not there.
Once the will of God became clear, the debate was over.
That is the way it should always be; our determination is made the very second that the voice of the Lord is discerned.

But what gets in the way.
Life
Things like money and family and careers and homes and property and tradition and a myriad of other things.
But, I think there is an even bigger problem than simply ignoring the Lord.

I think a lot of us really don’t know what we are trying to hear or what we are listening for.
To be honest, there are too many people who claim to be followers of Jesus Christ that would forsake Him instantly if it came down to their inconvenience or their simply not getting their way.
I think the reason for that is that too many people who claim to followers of Jesus Christ are merely church members and not followers of Jesus Christ at all.
This would bring us to our next step.

I must seek to be familiar with the voice of God so I can hear it when he calls me.
If we are going to hear the voice of God, we have to know Him first.
I would like you to roll the pages of your Bible to John 1:35.
This is a very intriguing passage because of who we see here.
We see John the Baptist with two of His disciples, Andrew and one other. Now who could that have been?
Hang on and we will postulate a logical guess.

John the Baptist is baptizing in the Jordan River and here comes Jesus and John proclaims him to be the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world. Two of John’s followers are there and they hence desire to follow Jesus. We see Andrew introducing Jesus to Simon Peter and then to Philip.
So, we see here that Andrew and Peter knew Jesus from about the time of His baptism.
Now what about John and James?
You see, there is a second unnamed disciple of John the Baptist and I would postulate that this was John the disciple.
John the disciple who wrote the gospel of vv35, 37, 40
John makes sure that we know that there were two disciples of John the Baptist.
Later in the Gospel of John, the writer avoids naming himself by using clichés like “the disciple whom Jesus loved.”
I honestly believe that John was with Andrew.
We also have one of the Zebedee brothers knowing Jesus as well.

How can we better recognize the voice of God than to know him?
How can we better understand God’s calling in our lives than to have a relationship with Him?
Jesus met our fishermen before he ever went to Galilee to call them into service.
Has Jesus ever met you?
Jesus said that his sheep hear His voice.
Would we hear his voice or would it become clouded behind fifty years of tradition?
Would the voice of Jesus be dulled by the fear of a budget shortfall?
I remember reading a joke in a Christian joke book that said this, “It says in our constitution and by laws that the will of God can only be overturned by a 2/3 vote.”

When we are listening for Christ in order to hear His voice, then nothing he says is too much for us or will be denied for any reason.
Do you know Christ through a personal relationship?
Or is it possible that you just know about Him because you have been in church all your life because that was just the right thing to do?
If we know Him, then we will hear His voice.
If we just know about Him then nothing he says will ever influence any decision that we make because we will never hear His voice.
And no matter what happens, we will never be ready to follow Him.