Leave It and Follow Him

Matthew 4:18-20 “And Jesus, walking by the sea of Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers. And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. And they straightway left their nets and followed him.”

Jesus called them. First, every one of us has a plan, a call. You have been assigned by the Lord to do something. It may not be full-time ministry, but make no mistake about it, you are being held responsible for what He’s called you to do, and you will be judged on whether you did it or not at the Judgment Seat of Christ.

Peter and Andrew were fishers by trade, and it seemed they had a very large fishing operation because it says they had ships, not bass boats, and partners. This was not a mom-and-pop operation. The Lord spoke to them and told them their future. If they followed Him, He would make them fishers of men. I like it that it is the Lord who makes us, and we get all the tools and equipment we need to do what God has called us to do. These are both spiritual and natural tools because you can and should have every tool the Lord has ordained for you. Think on that!

They had a choice in that moment. They could begin to reason why this was not a good time for them to follow the Lord: who would run the business since no one could do it as well as Peter, how would this work, where would they stay, what would they eat, who would pay for it, and so on? The simple answer is that Jesus said, “Follow me,” and so our response should be obedience in doing what He said to do.

But here is a key. They left everything and began to follow Him. In your situation, it may not be a “leave everything” scenario, but for me it was. I had to leave a career that I really enjoyed and was very good at. The Lord would not let me continue to be an accountant while I started in the ministry. He told me to leave it behind, and at first, I didn’t.

But I learned very quickly that my ability to be a very good accountant was not mine, that He was giving me the grace to be a good accountant, and when that grace lifted, my ability became a train wreck. I was going to Bible School and got a very good accounting job, but it was out of the will of God, and I made more mistakes in one week than I had ever made in my entire career.

The owner came to me and said, “Your references were incredible, but you don’t know what you are doing.” I think he even called me stupid. I learned a very hard lesson really fast, and that is that everything I do is by grace, and I no longer had accounting grace because that was not His will for this season of my life.

At that season, I had management grace to work at McDonald’s (not Douglas but the Golden Arches). When the Lord asks you to do something, it is in your best interest to follow Him even if you don’t get all your questions answered.