Why God Uses Unlikely People

Audio Transcript

As we continue our way studying through the entire Bible, now teaching through the four Gospels, let me ask you again, please, to take your Bibles and turn to Mark Chapter 3.

We’re going to pick up kind of right where we left off last week. We’ll be in verses 13 to 19 today. We covered a lot of verses last week; we’re only going to cover a tiny handful of verses today. And please don’t get too excited when I tell you this, but we’re about to read what could be considered among the most boring verses in the entire Bible. And yet, as is so often the case with God’s Word, hidden in these verses is one of the most extraordinary truths you will ever encounter. And I pray that when we leave here in just a few minutes, we will all be encouraged and blessed, empowered and inspired by the nugget of truth that is hidden in these words today.

We live in a world that is obsessed with credentials: where you went to school, who you know, what degrees you hold, what you’ve accomplished. In fact, entire industries exist to find the best of the best, the candidates who check all the boxes. Most of us, I think, if we were starting a company or building a movement—something that we hoped would outlast us and something that we dreamed might reach the ends of the earth—we’d find the most educated, most articulate, most impressive people that we could find, and Jesus would probably walk right past all of them.

Today in these verses, Jesus is about to choose the men who would take His Gospel to the world, and astonishingly, He didn’t check any resumes, He didn’t call for any references, He didn’t hire a recruiting firm. He called 12 unknown men with no ministry credentials whatsoever: sunburned fishermen with calloused hands, hated tax collectors, a political revolutionary, a doubter, a thief, and a traitor. These weren’t the best men available; they weren’t even the best men in town. And yet Jesus said, “These are the ones I want.” Embedded in this otherwise boring list of names that we’re going to look at today is one of the most beautiful truths in the entire New Testament, and people. And that should be great encouragement to every one of us sitting here right now.

Just to recap, Jesus has been ministering in Galilee; we’ve been following His ministry for months now. He’s still early in His ministry, and Mark says in verses 7 to 12, just prior to where we’re going to focus today, that people were coming to Jesus from near and far, and He lists all kinds of towns there. People were traveling great distances to come and see Him. In fact, so many people were coming to Him, it says that there was a fear that they were going to crush Him.

He’s now reached the peak of His popularity. People are bringing sick children and dying loved ones and crippled, the lame, the blind, and they’re coming to see this miracle worker. And now the crowds are pressing in on Him, but Jesus knows that the time has come for Him to do something that could be seen as one of the most pivotal steps in His entire ministry, and we read this starting in Mark Chapter 3, verse 13:

“Then Jesus went up on the mountain and called to Him those He wanted and they came to Him. He appointed twelve of them whom He designated as apostles so that they might be with Him and that He might send them out to preach and to have authority to cast out demons.”

I want you to notice the order here. The first call was not to do ministry; the first call was to be with Him. Before Jesus sends them out, He invites them in. By being with Him—and we’ll see this in the months to come as we continue studying the life of Jesus and of these disciples—by simply being with Jesus, they would grow from His teaching, they would learn to model themselves after His conduct, they would see His compassion for the lost, and their lives would be forever shaped by simply being with Him. And it’s still the same today.

Church, listen, before Jesus wants your service, He simply wants you. I’ve said this many times because it’s true, and you’ll hear me say it many more times as we go through the Gospels. There’s nothing more powerful that you can do for your Christian life than to get to Jesus by spending time reading about Him, reading His words, seeing how He handled various situations, seeing His heart for broken people. There’s no seminary course you can take, there’s no books you can read, there’s no magic three-step formula that will transform your Christian life more than simply being with Jesus. And so I wonder, are we spending time with Him, or are we just busy doing things for Him?

Years later, after this event, after much failure and after much growth, these disciples we’re about to look at are going to shake the world. Scripture looks back and gives us one explanation for everything these men became, and we find it in Acts Chapter 4, verse 13. They’ve been called in before the highest council in the land, threatened to stop speaking in the name of Jesus, and this is what is said of them when they—the opposition—when they saw the boldness of Peter and John and realized that they were unschooled, ordinary men, they marveled and took note—what?—that these men had been with Jesus.

Their lives were changed because they had been with Jesus. But who were these men? Let’s look at the remaining verses here, starting in verse 16:

“These are the twelve He appointed, Simon, to whom He gave the name Peter; James, the son of Zebedee and his brother John, whom He named Bonerges, meaning ‘sons of thunder’; Andrew, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas; James, son of Alphaeus; Thaddeus; Simon the Zealot;”

We saw months ago that Jesus had already called a handful of these men to come and follow Him. We looked at that one Sunday. But now Jesus is making it official. He’s getting ready to appoint these men as apostles, men who would be specifically empowered to carry on His work and to take His message to the ends of the earth, but it’s astounding that Jesus would appoint these particular men. They had no qualifications for ministry.

The religious men in that day—we’ve already seen this—the religious men in that day were the scribes, the Pharisees, the rabbis, even the Sadducees. If you wanted to be taken seriously in any kind of religious endeavor, you needed their endorsement. Not one of these twelve had it. Not one. And yet these are the men Jesus chose.

Let’s get to know them briefly. I’m only going to be able to spend a very short amount of time on each one. I mean, if you do the math, if I spend three minutes on each one, that’s 36 minutes already, so I’m just going to take a brief look at these. And I believe every one of us here today, if we listen, we can find ourselves in one of these twelve men. You’ll be able to identify with one of them.

Jesus starts with Simon, whom He had previously renamed Peter, which means “rock.” If you know anything about Peter, you know he’s anything but solid and grounded. He’s impulsive, he’s reckless, he’s spiritually overconfident. I mean, he would later walk on water and then immediately sink. He would declare his undying loyalty to Jesus and then turn around and deny Him three times. He would impulsively cut off a man’s ear with his sword. Peter wasn’t a scholar, he wasn’t a theologian; he was a rugged, rough, loud-mouthed fisherman with a quick temper. And yet Jesus looked at him and renamed him Peter, Petros, “rock,” because Jesus saw what he could become, not what he was. That’s grace. Jesus saw that this wild man would be transformed into one of the pillars of the church.

Years later, this same man would preach on the day of Pentecost, and 3,000 people would be cut to the heart and be saved. He would write two letters that we now have in our New Testament. He would be arrested and beaten and ultimately crucified, reportedly upside down because he did not feel worthy to die in the same manner as his Lord. What changed? What changed was that Jesus called him, and Peter said yes, and he spent time with Jesus.

Next we have James and John, the sons of Zebedee, brothers. Jesus gave them the nickname “Sons of Thunder.” I’m pretty sure I saw that on the back of a leather jacket one time in LA when I was there with a guy riding a motorcycle. This is the picture: Sons of Thunder. Why? Well, if you read the Gospels, you get a pretty good idea. For example, there was one Samaritan village that refused to welcome Jesus, and James and John literally turned to Jesus and said, “Lord, do You want us to call down fire from heaven to destroy them?” That’s not the suggestion you make when you’re known for being calm and measured. I would love to have been there to witness that moment. What did Jesus do? Did He laugh? Did He chuckle? Did He go… What a moment.

These brothers, James and John, were ambitious and they were competitive, which there’s nothing in the world wrong with that unless you’re aiming it in the wrong direction, and they were. They would later ask Jesus if they could each sit on either side of His throne in His kingdom. They wanted the best seats in the house; they wanted to be seen. And yet, as time goes by, these sons of thunder were transformed into men of grace by being with Jesus. John would become known as the disciple whom Jesus loved. He would write the Gospel of John, three epistles, and the book of Revelation. And James? James would become the first apostle to be martyred, killed by the sword under King Herod. What turned these two fireballs into pillars of the church? Jesus did. It’s amazing: He didn’t reject them because of their flaws, He called them in spite of them.

Next is Andrew, Peter’s brother, and he’s often overshadowed by Peter. In fact, almost every time Andrew is mentioned in Scripture, he’s identified as Simon Peter’s brother. Maybe you grew up as the little brother or the little sister of somebody, and that’s what you were always known by, right? Nobody even knew your name. “Oh, you’re Bill’s little sister, yeah.” Here’s what we know about Andrew: he was the first disciple to follow Jesus. When Andrew met Jesus, he immediately ran and got his brother Simon and introduced him to Jesus. And later, when there was a crowd of 5,000 hungry people who had nothing to eat, it was Andrew who brought the little boy with the five loaves and two fish to Jesus. When some Greeks wanted to meet Jesus later, they went to Philip, Philip went to Andrew, and Andrew took them to Jesus. Andrew wasn’t as prominent as Peter, but his role was just as vital: it was to point others to the Savior. Church tradition tells us that Andrew was eventually crucified on an X-shaped cross, and even as he was dying, he was preaching the Gospel to those who had gathered. He was faithful to the end.

Then there’s Philip. He’s known for being logical and practical, sometimes to a fault. At that same event where there were 5,000 people who needed to be fed, when Jesus asked him, “Philip, where can we buy bread for all these people to eat?” Philip immediately started doing the math, and he’s scanning the crowd and he’s guessing the numbers and he’s doing the, you know, times four, carry the two, and here’s what he says: “Lord, eight months’ wages wouldn’t be enough to give each person a bite.” But Jesus didn’t need a financial analyst. He didn’t need a spreadsheet. He needed someone who would trust Him even when the numbers didn’t add up. And unfortunately, in that moment, Philip failed. He struggled to see through the eyes of faith, but Jesus didn’t give up on him. Tradition tells us that Philip eventually took the Gospel to Phrygia, which is modern-day Turkey, where he was martyred for his faith.

Next is Bartholomew, also called Nathanael. We met him way back when Philip first met Jesus. He went to Nathanael and he said to him, “We found the One Moses wrote about: Jesus of Nazareth.” And it was Bartholomew Nathanael who said, “Nazareth? Can anything good come from there?” But he wasn’t alone in that opinion. Nazareth was this backwoods redneck town—can I say that in South Carolina? It was the joke of that part of the country. Everybody made fun of Nazareth, that nothing good could ever come from there. But man, Nathanael’s skepticism was turned around into belief when he saw Jesus’ power. As he walked up to meet Jesus, Jesus said to him, “I saw you before you ever came here. You were under the fig tree, weren’t you?” Nathanael said, “Rabbi, You are the Son of God.” We’re told that Nathanael took the Gospel to India and Armenia, where he also was eventually put to death. The man who questioned if anything good could come from Nazareth gave his life proclaiming the Good News of the very One who came from Nazareth.

Then there’s Matthew, also called Levi. We looked at him last week; we saw that Matthew was a tax collector. As I told you then, tax collectors were seen as traitors in the eyes of every Jew because they worked for Rome to help extort money from their own people. They were utterly despised. They were excluded from the synagogue, they were barred from worship, they were considered ceremonially unclean, and yet Jesus called Matthew to follow Him. Later, Matthew would write the Gospel that bears his name, and it would be a permanent testimony of the grace of Jesus, who loved this outcast when others didn’t. Matthew eventually took the Gospel to Ethiopia and possibly to Persia, and he was also martyred.

And we have Thomas. We know Thomas as Doubting Thomas. Poor guy. But let’s be fair: he wasn’t a chronic skeptic; he was just a man who needed some evidence. I kind of think if I was there, I might have been Thomas. I just need to see—just show me something. You know why? Because I’ve been hoodwinked a few times like you have, right? “Phil is the best deal ever, you get in now.” Yeah, and I got in now, and it wasn’t the best deal ever. And so you build up some skepticism along the way. Next time somebody comes to you with the greatest thing, you go, “Yeah, I’m not sure it’s the greatest thing. I’d like to see some evidence.” Nothing wrong with Thomas doing this, I don’t think.

In fact, when Jesus told the disciples that He was going back to Judea, where the religious leaders had literally just tried to stone Him, they left the village and Jesus says, “Let’s go back there.” The other disciples are going, “What now?” It was Thomas who said, “Let us go with Him, that we may die with Him.” That’s not doubt, man; that’s some bold courage. And yes, after the resurrection, when the other disciples told Thomas that they had seen Jesus, he said, “Unless I can see Him with my own eyes, unless I can touch Him with my own hands, put my hand in the nail prints in His hands and where the spear went into His side, I won’t believe it.” He got dinged a couple points for that, and yet when he did see Jesus and touch Him, Thomas declared with confidence, “My Lord and my God!”

Once again, can I insert this quickly? Skeptics say Jesus never claimed to be God. We must understand the culture in which this sentence was spoken. This was blasphemy. No one in that day used the phrase “my God.” It was unheard of. It was always Israel’s God. It was never personal. And to call any man God was blasphemy. You could be stoned to death. And here, Thomas looks at Jesus and says, “My Lord and my God.” You notice what doesn’t happen next? Jesus didn’t say, “Thomas, Thomas, no, no! What are you doing? Oh goodness, don’t call me God!” In whatever way He did, Jesus silently acknowledged, “You hit it right on the nose, son. You got it right. I am your Lord, and I am your God.”

Tradition tells us that Thomas eventually went to India, where he founded multiple churches that still exist to this day, and he was martyred by being run through with a spear. He was willing to die for the very truth that he once doubted. What changed? He was with Jesus.

Then there’s James, son of Alphaeus. This is the second James in the lineup now. We know almost nothing about him. He’s often called “James the Less,” to distinguish him from the other disciple James. We don’t know if that’s because he was younger than the other James, or if he was shorter than the other James. But if Jesus calls people Sons of Thunder, I imagine He has a bit of a sense of humor, and so possibly he was shorter than the other James and he was called James the Less. But here’s what we do know about him: he was chosen. He was chosen. Jesus looked at this quiet man who never made any headlines, and He said, “I want you.”

See, one of the problems in our modern church is that people like me get all the attention. You understand how wrong we have this? I’m up here under floodlights, burning up—thank you very much—and it’s like everybody comes to see this one guy do ministry. The truth is—the truth is, I’m convinced of this—that when all this is over and when we stand before Him, people like me will be somewhere miles away in an overflow room. And those of you who’ve served quietly and faithfully and prayed behind the scenes, you’ll be on the front row.

We must be very careful putting people in the spotlight. I was thinking yesterday, yesterday, “Lord, if there was just a way I could be faithful to what You’ve called me to do and be invisible at the same time.” I wish I could. We must be very careful. This James, he left no record of success. He didn’t write a Gospel, he didn’t preach any famous sermons that we know of, he didn’t perform any that are recorded, but he was faithful. He was there for those ten days in that upper room waiting and praying with the rest. He was there on the day of Pentecost when the Spirit fell. He was part of the mission, and that was enough. And he will have his name emblazoned on one of the foundation stones of heaven. Listen: you serve in small roles, you think? No one sees what you do? You’re the one keeping all this together. You are.

Then there’s Thaddeus, also known as Judas. Many of these men went by two names, either a nickname or a surname. Thaddeus, Judas—another one of the lesser-known disciples. In the Gospel of John, he’s referred to as—this always makes me laugh, it literally says this in the Scripture—it says, “Judas, not Iscariot.” Like, it says that in the text! “This is Judas, not Iscariot!” Because, I mean, understandably, who would want to be confused with the other Judas? The only time we really hear from Thaddeus, from Judas here, is at the Last Supper, when he asked Jesus, “Lord, why do You intend to show Yourself to us and not to the world?” What a question that was. And it reveals his heart for reaching others. Of course, Jesus would later show Himself to the entire world through these very men. And so Thaddeus got his wish granted. We’re told that he took the Gospel to Edessa, which is modern-day Turkey, where he too was martyred for his faith.

Next we have Simon the Zealot. The Zealots were a radical political revolutionary group—violent revolutionaries who engaged in terrorist activities against Rome. They were sometimes known as “dagger men” because they would conceal a dagger small enough to hide under their cloak, and any opportunity they got in a crowded situation—which was very common on the streets there—they would scoot through the crowd up to anyone associated with Rome, and they would quietly pull that dagger out and stab the man several times and disappear into the crowd. They were rebels, they were murderers, they were terrorists, and Jesus called one of them to be on His team right alongside Matthew the tax collector, who was a collaborator with Rome.

I want you to pause and think about this: in the same group, you had a man who worked for Rome and a man who wanted to kill anyone who worked for Rome. And Jesus said, “Love one another.” Isn’t this epic? Because Jesus wasn’t—He wasn’t building a political kingdom; He was building a spiritual kingdom, and in His kingdom, enemies can become brothers. This is the Gospel. Tradition says that Simon the Zealot took the Good News to Egypt and possibly to Britain, and he was eventually martyred, reportedly by being sawn in half. The man who once fought for an earthly kingdom gave his life for a heavenly one.

And finally, there’s Judas Iscariot, the betrayer. Now I want you to just—I want you to think about this. Jesus knew that Judas was a thief, and yet He made him the group’s treasurer, almost as if to give him another opportunity to choose whether his first love would be Jesus or money. And he chose money. We’re told in the Gospels that he stole from the money bag. By the way, Jesus and His disciples had a money bag. Anybody who tells you it’s wrong for churches to have money, well, how are they going to function? Who do you think pays the light bill? Who do you think pays to make it so hot in here? I’m not trying to drop hints or anything, but good grief! Don’t drop it again, man; people will be freezing. It’s just—it’s these lights up here; they always do it. Jesus and His men had a money bag. Jesus didn’t go around miraculously, you know, providing for everything; He did occasionally, but they had to pay for tolls, they had to pay for food and lodging and all of that. But Judas stole from the money bag, from his own fellow men, and he also sold out Jesus for 30 pieces of silver and then took his own life.

What a mixed up, messed up group of people. You understand what a catastrophe this collection of men was? If you were building an organization to change the world, you would never choose these guys. Jesus called the most unlikely people, and Church, He did it on purpose. Why? So that when these men turned the world upside down—which Acts 17 says they did—no one could look at them and say, “Well, of course! Look at their resume! Of course they accomplished this!” The only explanation for what happened would be Jesus. Is there anything that happens in your life or mine that defies human explanation and people go, “Must be Jesus”?

Folks, this truth right here should reorient us in how we see ourselves this morning. You may be sitting here right now with a list of reasons why God can’t use you: a past you’re ashamed of, a weakness you can’t overcome, a failure that keeps replaying in your head, doubts that won’t let go. Peter had a list like that, Matthew had a list like that, Thomas had a list like that—for goodness’ sake, his name is still a byword for doubt 2,000 years later. But I want you to hear this: Jesus knew every item on their list, and He chose them anyway.

The Bible says this in 1 Corinthians Chapter 1, verses 26 to 29—I just abbreviated this for time’s sake: “God chose the foolish things of the world to shame the wise so that no one may boast before Him.” It also says in 2 Corinthians 4:7: “We have this treasure in jars of clay to show that this surpassingly great power is from God and not from us.”

Listen, the jar of clay here is the whole point—everything we’ve talked about this morning. In ancient times, people in the marketplace would often try to sell clay jars—usually for water pots—that had small cracks in them. If they threw them away and broke them, you know, because they weren’t perfect, they would lose money. And so they would try to sell these as perfect clay pots. When you were standing in the sunlight looking at this jar—this clay jar—you couldn’t even notice the cracks in it. But if you took that jar into a dark place and put a candle inside, you would see the light shining through the cracks. Jesus intentionally chose cracked pots—not crackpots, but cracked pots. He intentionally chose cracked pots because it’s through our cracks, it’s through our brokenness that His glory shines.

You ever look at yourself and see the cracks and you despise them? You ever fail at something, just blow it so bad, and you hate yourself? We need to try to begin to turn that around and say, “No, wait a minute! If I was perfect, Jesus wouldn’t be able to shine through me. It’s because of my brokenness, it’s because of my weak places, it’s because of my cracks that His light can shine through.” And when people see light coming through those weak, broken, cracked places, and they see what God is doing in your life, they give glory to Him, not to you.

Listen: God doesn’t choose the impressive so that He can work with them; He chooses the broken so that He can work through them. God’s not asking you to make Him your sidekick; He wants to be your replacement so that it will leave no doubt who gets the glory.

I want to tell you as we close: your list of disqualifications? I’ve got news for you: Jesus has already read it, and He chose you anyway. The question isn’t, “Can God use someone like you?” The only question is, “Will you let Him?”

What an astounding thought that God’s mission on this earth is being carried out through people like you and me. What an astounding and humbling and possibly terrifying thought that is. Are you part of this mission? Have you ever answered that call that Jesus gave to these 12 men when He called them to Himself and they came? And His first assignment was to be with Him and then to send them out. Have you ever heard that call? Have you ever answered it? If not, Jesus is calling you today: “Come to Me. Come to Me. Be with Me.” And He will take your life, He will take your list—whatever is on that list—and He will transform you into a shining masterpiece of His glory, cracks and all, just like He did with these 12 ordinary men.