Words from a Branch

    While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him.   And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them.   Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him. Matthew 4:18-22 ESV             Here Jesus appears before His first disciples, He goes to them where they are, and He calls them away. He does not come to them and stay where they are. He does not come to them and leave something there for them before proceeding on. Jesus is marching to Zion and those who would be His disciples must follow where He leads. He cannot relent in His m...

  Only let us live up to what we have already attained. Philippians 3:16 ESV             In Christ we have attained perfection, not as Paul says earlier that even the very best of us, Paul himself, have obtained perfection, but are to be striving towards it as a runner who expects to win: 3:12-21. This instruction is so oft repeated in scripture and the power of God which is behind it so frequently brought in view that to fully disclose the matter would be to quote the full canon. Jesus died that we might live John 3:16, etc. and live we ought then for we have the life of Christ in us, John 15:5.             Now if you will make resolves at this or any other time let them be such as glorify God and recognize who you are in Him. I recommend to you only one resolution which is easily found in scripture, and may be formulated in many ways, but here is powerfully given by...

  He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Matthew 16:15 ESV             This is the central question. You can find it explicitly also in Mark 8:29 and Luke 9:20, and implicitly it is everywhere in scripture for scripture testifies as does John 14:6 to the exclusivity and necessary centrality of the gospel which has as its very center God. And God is made known only through Christ and so we arrive at the central question not only of scripture but of all things. It is the central question of this and every other season. It is the question which all human thought must finally arrive at and answer. Therefore, we may say with every confidence that all men and women and children who have ever been, or are now, or ever shall be must be theologians.             To be a theologian is not a choice we have, nor something we might seek to become; but we simply are by nat...