Today

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Having recently written about ‘Yesterday’ my thoughts jogged along to ‘Today’ and I thought I would try to wax poetic about this thing we call today. I don’t think I’m going to win an award for what is contained here, but I’m sharing it as a way of recording my jottings.

I woke and it was today. Wow! How fast it came.
Only yesterday this day was far away.
And I don’t think I’m ready yet for today.
Could I have a few more days to prepare?
I think I was distracted and didn’t realise how time was passing.

Can we just put it off one more day?
Oh.
So, it’s today.
And I’m ill prepared.
Hmmm.

Well I guess I can have a shot at it, but it won’t be very good.
I should have prepared.
I was going to study and do some reading.
And I thought I’d understand more by now.
But I guess that’s not how it works.

Just give me a minute to see if I can find something to help.
Where are those notes I scribbled long ago?
I can’t find them.
And I don’t remember what they said.
Are you sure we can’t do this tomorrow instead?

Cruel is the fate that catches us off-guard.
Unrelenting time has made this moment hard.
How dare it treat me so?
It seemed to go so slow.
But now I’m caught in moments locked and barred.

Today is oh so cruel to catch me unprepared.
It makes me feel the fool and not a little scared.
It leaves me out of step
With hardly time to prep.
It shows me up as one who hasn’t cared.

Others I can see have met this day full force.
Just how can it be that they have kept that course?
How did they do so well?
I wish that I could tell.
For as for me I’m like a limping horse.

While others dash ahead and run about quite free
My feet are made of lead and stumble under me.
Today has bogged me down
And made me look the clown
While others as I’ve said, get the jump on me.

Tomorrow’s on its way and so I make my choice
To pick a course and stay on track with mind and voice.
So when tomorrow comes
I’ll beat the welcome drums
And have it on a tray as I rejoice.

I’m Older Now

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That eager lad dashed about with inexhaustible energy. And he bore an idealism fitting for his youth. He didn’t know the tears and toil that time would add to his account.

He knelt in prayer and dedicated every waking breath. And then he stood and spent himself for everyone who called. Silly boy! How they used him up. Those hours and early starts. Those freezing nights and back-breaking loads. Those long, long days in unrelenting sun.

Yet he kept his word and stepped up again and again. They patted him on the head and said nice things about him. Without him much would never have occurred. His back carried the load. His car carried the people. His phone made the calls. His ear listened to the complaints and woes. It kept him on his toes.

The process finally found its end. A young woman won his heart and laid her own claim on his time. Something had to give and so, slowly, the zealous investment was tempered by other calls for his money, time and mind.

He moved on. New pressures called him to the mill. He earned his keep and hers. Together they built a life and did what they could in their spare time.

Marriage and family, renting and working gobbled up the years and put them in the suburbs. Hopes came and went. Projects were launched and spent.

Old sermons didn’t stir as they had before. Other people’s needs were dismissed as impossibilities now. Someone else would have to pay the price that once he’d paid. Others would have to bear the loads he bore. Someone else would have to be the bunny for all who needed a lackey.

His wife and his life, his children and his bills kept him in the real world where dreams were out of place. Yesterday’s ideals were boxed with other relics of his naive youth. How silly to be so simple and so sold out. How fruitless all those miles and hours and aches and pains.

But then…. the heart always retained a sense of that call felt long ago.

While stiffer limbs and double chin replaced the skinny zest,
the youthful zeal, now hardly real was never laid to rest.

Often o’er the years a flow of tears trickled to sermons preached.
The call still echoed there buried by life’s care yet still alive enough to now be reached.

And so it was that an older man stumbled to the altar and stood among a crowd of eager youth. As they committed themselves to serve the Lord with all they had to give he scanned the zealous ones with memories of his journey long ago.

“I’m older now”, he thought. “And do not come with the ignorance of youth. I know now what I did not know back then. I once launched off with wild, untamed enthusiasm. Ideals and imagination pulled me to the front to throw myself unmeasured to the cause.”

“But now I’m not a lad. I’m no longer wet behind the ears. I’m calloused by the passing years. I stand here with stiff knees and workman’s hands. I stand here with my debts and all my life’s demands.”

“I stand here to the call. It asks me for my all. And I have stumbled forward once again.
I know the price to pay. I know what my wife will say. But I’m not here to serve the Lord in vain.”

And there among those crying youth a man bent down to pray. His lowered chubby torso conspicuous among the rest. He’s older now. And he kneels like he’s never knelt before. This is no repeat of youthful zeal. This is something deeper, and more real.

Here is one who knows the price. Here is one who feels the weight. Here is one who drags himself back to where he has been.

A special trumpet voluntary was composed in heaven that day. The angels love to play it when they can. It speaks of those older, wiser ones who’ve chosen to go all the way. It celebrates the yielded-ness of man.

The Call of God

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Being called by God is a journey. It is not a destination. And the call is progressive as it takes us deeper into the purposes of God.

Peter’s experience exemplifies this so let’s review the historical record of Peter’s encounter with Jesus to see what you can expect as you respond to the call of God.

Peter’s Encounter with Jesus

Peter met Jesus at the time of Jesus’ baptism by John the Baptist, at the Jordan River. While we are not told that Peter was a disciple of John the Baptist, it is evident that he and his friends were impressed and touched by John’s ministry.

That is why they had journeyed from Galilee, where they left their fishing boats idle while they went to get right with God. We can be pretty sure that Peter had been baptised by John, possibly not long before Jesus was, maybe even on the same day.

A Second Encounter with Jesus

After that initial encounter Peter, James and John had to return to their fishing boats and their livelihood. They had heard John’s prophecy about Jesus and had been introduced to Jesus as the “lamb of God”. They were among the very first people to encounter Jesus as He began His ministry. Now, however, they were many miles away from the Jordan River, back on the shores of Lake Galilee.

Jesus came to them and called them to “Follow Me”. Jesus promised to make the “fishers of men”. Peter, James and John all left their boats and their fishing nets to follow Jesus. They had come under the call of God and responded to it.

The Call of God

There are many things that could be said about the call of God. We know that when God calls us the very call itself brings with it the power for its fulfilment.

“Faithful is he that calls you, who also will do it.” 1Thessalonians 5:24

We also know that when God calls us He does not change His mind, nor abandon that call, even if we make a mess of it. The Biblical statement to that effect is that the “gifts and callings of God are without repentance”, which means God does not change His mind about it.

“For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” Romans 11:29

Peter’s Journey

For about three and a half years Peter and the other disciples journeyed with Him, learned from Him, saw His miracles and were activated into the supernatural, being empowered to do miracles themselves. It must have been a heady time for them all, but most especially for Peter, James and John who were given privileged treatment. They alone saw the transfiguration and the raising of Jairus’ daughter.

When Jesus was betrayed, however, they were just like the other disciples. They all fled. Peter, to his shame, also denied Jesus three times over that dreadful night of His betrayal and trial. This must have been a deeply challenging reality in Peter’s experience, since it was fulfilment of a prophecy from Jesus which Peter had denied would happen.

A New Encounter

Following Jesus’ resurrection Peter saw the empty tomb and met the resurrected Jesus. Then came an encounter back on the shores of Galilee. There Peter experienced his second calling to follow Jesus, possibly very close to where he was called the first time, years before.

Peter and some of the disciples had gone fishing in Peter’s boat. They caught nothing until a lone man on the shore called to them and instructed them to drop net on the other side of the boat. They did so and caught a huge catch. At that point someone realised that the man on the shore was none other than Jesus, Himself. Peter swam ashore and met His lord once again.

Jesus Deals with Peter

Jesus then interrogated Peter about Peter’s love for Jesus. Three times Jesus asked, “Do you love me?” Jesus was ploughing deep into Peter’s soul and reducing him to a desperate cry, that Jesus knew him intimately and could tell that he was admitting the truth when he said “Yes”.

Since that first call to follow Jesus, Peter had experienced the heights of walking with Jesus. But he also experienced the depths of personal failure. He now knew that he had nothing to offer Jesus. He now knew that God’s call on his life was not based on what Peter brought to Jesus but on what Jesus brought to Peter.

Peter had failed Jesus. All of his arrogant self-assurance was decimated by his humiliating and bitter denial of Jesus. Yet the call of God on Peter’s life was without repentance. God had not given up on Peter nor revoked the call on his life.

Follow Me

Jesus repeated to Peter what He had said over three years before. “Follow Me!” Here we see that the call of God comes again to our life, once we have failed and faltered in our fulfilment of that call. The call comes the second time to call us to follow, not in the confidence of our ability, but in humble submission as stumbling saints. The call comes again to show us that God is not basing the call on our ability to succeed but on His choice to call us. The whole process is sovereign, on His part, not energised by what we bring to God.

Peter Gets Distracted

Peter was then told something about his own future. His impulsive response was to ask Jesus about one of the others near him. Jesus reply was a gentle rebuke that what God had in store for anyone else was not Peter’s business. By this Jesus was revealing that our part in serving Him has nothing to do with what others are doing or what others will be led into. We must do what we are called to do, irrespective of those who succeed or fail around us, and irrespective of how our journey differs from others.

Here we see that the call of God is personal. It is not something that is subject to analysis based on how ours compares with others. Instead it is something that is to be lived and pursued to the full whether we must journey alone or with a great throng. It must be pursued whether our path is unique or a carbon copy of what others are doing.

And Again, “Follow Me”

Following Jesus’ rebuke to Peter, Jesus repeats one more time the call to “Follow Me”. Here Jesus set the seal on the call on Peter’s life.

It is as if Jesus had said to him in the sequence of these different calls, “Peter, Follow Me and I will make you a fisher of men.” Then when Peter had experienced both success and failure Jesus came to him again to say, “Peter, you are to Follow Me, not because of who or what you are, but because I have called you. My call is what is important, not who and what you are.” Then it is as if Jesus added, “Peter, your call is unique, so don’t look at those around you. Just go and fulfil what I have called you to do.”

God’s Call on Your Life

So that’s what the call of God is all about in your life. May God give you grace to hear His call and to respond to it in faith and faithfulness, despite your own limitations, and irrespective of those around you who have a different deal or who shame Christ or outshine you along the way. Just be what God has called you to be, with all the power and grace He gives you to fulfil that call.

The account of Jesus final calls on Peter to “Follow Me” are found in John 21.