Men Jesus Called: The Twelve

The Twelve (Men Jesus Called – Part 1) by Mike Campagna on Vimeo.

This is supplement #1 to the Bible study: “Men Jesus Called.”

Christ chooses a dozen guys to be His very first followers. “The Twelve” include, according to the Gospel of Mark chapter 3…

Simon (to whom Jesus gave the name Peter), and James, the son of Zebedee, and John the brother of James (to them He gave the name Boanerges, which means, “Sons of Thunder”); and (then there was) Andrew, and Philip, and Bartholomew, and Matthew, and Thomas, and James the son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus, and Simon the Zealot; and (then lastly) Judas Iscariot, who also betrayed Him. (Mark 3:16b-19)

These are “the Twelve.”

And what’s interesting about them is the fact that Christ prays all night prior to their selection. In Luke 6:12, it says…

And it was at this time that [Jesus] went off to the mountain to pray, and He spent the whole night in prayer to God. And when day came, He . . . chose twelve [disciples]. (Luke 6:12-13a)

And this is what He gets? These must be the most flawed men in history. Are you kidding me?

And we can get it in our head that this is what should take place and how it should take place. And then we go and pray about it, but you see we’ve already decided what the outcome should be.

And it’s like Jesus from dusk to dawn long ago praying as follows…

“It’s this person that will be My disciple, Lord. This is the person I want. And this person. And this other guy. And I want these because, after all, they have resources. And charisma and personality. Yes, I need people with personality. Unless I have people with personality, things just won’t happen. That’s why I need these type of people.” Do you see Jesus praying like that? *******

And can you just imagine if it was us praying and then selecting versus Christ? That’s how we would have been looking at things. Do you really think that this would have been the team – these Twelve guys! – if we were in charge of choosing?

And yet they were the right guys for the job (less one)!

And sometimes God’s choice and ours can be totally different. The bottom line is, no matter what God decides, we want that!

And when you’ve prayed all night and sought the Lord with your whole heart, mind, soul and strength, you just gotta believe that what you get is what you were praying for.