Follow Me with Pastor Ryan Braley

We're launching into a new series and we wanna talk about what does it mean to follow Jesus?

Here's our mission statement at Central.

In case you haven't noticed or known, our mission is to follow Jesus together.

This is what we're doing here.

When I say mission, it's like what are we doing?

We're a church.

Of course.

Our mission is like love God and love the world.

That's pretty much it.

Basically, every church has the same mission.

But more specifically, here's what we're up to.

We're gonna follow Jesus together.

We're gonna be a community where people can belong.

I cannot tell you how many people have told me man, when I walked into the doors there, I felt so welcomed, I felt like it was family, I felt like I was at home.

I mean, a number of people have told me that In fact Pastor Donna was here last Sunday with her husband.

Donna was here years and years ago and she's a gym.

Her husband told me he was man.

I just love the feel when you walk into this place.

It just feels so good that people are so and it's more than just we're nice I mean everyone's nice in Minnesota but it's like there's something community sort of feeling about this place.

It just feels good and it's because I think that people here are just welcoming, and so you know, anybody's welcome to come here and be a part of what we're doing here Young, old, rich, poor.

Professor Beardo, we let him in here too, it's no problem.

So when you can come and you can wear a tuxedo or a nice suit and a tie, you can wear.

Ripped jeans or shorts, and flip-flops you can wear, we don't care, we're just glad you're here with us and want you to know that you can belong, and I think it's important.

I don't wanna get too far down the road, but it's important because we live in a culture that's so isolated and individuated and we're more connected technologically than we ever have been in the history of the world, yet we're more lonely, depressed and anxious than we've ever been in our lifetime too, and it's a weird dichotomy.

You know this idea.

So real community is important, and we're living in a day and age where third spaces are like going away.

Like you know, you have your home, you have your job, and these third spaces, like coffee shops, they're not becoming drive-throughs.

You know, we order on Grubhub anymore.

We have Netflix.

So these movie theaters, you know, restaurants and coffee houses, they're all going away.

It feels like it.

I'm sure there might be a renaissance, but so we need places to gather.

This is what I'm saying.

And then, lastly, when I love our neighbors across the street and around the world, that's what our calling is to love.

And really, and love looks like Jesus on the cross.

So when I say love, I'm like, hey, man, let's just love each other, bro.

I don't mean that Like first, john 3, 16, this is how we know what love is, that Jesus Christ came out and died for us.

Now you go do the same thing for your brother and sister.

And so you wanna change the world?

Go and live like that.

That'll change the world.

And I tell married couples all the time I said that's what your love should look like dying for each other, which is really romantic.

But anyway, there you go, that's our mission.

Okay, and but that first one what does that mean to follow Jesus?

I mean, many people here might say I'm a Christian, but are you a follower of Jesus?

I'm not trying to play on words or kind of get people tricked on semantics, but what does it mean to be a follower?

So we're gonna take a whole series and do a series on discipleship.

And when I mean that I don't mean like discipling others, I mean, are you a disciple?

And how do you know?

And what does it mean to follow Jesus and be a student of the teacher Jesus?

And so I wanna take I don't know, we'll do it for a couple of months and talk Then today.

I wanna just give like a cursory fly-by on what discipleship meant in the ancient world and in the first century.

Fair enough.

And by disciple?

Well, here's what I mean by disciple.

The term disciple means this it really just means a student, a follower or an adherent, in this case of Jesus, but it could be of anything.

Because here's the reality we're all disciples of something all right.

We're all students of some kind of a teacher, and who your teacher is is important.

In fact, aristotle once commented that we owe more to our teachers than we do our parents, and if you're a parent, you know like after the age of five, that teacher has them for more hours in the day than you probably have them and their friends.

So we really are a product of whatever it is that's teaching us.

And when I say teaching, I don't mean like in the Cartesian sort of the modern Cartesian idea of like absorbing information or data that you can then regurgitate back out later on a piece of paper.

That's one way of learning something that you just memorized.

I don't mean like just the transference of knowledge, I mean something is shaping you and your life.

We're all students of something of an ideology, philosophy, theology, an idea, a narrative, and we'll shape our lives around that, and that's important to know.

What is it that's shaping my life?

Who am I following?

Who is my teacher, who is my instructor and what am I a disciple of?

Because we're all disciples of something.

It's interesting to me that the first commandment in the gospels, in the Bible, that God gives the Jewish people, what is it?

What is it?

What's the first commandment?

Paul, your catechism class notes yes, he's got it.

No other gods.

We forgive David some love.

This morning, here it is.

Yeah, I think, at least in part.

The implication is like hey, you as a human species are worshiping the kinds of beings you all worship.

That's what we do.

We're kind of wired that way and I think God is sort of telling the people hey, worship me, because if you don't, you'll worship the profane, you'll worship something entirely different.

And, like David Foster, wallace says, the danger in that that is, whatever it is that you worship aside from God, it will eat you alive.

So if you don't worship God, you can worship the self, which many people do.

You might worship money, which a lot of people do.

You might worship fame or celebrity or like of your own sort of desires making.

You might worship your own desires.

You can worship anything that's not God, and the problem with that is, as David Foster Wallace comments, it will eat you alive.

And so God is protecting the people in some way saying, hey, worship me, and then everything will go in kind of proper order, because if not, you'll worship the, the, the Monday or the profane the.

You know these things that will take from you and suck your life dry, and so don't worship them.

Now, I know many of us in the modern world and, by the way, this is called discipleship or, follow me, discipleship in a disenchanted world, because in many ways, in many places in our world today, most folks that's a general a lot of folks don't believe in God, in the longer or the, what we call the transcendent things that are, you know, ephemeral or ethereal or like other worldly, that like that's fairytale.

They want to believe in what we call the material world.

This might be called some form of materialism as a philosophy.

And so, like they like, look at us, like you guys are silly, you guys are in a church and see.

So how do we follow Jesus in a world that has disregarded Jesus and the Bible and Christianity or other religions and want to just sort of that's the question.

And so in our modern world, we think, oh, I'm not really influenced by others, I'm my own person, like I can, I can make up my own mind, I have my own opinions, you might say, but the reality is that we're all shaped by something.

So Dallas Willard writes a lot about discipleship, and here's how he defines discipleship.

I love this as a framework.

Is what he says?

He says that it's someone who has decided to be with another person under appropriate conditions in order to become capable of doing what that person does, or to become what that person is.

Does that make sense?

He also says this I love it.

It's kind of he gets a little clunky in his verbates, but it's kind of good.

He says this learning to live my life as Jesus.

Would live my life if he were me.

Because here's the reality when I say follow Jesus or be like him.

It's like I don't mean like go get your white robe with the blue pageant sash on the side and sandals.

I don't mean that, like.

I mean that would be silly, that was 2000 years ago and so the things he's doing back then you're not going to do all of that because you don't live in Palestine, you live here.

So, rather, how would Jesus live your life if he were you?

How would he respond to people?

How would he view his?

How might he order his day?

I'm not necessarily saying Willard says learning to do everything that he did Again, I mentioned that but I'm learning how to do everything I do in the manner that he did, all he did.

So the characteristics of Jesus, like learning those and then flushing those out in your life today, does that make sense?

Okay so, but it's important to know and remember how this whole movement of discipleship and rabbis and the ancient world, how it worked and how it sort of began to be a thing, because it wasn't before.

Like the rabbi, the disciple, that's a, you know in the, in the story early on in Israel's history.

That wasn't actually a thing until until later on.

But here's where I want to take you back for just a little bit Into the first century in Jesus' day, when he calls his first disciples what that looked like and then what it might mean for us today.

Fair enough, so here's a picture of where Jesus kind of grew up.

This is awesome.

This is in Israel, and up there is Nazareth.

Everyone say Nazareth Great.

You've probably heard of this before.

It's a city that's up a northwest of this other town called Bet-Shan.

Everyone say Bet-Shan Sounds a little bit like a swear word, so be careful, but Bet-Shan is also called Scythopolis and it's actually this vibrant, thriving metropolis of a city.

I've been there.

It was there last February and if you were in Israel with me, you were also there.

And here's the deal Bet-Shan was a wonderful, cultured historical place.

They had arenas, they had theaters, they had temples, they had paved sidewalks and roads, they had running water.

This is in the first century.

They had all kinds of incredible arts and culture and like it was like a thriving place, lots of influence in this city.

Here's some pictures of it.

Here I am actually in this place.

This is actually.

By the way, this is a bathroom.

That's where I am, and so I'm sitting on a toilet, an ancient toilet.

It's funny because you'd have, like there would be like there's like several of them in a row.

You'd have like 20 different people using the toilet at the same time and you thought you couldn't find privacy in your own house.

This is, but okay, go ahead.

For me, sarah, here's another picture of it.

So this is a mosaic.

There were mosaics.

It's crazy, these ancient mosaic, like tiled pieces of artwork, just everywhere you would like uncover one, or it'd be another one, like layers, deep but beautiful mosaics, pieces of art.

They also had this.

This is like this is a little arena.

They would do training.

These athletes would go there, they would stand on these things and do all kinds of training exercises and they would try like better than you know, like in the Greek world.

There was a lot of.

It was very Greek, it was Sothopolis.

It's a Greek city, greek influenced, and so for the Greeks, like the body and the physiology was very important, and so they would train and they had all these athletes who would come and practice their sport.

Then they had this this is a cool picture too.

This is a paved road that we're all walking on.

There's these pillars on the side.

Beautiful city, sothopolis.

I think I have one more, maybe, or is that the last one?

Okay, there's an earthquake, that happened, so all these pillars sort of toppled over.

Is that the okay?

Then this one yeah, that's awesome.

So here's the deal.

If Jesus Nazareth is 15 miles away not far now in our day and age, 15 miles to walk, but in that day and age you would not be that far to shoot over there.

But it's 15 miles from Nazareth to Stathopolis.

So if I'm Jesus, I show up like, hey, I wanna start a movement and change the world.

I'd go to Stathopolis.

That's where all the students, those who are in the universities, like this incredible, these brightest minds, the most athletic people, the cultured most, the ones who knew art and had an idea of culture, and they were like, just brilliant, they knew rhetoric and art.

You know, they'd go there.

But Jesus doesn't go there to find his disciples.

He never goes there to find them.

He goes instead to a place called Betsida.

Everyone say Betsida.

Here's a picture of Betsida.

It's north of the Sea of Galilee and I was gonna tell you it is not at all like Stathopolis.

There's no running water, there's no paved roads, there's not any temples or universities.

It is a small podunk fishing village.

Here's some pictures of this place.

So different architecture.

It's like way more the Galilee region's way more spread out.

It's a lot like this undeveloped.

I mean there's stones and stuff, but not these gorgeous Greco-Roman pillars.

How about this picture?

This is actually modern day Betsida region, this area that's the Sea of Galilee.

These guys are fishing.

It's like a fisherman's village.

Betsida means the house of the fish.

This place is very rural, rural, rural, rural.

This word, it's this word, that's what it is Rural, are you trying to say it up?

It's that Very, I mean, it's very undeveloped.

And Jesus goes there to find his followers to change the course of human history.

Like if you were gonna come to Minnesota and like find the brightest minds, you'd go to, like I don't know, the U of M or somewhere down in that area where all those colleges are and there's arts and culture and museums.

You wouldn't go to some small village where they fish and like this Betsida had like six to 800 people.

Why then does Jesus go to Betsida?

Cause here's who he finds there.

He finds these five knuckleheads Peter, andrew, james, john and Philip.

Those five guys are from Betsida and the rest are ultimately small, little tiny villages where there's not much going on.

Why does Jesus go to Betsida, of all places, to find these guys?

Now, here's the ancient world.

There was, like this community way of doing life in the Galilee region that was actually specific to that region.

This is why maybe he does go to the Galilee region.

They had this way of teaching younger people about the Torah, the Jewish people and like religion, like they're kind of form of catechism.

And there were these guys called rabbis.

Rabbis were teachers and the rabbi develops post-Israel story but before Jesus sort of shows up, and rabbis were like teachers, but they were wild.

These rabbis would go from like synagogue to synagogue and teach people the Torah and they were maniacs.

They would do anything they could to help the text come alive to their students and to the people.

And they would do.

They would carry props around, they would like set things on fire, they would curse fig trees, they'd put hilarious slides up on their PowerPoint presentation, do all kinds of wild stuff.

That's a joke.

They did all kinds of crazy things and the kids loved them because, like, the kids were like oh, they were like, they were wise and old savvy people and they knew the Torah, they had the Torah memorized.

They were incredibly wise and funny, and kids loved them, and the people loved them too that these rabbis would go from synagogue to synagogue and teach people the Torah, and so these synagogues were like these central places of gathering for the Jewish people.

They had one in every town, and synagogues were like a place of gathering on the Sabbath.

They'd gather there to read Torah, because not everybody had a Bible, so you would have like one scroll in the synagogue, and they would sit around, they would read it, they would celebrate there, they'd have meals there, they had all kinds of like social things at the synagogue.

It was wonderful.

It was like the ancient world version of the guy in your neighborhood who has that garage like eight TVs, a poker table, a pinball machine.

You have this guy in your neighborhood Just me, maybe.

I'm like why don't you go inside?

Do you have a basement, or why you got in the garage all the time?

That's what it was like, though, and they would go there to worship God.

It was incredible these times with and so Jesus actually checked us out, and Matthew nine, I believe it is right, sarah, yeah, Matthew 9.

Jesus went to all the towns and villages to teach in their synagogue.

It's what he's doing.

He's a rabbi.

He's going from town to town to teach them in their synagogue.

Now here's the deal.

They read the.

So the rabbi would get up and open the text, the scroll, and everybody had a high.

Like they like esteemed the Torah, the text, the scroll, whatever they were reading, like they loved the words of God.

And the rabbi would read it and everyone would like be like on, you know, waiting with bated breath for what the rabbi would read to them.

They loved it.

And then they would be done and roll up, they would sit around, they would talk about it, they would discuss it, they would argue and they would debate about the text.

It's funny, because we don't do that often now, do we?

We don't want to.

Just, we want just the right answers.

We open our bibles today, our modern sort of post enlightenment world, like what's the one way to interpret this text?

And sometimes Christians get nervous, like, well, there's only one way to interpret this text, what's the one way?

And we got to find the one way instead of arguing and debating and discussing it.

What if we were more like the rabbis and like in these synagogues, we're like, hey, let's talk about it.

I'll give you the idea and then let's argue about it over coffee when we're done.

Wouldn't that be kind of fun?

I'd like that.

So you're walking to always grab me for coffee.

We can chat about anything.

That's what they would do.

That's what Jesus would.

He would go from town to town and he would teach these people.

Now here's the deal when they would teach these youngsters, they'd all not everybody in the synagogue became a disciple.

There were some like these little kids because they would always argue in the ancient world like hey, at what age should we really begin to teach these kids the Bible?

Well, the Torah, like the law and the laws of God, the prophets, the writings as well.

They're like okay, well, what age should we begin to kind of cataclyse these kids?

Catechism just means like teaching, but that wasn't the word they would have used Like okay, well, there was a saying well, when they're like under six years old, they're too young, we should let them just be children.

But when they're six or older, we will teach them and stuff them with Torah like an ox, which is kind of great.

I love that.

So that's what we're gonna do with your kids.

We're gonna stuff them with Torah like an ox.

They knew that unless they got the Torah passed on to that next generation of kids, they were always one generation away from being extinct.

They knew that they would die off and they would no longer pass on what they knew in the stories and the move of God that have happened in the Israel story.

And we're the same way.

This is why we allow Beardo and doing crazy things with kids and letting kids be in the sanctuary, because we want them to learn and be a part of what we're doing, because we're also one generation away from being extinct.

And friends, there are churches now that really you can go there, and there are very few young people, and I don't mean like 20-somethings, I mean like little kids.

They're not around.

So may central always be a place where we allow kids to be around and to learn, and then our job is to stuff them with Torah or the gospels of the Bible like an ox.

Fair enough, okay.

So this is what they do, okay.

So then they began to have these schooling systems where at the synagogues, they would teach these kids, and the first level of schooling, like elementary school, was called Bet Se Fer.

I wouldn't say Bet Se Fer.

This means house of the book, and there their curriculum was the Torah.

They would learn, and the first five books only Genesis, exodus, leviticus, numbers and Deuteronomy.

And they would like learn, they would talk about it, they'd write it, they'd read it, they would like dissect it, and they would learn by asking questions.

So the rabbi would teach something and then the student would like you know, oh, I got them.

They would ask questions, they would ask questions back and forth.

So he would oh, this is what this says Boom, boom, boom, boom.

And the disciple would ask questions Boom, boom, boom.

And the rabbi would answer the questions with more questions Boom, boom, boom.

So this is like a question back and forth.

This is pre-Jeopardy.

So that sort of was a precursor to Jeopardy.

And because they couldn't take the text home, these kids had to memorize it.

So by the time they were done and which is about, you know, this elementary school went from like around age six to about age 12, they would have most of the first five books of the Bible memorized.

So, genesis, exodus, leviticus, numbers, deuteronomy, memorized.

It's crazy, how much of the Bible do we have memorized today?

How many you know songs do I have memorized?

You know more than the Bible, probably, but anyway, and they would devote themselves to the book and learning the scriptures.

Then, on age 13 or somewhere and the ages would differ depending on what community you're apart of and where you went they would leave Betsey Fair.

And the really passionate ones, these students, the ones who like got it, who loved to argue with the rabbis and like debate, and they would have the books memorized and they like, they like, just love the text and they loved learning and they were brighter, they were kind of like the smarter ones, those ones would go on to the next level.

But the other ones, which is a lot of people, a lot of the majority of those kids, they would leave Betsey Fair and they would go back home and the girls would get married, because around age 13 you were kind of an adult and the boys would go and they would learn the trade of the family.

They would become like an olive producer or they would become a fisherman.

They would become, you know, they would make tables, they would build, they'd be a stone mason, but the best and the brightest would move on to the next school, which is called Bet Midrash.

Everyone say Bet Midrash.

Bet Midrash was like around age 13.

By the way, around 12 or 13, they would oftentimes.

This is why Jesus in the Gospels he goes at Passover to the temple.

And where do you find him?

You find him in the courts, arguing and asking good questions of the teachers there and they're impressed by Jesus.

Of course he's just sort of finishing up this Betsey Fair and he goes there and he's asking these dynamic questions because he is a student of a rabbi and he's practicing his question asking and he's doing a great job at this.

This is why Jesus is probably sort of a rite of passage for a lot of the Jewish boys.

Now, at age 13, you would go to the next level, bet Midrash, and at Bet Midrash you'd learn the prophets, you'd learn the writings, the rest of the Old Testament, and again, because you couldn't bring that text home, you'd memorize it.

There are many Jewish kids in that day, and actually to this day, who have most of the Old Testament memorized Genesis through Malachi or the Italian prophet Malachi.

Those books are.

That's a bad joke, I'm sorry, that's a dad joke.

They had it memorized.

That's like the whole thing.

And to this day you go to different Jewish schools and these young men and women will have this.

Actually adults will have this entire thing memorized.

Then, once you sort of graduate from Bet Midrash, which is like a couple years, so 14, 15 years old, at that point again, if you weren't like, you know, the brightest kid in the school or if you didn't have like the passion or the desire to keep going, you'd dip out and you'd go back and learn the family trade.

But if you were like one of the brightest ones and you had, like this zeal for the scriptures and for a rabbi in particular, you would go to that rabbi and say, hey, rabbi, I want to learn underneath you, I want to study underneath you and I want you to keep teaching me and I want to be your disciple.

And in the Hebrews there were Tal Med.

Everyone said Tal Med and in fact the plural is Tal Medim and so Tal Medim, these rabbis would have this whole crew.

They would always roll like 15 deep and they'd go into town and they'd have like the rabbi up front because these rabbis are just like maniacs, you know, and they're high on coffee and they're highly caffeinated and they're like just kidding, that wasn't invented yet and they'd have this group of like little boys behind them or, like you know, 15-year-old boys or 12-year-old boys, and they were their Tal Medim and they would follow right behind them and they wanted to like, because they respected and loved and revered that rabbi.

They would just be like right up next to him and they followed him everywhere he went.

That's what it means to follow a rabbi.

And they'd follow so closely.

There became this midrash, there became this ancient saying, a blessing of sorts.

They would say, hey, may you be covered in the dust of your rabbi, because you'd be following so close to your rabbi that you'd be like you couldn't help but kind of have the dust kick up off, you know, off his sails, and kind of land on you.

So they would tell these Tal Medim, may you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.

And they would study what the rabbi thought, his interpretation of the Torah, because they didn't always agree, which was fine.

That was how they honored the text back then and it was part of the conversation and the debate, and they would want to inherit what he thought, how he lived, what he did.

So they mimicked everything.

They would follow them around everywhere.

They would follow him even into the bathroom.

They would do everything with this rabbi In order, not just to learn what the rabbi knew, but they wanted to be just like the rabbi and do the things that the rabbi did.

Jesus, of course, had his own Tal Medim.

In fact, here's what Jesus had.

You know, you have these stories about his followers.

I think I have a picture of it, right, sarah.

He had 500, there was like the 500 crowd, then there was the 70, and there was the 12.

And that 12, those boys that followed him around everywhere, were Jesus' Tal Medim.

They were his disciples.

And check this out when Jesus finds those five guys, the sons of thunder and Peter, what are they doing?

When he finds them, they're fishing.

Which means what?

These Podunk fishermen from Bethsaida, this little like almost wiped off the map, small little town of 600 people.

They weren't at school, at Bethsaidae Fair, at Bed-Midrash, they weren't already following a rabbi.

These guys were like not good enough, these dudes are fishing because they're trying to learn the family tree.

They got to find a way to make a living and they can't do it following a rabbi.

And Jesus comes and sees them and to say to them hey, come and follow me.

He's telling them hey, you guys, you got something there, you got, I think you might have what it takes to be like me.

I want you to come and follow me.

Because, again, if you were in Bed-Midrash, at the end of Bed-Midrash you would go and you're like, hey, I want to keep going.

You would find a rabbi and you would apply to that rabbi, say, hey, rabbi, I want to be like you.

And a lot of them got turned down.

The rabbi like oh, you're a smart kid, you've got the books memorized, you're good, you're good looking.

But I just keep looking.

I can't, you're not good enough, and they would kind of dismiss them, they'd go off and they'd learn the trade.

So there are a lot of folks that just weren't good enough.

Jesus finds these knuckleheads like yo, you've got something.

You got something there.

I want you to come and follow me.

Imagine if you're Peter or Andrew or James and John.

He calls them the Sons of Thunder, which is awesome nickname later on.

And he's like yo and they must have known who he was, at least a little bit.

And he's like hey, come and follow me.

He's telling me I think you've got what it takes to be just like me.

And in the ancient world they have a rabbi say I believe in you, I think you've got what it takes.

No wonder they left so quickly.

I often wonder, like why would they just drop all their stuff and just go?

How weird is that?

As though like they'd become hypnotized.

And then Jesus like, follow me, okay.

Like it's weird, they just drop all their stuff and just go.

Like why would they do that?

Because in the ancient world these rabbis were so loved and so respected For a rabbi to say to you, I think you've got what it takes, kid.

You'd be like you, what Now?

And you think the dad would be kind of upset, like yo, I.

But you never hear the dad say, oh, I lost my labor force, where I'm not going to get the nets out, these darn kids running off again.

No, if you were their dad, you'd be like, oh my, that rabbi thinks my boys have what it takes.

I can imagine their dad in the village the next day walking around, you know, sort of trying to be the alpha dad in the neighborhood and like yo, my boys aren't with me today.

And everyone's like yeah, we know, no, no, no, my boys aren't with me.

Rabbi thinks they've got what it takes.

You'd be so proud that your boys got called to go be a Tal Medin or Tal Medin, one of these rabbis.

Jesus sees them and thinks they've got what it takes.

And these dudes change the course of human history.

A bunch of nobodies, a bunch of not good enoughs, like the JV squad, the B or C team even these guys are.

And yet he chooses them.

And we heard in the gospel reading I chose you, you didn't choose me.

This maybe shed some light too on what happens with Peter that night when they're out on the boats.

Remember, they're all on the boats and there was often in the Talmud even crew.

There was often one disciple that was always older than the other ones and for all of you know, as you look at the gospels, peter seems to be older than the other boys.

He's married, he's got, you know, this mother-in-law thing.

I mean, there's all these signs that suggest he's a little bit older, and there's always one, and the older one would often sort of be the one that does things first to kind of try things out.

So this night they're on the boat and they're scared.

It's night and in the ancient world the water is like the abyss, like they're terrified and they see Jesus come walking out on the water, which is crazy and they think he's a.

What A ghost.

Of course they would.

They're on the abyss.

That's where the evil lives.

Like, yo, this is a ghost.

And Peter sees him.

And Peter says Jesus, if it's you, tell me to come out on the water.

Of course he would do that.

He wants to be just like his rabbi.

Yo, my rabbi's walking on the water.

I'm gonna go walk on the water.

And the boys are like dude, don't do that, you're not gonna.

You're gonna, don't do that.

No, I got this.

And he climbs out of the boat and walks in the water.

And he does it.

Peter, it's a bad rap, but dude, walked on water.

You ever walk on water?

I didn't think so.

And then he sees the storm and he begins to sink.

And Jesus says you little faith, why did you doubt?

And I've always thought, oh, peter must have doubted Jesus, but Jesus isn't sinking, he was fine.

And I heard recently maybe Peter doubted not Jesus, maybe he doubted himself.

He lost faith in himself.

See, all this time I've been told that you need to have faith in Jesus, and no doubt we should, but Jesus has faith in you.

You see, central, you didn't choose Jesus.

Jesus says I chose you this morning.

May you know, this is our story.

We wanna follow Jesus, be followers, be disciples, be students of the rabbi Jesus, and we're gonna spend the next several weeks and explore what does that mean?

How do we do it?

What about the Bible?

How do we pray?

What about community and how to confront others when they hurt our feelings, and how do we have good relationships and all these kinds of things.

This is all what it means to be a follower of the rabbi Jesus.

It's sort of unpack it and we're gonna have several different weeks about all these different topics about it.

But may you know this morning that Jesus chose a bunch of mid-disciples.

They weren't the All-Star team, they were ah.

They were not good enough and through the power of the spirit and through their life up against the rabbi, they changed the course of human history.

And, friends, you have been called by Jesus.

Come and follow me and maybe you're like the disciples, like I don't know.

I'm like ah, ah, I know you're in good company, you're fine, I'm like that too.

I don't know.

Whatever, I don't follow him, I don't be so close to him that I'm covered in the dust of my rabbi.

This morning, central, may you know that Jesus has chosen you.

May you know that you're in good company when you're like JV material.

May you know that, through the power of the spirit, god wants to change the world through you, and may you be covered in the dust of your rabbi.

Amen.