Jan. 21, 2001

Luke 5:1-11, 27-32; 6:12-16

How to Have a Powerful Influence for God

1. Introduction

1. Illustration – "Listening, not imitation, may be the most sincere form of flattery…If you want to influence someone, listen to what he says…When he is finished talking, ask him about any points that you do not understand" says Dr. Joyce Brothers. She is referring of course to Charles Caleb Colton’s familiar saying, Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. Marcus Cicero wrote, In everything truth surpasses the imitation and copy. On the other hand, Edward Bulwer-Lytton wrote that Imitation, if noble and general, insures the best hope of originality. Thomas a Kempis, in The Imitation of Christ, wrote Man considers the actions, but God weighs the intentions.
2. Context – Jesus hand-picked a group of twelve men He wanted to learn to be like Him. In this instance, imitation is a good thing. And today we’re going to take a look at how imitation can enable us to have a powerful influence for God on others.

1. Scripture Passages

1. Let’s read Luke 5:1-11 - One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the people crowding around him and listening to the word of God, ² he saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. ³ He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat. ⁴ When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, "Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch." ⁵ Simon answered, "Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets." ⁶ When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. ⁷ So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink. ⁸ When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and said, "Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!" ⁹ For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch of fish they had taken, ¹⁰ and so were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, Simon’s partners. Then Jesus said to Simon, "Don’t be afraid; from now on you will catch men." ¹¹ So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.
2. Now let’s jump to verses 27-32 of Luke 5 - ²⁷ After this, Jesus went out and saw a tax collector by the name of Levi sitting at his tax booth. "Follow me," Jesus said to him, ²⁸ and Levi got up, left everything and followed him. ²⁹ Then Levi held a great banquet for Jesus at his house, and a large crowd of tax collectors and others were eating with them. ³⁰ But the Pharisees and the teachers of the law who belonged to their sect complained to his disciples, "Why do you eat and drink with tax collectors and ‘sinners’?" ³¹ Jesus answered them, "It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. ³² I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance."
3. Now let’s read Luke 6:12-16 - ¹² One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God. ¹³ When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles: ¹⁴ Simon (whom he named Peter), his brother Andrew, James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, ¹⁵ Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Simon who was called the Zealot, ¹⁶ Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.
4. Jesus went through a process of gathering around Him what we would consider a "motley crew." Men from all walks of life; fishermen, tax collectors, but none of what their society would call "leaders." But Jesus knew that these men would change the world. In order for that to happen, He had to have a profound impact on them. Let’s try to get a little bit of a glimpse of what that means.

1. Fishers of Men

1. One morning, some fishermen come off the lake. They have been casting their nets all night long, but didn’t even get one fish. They come on shore and begin to clean their nets and prepare them for the next night’s fishing. But this isn’t an ordinary day. A Man is speaking at the edge of the lake with a large crowd pressing in on Him. "Hey, wait a minute! Isn’t this guy the Prophet that just moved to town? Isn’t this the guy who’s been healing those folks and speaking like God Himself? We’d better listen."
2. Luke tells us that the people were pressing around Jesus to "hear the Word of God." The fishermen listened. So when Jesus asked them to give Him a floating pulpit, they were more than willing to comply. After Jesus was done teaching, He told them to try fishing again. His words had made such an impact that they did what He said. They literally took Jesus at His word. And where fishing had been an all-night exercise in futility, their nets were full to breaking. The overall impact of what Simon Peter heard and saw was so overwhelming that he believed Jesus to be a great man of God. He wasn’t far from the truth.
3. Jesus then called Simon Peter and James and John to a new vocation – becoming fishers of men. And, rowing back to shore, they left everything and followed Him. They totally abandoned their past for a new future with Jesus.
4. John Maxwell says that leadership is influence. This passage shows us Jesus’ powerful influence on these men for God in two ways: what He said and what He did. To put it simply, Jesus did what God called Him to do and said what God called Him to say. If we are to have a powerful influence for God on those around us, we have got to do what God says to do when He says to do it. We have got to say what Jesus says to say when He says to say it.
5. Illustration – Tom and Henry Blackaby, in their book The Man God Uses, list several kinds of men God will not use. They are: men who know best, who refuse to wait on God; men who put conditions on how God can use them; men with divided hearts; men who will not listen to God; and men who bring God down to their own level in their minds and then tell Him what to do. Obedience is a huge condition of usefulness, and we have to be used of God in order to have the kind of influence on others He desires us to. Like Jesus, we have to say what God tells us to, no more and no less, and do what He tells us to do, no more and no less, even if He says to sit still. Our obedience in these areas will help us have a powerful influence for God in these two areas.
6. But Jesus called more than just fishermen. Let’s take a look at Levi, who we know as Matthew.

1. Tax Collectors

1. Now let’s stop for a minute and think about one of our least favorite topics this time of year: taxes. Think of all the less than fond feelings we tend to have about the Internal Revenue Service. Now imagine that the people collecting the funds for them were charging extra for their own use, and it was perfectly legal. And that the funds that we were paying in taxes were being used by a foreign government to oppress and control us. Our own people helping to keep us under that control! Wouldn’t it make you angry if it were happening in such an overt manner in our country? That is how the Jews felt. Their own people were not only helping to keep them in bondage, but they were also stealing them blind in doing so. That is why the Jews considered tax collectors the "scum of the earth". No one in their right mind would ever voluntarily go up to one just to talk! It was bad enough to have to face them at tax time!
2. But Jesus had a different agenda. His was one of compassion. Matthew would have heard of Jesus, and about all that Jesus had done. He probably heard about all that Jesus had been saying, too. Matthew knew that Jesus was different, but how could he listen to Him if He treated Matthew like everyone else did? But Jesus didn’t. Jesus spoke to him. What is more, Jesus called Matthew to follow Him, showing him that He wanted to spend time with Him. Matthew was so grateful that he threw Jesus a big banquet, and invited his kind of people there. The Pharisees had a cow! How could this supposed Rabbi be eating with these "sinners"? If He were really a man of God, wouldn’t He know about these "people"? Jesus cared more about how He impacted the people who needed Him the most rather that who He was seen with. Being a part of the "in crowd" was not on His agenda. His agenda was one of compassion.
3. A huge part of having a powerful influence for God on those around us is having compassion on them. People aren’t going to listen if they don’t know how deeply you care. You’re going to influence people one way or another just by being around them, but if you want your influence to be for God, you have to have and show compassion for those around you.
4. Illustration – Henry Nouwen, in Seeds of Hope, wrote, Compassion lies at the heart of our prayer for our fellow human beings. When I pray for the world, I become the world; when I pray for the endless needs of the millions, my soul expands and wants to embrace them all and bring them into the presence of God. But in the midst of that experience I realize that compassion is not mine but God’s gift to me. I cannot embrace the world, but God can. I cannot pray, but God can pray in me. When God became as we are, that is, when God allowed all of us to enter into the intimacy of the divine life, it became possible for us to share in God’s infinite compassion.
5. Doing and saying what God tells you to and having compassion are three ways of having a powerful influence for God on others. But Jesus’ selection process for his apostles has another step, perhaps the most vital one.

1. Prayer

1. Luke 6:12 stood out to me more than any of the others in these important passages detailing how Jesus selected his apostles. Jesus went up to a mountain to pray, and the Greek says that He was "watching through the night in the prayer of God." What an intriguing phrase! "Watching through the night in the prayer of God."" The way this phrase is constructed in the Greek makes it clear that this is what is meant. But the NIV translates it spent the night praying to God. The King James says that He continued all night in prayer to God. The New Revised Standard Version says he spent the night in prayer to God. Are these translations wrong? Probably not, it’s just that Young’s Literal Translation got it more right, saying that Jesus was passing the night in the prayer of God.
2. I’ve got to tell you that I am hung up on that phrase. It’s got me thinking of "what ifs." What if prayer is supposed to be just praying to God? What if prayer is supposed to be listening to the heart of God and then responding? I mean, if you think about it, Jesus had some big decisions coming up the next day. He would be separating out those He would be investing Himself in wholeheartedly for the next three years. He would be selecting the men who would be called on to spread the good news throughout the world. So he spent the night "in the prayer of God."
3. What was the "prayer of God"? What was this desire that God felt so deeply that Jesus spent the whole night discussing it with the Father? Being the Son of God, Jesus knew what was going to happen with each one of them. Some we know more about than others. Peter would confess Jesus as the Christ, then deny Him three times, then preach and spread the gospel powerfully, leaving us with three epistles bearing his signature. John and Matthew would write accounts of His life, and John would go on to write three letters and a revelation of the end of the earth that continue to powerfully impact the church. Thomas would doubt, then believe. Some would plant churches. Many would be martyred. One would betray Him.
4. It would be easy to think that Jesus spent the night begging God not to make Him chose Judas Iscariot, the betrayer. But I don’t think so. I think that the desire of God’s heart was that each man would follow through to become the man God planned him to be. I think that God was telling Jesus to go with each of the twelve, to not leave anyone out. I think God was reassuring Jesus that He was doing what He was supposed to be doing, that each man was hand chosen for a purpose. Each man had to be in Jesus’ inner circle in order for God’s plan to be fulfilled. Jesus needed all of them, and they needed Him.
5. Illustration – William Carey wrote, "Prayer – secret, fervent, believing prayer – lies at the root of all personal godliness." Richard Foster writes, Prayer catapults us onto the frontier of the spiritual life. It is original research in unexplored territory…it is the Discipline of prayer itself that brings us into the deepest and highest work of the human spirit. Real prayer is life creating and life changing…To pray is to change…In prayer, real prayer, we begin to think God’s thoughts after Him: to desire the things He desires, to love the things He loves. Progressively we are taught to see things from His point of view. He goes on to write, Perhaps the most astonishing characteristic of Jesus’ praying is that when He prayed for others He never concluded by saying "if it be Thy will." Nor did the apostles or prophets when they were praying for others. They obviously believed that they knew what the will of God was before they prayed the prayer of faith. They were so immersed in the milieu of the Holy Spirit that when they encountered a specific situation, they knew what should be done. That’s what Jesus was doing. He was becoming so connected with God by being dependent on Him in prayer that He knew God’s will. That connection and dependence had a profound impact on Jesus’ disciples.
6. To be a person who has a powerful influence for God I must move beyond mere asking for requests, which is a good and appropriate use for prayer. But if I never move beyond that I am missing the boat. Prayer is connecting with God, and becoming like God. That’s what prayer is all about. Becoming like God through spending time listening to His heart. Nearly three hundred years ago, Matthew Henry wrote this about verse twelve: We think one half hour a great deal to spend in the duties of the closet; but Christ continued a whole night in meditation and secret prayer. We have a great deal of business at the throne of grace, and we should take a great delight in communion with God, and by both these we may be kept sometimes long at prayer. To be a person of influence for God, we have got to figure out this prayer thing. We’ve got to move from simply requesting stuff to hearing what God has to say. It is a slow process, and it takes time. But as Matthew Henry shows us, it was just as much of a problem three hundred years ago. But to have a powerful influence for God, we’ve got to be like Jesus. We have to spend time regularly in the prayer of God.

1. Conclusion

1. Jesus shows us four basic principles that allowed Him to have a profound influence on the men God chose to change the world. He said what God told Him to, He did what God told Him to do, He had compassion on those who needed Him, and He prayer the prayer of God. If we are to have a powerful influence for God on the people around us, we have to do what as Jesus did. We have to say what God tells us to, do what God tells us to, have compassion on all others, and listen to the heart of God through prayer. That is how we will have a powerful impact for God on those we meet each day.
2. What’s God been saying to you today? What has He been speaking to your heart? If God’s been telling you that you’ve been lacking in any of these four areas, and you want to get right it right with God, come forward and pray. Come forward as a sign of your commitment to allow Him to change you, and pray.
3. Let’s pray together.