Do you ever wonder how Christianity, as we know it today, spread across the world? Over 2,000 years have passed since Christ came, and his message has reached every corner of the globe. It’s amazing to think that it was initially spread by just 12 ordinary men—the 12 disciples of Christ.
These were very special men, not because of anything in themselves, but because of the grace of God and how He used them. They are the foundation of the church in all ages. As we come to Matthew chapter 10, we see how Christ trained and sent these 12 men.
Matthew 10 marks a new phase in Matthew’s presentation of the work of the King. The chapter begins in the first verse with the calling and commissioning of the disciples, and in the second verse, they are sent out as apostles. This marks a significant change in the pattern of our Lord’s ministry.
In our last discussion, we saw that our blessed Lord was moved with compassion when he saw the multitudes. They were trapped by false shepherds who had mangled and mutilated them, leaving them for dead without guidance. Jesus saw the whole world as a vast field to be harvested. That is why in verse 37, he said, “The harvest is plentiful.” Jesus saw them in light of the inevitability of judgment and their move toward eternal doom. Harvesting is an urgent work that must be done soon. He literally felt their pain, suffering, and hurt deep inside as he experienced their agony. He said, “The laborers are few.” At that time, in the vast field of humanity, there was only one solitary person, Jesus Christ, who had moved through the field, harvesting alone until then. But there was so much work that he could not do it all. At the end of chapter 9, he tells his disciples to pray. Now, in chapter 10, verse 1, he calls the very ones he asked to pray to do the ministry themselves.
He prepares 12 men as laborers for the harvest. So, we enter a new dimension in the Gospel of Matthew as the Lord begins to add these twelve men to his own ministry. I said that we need to have a burden for the harvest and pray with that burden for laborers, but this chapter teaches us how we need to prepare ourselves for the harvest with that burden. As we go through this 10th chapter, we will learn so much about discipleship and disciple training—what our Lord did, what he taught, and how he trained the men who would carry the baton after he gave it to them. May the Holy Spirit dramatically affect and transform our lives as disciples as we go through the truths in this chapter.
This is very appropriate for us as a church. We have been used to coming every week and listening to the truth being preached for years now. Last week, we raised some piercing questions: how long are we going to continue like this? What are we going to do with all the truth God has taught us? What are we going to do for our society, which is going down the gutter? Just coming weekly and attending service and leaving is our comfort zone. Nothing will change if we continue like this for another ten years. If things are to change, we need to change. We need to go to the next level as a church and reach out to the community. This chapter will deeply and powerfully prepare us for that. May you deeply meditate on these verses every week before you come and listen.
First, he makes them see the situation through his eyes, feel the compassion, and be burdened that the harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. He then tells them to pray, and now, once they are burdened and praying, he sends them out. Prayer is never enough. You can’t be content with just praying; there has to be the willingness to go. In this chapter, he is going to commission them as his personal ambassadors and send them out. The major teaching starts in verse 5, and from there to the end of the chapter, you have the most marvelous instruction about discipleship, what happens when you go to preach for Christ, and tremendous insight into what it is to preach and represent the Lord Jesus Christ. It will instruct us and change us, I am quite confident.
But before we get to verse 5, we have to look at the first four verses. They are very simple in what they say, and yet hidden behind them is some tremendous richness that I want you to see. It is important to spend some time and learn about these apostles, how God called, prepared, and sent them into the ministry. I want to explain to you some of the things behind his preparation and calling of these men, but I want you to see how they apply in your own life. This will teach us how we should be trained as disciples and how we should train others as disciples.
I want us to see four things in verses 1-4:
- How he chose them.
- How he prepared them for the great work.
- What problems they had in discipleship and how our Lord corrected them.
- Who are they?
How He Chose Them
We are going to see the problems these men had. If you look at them in the gospels, they were nothing special. They didn’t have great faith, knowledge, education, or boldness; in fact, they were often cowardly. What did he see in them to select them? There is no clear answer. He really had a dirty, low-class, foolish group of guys. According to worldly standards, no man would have picked twelve such pathetic characters to hang around him. By the time you get to the end of the story, you wonder whether he could ever pull it off with them. Some people might question if he was God for selecting such a group. Didn’t he know them? How could he select such men? His ability is shown on that basis alone. It’s a marvelous lesson for all the ages to come, so that all future disciples never get discouraged. It shows what the grace of God can do to such ordinary, pathetic men. As we see Christ dealing with men who are weak, we will be much encouraged and have hope for what the grace of God can do in our lives.
How were they chosen? They were chosen sovereignly and unconditionally before the foundation of the world. If every saved person is chosen before the creation of the world, how much more the apostles? They play a critical role in the history of the world and in eternity as well, and God had it all laid out so that they were chosen sovereignly. Verse 1 says, “He called unto him his twelve disciples.” In Mark 3:13, there is a wonderful statement: “He called to him those he wanted.” It was his choice, his will, his sovereign purpose. There was no executive search. It wasn’t, “How many of you would like to be apostles? Put up your hand.” It wasn’t, “If you can’t succeed, if you’re a lousy fisherman, maybe you’d like to go into the ministry.” They were called by the sovereign will and purpose of God. He knew the men he chose, and they were not consulted, nor was anybody else consulted but God the Father. It was foreordained like Abraham, Moses, Jeremiah, Isaiah, and the Apostle Paul, who were chosen before birth and before creation. And so Jesus said in John 15, “You have not chosen me, but I have chosen you, and ordained you, that you should go forth and bring forth fruit.” Sovereignly, God chose these individuals, and that has always been God’s pattern. He chose Israel, he chose the apostles, and he chooses his church. He chooses those who serve him within his church. So that we who are representing him are the called according to his purpose.
Secondly, while they were sovereignly chosen from the divine side, there is a human side and human responsibility. Humanly, they were chosen after a lot of prayer. Yes, Christ chose whom he would, but marvelously and wonderfully, in his submission to the Father, it occurred only after he sought the Father’s will. Listen to Luke 6:12: “And it came to pass in those days, that he (being Jesus) went out into a mountain to pray, and continued all night in prayer to God.” He prayed all night. Then it says, “And when it was day, he called unto him his disciples; and of them” out of the whole group, “he chose twelve, whom also he named apostles.” They were chosen sovereignly, and they were chosen after a night of prayer as the submissive Son in his humility sought only the will of the Father. And in John 17, he affirms that indeed they were the ones the Father wanted, given by the Father to the Son. He says, “I have manifested thy name unto the men whom thou gavest me out of the world; thine they were, and thou gavest them to me” (John 17:6). He affirmed that they were the gift of God. And so these very special men were chosen by God and affirmed by the Son after a whole night of prayer.
This is such a wonderful thing in terms of discipling. As we select those that we will pour our life into, it should be only after great prayer, so that God can show us who it is that we are to give ourselves to. If Christ selected them with so much prayer, how much more should we? We see this pattern in the apostles. In Acts 13:2-3, it says, “While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for Me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.’ So after they had fasted and prayed, they laid their hands on them and sent them off.” In Acts 14:23, Paul and Barnabas “appointed elders for them in each church and, with prayer and fasting, committed them to the Lord, in whom they had put their trust.” This is a regular pattern you see. This is what we did when I was appointed as a pastor. This is a great work that needs to be done with a lot of preparation and prayer, looking at the qualifications in 1 Timothy 3. If we put in the wrong man, all the work we did for 10, 20, or 30 years can be spoiled in one month.
How He Prepared Them for the Great Work
How did he prepare them to be apostles? Chapter 10, verse 1 simply says, “And when he had called unto him his twelve disciples, he gave them authority.” Or, “Having called unto Him His twelve disciples, He gave them authority.” Then, verse 2 says, “Now the names of the twelve apostles are these.” Before making them apostles, he called them to be his disciples. If you notice, in verse 1, they are disciples, and in verse 2, they are apostles. First, he called them to be disciples and then made them apostles. A disciple (Greek: mathetes) means a learner. An apostle (Greek: apostello) means to be sent. First, they were learners; then they were sent. Before they were “sent,” they were first “taught.” And so this is their transition from being learners in verse 1 to being sent in verse 2. They’ve been trained and now they are sent. They were disciples when they were learning; they were apostles when they were sent. The word “called” means an official commissioning.
How did he train and prepare them to be apostles? There are two important things involved in their calling. This is the curse of our country; you don’t find men with these two things. First, a man must be truly saved, and secondly, a man must be thoroughly trained in truth and a holy life.
First, a man must be truly born again and saved. You may think this is basic, but it is a sad reality that so many pastors and preachers are not saved at all. This is the state of our country, and they don’t even know that they are not saved. We see that the Lord first called them for salvation. Their first call from Christ was a call for their salvation or conversion. If you look at John 1:35-51, you find an illustration of the initial calling to faith, conversion, or salvation that our Lord used in the lives of these twelve. That was the initial calling. They were called to believe, and they were called to Christ in a conversion sense. But after that, they went back to their jobs, their secular employment, and their homes.
And then came a second step: they were called for ministry. When he called them for ministry, he thoroughly trained them. Any good training needs to have observing and practical hands-on experience. Our wise Lord gives both to the disciples. He first calls them for thorough training in truth, and that is recorded for us in Matthew chapter 4, verses 18-22. This was phase two of the initial training of the twelve. “He saw two brethren, Simon, called Peter, and Andrew, his brother, casting a net into the sea; for they were fishers. He said to them, ‘Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.'” Now, they had already been converted. They had already believed in Christ, and they had already affirmed that he was the Messiah as they did in John 1. But now he is calling them to leave the nets and their secular employment and their homes and to follow him exclusively and totally. This is their calling into ministry. They had been called to salvation; that’s phase one. Now they’re called to attach themselves to him permanently; that’s phase two. And he’s going to make them into fishers of men. This was their intense education. They were called out of their employment to follow Jesus around for three years wherever he went and to be trained. This was their schooling, like a school of theology.
1. Lack of Spiritual Understanding
The disciples were spiritually dull, often failing to grasp the parables and precepts Jesus taught, even after repeated explanations. They would often say they understood when they did not, as seen when Peter asked Jesus to explain a parable, and Jesus responded with frustration, “Are you also yet without understanding?” They didn’t even understand the purpose of Jesus’s suffering and death, as demonstrated when Peter rebuked Him for speaking of the cross.
How Jesus Corrected It: Jesus dealt with their lack of understanding through prayer and continuous teaching. He repeatedly taught them, explaining things in different ways. After His resurrection, He spent 40 days teaching them “the things pertaining to the kingdom of heaven,” knowing they needed to fully comprehend His purpose and the truth.
2. Lack of Humility
The disciples were a proud, jealous, and envious group. They were frequently caught arguing about “who would be the greatest” among them. This was most evident when the mother of James and John asked Jesus to give her sons the highest positions in His kingdom, which infuriated the other ten disciples—not because of the pride, but because they wanted those positions themselves.
How Jesus Corrected It: Jesus dealt with their pride through His own example. He taught them that true leadership is about selfless service, not status. He used a little child as an illustration and, most powerfully, washed their feet in John 13, commanding them to do the same for one another. He showed them that He came “not to be ministered unto, but to minister.”
3. Lack of Faith
Despite witnessing countless miracles, the disciples were still “of little faith.” Jesus often rebuked them, asking, “How is it that you have no faith?” Their lack of belief was so profound that even after His resurrection, they struggled to believe the reports of those who had seen Him.
How Jesus Corrected It: Jesus overcame their unbelief through His words and mighty deeds. He performed miracles not just for the crowds but also to build the disciples’ faith. He provided them with “many infallible proofs” of His resurrection, appearing to them and letting them touch Him so they would have absolute certainty.
4. Lack of Commitment
When faced with crisis, the disciples’ commitment failed. Even after professing their loyalty, they forsook and denied Jesus when He was arrested. Judas betrayed Him, Peter denied Him, and the rest simply ran away.
How Jesus Corrected It: Jesus dealt with their lack of commitment primarily through prayer. He told Peter, “Satan hath desired to have you… but I have prayed for you, that your faith fail not.” He also demonstrated ultimate commitment to His calling by enduring the cross. He showed them through His life and death that His commitment to the will of the Father was unwavering.
Grace Reformed Baptist Church, Bangalore 