By Mark Grace, CCCNZ Ambassador
Ka mea ia ki a raua, haere mai kia kite.
‘Ona tali mai lea o ia, “O mai e matamata.”
“Come,” he replied, “and you will see.”
John 1:39
In Western literature from Jesus’ time, ordinary people were not normally featured prominently. Usually, the only way ordinary people were written about was as the butt of jokes.
Historian Tom Holland writes that during his years of studying classical antiquity he was struck by the apparent assumption of most people that the poor and the weak did not have the slightest intrinsic value.
In John chapter one, Jesus was slowly being revealed as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world”. What was probably just as remarkable to an ancient audience is what Jesus does first.
He invites John's disciples to stay with him.
He meets Andrew, Simon Peter's brother, and Andrew begins to follow him.
He meets Andrew’s brother and renames him Simon Peter, and he too becomes a follower.
He goes to Galilee and looks for Philip, asking him to follow him.
He talks with a skeptic called Nathaniel and makes him believe.
I love how ordinary this all is. John writes about the specific people Jesus called, and where they were from, and how they became disciples. The Lamb who existed with God in eternity past, the who one is God come in the flesh, calls ordinary people into the heart of his mission.
The idea that ordinary people in the Roman world could become one of the most important parts of the story just wouldn’t compute.
The thought that the Son of God would choose unimportant, confused, skeptical people with ordinary jobs and ordinary lives to carry out his mission would never have entered their minds.
This was a revolution in the literature of Rome. More than that, it was a revolution in human history.
From Waitangi to the West Coast, from Foxton to Featherston, from Northland to Naseby, one of the joys I have is seeing ordinary Christians from our ordinary church movement doing ordinary service, quietly advancing the gospel in their generation.
Those moments cause me to reflect on our extraordinary Saviour. This Saviour died and rose again for us, and he gifted each of us as ordinary Christians by his Spirit, and he then sent each of us into his glorious mission.
What a privilege it is to be an ordinary Christian involved in the most extraordinary story we could ever imagine.
