THE service at Crediton Methodist Church on Sunday, January 15 was planned by the Fellowship Team and led by Pam Murphy. Her theme was “The Call of the Kingdom”.

Pam said that if a school challenges another school to a sports match the headteacher needs to find the best team and choose students with the necessary skills and capabilities.

We are used to choosing the most gifted people with specific proven experience if we want to win a game or succeed at something.

We do not choose people who are not good at the activity.

If we are going to employ someone for a job we want to know what their qualifications and experience are and we may even ask a recruitment agency to do a psychology assessment of the candidates.

The Bible readings told of Jesus selecting the 12 disciples.

John read a spoof letter from a recruitment agency who had performed psychological assessments on the 12 people Jesus had selected.

Simon Peter is emotionally unstable, erratic and prone to fits of temper. Andrew and Phillip do not have leadership qualities.

James and John place personal interest before company loyalty.

Thomas demonstrates an unsettling and questioning attitude.

Matthew and James had been black-listed by the Chamber of Commerce and Thadeous, Nathaniel and Simon the Zealot have radical leanings.

Only one candidate shows potential having resourcefulness, good business sense and contacts in high places.

They recommend Judas Iscariot should be made finance director and Jesus’s right-hand man.

The agency recommends Jesus continues to search for people with suitable experience, managerial ability and proven capability.

Pam said that is what conventional wisdom would have said of Jesus’s choice of disciples.

God is not into conventional wisdom. From the world’s point of view the disciples were just ordinary men with no leadership qualities.

They were not versed in the law, gifted speakers or high up in society.

At least four were fishermen.

Simon was part of a political group that sought to overthrow the Roman government.

Matthew worked for the Romans as a tax collector and was viewed as a traitor. We know that Judas Iscariot eventually betrayed Jesus.

It was shocking in the then society when religious leaders and teachers were expected to gather their students around them.

They were not expected to gather fishermen and tax collectors.

Jesus was frowned upon for the kind of people with which He surrounded himself.

The great thing was that they were called by Jesus and empowered by Jesus’s spirit on the day of Pentecost. It was all God’s initiative not human abilities that enabled them to succeed.

These special men (with the exception of Judas) became eye witnesses of Jesus’s work on earth and witnesses to His resurrection.

It was through their Spirit-empowered witnesses that the church began and continues today.

Bronwyn Nott