Jesus said, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Matthew 4:19). That was more than a call to go somewhere with Jesus. It was a promise that following Him would change them. Before Jesus could use John to reach people, there were things in John that Jesus had to change.

We see one of them in Mark 9:38. John told Jesus, “Teacher, we saw someone who does not follow us casting out demons in Your name, and we forbade him because he does not follow us.” The revealing words are, “He does not follow us.” John did not say the man refused to follow Jesus. His concern was that the man did not belong to their group. Jesus responded, “Do not forbid him.”

John was learning something essential about becoming a fisher of men: the mission is bigger than our circle. If Jesus was going to make John a fisher of men, John had to learn to see beyond the boundaries he had drawn. He could not spend his life reaching people for Jesus while believing that Jesus could only work through people who looked like him, traveled with him, belonged to his group, or did things exactly as he did.

That is still part of how Jesus makes fishers of men. We can become so attached to our church, denomination, tradition, methods, or circle that without realizing it, “Follow Jesus” becomes “Follow us.” We begin measuring other believers by their proximity to us rather than their relationship to Christ. We can become suspicious of what God is doing simply because He is doing it through people outside our circle.

Jesus was not teaching John that truth does not matter or that everything done in His name should be accepted without discernment. He was correcting John’s assumption that his group defined the boundaries of God’s work. A fisher of men must have a heart big enough for the people Jesus wants to reach.

Think about what Jesus was doing in John. John sought status, and Jesus taught him to serve. John wanted fire to consume the Samaritans, but eventually he would return to Samaria and pray for Samaritans to receive the Holy Spirit. John wanted to stop a man because “he does not follow us,” and Jesus taught him that His work extended beyond John’s circle. Jesus was making a fisher of men, and He was doing it by changing the fisherman.

That may be one of the things we miss when we read, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” We tend to concentrate on learning how to fish. Jesus concentrated first on forming the fisher. He changes our ambitions. He changes our attitudes. He changes our boundaries.

Sometimes the greatest obstacle to reaching the people Jesus wants to reach is not their unwillingness to come near us. It is our unwillingness to see beyond us.

Follow Him long enough, and Jesus will enlarge our hearts for people we once considered outside our circle. That is part of what it means when Jesus says, “Follow Me, and I will make you fishers of men.” ©