First Lutheran Church • 3 Epiphany • Sunday, January 25, 2026

``Went on a mission trip to Honduras when I was 24 years old with some seminary classmates of mine. The trip was designed to go into the mountains of Honduras and run a clinic, a health clinic for the people there who were very poor and rarely got to see a doctor, and that's what we did. The village we were in was very remote, very small, and they were building a new church. And part of our job alongside doing the work of the clinic was to help them put a roof on this church. [00:18:28] (35 seconds)  #GoWhereTheFishAre

So one morning, they told us that they needed to go get some lumber to put the roof on the church. So we gathered on this dirt road in the mountains in the fog, and one of our Honduran leaders came and said to us in broken English, follow me. [00:19:02] (17 seconds)

And so we did, and he led us down the mountain, down a muddy path, up on the other side of the mountain, up into the jungle, and we arrived about after thirty minutes or so at the Honduran equivalent of a Home Depot lumberyard, which was to say it was a tree that had been felled in the jungle, carved up with axes into 12 foot beams that they were gonna use to put on the church. [00:19:19] (27 seconds)

I hiked to the trail as best I could. I got out of the jungle. I started walking back up the mountainside on the other side, and my legs were throbbing. And I kept slipping, and finally, about halfway up, I just sat down. And I couldn't go any further and I rested and I looked below me and I was surprised that I saw the man who had been in front of me with two beams was now below me with two more beams. And I realized, I'm about to be lapped. And so I grabbed my beam and got it on my shoulder and started back up the mountain, but sure enough, the Honduran came and with his two beams beat me to the church. He had now carried four to my one. It was a humbling experience to realize that I was not as strong or able or sure footed as these poor Honduran farmers. [00:20:18] (60 seconds)

And I think of that Honduran man a lot when I think of Jesus' call to the disciples to follow him. What does it mean to follow someone like Jesus? What does it mean to be his disciple? Peter, Andrew, John, and James were not preachers. They were not healers. They were fishermen, and they were called by Jesus into a totally different kind of life. And the path that Jesus invited them to was a path they had never walked before. [00:21:18] (31 seconds)

It was harder than anything they'd ever done before. The work that Jesus invited them to do was more challenging than any fishing expedition. The burden that they carried was heavier than any haul of fish they had gathered into shore. But Jesus called them anyway, these fishermen, just as Jesus calls us. [00:21:49] (21 seconds)

Jesus didn't walk the shores of Galilee looking for men who would be great preachers or great healers or who could do great works of faith. The only criteria Jesus had was people who would say yes, people who would drop their nets and follow him. [00:22:11] (19 seconds)

And that's the question before us this morning. Are we willing to follow Jesus? It's not about being the best disciples. It's not about being the one who has the answer to any religious question that comes your way. It's not even about being able to perform great feats of faith. It's about dropping the net, putting one foot in front of the other, and as best you can, follow the way of Jesus. [00:22:29] (29 seconds)