Blind Faith or Understanding?

    We have all read Matthew 4:19-20, where Jesus says to Peter and Andrew:  “Come, follow me… and I will make you fishers of men,” and at once they leave their nets and follow him. In this scene we get the impression that Peter and Andrew drop what they are doing, join Jesus, and commit their lives to him.  The episode is frequently presented as a lesson in blind faith and obedience, a measure against which we should judge our own response to Jesus’ call.

    I believe this is an incorrect reading.  As we have seen during our studies, the four
gospels are written by four different men for four different audiences from four different perspectives.  None is meant to be a full biographical account of Jesus.  Rather, the gospels are more like four court testimonies about the same set of events—the life, death and resurrection of Jesus—and what those events mean to the human...