“Jesus went up into the hills and called to him those he wanted, and they came to him. He appointed twelve—designating them apostles—that they might be with him and that he might send them out to preach and to have authority to drive out demons.” (Mark 3:13-15a)

The beginning of the Gospel of Mark shows Jesus establishing His plan to help the Hebrew people—and, consequently, us—enter the Kingdom His coming promised.  

During those early days His ways of speaking, healing, and casting out evil spirits drew a large following. By then Jesus had called Simon, Andrew, James, John, and Levi (Matthew) to be His disciples. Later He designated these five, along with seven more, to be His apostles. That calling meant they would be with Him, be sent out to preach by Him, and be given authority to drive out demons by Him. 

(Note: “While a disciple is a student, one who learns from a teacher, an apostle is sent to deliver those teachings to others. “Apostle” means messenger, he who is sent. We can say that all apostles were disciples, but all disciples are not apostles. www.diffen.com)

When my husband Tony was six years old he and his mother fled Communist China for a new life in Hong Kong. They arrived speaking their village dialect, Hakka, while Hong Kong residents spoke Cantonese and English. As you can imagine, this language situation was a big challenge for them.  

I’ve been considering how entering the Kingdom of God is a bit like entering a foreign country. You hear about the existence of this new land, and it sure sounds better than the one you’re in. So you journey into the unknown.

When you arrive you discover you have no idea what is being said by the people living there. You feel lost, adrift, confused but, at the same time, somehow invigorated. 

Several of Tony’s teachers in Hong Kong took a special interest in him. They invited him into their families, spent extra time helping him learn English, saw to it he got scholarships. 

You could say they were apostles of the kingdom of Hong Kong. First, they had been disciples of those who had taught and nurtured them, and now they were apostles sent out to teach and nurture others, like Tony. At that point he became their disciple. Later, he became the “apostle” teaching English to many others.

I don’t know of any stories about demons being cast out by those “apostles,” but I believe we can legitimately say they succeeded in casting out the darkness of Tony’s incomprehension, thereby releasing him into a whole new world of understanding. 

Do you know someone—maybe you? —who has trouble understanding the concept of the Kingdom of God? Perhaps you could do the work of an apostle and use this story as a helpful metaphor for them.