One of those days Jesus went out to a mountainside to pray, and spent the night praying to God. When morning came, he called his disciples to him and chose twelve of them, whom he also designated apostles: Simon (whom he named Peter), his brother Andrew, James, John, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Thomas, James son of Alphaeus, Simon who was called the Zealot, Judas son of James, and Judas Iscariot, who became a traitor.

–Parallel Verses:
Philippians‬ ‭2‬:‭5‬-‭8‬
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset [attitude] as Christ Jesus: Who, being in very nature God, did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage; rather, he made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant, being made in human likeness. And being found in appearance as a man, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to death— even death on a cross!

‭‭Notice Jesus goes to God with the important decision of who should be named his twelve Apostles. And he prayed hard, into the night.

There are a few people in heaven I want to ask a question of: How did you do the amazing things you did on earth? 1) How did Stephen in the Bible forgive the people who were stoning him and pray for God’s grace on them? 2) How did Francis of Assisi have the courage to walk into Muslim territory during the crusades? How did he walk all the way up to the Sultan and speak with him, without being killed as an “infidel”? 3) How did Elizabeth Elliot and her female missionary partners ever forgive the native people in Ecuador who murdered their husbands in cold blood, when all they had done was give them food and supplies and teach them the truth about Jesus? How did they return to love them, minister to them, and care enough for them to win them to Jesus? 4) How did Cory Ten Boom survive and thrive in a German concentration camp as a non-Jewish Christian who shared the gospel with other hurting women in such a tough circumstance? How did she come to see having lice as a blessing from God? 5) How did my mom serve the Lord faithfully, and disciple so many Cambodian women in studying the Bible, even while she was wheelchair-bound and dying of cancer and until she could not move anymore from her bed?
And finally, I would ask Jesus: How did you pick the Twelve apostles, knowing that one of them would be a traitor and lead you to your death? How did you faithfully love Judas, even though his heart turned evil?

And while I am sure their answers may vary a bit, I believe they will all have this in common: They found a peace with God in any circumstance by humbling themselves. They sacrificed their wants and desires and became bondservants to God. They relied upon prayer and communication with the Almighty to given them a supernatural strength to endure incredible hardship and arise from the flames — VICTORIOUS!

Jesus, once again, models his reliance on God for his strength. He prayed hard before choosing his Apostles. It may make you wonder as it has me: If he is God, why did he need to pray? I think God has shown me the answer to this in the passage in Philippians: Jesus, though God, offered up his Kingdom, his rights, and, in part, his power — to become human. He did this to save us. But his power was perfected in this weak human body through his relationship with God. At any time he could have claimed his high position and his command over legions of angels. But God had a different plan for him. So while he was fully God, he became fully man to save us and offered up that to which he was owed, in order to become a sacrifice for those he loved. And he accomplished this by relying on prayer to God to give him the power and the right attitude or mindset. So the other people I mentioned above, I believe they also adopted this mindset to accomplish their great deeds in the Lord.

The question is … what will you and I do about it? We see this all-out SACRIFICE AND COMPLETE SURRENDER to God and his Will modeled before us, but will we follow suit ourselves?

Lord, you modeled complete surrender to God and his plan for you to sacrifice yourself for others — more than that — to be persecuted, falsely accused, beaten, and crucified as a criminal, though innocent. Work your way in me, that I may become (and stay) a vessel in The Potter’s hands, that is completely surrendered to his molding and his purposes for me in this life!