and they, having left the ship and their father, immediately followed him.
Commentary for this Verse
Matthew 4:21-22 records that Jesus saw James and John mending their nets with their father Zebedee, called them, "and they immediately left the ship and their father, and followed him." The commentary unfolds several threads.
The call was unmistakable and came with power
William Kelly treats this as the decisive call to service following earlier acquaintance with Christ in John 1:
William KellyIt is well for us to remember that we have a divine selection of events in the Gospels — a small selection according to John, but all of divine arrangement. In Matthew the several incidents are arranged dispensationally... Where we begin today was not the first time these disciples had come in contact with the Lord Jesus. We get the Baptist's ministry in John 3, and we find these disciples in John 1. The first four chapters of John had taken place before the events here.
Kelly underscores that the Lord's word itself carried the power that drew them:
Satan had for the first time met one stronger than he; he was spoiled, not yet annulled. With the Lord's word there was power. If He said, "Follow me," there was power with it, and those who left all to be identified with Him formed the remnant.
They were prosperous, not desperate
A point several commentators press is that this was no flight from a failing trade. Kelly is emphatic:
This is a real call to service. They did not give up their business and turn to the Lord's service because it was a decaying trade. They had never had such success as fishermen before. This made it the greater test. Why leave this to turn to a less profitable employment? The great thing is to have the Lord's mind.
And on the specific standing of Zebedee's family:
James and John were pretty well off comparatively. Other partners were with them, and servants with their father. They left their father as well as the ship.
F. B. Hole, commenting on the parallel in Mark, notices that they were not idle men waiting to be rescued from boredom:
F. B. HoleIt is worthy of note that all four who were called were men of diligence in their work. Peter and Andrew were engaged in their fishing. James and John were not lolling about during their time of leisure. They were mending the nets.
"Straightway" — the promptness of true obedience
Hole draws attention to the word that characterizes both Master and servants:
He knew whom He would call to His service. Seeing the sons of Zebedee He called them "straightway," and it is said of the sons of Jonas that when He called them "straightway they forsook their nets and followed Him." As the great Servant of God, He was prompt in issuing His call: as under-servants they were prompt to obey.
Forsaking "all" to share the Lord's portion
J. N. Darby, in his synopsis of Matthew 4, sets the call in its larger dispensational frame:
J. N. DarbyHe then gathers around Him those who were definitively to follow Him in His ministry and His temptations; and, at His call, to link their portion and their lot with His, forsaking all beside.
Kelly picks up the same note with a tender observation on how modestly the Lord reckons what they left:
The Lord may call us to leave prosperity for spiritual service; but when they say, "we have left all," we wonder what the "all" was. We do not get a hundred per cent., but a hundredfold.
The cost of leaving the father
The phrase "they left their father" is not decorative. W. T. P. Wolston recalls how heavily this detail weighed on the sons of Zebedee, and how the Lord's call had required a real break with the family trade:
W. T. P. WolstonWhen the Lord first called Andrew and Simon, and then called James and John, it says, "They left their father Zebedee in the ship with the hired servants, and went after him" (Mark 1:20).
Wolston then draws out the warning that the old associations never quite lose their pull — when the disciples later drift back to the Sea of Tiberias in John 21, it is precisely these old nets and boats that tempt them again:
That which dominated us in our unconverted days is very apt to re-assert its influence if we are not on our watch... things that you and I dropped in the first blush of affection for Christ, habits, ways, things we were full of, till Christ met us, are dangers we cannot afford to under-estimate.
"Fear not, from henceforth thou shalt be catching men"
Kelly, expounding the earlier scene on the lake in Luke 5, applies the Lord's promise equally to the sons of Zebedee who were listening in:
And so it was for James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon's partners. The word addressed to Simon they took for themselves believingly; and they were right. It was written for us, that we might believe and have the blessing with like assurance. Perfect love casts out fear.
And, on a solemn note for all who would serve:
It is a solemn truth as to ministry that the only recorded time the Lord spent the night in prayer was before He chose the twelve. In any kind of service, however small, there must be the being with Him before we are sent forth. We need to be "sent" and by Him.
Synthesis
Matthew 4:22 is not a romantic sketch of fishermen walking away from a dying trade — it is the record of two prosperous men, diligent at their work, who hear a word with divine power in it and answer it at once. They leave the ship (their means of living) and their father (their closest natural tie) because the One who calls has bound the strong man and is now gathering a remnant to share His ministry and His rejection. Their promptness answers the Lord's own promptness: "straightway" on His side met by an "immediately" on theirs. The cost is real — the "all" may look small to us, but the test was the greater because Zebedee's boats were thriving and his household was provided with hired servants. Yet the call to link portion and lot with Christ outweighed both ship and father, and this is the pattern of every true call to follow Him.