I was buttoning the shirt of my little boy this morning. He was in a very good mood and asked what day is today. I told him it is Wednesday and tomorrow will be Holy Thursday or the last supper day where Jesus had his last meal with His disciples.
What he said surprised me again, “I know…Jesus has 12 disciples.” I forget that he goes to a Christian based school and listened to his teachers sharing about God every morning for fifteen minutes. On top of that, he has chapel time, praise and worship and God’s Word as part of his lesson. Sometimes, I think he has more knowledge about the Bible than all of us.
So, I asked him if he knows the name of the twelve disciples. Actually, I myself cannot remember who they are except for a few. He then rattled off…John, Peter, James……and he cannot remember further. I tried to recall and said there is Simon and also Judas.
I then asked him to ask my eldest son if he knows. My eldest joked with him, “Yes, I know there is Simon and there is Randy.” My boy was so amused he couldn’t stop laughing. Later in the day, when my other sons returned home, he tried the joke on them again. (Simon as in Simon of American Idol and Randy and Simon always go together in the contest)
Anyway, I just Googled and found the twelve disciples name are mentioned in Matthew 10:2-4 and the twelve disciples are :
Simon (who is called Peter) and his brother Andrew; James son of Zebedee, and his brother John; Philip and Bartholomew; Thomas and Matthew the tax collector; James son of Alphaeus, and Thaddaeus; Simon the Zealot and Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Him.”
Now, I am even more confused. I thought John, Luke, Mark and Matthew were part of the 12! LOL, no, they are not. And is the John the same John as the one who wrote the book of Revelation? With two Simons, is one of them the one who carried Jesus cross or was it another Simon? Aren’t you confused yet?
Bah…Never mind….
April 10th, 2009 at 4:06 am
Matthew and John were part of the original 12. Mark, who is sometimes known as John Mark is the cousin of Barnabas. He is actually a disciple of Peter. Luke on the other hand was a doctor and evangelist. He was Paul’s disciple and followed him until Pauls martyrdom.
About the Simons, one is of course Simon Peter..most of us know him by the name Peter. So, he is not he one that carried the cross. The other Simon is Simon the Zealot. Not much is said about him in the bible but we know that he was a fisherman is from Galilee. The Simon that carried Jesus cross was Simon from Cyrene. He was a passerby with his two sons when the soldiers asked him to carry the cross. So many Simons, very confusing hor?