Luke 5:1-11
“What’s the Catch?”
February 6, 2022
One of the things that drives me a bit crazy whenever watching sports be it last week’s NFL playoffs, the professional golf that my husband can never seem to get enough of or even the Winter Olympics that have just begun is the need to show us that play or swing or feat of sometimes unbelievable skill over and over again.
We have a man named Tony Verna back in 1963 to thank for figuring out a system that enabled a standard videotape machine to instantly replay something on television.
That something was a touchdown during the Army-Navy football game and the rest is history, and another and another and another view of it just in case we missed something the first 3 or 4 times it was shown, regardless of how spectacular or mundane it appeared to be.
Secretly, though, wouldn’t it be amazing to experience some of those aha or deeply meaningful moments of life once again somewhere other than in our own heads?
The problem would be, when would the virtual camera capturing that special moment be on?
So much of life, after all is fairly routine, filled with the same tasks done with such regularity that no one would think them special.
Sometimes it takes an unusual event like say an ice storm that shuts down all power, communication, and sources of heat for more than 24 hours to make us appreciate how much we miss being able to cook a meal or take a hot shower or hear the voice of a loved one.
Here we have Simon and Andrew and James and John getting back into their boats after a bummer of a night of fishing. They can’t wait to clean off that fish stink and lay down and sleep out of utter exhaustion and disappointment and worry about how they’ll pay the bills if this lousy fishing keeps up.
They had no idea how dramatically their lives were going to change because of one man who all the people in town were talking about.
There they are deflated and bone-tired, scrubbing down their empty nets, eying the growing crowd all around them and Simon gets asked to take the boat out just a little bit so Jesus can offer up a lesson. Something about Jesus made him listen and do it.
As if that wasn’t enough of a moment that we all wished we could see on replay, Jesus’ request to go back out, into the same disappointing waters, actually seizing on that sense of failure and self-doubt.
He asks them to trust him and in return, they are given a glimpse into what a life of discipleship might look like.
It is just then that teacher Jesus in his floating classroom inspires and then pushes on to the next level with his lesson.
How and what exactly inspired the man who started out at the beginning of this story as Simon and becomes Simon Peter by the time they are overflowing with fish to actually say yes is hard to say.
Maybe it is the strangeness of the request coming from someone so deeply admired that he had no way of saying no.
Go deeper and then drop your nets is the instruction coming from someone who probably knew very little about fishing but a lot about risk taking.
That, after all is what it can mean to follow a call.
You stick your neck out, potentially risk ridicule or financial hardship or worse because something inside says you must push on and take the chance.
And it’s really scary.
Consider the riskiest move you’ve ever made in your life.
Maybe it was quitting a comfortable, predictable and safe job for one your heart was calling you toward.
It could have been moving to a faraway place where you knew no one for what you believed was your intended destination.
Giving up the known for the unknown can be downright terrifying and exhilarating all at the same time.
Following a call can sometimes mean alienating folks or thinking you have disappointed them.
Here Simon Peter is filled with doubt.
He can’t believe that Jesus would have time and energy or “holiness” to share with him, a modest fisherman. This is what grace looks like and many of us keep wondering, “Do you really mean me, God?
Are you sure?”
And Jesus had a response – “There is nothing to fear” or “Be not afraid.”
Because so often the hesitancy to listen to the call, to put out in the deep water when we’re exhausted from the work of living is based on fear.
What if I try and fail?
What if people I need stop caring about me?
What if I have to let something go to make this happen?
Today we hear about how Jesus calls his first disciples and some of us are probably uncomfortable or nervous because are we really supposed to leave everything and follow him?
What are we expected to give up or embrace if we are answering God’s call to discipleship?
You know those instant replays that capture a special moment on camera?
Maybe what we are witnessing here is the very moment when Simon Peter saw the beauty of God’s holiness in that old boat that was his livelihood, that he probably was fiercely protective of but must have approached some days with dread.
In that very boat he spent every single day is where Jesus was able to bring the sacred down to earth, among those mended nets bulging with more fish than they had ever dreamed of catching.
Was that the moment that the fear intensified or slipped away as they suddenly realized what they were meant to do?
Would these hardworking fishermen actually be able to help Jesus spread the message of God’s love?
They saw something unexplainable and unexpected in the setting they knew best.
Jesus says, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be fishers of people.”
As one writer lovingly describes this image:
“To be fishers of people
is to let the great net of your love
down into their lives,
trusting that there you will discover
miracles and blessings,
and draw them out.” (Steve Garnaas-Holmes, Unfolding Light, www.unfoldinglight.net)
We may need to replay that image of being called not with some bolt of lightning or disembodied image from above but from the places and people that we encountered yesterday, and again today, and yet again tomorrow.
And the place we are called to is the place of love, deep and abundant, and ever flowing love. Amen.