Readings: Isaiah 51:1-2, 4-5, 9-11, Luke 5:1-11, True Christianity 58 (see below)
See also on Youtube This is the first call story in the gospel of Luke. The Jesus that we have just celebrated being born will grow up to perform a ministry of teaching and healing. At the start of today’s text, we see that he is beginning to gain a reputation and is drawing large crowds, so large that he resorts to preaching from a boat. Now, Jesus and Simon Peter, who will become one of the most prominent disciples, have already met by this point. In fact, one of the healings Jesus had just performed in the gospel of Luke was for Simon Peter’s mother-in-law. Jesus knew whose boat he was using, and the gospel makes it sound a little more casual and random than it probably was. Yet, there was purpose in what Jesus was doing, because when he was done teaching, he was not yet done with Simon. “Put out into the deep water, and let down your nets for a catch,” he told him. Simon does not seem sure about Jesus entirely. He has seen him heal his mother-in-law but still thinks he knows better, at least regarding fishing. After all, fishing is his trade. So, he is doubtful but respectful, still calling Jesus “Master,” and he does what Jesus says, though we imagine probably half-heartedly and without expectation. The catch, however, is super-abundant; it is a miracle of plenty where there previously had been none. Simon is astonished and falls on his knees before Jesus, this time calling him “Lord.” And along with James and John, Simon subsequently leaves everything and follows Jesus. There is some interesting language used in this gospel, compared the the other versions. Jesus tells Simon “don’t be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” Perhaps some of us are more familiar with the wording from Matthew or Mark: “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.” This is not just a disagreement in translation; the actual words in greek are different between the gospels. Perhaps Luke was trying to be clever, playing on the sense that Simon Peter, the fisherman, was he himself the first to be “caught.” However, in modernity, we cannot help but squirm at this wording. From this side of history, catching people sounds very problematic. Through the lens of colonialism and slavery, the word catch sounds a discordant note. Whatever Luke intended at the time, “to catch” a person, to us now, infers an abrogation of freedom on the part of the one who is caught. Is this what Jesus meant? We know that it cannot be so. There is not a single instance of Jesus forcing someone to follow him. Indeed, he even allowed one of his own the freedom to betray him. What is meant here then? What shall we gather from this story, as we enter into it as people who both support the growth of spiritual community and experience our personal faith? As people who hope to “catch” and also who are caught? As both fisherman and fish? From the fisherman point of view, we are being asked to believe in an abundance of spirit and connection in the midst of the everyday. Fish was a staple food and there was a thriving fishing industry on the sea of Galilee. Simon was equivalent to a middle class small business owner today (1). He was wonderfully ordinary, not particularly distinguished or qualified. After Jesus had done his thing for while, he issued a specific challenge to Simon. Go out onto the deep water, put down your nets. Much like the English word “deep,” the greek word “bathos” has both a literal meaning (“deep sea”) and also a metaphorical meaning (“the deep things of God.”) It speaks of depth as a physical measurement, but also as the depth of things, as mystery. As we heard in our Isaiah reading, the primordial sea was an ancient Jewish symbol of chaos (2). And that is often how we perceive things that are beyond our understanding in any given moment; as chaos, as a deep and foreboding darkness. Yet, Jesus invites us to go out into this depth, this mystery, to go out beyond what we think we know, to go out beyond into the place where our limited understanding is no longer dominant. How many of us want to do that? How many of us really want to go deep, when we could just exist on the surface? But Jesus directly commanded Simon to go there, to put down his net, to reach into the mystery and see what he might find. When God invites us to go deep, it is not chaos that God means for us find but God’s presence. From our Swedenborg reading we heard: [God’s] omnipotence fills, and works within, the sphere of the extension of goodness, a sphere that is infinite. At a deep level, this sphere pervades the universe and everything in it. God’s love pervades everything. Even at the deepest darkest depths, God’s love and God’s presence can be found. The purpose of Jesus’ request to Simon Peter was to uncover that reality. In our everyday lives, we remain safe on the boat, living our surface life, seeing how we want to see, thinking we know what fish are out there. God is inviting us to go deeper into the water. What did Simon find there? He found an abundance of fish that he could not have predicted. And Simon also found that he was the fish. He was the one who was caught. The heart of the miracle is not so much the abundant haul of fish, though knowledge of God’s abundance is always a miracle. This was also a call story. The real miracle is that Simon became the fish. The real miracle was that for a moment, separation and distance were abolished, and Simon found himself viewing God’s love from the inside, breathing water when we has was used to breathing air. The real miracle is the knowledge that everything is connected. We imagine a separation between the spiritual life and our everyday concerns, between Sunday and Monday. We imagine a separation between God and the world, or between groups of people. Perhaps it is easier to get on with being a fisherman that way. Our default mode is separation, our default mode is to stay on the surface. Yet God invites us into the deep. And when we accept this invitation, connection, empathy, and love are our reward. But even so, what is our reaction to this new sense of connectedness? When we look to the text, do we see wonder and astonishment? Yes. But we also see shame. Simon was convinced of God’s transformative power but believed that he was not pure enough to engage with it. That his sinfulness must somehow disqualify him from relationship with God. Even as he proclaimed Jesus “Lord,” he also told him to go away. Connection feels painful, feels impossible, if we truly believe that we don’t deserve it, or that we don’t belong in the circle. Even as Simon recognized the abundant power that he saw before him, even as Simon recognized the gift of being scooped up in God’s net, it felt like too much. Simon received an invitation to explore depth, connection, and transformation. Sometimes the possibility of these things feel like chaos and so we demur. We burrow back into our own smallness, we toss out our shame behind us as reasons why God should not want us. But God does want us. There is nothing we can do that will ever persuade God to no longer want us. So what does this mean for the mission of the church, for the so-called “catching” of people? How are we to understand that? For the disciples were to become leaders in the Jesus movement, spreading Jesus’ teachings far and wide. What does it mean for us, as we step away from the boat as Simon did, leaving behind what we think we know, to follow Jesus? I believe that it means we issue the invitation as Jesus did, for people to explore depth in safety. I believe it means that we let the spirit do the work of transformation in others and stand together in love and community as we each struggle with what that brings up for us, including shame. And I believe it means we go forth with a vision in which people are no longer marked and defined by separation, but in which the fisherman sees with the eyes of the fish and vice versa. As we are liberated from our own sense of separation, our presence automatically brings others into community. And perhaps this is what it means “to catch” others: to help facilitate a transformative moment… to catch our breath, to catch a glimpse of something beautiful….a moment when we realize that something is deeper and fuller than we thought, a moment when we realize our potential, a moment when we realize God’s love, a moment when we shift from Master to Lord, a moment when we transform from fisherman to fish. These are deeply precious moments of personal call, and so we praise a God who, in the words of Isaiah, makes a road in the depths of the sea for us. Amen (1) Ronald J. Allen, https://www.workingpreacher.org/?lect_date=02/10/2019&lectionary=rcl (2) Ibid Readings: Isaiah 51:1-2, 4-5, 9-11 1 “Listen to me, you who pursue righteousness and who seek the LORD: Look to the rock from which you were cut and to the quarry from which you were hewn; 2 look to Abraham, your father, and to Sarah, who gave you birth. When I called him he was only one man, and I blessed him and made him many. 4 “Listen to me, my people; hear me, my nation: Instruction will go out from me; my justice will become a light to the nations. 5 My righteousness draws near speedily, my salvation is on the way, and my arm will bring justice to the nations. 9 Awake, awake, arm of the LORD, clothe yourself with strength! Awake, as in days gone by, as in generations of old. Was it not you who cut Rahab to pieces, who pierced that sea monster through? 10 Was it not you who dried up the sea, the waters of the great deep, who made a road in the depths of the sea so that the redeemed might cross over? 11 Those the LORD has rescued will return. They will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away. Luke 5:1-11 1 Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, 2 he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. 3 He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. 4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, "Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch." 5 Simon answered, "Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets." 6 When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. 7 So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. 8 But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, "Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!" 9 For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken; 10 and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, "Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people." 11 When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him. True Christianity #56 In the universe and everything in it, God's omnipotence follows and works through the laws of its design. God is omnipotent, because he has all power from himself. All others have power from him. God's power and his will are one. Because he wills nothing but what is good, he cannot do anything but what is good… God is in fact goodness itself. When he does something good, he is in himself. He cannot walk away from himself. Clearly then, his omnipotence fills, and works within, the sphere of the extension of goodness, a sphere that is infinite. At a deep level, this sphere pervades the universe and everything in it. At a deep level, this sphere also governs things outside of itself to the extent that they become part of it through their own design. If things do not become part of that sphere, it still sustains them. It tries in every way to bring them back to a design in harmony with the universal design that God inhabits with his omnipotence and follows in his actions. If things against the design are not brought back into the design, they are cast out of God; but there he still sustains them from deep within.
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