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Isaiah 6:1-8 In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw the Lord seated on a throne, high
and exalted, and the train of his robe filled the temple. 2
Above him were seraphs, each
with six wings: With two wings they covered their faces, with two they covered their feet,
and with two they were flying. 3
And they were calling to one another: “Holy, holy, holy is
the LORD Almighty; the whole earth is full of his glory.” 4
At the sound of their voices the
doorposts and thresholds shook and the temple was filled with smoke. 5
“Woe to me!” I cried. “I am ruined! For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a
people of unclean lips, and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.” 6
Then
one of the seraphs flew to me with a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with tongs
from the altar. 7
With it he touched my mouth and said, “See, this has touched your lips;
your guilt is taken away and your sin atoned for.” 8
Then I heard the voice of the Lord
saying, “Whom shall I send? And who will go for us?” And I said, “Here am I. Send me!”Luke 5:1-11 One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the
people crowding around him and listening to the word of God, 2
he saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who 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 from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat. 4 When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let
down the nets for a catch.”
5
Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything.
But because you say so, I will let down the nets.” 6
When they had done so, they caught
such a large number of fish that their nets began 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 full that they began to sink. 8
When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus’ knees and
said, “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” 9
For he and all his companions were
astonished at the catch of fish they had taken, 10 and so were James and John, the sons
of Zebedee, Simon’s partners. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t be afraid; from now on
you will catch men.” 11 So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and
followed him.
Fishing With Jesus
This morning we are going to talk about fishing. I would imagine most of you know that
Erin, James and Mykah go on an annual fishing trip each summer. They and their
friends all go to upstate New York on the St. Lawrence River. I asked Erin what kinds of
fish they catch. It’s quite a list. Small and Large Mouth Bass, Pike, Walleye, Perch and
more. The best time to go fishing there is early in the morning, very early in the morning,
as in 5:30 or 6 am. They use fishing poles baited with crayfish and minnows.
Our scripture today is about fishing in the Sea of Gaililee. Now our text calls it Lake
Gennesaret but that is simply another name for the same lake. Did you know that the
Sea of Galilee is the lowest freshwater lake in the world? On the Sea of Galilee the
fishermen normally fish at night, not in the morning as Erin and James do. The fish
caught there are different, not surprising since it is such a different part of the world. The
fish caught there are usually carp, tilapia or sardines. They don’t fish with poles and
2they don’t use bait. They cast a net onto the water, part floats and part sinks. When they
pull the net back in the fish are caught in it.
So, let’s go fishing with Jesus this morning. There will be several questions throughout
the sermon this morning for all of us to ponder.
Jesus has been preaching the good news of the kingdom throughout Galilee and this
particular morning he is preaching at the shore of the Sea of Galilee. The people were
crowding around him and listening to the word of God.
For Simon, it had been a difficult night of fishing. They had fished all night, but hadn’t
caught a single fish. They beached their boats and were cleaning their nets so that they
would be well prepared for later tonight when they might have more luck. Most likely,
they were able to listen to Jesus teach while they went about their work.
As they clean their nets, Jesus continues to teach, and the crowd begins to press in on
him more and more, until finally, Jesus sees Simon’s boat.
Let’s pause here a second. Did you realize that Jesus and Simon knew each other
before this encounter? I didn’t. This is a problem when we read portions of scripture and
don’t keep the sequence in mind. Prior to this Jesus has already been to Simon’s house
where he healed Simon’s mother-in-law of a fever. Simon has heard Jesus preach and
knows Jesus is a healer. But this day Simon will learn who Jesus really is.
Jesus gets into Simon’s boat and asked Simon to take them a little way out so that
Jesus can teach from there. Simon had just finished cleaning his nets, and was kind of
hoping to get some sleep because he had to go fishing again later, and now Jesus
wants to borrow his boat. But the sermon was good, and this would allow Simon to hear
it better, if he was in the same boat with Jesus, and so he picked up his nets, put them
in the boat, and then shoved off and rowed a little way out from shore so that Jesus
could continue to teach.
When Jesus finished speaking he told Simon to put out into deep water and let down
the nets for a catch.
Let’s consider exactly what Jesus was asking Simon to do here. First of all, Simon was
the fisherman; Jesus was a carpenter and a teacher. Who knows more about fishing?
Simon should be instructing Jesus about how to fish, not the other way around. Second,
Simon had already been fishing all night long, and he hadn’t caught a thing. And
besides that, this was probably near the middle of the day now, and everybody knows
that the middle of the day is generally the worst time to fish. The fish have retreated to
hide under their rocks and submerged logs. They have gone to the cooler parts of the
water. As long as the sun is out, they hide where no predators can see them. So
chances are, if they didn’t catch anything at night, they surely wouldn’t catch anything
during the day. And finally, most frustrating of all for Simon, is that he had just finished
cleaning his nets to get them ready for fishing later when the fishing would hopefully be
better. If he dropped them in the lake now, he would have to clean them again later.
But look at Simon’s reply, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught
anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”
Wow! There is a statement of faith! Simon tells Jesus that this request doesn’t make
much sense, but he will obey Jesus anyway.
How about us? Do we trust Jesus this much? Are we willing to let down our nets?Simon goes out into deep water, throws out the net and a miracle happens. It was a
miracle of abundance! This amazing load of fish, so much that their nets were breaking
3shows the power of Jesus. Simon and the others were so stunned that day because of
the enormous load of fish that there was no human explanation for it. Truly the Lord had
done a miracle for them. These fishermen had just witnessed a mighty display of the
Lord’s power which caused their nets to break so that the other boat to come and help
them pull in all the fish. So many fish that both of these boats began to sink. That’s a lot
of fish!
Now we might expect Simon and all the fishermen to jump up and down and shout in
excitement and perhaps the others do but something significant happens to Simon as
he witnesses this wonderful miracle. As this miracle plays out in front of him, Simon now
begins to truly understand who Jesus is. To understand the Lord’s glory and holiness.
There is one greater than man in his boat! In light of the Lord’s power and holiness,
Simon also sees his own sinfulness, his own unworthiness. He fell on his knees before
Jesus and confessed his sinfulness. “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!”
Simon did not feel worthy to be in the presence of Jesus. He was immediately aware of
his own sinfulness. We saw the same thing in our reading from Isaiah this morning.
Isaiah, when confronted with the holiness of God declares, “5
“Woe to me! I am ruined!
For I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, and my eyes
have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.” When we compare ourselves to God, to
Jesus we realize just how holy God is and how sinful we are.
So let’s ask, are we aware of our sinfulness? Do we truly know the times we have
turned from God?
The first thing Jesus says to Simon is, “Do not be afraid.” When we confess our sin and
are truly sorry we have nothing to fear. We will always be forgiven. Through Jesus’
death on the cross, God takes away our sins and shows us His amazing love.
Do we truly know this? No matter what we have done we can confess it to God and be
forgiven.
Jesus tells Simon, “from now on you will catch men”. Jesus would make them fishers of
people. Simon, Andrew, James and John brought their boats to shore and they left
everything and followed Jesus.
Let’s think, what exactly did they leave? They left their fishing business. The fish, the
boats, the nets. They left it all.
They left their homes. They left their families. They left everything. At the pinnacle of their fishing careers, having just caught the greatest catch ever they
abandon everything to follow Jesus.
So, how about us? How much are we willing to abandon for Jesus?
Jesus called them to a commitment to follow Him and to do what He does. They left
their nets and their fishing and followed Him. It sounds so simple when we read it in the
gospel. It makes perfect sense to us, we know who Jesus is, the Messiah, the Son of
God, of course they followed Him. Remember those four men who first followed Jesus
didn’t know this. It makes us wonder what it was about Jesus that drew them to Him.
They were just regular people, nothing particularly special about them except perhaps
their willingness. Their willingness to have their lives changed, to identify with Jesus
and to follow Him.
Simon and his partners have been catching fish and now Simon would spend the rest of
his life telling people about the good news, the life changing news of Jesus.
4Are we willing to let Jesus change us? Have we let God open our hearts to the good
news Jesus came to tell us about?
Well, we’ve spent a lot of time talking about fishing this morning but that’s not really
what this sermon is about. It’s about trusting the power of God to use us in all of our
unworthiness, to follow Jesus Christ wherever he calls us to usher in his kingdom in this
time and place.
As Simon and Isaiah both witnessed God and His holiness, it made them aware of their
sinfulness. The more that we understand about God and who He is, it makes us aware
that we are all sinners in need of a mighty Savior. That is what we celebrate this
morning. About two years after this episode Jesus was crucified on a cross on a hillside.
Jesus gave up his life so we could be forgiven, show we would know the amazing, all
consuming love of God.