Luke 5:1-11
Once when he was standing on the shore of Lake Gennesaret, the crowd was pushing in on him to better hear the Word of God. He noticed two boats tied up. The fishermen had just left them and were out scrubbing their nets. He climbed into the boat that was Simon’s and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Sitting there, using the boat for a pulpit, he taught the crowd.
When he finished teaching, he said to Simon, “Push out into deep water and let your nets out for a catch.”
Simon said, “Master, we’ve been fishing hard all night and haven’t caught even a minnow. But if you say so, I’ll let out the nets.” It was no sooner said than done—a huge haul of fish, straining the nets past capacity. They waved to their partners in the other boat to come help them. They filled both boats, nearly swamping them with the catch.
Simon Peter, when he saw it, fell to his knees before Jesus. “Master, leave. I’m a sinner and can’t handle this holiness. Leave me to myself.” When they pulled in that catch of fish, awe overwhelmed Simon and everyone with him. It was the same with James and John, Zebedee’s sons, coworkers with Simon.
Jesus said to Simon, “There is nothing to fear. From now on you’ll be fishing for men and women.” They pulled their boats up on the beach, left them, nets and all, and followed him.
Last week, if you’ll recall, Jesus revisited his hometown, Nazareth. He impressed everyone there with his wisdom – at first – but then everything went south when he began preaching a message of inclusivity rather than separatism, when the Nazarenes present turned against him and tried to toss him off a cliff.
He managed to “slip away” from those people and went to Capernaum, a larger village, the home of Simon, on the northern shore of Lake Gennesaret, which is another name for the Sea of Galilee. He taught in the synagogue there and healed a man possessed by an evil spirit.
From the synagogue, he went to Simon’s home and healed his very sick mother-in-law. When the people of Capernaum saw all this they brought all their ill and broken people to him and he healed them all. The next day he left Capernaum to travel around to other towns in Galilee – healing and teaching -- and his fame grew.
Some unspecified time later he returned to Capernaum but this time he arrived with a crowd pushing around him, all wanting to be healed and instructed, so to gain a little space he climbed into Simon’s boat and they pulled a short distance offshore, where Jesus could speak and everyone could hear.
All that now is history and setting for the main part of this reading, which happened after he finished teaching and sent the people on their way again. Here he instructed Simon to set out into deeper waters and throw out his nets. Simon protests that they’ve already done that all night with no results – but if that’s what Jesus wants, he’ll do it.
Have you ever wondered just how big these boats were? How many fish they could actually hold? Kathryn Matthews who curates and often writes for the UCC Sermon Seeds lectionary guide, included the following notes about the size of a Galilean fishing boat: measured by an archaeological find, a first-century boat from the Sea of Galilee, would have been 26.5 feet long, 7.5 feet wide, and 4.5 feet high.
Measure it out on the floor - that's what we did in church Sunday. It really helps to visualize it. What we found was that it would have held a lot of fish.
The story tells us they netted so many fish they had to call for help from their partner boat and even working together they could barely land all the fish and almost swamped both boats.
It was something very big. Big enough that this is one of the few stories that is told in every one of the four gospels.
Lake Gennesaret or the Sea of Galilee, whatever you prefer to call it, is roughly 2/3 the size of Lake Tahoe. We’re not talking an ocean here, but it is still plenty large enough that men died out there on those waters. Recall the story of Jesus commanding the waves to be still when an unexpected storm came up another time they were all out on the boat and how terrified the fisherfolk were in that story.
What happened out there on that lake with all the fish on this particular day was a miracle and Simon and the others were right in the middle of it. We should not walk away from a miracle unchanged.
These were brave men who made their living out in those boats every day, and yet in today’s story, Simon – who at this point in Luke’s telling of the story suddenly receives a name change and becomes Simon Peter – this new Simon Peter ended up on his knees begging Jesus to go away from him because he, a sinner, was overawed and afraid to be in the presence of such holiness.
Simon was already following Jesus around, listening to his teaching. He knew he was someone very special but I doubt he had figured yet just how special. This moment today is Luke’s equivalent to the moment in Mark’s gospel when Jesus asks Peter, “who do you say I am?” and Peter replies, “You are the messiah.” This is Simon Peter’s moment of total commitment – and therefore worthy of a new name.
When they finally beached their catch-of-the-century, Jesus told them not to be afraid [that phrase we hear so often throughout scripture] – don’t be afraid, I’m going to make you a different kind of fisher – and they dropped what they were doing and walked away from their boats and followed him.
Did you notice that this last bit says “they walked away”? We already know that Simon Peter’s brother, Andrew, was the first to follow Jesus and brought Simon Peter with him, but here we learn that James and John, the sons of Zebedee, were among the fisherfolk that day, possibly on the second boat, and they too left everything, walked away, and followed after Jesus.
They didn’t stop to clean the astronomical catch of fish, or mend their nets, or tend their beached boats – they just walked away – leaving their fathers, John and Zebedee, presumably, to deal with it all. Jesus came to heal bodies, yes, but also to heal broken spirits, broken hopes, broken trust. So touched were these men by the power and spirit of Jesus that none of the things they were leaving behind mattered for them anymore. They left their fears behind and they followed.
Next week’s reading will be the Sermon on the Plain – Luke’s version of Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount. But between today’s story and that one there are healings galore – lepers, a paraplegic, and the man with a crippled right hand, among others. There is also the calling of another follower – Matthew Levi, the hatred tax collector.
Once Luke gets started with the stories they come fast and furious now. In just a few chapters we have already watched Jesus go from an unknown 30 year old from a tiny out-of-the-way village to someone who is known and admired and actually followed around – just so people could see and hear him.
Maybe it isn’t Luke’s storytelling that moves that fast -- perhaps it is just that Jesus moved that fast. Healing is what he was sent to do. That is what he had learned in the moment of rising from the waters of his baptism. That is why he could so easily withstand Satan’s temptations – they couldn’t be allowed to get in the way of doing what he was sent to do.
He knows now what he is supposed to do - and he's doing it.
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