A Sermon for the Fourth Sunday before Lent, February 10, 2019
St. Dunstan’s Anglican Church, Largo, FL
The Very Rev. J. Michael Strachan
Without Jesus, we can do nothing.
With Jesus, we can do more than we ever dreamed. If I was to summarize this
morning’s Gospel reading into two sentences, that would be it: Without Jesus,
we can do nothing. With Jesus, we can do more than we ever dreamed. Whether we
apply this truth to the church or to ourselves or our family, the truth is the
You’re a professional fisherman. You’ve done everything right, especially
finishing at night. In the Lake of Gennesaret even to this day the fish mainly
come up at night, and for most of the day they stay far below the surface of
the water. You come in from a long night of fishing and there’s Jesus on the
shore, talking to the people, and he’s being crowded and almost pushed back
into he water. Interestingly, it doesn’t say Jesus asked if he could get into
the boat. The text simply says that he got into the boat.
So, you get into the boat with
Jesus and you push out into the water so he can talk to the people without
being crowded. This might seem a little strange to us, but the geography of the
place forms a small amphitheater, and some scholars say it’s easier even to
this day to talk to a large crowd from the water than it would be from the edge
of the lake. When Jesus finishes speaking, and remember that you’ve worked all
through the night, he says the strangest thing to you: “Put out into the deep
and let down your nets for a catch.”
professional fisherman. You know what you’re doing. You don’t fish during the
day, you fish at night when you have the best chance of catching fish, and you
fished all night and caught nothing. You just want to go home. You’re done.
You’re tired. And here’s Jesus telling you to go fishing again. Perhaps even
stranger than Jesus’ suggestion, or perhaps it’s a command, is that Simon Peter
says yes. This is a situation that isn’t foreign to any of us. We know the
thing Jesus says to do, but we also know, or we think we know, what’s the most
practical way to accomplish what it is we want to accomplish, maybe even in his
name. Or perhaps we’re just tired, and we know the thing we should do, and the
Spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. It’s been a long day, Jesus. I don’t
want to lower the nets again. I’ve been fishing all night, Jesus, and we didn’t
catch anything. Let’s come back and try again tomorrow.
yes, and of course, we know what happened. Peter and the other fisherman caught
so many fish that the nets starts breaking, and Peter had to call to the other
boat for help. Peter seems to suddenly stop being involved with bringing in the
fish, and instead he turns to Jesus, falls at his knees, and says, “Depart from
me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Peter recognizes that there is more to
Jesus than meets the eye. Peter recognizes that there is holiness to Jesus, and
power, and that Jesus was more than just a wise teacher. Peter seems to learn
the lesson quick. Without Jesus, he could do nothing. With Jesus, he could do
more than he ever dreamed. And in the light of this, he doesn’t celebrate as if
he had just a genie in a bottle buried in the sand around the lake. He doesn’t
shout about how he’s going to be the world’s most successful fisherman now that
he has Jesus. No, in light of this incredible success he experiences by
listening to Jesus, instead of celebrating, he recognizes his own sinfulness.
The allusion to Isaiah’s vision of
the heavenly throne room is obvious, and Luke wants his readers to thing
through these two texts together. In one Isaiah sees the Lord of Hosts upon his
throne, and he cries out, “Woe is me! For I am lost; for I am a man of unclean
lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean lips; for my eyes have
seen the King, the LORD of hosts!” (Isa 6:5). Likewise, Peter sees Jesus’
glory, not the radiating glory he will see one day during the transfiguration,
and not the hidden glory of the cross, but the glory of the God who controls
the wind and the waves and even the fish, and he, like Isaiah, sees his own
sinfulness in the light of that glory.
make of what Jesus says at the every end of this story? The point is made.
Jesus reveals his glory as he reveals to Peter what his life will be like with
him and without him. Everyone is astonished at the number of fish that were
caught that day, and then Jesus says to Simon Peter, seemingly avoiding the
punchline of the story, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching
people.” This is often thought to be a clever turn of phrase: you were catching
fish, and now you’re going to be catching people. Except, that’s not typically
how Jesus speaks. Most of what Jesus says isn’t an expression of his rhetorical
cleverness, bur rather, speech that is deeply rooted in the Old Testament.
remember from last week that we talked about the opening verses of Isaiah 40.
“Comfort, comfort my people, says your God. Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and
cry to her that her warfare is ended, that her iniquity is pardoned, that she
has received from the LORD’s hand double for all her sin.” These verses are
about the end of the exile, and I’ve said before that this is the dominant lens
through which we need to read the story of Jesus and attempt to understand who
he was and what he did. Keep this in mind as I read to you these verse from
Jeremiah 16. The beginning of the chapter is the announcement of God’s judgment
on the city and exile to come, but then the prophet says, “Therefore, behold,
the days are coming, declares the LORD, when it shall no longer be said, ‘As
the LORD lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the land of Egypt,’ but
‘As the LORD lives who brought up the people of Israel out of the north country
and out of all the countries where he had driven them.’ For I will bring them
back to their own land that I gave to their fathers. Behold, I am sending for
many fishers, declares the LORD, and they shall catch them” (Jer 16:14–16).
draws from the deep story of God’s coming redemption to explain to Peter was
has just happened. The time for fishing has come. Not the fishing you do off
boats but the fishing of God that will bring back the people to the land and
bring about the long awaited renewal and restoration of the people. And this
new vocation isn’t just for Peter. “They,” Peter, James, and John are mentioned
by name, they left everything, and followed him. God’s great plan for the
renewal and restoration of this world is what we call the coming of the kingdom
of God, and that plan is still unfolding before us today. We all have a part to
play. I’m not a fisherman. Some of you are. But we are all called to be fishers
of people, to leave behind all that we have and all that we’ve known and go out
to the places where God’s fish are, where those created in his image are, where
those in need of restoration and renewal are, and bring them back to the Lord.
This is our task as a church. To be fishers of people in the communities around
our church. And we can do this, and we should do this, with the best strategies
and resources and wisdom that we have. But ultimately, if we try to do this
without Jesus, without seeking him in word and prayer, we can do nothing. But
if we will listen to him, with him we will be able to do more for this
community than we ever dreamed.
Amen.
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