Sermon 2022.02.06

Rev. Wesley Menke

5th Sun After Epiphany

Why do we work? Well, one reason is to make money to buy the things that are needed to live and survive. But that’s not the only reason. We also work because it can be therapeutic. Work can be a welcome distraction from the worries of life. When you work you can get into “the zone,” or feel a sense of flow where time slips by quickly, and there can be an immense sense of satisfaction having seen the results of your work. What if God’s intention for work in your life is not to burden you, but to give you something to do that engages your interest and passion? What if work isn’t something you have to do, but something you get to do? As Lutheran Christians you believe that you are saved by Grace through Faith, and not by Works. Your eternal life, salvation, and forgiveness are all gifts from God that you have not and cannot earn. If you believe this, that you are saved by Grace, then you know that you don’t have to work for your salvation. Your salvation doesn’t depend on you, it depends on God. 

Consider Simon. Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, also known as the Sea of Galilee, teaching the people. The crowd was eager to learn and be close to Jesus, and unfortunately as they crowded close to Jesus he was getting pushed into the water. So he asked Peter to take him in his boat a little ways into the water. This made a buffer zone. Jesus sat down in the boat and taught the people. When Jesus was done speaking, but he wasn’t done teaching, he asked Simon to take him out to the deep water. Simon questions this a little bit. He tells Jesus that they have already been working all night, and have caught no fish. Yet Peter obeys Jesus, and goes out. Why? Well this is not the first time that they have met. Recently Jesus had healed Simon’s mother in law. So what Jesus lacked in fishing credibility, he made up for in some kind of miraculous power and teaching authority. Do you know what happens next? Simon’s nets catch so many fish that the nets would have broken, if James and John weren’t ready to help out. Evenso there were so many fish that two boats almost capsized due to the weight of the catch. 

What’s the point of the story? What is the lesson that Jesus was trying to get across to the crowds, to Simon, his colleagues, and to us? Well it is nothing less than the gospel itself. You are saved by grace through faith, and not by works. Simon had made the classic mortal mistake of putting faith in himself. He had already worked all night and caught no fish. He hesitated to fish anymore because he had already done so much work. In his mind he believed that if you work hard, and put your mind to it, you could be a successful fisherman. If you worked hard enough perhaps you could even lift yourself up by the bootstraps and get yourself and your family out of generations of grinding poverty and subsistence living. We know from history that the recent expansion of the Roman Empire opened up new avenues of trade for Galileeans so that an industrious fisherman could tap into the growing market of fish connoisseurs not just in Capernaum, but the whole Roman Empire. A new city was being built for this express purpose: Tiberius, named after Caesar, on the Lake of Gennesaret also known as the Sea of Galilee. The sea of Galilee wasn’t a sea at all. It was this same freshwater lake. It was an exciting and heady time for the old fishing families near the Sea of Galilee like Simon. This was their chance to be something bigger. And yet, like many ambitious dreams, things weren’t materializing like many people had hoped. There were scads of new fishing operations on the lake, and that meant more competition. The preponderance of fishers also meant the price of fish stayed low. You put all of this together and you can empathize with Peter for how discouraging and disheartening the whole situation was.&nbs