1 Launch Into the Deep (Luke 5:1-11) Last week Pastor Russell Lee brought us a refreshing and inspiring message for Reformation Day, didn t he? But one point of inspiration he may not have intended is that, in the fine tradition of C. S. Lewis, he set a precedent for stories with talking animals. I have another one for you this morning: A guy was driving around the plains of eastern New Mexico, and he saw a sign in front of a weather-worn house that said: "Talking Dog for Sale." He rang the doorbell and the owner appeared and told him the dog was around back. So the guy went around and saw this friendly black lab sitting there. Looking around furtively he asked, "You talk?" "Yep," the dog quickly replied. So after the guy recovered from the shock of hearing a dog talk, he said "Well, OK, what's your story?" The lab looked up and said, "Well, I discovered that I could talk when I was pretty young. I wanted to help out Uncle Sam, so I told the CIA. And in no time at all they had me jetting from country to country, sitting in rooms with spies and world leaders, because no one figured a dog would be eavesdropping. I was one of their most valuable assets for eight years running. But the travel really tired me out, and I knew I wasn't getting any younger so I decided to settle down. I signed up for a job at the airport to do some undercover security, wandering near suspicious characters, listening in, and so forth. And I tell you, I uncovered some incredible dealings and they awarded me with a batch of medals. I got married, had a bunch of puppies, and now, I'm just retired." The guy was amazed. He went back in and asked the owner how much he wanted for the dog. The owner said, "Ten bucks." Ten bucks? This dog is incredible! Why on earth are you selling him so cheap??" Because the dog's a liar. He never did any of that stuff." Sometimes we get so familiar with amazing things that we take them for granted. Some of the Gospel stories are that way, and the reading I chose today for All Saints Sunday is a special case in point. Because here Jesus performs a nature miracle in which it s all too easy to miss some profound layers of meaning that flow down the ages to us with as much relevance now as they had when the story was first reported. (Speaking of which, some of the explanatory notes within these verses have led Bible scholars to speculate that this piece of Luke s Gospel may have been written down as early as the 40 s A.D., or maybe even earlier. So it s very close to the source. The thing is: This story tells us a lot about how we become saints. We ll see that we become saints by allowing ourselves to be captured in Jesus dragnet of salvation, if you will, and then becoming fisher folk ourselves. We become saints by launching into the deep.
2 I m indebted to Dr. Megan McKenna, whose talk on this story at Diocesan Convention really fired my imagination, and convinced me that now is a good time to preach on it; and, to the late Dr. Ken Bailey, whose commentary is among the very most enlightening of anyone s in the world, in my view. The passage is Luke 5:1-11. The first thing I want to remind us of, is that big water, and especially deep water, was a very scary thing to the Hebrew people. Most Jews in Palestine, including fishermen, didn t know how to swim, for starters. In the Creation Story, the waters symbolize the chaos before God s hand gave shape to the land. To bring this home, if you can remember being a young child out on a boat, perhaps before you learned to swim, do you recall what it felt like to look down into deep, wild water? I could imagine all kinds of fearful things lurking down there, and I stood well back from the rail. For the first century Jews, deep water symbolized all that was fearful and untamed. So please keep that in the back of your mind as we go through the passage. So here s the scene: It s morning on the northwest shore of the Sea of Galilee, or the Lake of Gennesaret, as it s called in this passage. The sun s climbing in the eastern skies above the Golan Heights through streaks of high clouds, and rays are sparkling off the surface of the lake. Jesus is at the landing used by Peter and the other fishermen. That familiar and pungent smell of a freshwater lake fills the air. Morning breezes are gently stirring the surface of the waters, and a crowd is gathering around Jesus. Two boats are moored at the landing, and Simon Peter and the other fishermen are busily (and dejectedly) washing their nets after a fruitless night out on the water. Luke says in verse1 that the crowd s gathering to hear the Word of God. The spoken word from the lips of the Incarnate Word. This is a clear sign that those assembled regard Jesus, at the very least, as a prophet. And as we ll see, Jesus uses this opportunity to show Peter and all those gathered what happens when the Word of God is not only heard, but heeded. So, as the crowd presses in, Jesus climbs into Peter s fishing boat, calls him over, and asks him to put out into the water near the shore. Now, I need to point out here that this isn t as easy as it sounds. Jesus intends to preach to the crowd, and Peter s job will be to keep the boat steady and relatively motionless in the water. It will require pretty constant work on his part. And you know Peter My guess is that at least his inner self-talk is something like: Oh Jesus, now what? I m tired. But in the previous chapter, Jesus had just healed Peter s mother-in-law, so he kind of owes him one. Now, there are two more things that are both intentional and significant. First, Jesus is asking for Peter s help. No accident. In order to spread the good news of the kingdom of God, Jesus wants Peter s help, however mundane and practical, just like us. He wants our help, too. So, reluctantly, Peter hops in and controls the boat for Jesus.
3 And second, in deeply calculated symbolism, Jesus begins fishing from Peter s boat. Not for fish, but for people. For his listeners. He s using a wooden, fishy-smelling platform that s normally used for catching and ultimately killing fish, instead to catch and give life to people. It s sometimes surprising the people, places and things that end up being used as vehicles for salvation and life. Then, Jesus sits down (the position of authority remember he also sat down and identified himself as the fulfillment of Isaiah s prophecy of the coming Messiah by saying, Today these things are fulfilled in your hearing, and that was in the chapter of Luke immediately preceding this one); Jesus sits down in the boat and teaches the crowds. And at the end of his teaching, he ups the ante with Simon Peter. He looks at him and says, Now put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch. Peter feels the heat rising to his face, and thinks to himself, Oh, Jesus, just don t. Okay? I ve been doing this all my life; I know where the fish are. We ve been fishing all night, and nothing. Zip, zero, nada. And now a landlubber from the highlands of Galilee Peter is exhausted. But to Jesus he says, Master, we ve worked all night long, but have caught nothing. But if you say so, I ll let down the nets. And lest we think here that Peter is humbly and respectfully acquiescing, the Greek word translated as master here does not mean Lord, or even rabbi, but something that might be rendered in our own vernacular as Mr. Teacher Man or the like. It was a term not so much of endearment, as sarcasm. Peter s like, What is Jesus thinking? Not only is it deep and dangerous out there, but there are no fish! During the night the fish hang out along the benches near the shore, fed by the streams that come out of the hills. And in the daytime they simply hide under the rocks in the shallows. Everyone knows that. There are no fish out there in the middle of the lake! But, hey, if you say so. So off they go, both boats. And guess what happens. They let down the nets as prescribed, and the fish act like it s party time. They can t wait to climb in. They do a conga line right into the nets, which become so full that they re in danger of breaking. What happens here is that, despite his misgivings and his sarcasm, when Peter obeys the Word the Word made flesh lavish abundance is the result. In God s economy: Obedience yields abundance. And make no mistake, this is Jesus doing. It s a nature miracle of the most unmistakable and stunning kind. Yet even now, Peter is of two minds. You ll notice that the text says not that Peter calls out to the other fishermen for help, but that he signals them. He beckons them over with his hand. Why? Ken Bailey thinks it s because sound carries on the water, and Peter doesn t want folks on the shore to know where the good fishing is. He s still reflexively thinking in material terms, and of competition, and income and wealth. Hey, we hit a gold mine!
4 But when they finally stabilize everything, and the boats are drafting low in the water for the sheer weight of the fish, the penny drops. Peter suddenly realizes in his heart what Jesus has done, and, at least for the moment, he has some inkling of who he is. He realizes that his own heart needs cleansing. And, he realizes that there s something much greater afoot here than the size of his catch, and the money it will produce. So he drops to his knees before Jesus. And this time he doesn t call Jesus teacher man, but Kyrie, Lord. Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man! he cries. Because in those times, it was thought that the sinfulness of a person could somehow pollute a holy man. So Peter doesn t realize that, instead of telling Jesus to go away, he should be asking him to come near, and to touch him and to heal him. Because that s what Jesus came to do. That is the good news. And indeed, once all this soaks in to Peter and his cohorts, Jesus doesn t reject them. No, he invites them to a higher calling. He says, Don t be afraid; from now on you ll be catching people. Or, in the literal Greek, You will be live-catching humans! Let s look at both parts of this. First, Don t be afraid. Are you kidding me?? Don t be afraid? You want me to go out there into the deep, way over my head, where there s hopelessness and danger and chaos, and let my nets down?? In my life, it was You want me to go off to seminary, with a family of five, no savings, at mid-career and just trust you? In Hope s life it was You give someone a vision of a house of worship with a view of the mountains, sixty or so members, and you want us just to trust you and go build it? And I m guessing you know the answer. Yes. Jesus says Yes. And in this amazing vignette from Luke s Gospel, he shows us the sequence of obedience. First, he himself models the reality that our highest calling in life is to place God over mammon, and to place heavenly priorities above earthly priorities. Ken Bailey thinks this is an absolutely central intention in this story of the calling of the disciples, along with the nature miracle that captured their hearts and shifted their whole worldview. Jesus is calling them to follow him, and to obey the Word of God. And this obedience entails risk. Real, sacrificial risk. Risk of discomfort, and in the case of many of the saints whose lives we celebrate today, risk even of martyrdom. The waters out there are deep and dark. The dangers are real. But here s the clincher: the One who has displayed his authority by mastering the beautiful and good elements of creation to produce fish where there should be none, is the same One who says that neither death, nor life, nor anything else in all of creation can separate us from his love. And this sign by Jesus so convinces the disciples that Luke says, When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him. They became fisher folk, fishing for people. Some today might call them fanatics, but Jesus calls them disciples. And we call them saints.
5 And the faces I see in this room this morning, the faces looking on from the back altar behind me, and the faces of every color and shape of every saint through the ages, capital S or small s, whose life we celebrate today, attests to the truth that obedience to God s word produces abundance. Heavenly abundance. Abundance where it truly counts. And the richest, heavenliest abundance for which we can ever hope is that of souls healed and transformed by the Author of Life, Jesus Christ, who walks with us every step of the way, here, now, and to the very end of the age. That s why we can trust him when he says, Don t be afraid. So the question is: Is Jesus asking you to help him fish for people? Is he directing you to launch out into the deep? And if he is, what s your answer? Amen.