He saw two boats there alongside the lake;
the fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets.
Getting into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon,
he asked him to put out a short distance from the shore.
We might ask ourselves, what of ours is there that Jesus desires to use for his purposes? We have our efforts and energies invested in using our boats to a certain purpose, and we naturally assume that this is all for which the boats are meant to be used. But Jesus may have other ideas. We may well have parts of our lives that he desires to use as a platform to make his compassion and message known. How can we identify these things, and how can we put them into his service? We must listen for his invitation since it may not be obvious to us otherwise that our boats have a part to play. Indeed on the surface they seem suited only to take Jesus away from the crowd, not to help him to engage them. But perhaps there is a message in that the way these boats have served us thus far has brought us disappointment and frustration. Maybe there is already a hint in that disappointment that they are awaiting a new and higher purpose.
"Master, we have worked hard all night and have caught nothing,
but at your command I will lower the nets."
Ah, but what we are asked is not simply to continue in a comfortable routine. The boats may be the same boats, but everything else is different. We are called "out into deep water", to the new, the unfamiliar, and yes, the potentially challenging and difficult. But if the old routine brought us disappointment this move to new territory under the direction of Jesus must be necessary. We were returning, as it were, to a shallow well that was mostly dry. It is time to go deeper.
When they had done this, they caught a great number of fish
and their nets were tearing.
When Peter allowed Jesus to use his boat as a platform to teach he did so most likely already have abandoned the idea of catching any fish that time. But to his surprise, he received much more than he had hoped. Even without doing so explicitly he had sought first the Kingdom and had received all else besides (see Matthew 6:33).
When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus and said,
"Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man."
Peter had received the fish, but they no longer seemed to matter so much compared to the abundance that followed in the steps of Jesus. Peter did not now insist on the literal fish, or imagine the great profit that might accrue, the way in which they might dominate the market. Rather, he fixed his gaze on the giver of the gift. He had yielded the control of his boat, perhaps still not entirely convinced. But now he called Jesus, "Lord". He had a holy fear much like Isaiah in the presence of God.
And I said: “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!” (see Isaiah 6:5).
When we seek first the Kingdom Jesus is able to give us all else besides precisely because it is then that such gifts do not obscure the giver but in fact only serve to accentuate his holiness and his glory. They do not create a risk that we turn back only to the gifts themselves, but rather create the conditions where we are free to follow Jesus himself.
Jesus said to Simon, "Do not be afraid;
from now on you will be catching men."
When they brought their boats to the shore,
they left everything and followed him.
Let us pray that we too may be "filled with the knowledge of God's will through all spiritual wisdom and understanding" so that we may discover the joy of the abundant catch toward witch he desires to guide us. And where is this? From darkness to light, shallow to deep, disappointment to joy.
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