Prayer: Dear Lord, we confess you as the Only true fisher of men. Although You direct us to cast the Gospel net overboard so that others may believe in you and so be pulled into your boat, you are the One who fills the nets, not us. We pray that as the Gospel is preached here, you will save many, just as you saved us. Amen.
 

Text: One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the people crowding around him and listening to the word of God, he saw at the water's edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat.

When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.” Simon answered. “Master, we've been working hard all night and haven't caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.” When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.

When they Simon Peter saw this, he fell at Jesus' knees and said, “Go away from me Lord. I am a sinful man.” For he and all his companions were astonished at the catch offish they had taken, and so were James and john, the sons of Zebedee, Simon's partners. Then Jesus said to Simon. “Don't be afraid; from now on you will catch men.” So they pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed him.
 
 

As the Presidential Election Day nears, political “experts” are popping up all around US. These “experts” are quick to analyze, criticize and commend the proposals, speeches, and other political strategies of Governor Bush and Vice-President Gore. At best, they try to inform us what the candidates are saying. At worst, they try to steer public opinion towards the candidate they prefer. I don't know about you, but when I listen to most of these “experts” I wonder: Are they really experts at all? Most of them have never run for public office themselves, not to mention never actually getting elected to anything. Most of these “experts” simply don't know what it is like to live inside the glass house of presidential politics. Being expert in something takes more than imagining what it is like to live in the glass house. One must actually live in the house. It's all about experience--handling difficult problems, facing one's own fears and insecurities in the process, yet still getting the job done. If you haven't been there, you really cannot become an expert in anything.

When it comes to finding experts to spread the saving Gospel to others, the Gospel which says, “Christ came into the world to save sinners,” maybe it is not surprising that God chose us Christians to do this. If being an expert in something is all about experience, who is better qualified to tell others about Jesus than his believers. We know all about him from the Bible. And because the Bible gives us faith to believe in him, we also know Him by experience. We experience how God's forgiving love in Christ brings peace to our guilt-filled hearts, and carried us through to eternal life. We also treasure the comfort the Gospel brings us when we lose a loved one, deal with illness, are filled with heartache as a parent, struggle at school. We want others to know this too. Surely we can see ourselves as experts at spreading the Gospel, or as Jesus puts it, at “catching men!” ... Or can we?

Does our study of God's word and our experience of His forgiveness in our hearts make us experts at catching men? I think each of us can look at ourselves and say “hardly.” When we do have the chance to give the reason for the hope we have within us, we often walk away from those chances doubting: “Did I say the right thing?” “Did I say too much or not enough?” Maybe we kick ourselves: “What a big chicken! I didn't say anything at all.”

Since we hardly feel like experts in spreading the Gospel, maybe Jesus words to Peter, “Do not be afraid, from now on you will catch men,” makes no sense to us. “Do not be afraid, Lord? This responsibility of catching men is too much for me! It makes me nothing but afraid that I'm not going to do it right!”

But Jesus' lesson to us today really does give us reason not to fear the church's mission to catch men, or as Jesus states it more formally in the words of Matthew 28:19, “Go and make disciples of all nations by baptizing and teaching them all things.” Let's listen to what Jesus the ONE and ONLY Fisher of men has to say.

As Luke describes, we find Jesus today on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. But Jesus is not standing alone. He has no chance to enjoy the beach, to cool his toes in the water, or to watch the sea gulls float by. No, there are people there, lots of people. Their faces and voices crowd around Him as he is busy preaching the word of God to them.

As he is preaching, he notices two fishing boats pulled up on the water's edge.  The fishermen who own these boats are washing their nets nearby. One of them was Peter. So that He might find a better pulpit from which to preach God's word, Jesus asks Peter to put out a little way from shore.

Now the stage is set for the lesson which Jesus, the Fisher of Men, wants to teach. After preaching to the crowds for awhile longer, He now turns to Peter and says: “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets. for a catch.”

Since we have spoken today about what it takes to be a true expert in something, let us remember now that the disciple Peter was an expert in something. He was an expert fisherman. Fishing is how he made his living. What Jesus just told him to do must have seemed silly to the ears of an expert fisherman like Peter. Galilean fishermen didn't fish the deep water, they fished the shallows where the fish fed. Yet Jesus directs Peter to drop his nets down in the deep. These fishermen also knew that fish don't bite in the heat of the day. Yet under the hot sun Jesus asks: “Drop the nets down.” If Peter had routinely fished like this, in the middle of the day, in the deep water, what do you think his fellow fisherman would have said? Maybe this: “Hey Peter, didn't your Daddy teach you anything about the right way to snag a fish!?”

Despite this, Simon Peter respectfully does as he is requested anyway. “Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.” Yes, Peter obeys! But can't you just read his thoughts? He is probably saying to himself, “I just finished washing my nets, and he wants me to let them down again for this mid-day deep-water fishing experiment. I know these fish; soon Jesus will know them too. Daytime fishing in deep water is a waste of time.”

Of course, Peter forgot whom it was that told him to drop the nets down. It was his Lord, the One who has all things in his hands, including the things under the sea. Soon the nets were overflowing with fish. In fact there were so many fish, Peter had to call over his partner's boat over. The nets were breaking. The boats even began to sink! Quite a picture!
To Peter, however, it was more than “quite a picture.” Upon seeing the unexpected catch, Peter falls to Jesus' knees, crying out in fear and dismay, “Go away from me Lord, I am a sinful man!”

You might think that Peter would have been jumping up and down in the boat with little dollar signs dancing in his eyes. There were a lot of fish in his boat. On the market, these fish would have brought a lot of cash. Instead he says, “Go away from Lord, I am sinful man!”

What do you think made Peter say this? Because he felt sorry for doubting that Jesus knew a little about fishing after all? Of course not. He fell to Jesus' knees because he, a sinner, realized he was in the presence of holy God. Really, he reacted much like the prophet Isaiah did when the Lord came to him and called him to preach. “Woe to me!” Isaiah cried. “I am ruined! I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips and my eyes have seen the King, the LORD Almighty.”  Peter, like Isaiah, felt like he should die!

But Jesus' did not do this simply to overwhelm Peter like this. He was teaching him something very important about catching men, as he teaches us today! He was teaching that catching men doesn't depend on man's timing but on God's. We tell people about Jesus and why came to die for us, in our sometimes stumbling ways; but God is the one who provides the catch! Even in the deepest of water or hottest of days! Jesus, the Fisher of men is the one then who caught you and me in his good time, pulling us safely into his boat with the Gospel net.

If you doubt that your salvation was entirely God's doing according to His timing, remember--our natural response is to swim away from the God of Scripture, not toward him. For us no time would have been a good time to find God. This is because one side of God which Scripture presents to us is the God of judgment. The God who hates sin, even one, and promises punishment to all who sin by breaking his Ten Commandments. These commandments tell us to love God perfectly and love our neighbor perfectly in thought, word and deed. When see our failures to obey God and love neighbor- the fear or laziness which causes us not to spread his message of Jesus to our children and neighbor, we want to do nothing but swim away from God. We do not want to be confronted with our weakness and failure. And you think Peter was overreacting when he got down on his knees to plead with Jesus: “Away from me Lord, I am a sinful man.”

Yet, did you know that your heavenly Father did everything to rescue from our sea of sin and weakness? He loves you and sent Jesus, the Great Fisher of Men, to rescue us from our lack of focus on his mission, or our fearful hearts which cause our mouths stayed closed. He came to be your Savior who didn't merely suffer mere physical pain on the cross, as great as that was. He literally plunged into the depths of hell when he hung on the cross. The innocent One took on your sins, and suffered hell your place as a sinner. Because he went there for you, the Father does not need to send you there at all. Instead, as St. Peter proclaims, “Christ died for sins once for all, the righteous for the unrighteous, to bring you to God” (1 Pe 3:18).

This is the Gospel message! It proclaims to you what Jesus did to save you from God's wrath. This Gospel is what brings us faith to cling to the Savior who brings us eternal life. This Gospel is what indeed brings us to God. The fact that you can now say, “Jesus died to take away my sins,” does not mean that you went seeking for God. It means that Jesus graciously sought for you like a fisherman seeks fish. He dropped the gospel net over, scooped you up, pulling you to eternal safety.

Jesus goes on fishing still! Just as others brought you the Gospel, your parents for instance, or your spouse, you and I now bring this message to others as he gives us opportunity. He calls us to do this continually. Like he said to Peter, “Let down your nets for a catch.”

It is easy to think that this great responsibility to too much for us. But Jesus says, “Fear not! Filling the nets is not your job, its mine. And even as you let down this Gospel to save others, don 't forget the Gospel is always for you too. Through it, I will continue to bring you forgiveness so that your weaknesses do not drown you in unworthiness. I will always give you the joy and strength to let down the Gospel net just one more time. Even if I do not fill it like I filled Peter's net with fish, I will pull to safety one more soul, or two or five! That's O.K! Heaven rejoices over even one soul who repents. As far as I am concerned, the water is never too deep, or the day too hot, to save souls. I rescued you under just such conditions!”