Two Sinking Ships of Hope

A Sermon by Andrew Colman based on Luke 5:1-11

It would probably not have been unusual for the disciples to spend an evening fishing and not catch anything. 

If any of us have ever been fishing more than a few times, we know that sometimes it can feel like it is just up to the gods whether we are going to catch something or not. A good friend of mine was an avid and fairly skilled fisherman; all the fish-finding gear you can imagine, he'd done all the research about where there are deeper parts of this river and that lake, knew when the fish are active and eating and when they are taking their afternoon nap. And it showed he did catch a lot of fish. One weekend, he went out to Caddy Lake and just pulled in a fish every other cast… and he had the photos to prove it.

He came back, and we decided that the two of us should return the following weekend if conditions were about the same and catch a lot of fish… Well, I wonder if you can guess where this is going; if you've ever been fishing with me, you'll know it's basically a guarantee that I'll ruin any kind of good luck whatsoever. 

We tried every corner of the lake, deep, shallow, under trees beside bushes… nothing. We toiled and toiled, and nothing. Were other people catching things? Of course, they were. But that's just how fishing goes.

That said, it probably wouldn't have been unusual for the disciples to spend an evening fishing and not catch anything. 

They toiled all night; they had seen this before, so out they would go the next night full of expectation and hope for a decent catch. They would go back and follow the pattern of what they normally did, and that would sustain them. They were fishermen. After all, it's just what they did.

And then came along this travelling rabbi… he had probably watched them as they came in, baskets empty, tired and a little defeated… thought it himself in prayer… ok, Father, here is the moment I'm going go down and remind them about you sending their ancestors' Mana in the Wilderness after freeing them from the land of Egypt and then I'll send them out and make those baskets explode with fish… Not big enough, you say? How about making their boat sink with so many fish? Bigger? Ok, I'm going to make both of those boats sink. They are so full of fish! One for the Jews and one for the Gentiles! Perfect. I mean, really, If you take a moment to think about it, it's actually a pretty funny story. Two sinking boats full of fish…

They could have never seen anything like this before. It was a completely different kind of catch. Even on their very best nights—the kind that would have earned them enough money to maybe take a few days off—it still would not have come close to what they pulled in from this one haul. They would have stopped long before their boat started to sink. Let alone two. A simple, intuitive cost-benefit analysis would have done this for them.

Imagine that very best night… heaps and heaps of fish. The boat is starting to feel a bit weighed down. It might take them a little extra effort to steer the boat because it was so loaded down. But no further than that. No, this was two sinking boats full of fish…

Anyways, But first, he waited. Waited until they were cleaning their nets. He waited until the thought of catching another fish that day was so far from reality that they might catch on to what he was up to. 

He didn't feel bad asking them to toss their nets in again, even though they were clean. They would have had to wash their nets again afterward, but in fact, it was important.

You see, had Jesus come at the beginning of the night, when they were just starting to put their nets in, it would have fit with their usual pattern. Even if he had given his lesson about Egypt and the Mana from God, that massive catch would have been them doing their thing with a little help from Jesus— got a little boost from God, well, a big boost, but just a boost nonetheless.

But this was not that. It was not just a boost. It was an entirely different thing. 

It was not business as usual. This was God entering into the business as usual and flipping it upside down. 

This was God, in Jesus, coming to us and telling us that there was a new way of doing things, and it is through him that that new way happens. And since they were fishers, it was through the work that they knew best that he showed them what this new way was going to be and how it could look. How overflowing with goodness it could be. We all have some idea of what that kind of catch would have meant. 

But to a group of fishers who knew those waters and that weather, the markets and profit margins, and that land, the impact of what that single haul meant would have been staggering. All of the implications would have been firing off all at once. 

And then, a thought, if this man Jesus can do this! What else can he do? It is with all of that that when he called them, they followed. Everything they thought they knew about fishing and creation… had been changed, but they were only just beginning to get the picture.

But again, Jesus had to wait until they were cleaning their nets. He had to wait until they thought they knew what was coming next, probably a bath, a meal, and some sleep.

So, as much as this story is an invitation to follow Jesus to become disciples, it is first a story about paying attention to what God is up to in the world despite the constant toil. Despite everything that is going wrong in the world, a lot is going wrong in the world. Where is God at work bringing life-filling people up? At the Bell Tower cafe at Westminster United, they provide a meal and community once a week; at St. Thomas's Anglican Church, a very small congregation that volunteers 300 people a week, churches raise millions of dollars around the world and sponsor thousands of refugees from war-torn places. 

Those are some of the bigger things, but they happen on an individual level all the time, too. People who make it their lives work to create safer spaces one person at a time, who write stories, songs, and poems to help others move through the hard times; this could be an endless list.

But when those things happen, and people are lifted up, encouraged, gladdened, healed, and comforted, it may not look like two sinking ships full of fish, but it very well may feel like it to the person who has experienced that healing.

This is a story about hope. Hope because the disciples had packed it in, given up, for the day. But that is just the place where God steps in to change everything. First, he created us, then loves us, then teaches, then shows us through all of the good, and there is, in fact, a lot of good that is done in his name that he can be trusted. And then, did he ask the disciples, does he ask us to follow and be part of the body that does that good.

That is a different pattern than this world would have us believe. The world would have it that it starts with us. It could be subtle, like hanging the promise of this text on Peter's words when he says, "But at your word /I will/ let down the nets." Like it was because /he/ let down the nets that he caught the fish; he'd been at that all night! The results of "our will" taking priority over God's, in the name of the church, have seen horrendous results.

No, it was because Jesus had directed the fish to them. Peter played his part, of course, but they would have come up empty again, or worse, had it not been for Jesus.

This story has a different pattern, starting with God's work and teaching, which is worked out in concert with his people and ends in God's Glory. Which, inevitably, starts the whole thing over again.

This is a story that reminds us that when our nets come up empty after a long time of toil, we need only look to the God who took God's people out of Egypt, fed them, Mana, in the Wilderness, and led them into a land flowing with milk and honey. And then eventually flooded them with more fish than they knew what to do with. 

That was the promise to the Israelites; it was the promise to the disciples that day, and it is the promise to us now. 

Empty nets are not the end of the story. A life that is filled in all of its unexpected ways with God's promise is its beginning, middle, and end.

Amen