Earlier this week, I found myself in the Family Room alone with Hannah. I was flipping channels and came across a great 1980’s action flick called Delta Force. I see some nods. Yes, this is a Chuck Norris flick. Of course, I had not seen a good roundhouse kick in some time, so I stopped on the movie to instruct Hannah on the virtues of Chuck Norris. Hannah, for her part, has heard all the jokes. She just does not have all the background of his movies or television show.
Now,
based on the age of many present today and some of the confused look on your
faces, I am going to assume you do not know much about the cult of Chuck Norris
jokes out there on the interwebs. I was
introduced to them more than a decade ago playing World of Warcraft. Sometimes, a good Chuck Norris joke was
required to join a raid. Sometimes,
people just told jokes in the cities and pubs.
It was a thing. My personal
favorite was: The last thing the boogeyman does before going to sleep is to
check under his bed for Chuck Norris.
Ah, I see that’s a new one for some of you. There were other good ones: Chuck Norris makes onions cry. Chuck Norris does not read books; he stares at
them until they give him the information he needs.
One of
the more popular ones, though, was Chuck Norris only goes killing. Hunting allows for the possibility of
failure, and Chuck Norris never fails. Good,
everyone is mostly laughing but with a confused look on your face. In the background, everyone is wondering what
in the heck this has to do with spiritual gifts and our readings today. Bear with me.
It might make sense later.
Our
story from Luke is fairly famous. If you
have ever travelled to the Holy Land, it is even more famous than we
think. I think folks from St. B’s told
me after their last trip to the Holy Land that there were maybe 6 sites that
claim to be the place where this event took place. It sounds like anywhere along the coast there
was a natural amphitheater, people decided to try and make some bucks off Christian
tourists.
Jesus is
preaching and teaching, as He often is doing.
His preaching and teaching, we were reminded last week, were full of
grace. His hometown friends and
neighbors were shocked by His eloquence and wisdom, even as strangers were
drawn to Him. Unsurprisingly, as he
teaches and preaches, the crowd grows.
If you
have ever been in a crowd and tried to hear someone talking, you know the
difficulty. Add a kid or three, someone
reaching into their pockets to unwrap candies, sneezes and coughs, and, well, y’all
get the idea. The more people present,
the greater the distractions. Naturally,
everyone keeps pressing in on Jesus to hear Him better.
Jesus
spies the two boats and asks one of the fisherman, whom we learn is Simon
Peter, to put out into the lake with Him in it.
Simon does as he is asked. This
gives Jesus a boundary from the crowd and allows them to hear Him better.
Jesus
preaches and teaches for some time. When
finished, He commands Simon to toss his net out in the deep water. Simon, for his part, knows fishing. Luke shares that the fishermen were out the
night before and caught nothing. Simon
is humoring the Master, at this point.
He has zero expectation of catching anything, based on his lifelong
experience fishing this lake and the recent experience of the prior night.
Imagine
his surprise, though, when his net is filled to near breaking! Simon has so many fish, he calls to his
partners to come and help get the fish out of the net and into the boat. Peter has caught so many fish, Luke shares,
that both boats nearly sink!
Simon
Peter recognizes that what has happened is miraculous. He begs Jesus to go away, because he, Simon, is
a sinful man. Jesus, as we all just
read, tells Simon not to be afraid and further instructs him that from now on
He will be catching people. For their
part, Simon, James, and John all lay down their equipment, abandon their boats,
and follow Jesus. What has all this to
do with gifts?
One
teaching I want us to notice is really counter-cultural to us living in a
post-Christendom Protestant United States.
What do I mean by that? We are
too individualized for our own good, even those of us who claim to be active
Christians. Christians are called to
live in community. We gather as a group
of people to encourage one another and be encouraged, to pray for one another
and be prayed for, to instruct one another and be instructed, and to faithful
obey God His effort to draw the world to Himself through us. Think of our vows at Baptisms. Our first vow, after the Creed, is the
promise to continue in the fellowship of Christians. Yet how often, how easily, do we fail to keep
that vow? I mean, in the grand scheme,
it’s a pretty easy vow, right? But
sometimes it seems so hard to drag ourselves to church. Ugh, I am tired. Man, Brian is going to put me to sleep anyway,
why not just stay in bed? I can get
through this on my own; I don’t need help.
Things are great; I don’t need God right now.
For my
part, and I get I am the “professional” Christian here, I have that
conversation over and over and over with people in our community. As long as I have the Bible, I have
God. I don’t need to go to church. I don’t need to write checks to church or take
Communion or pray with others to be a real Christian. We get so myopic that we miss the point that
God calls us into community. We have
talked more about that on Trinity Sunday, but you and I are called into right
relationship with the Trinity through the work and person of the Son. The Son restores us through His death, Resurrection,
and Ascension; and the Holy Spirit empowers us to accomplish God’s will in our
midst. Even when people are called to a
life of a prayerful hermit or hermitess, that vocation is acknowledged in
community. The Body affirms and commissions
the called.
This
focus on individualism, though, affects every effort to evangelize. How many of you, before this question, knew
Jesus was telling Simon that Simon would be fishing for people? It is not a statement found in Luke. But what happens? We hear that we will fish for people and we
become like the great fishermen that we know in our lives. We look to the weather, we look to the sky,
we consider the fish we are trying to catch, and we consider the water in which
we will fish. Then we place a reflective
lure in sunny weather or a red lure in murky waters or the tried and true worm
and bobber and cast our rod. Then we
hope to catch a fish. Most of us do it
singly, hoping to catch fish one at a time.
We think
evangelism must work the same way, right?
If I have the winsome words; if I do the right service; if I have the
answer to their questions; they will choose God. Hopefully, many of us are vaccinated against
that attitude thanks to last week’s reminder that Jesus was rejected by people,
and He had all the knowledge and answers and the power to miraculously cure or
provide or cast out. If He can fail,
what are our chances of guaranteed success?
Notice,
though, the two communities present in this story. On the one hand, there is the crowd. Jesus is teaching and preaching to a crowd of
people who want to hear what He has to say.
He is not standing on a street corner condemning passerby’s. Jesus is teaching about God and God’s love
for all humanity. It is almost like He
is casting a net . . .
The
other group, of course, are the fishermen.
We know fishermen, so these men seem relatable to us. They probably knew every inch of that
lake. They probably told tales about the
big ones that got away. We assume they
drank some; they likely cussed. You are
laughing, but understand that when I talk about fishermen, you already have an
image in your mind. You know men and
women like Simon and James and John, or you have seen them on Deadliest Catch,
right? And, yes, Jesus switches the
bait, so to speak, but it is clear He is fishing among two distinct groups in
this pericope, tossing a net to catch as many as possible for God.
Think of
our ministries around here, and the communities in which we fish for the glory
of God. We just served the homeless in
our community last night. Our community
came together to fish in another community.
Sitting there you might say, well, I’m not like Dale or Larry or Betty
or Anoosh or Gregg or Lynn or whoever. You
are correct. Betty herds the cats. Anoosh washes and prepares the bedding. Gregg & Lynn cooked the pork butts. But, do you contribute faithful to the parish
and the work that God has given us to do?
Do you pledge or offer financial gifts?
Do you pray that the ministry will glorify God? Do you tell your friends about it? Then you are a part of that work. You are part of the Body that we call Advent
that is seeking to serve those without a roof over their heads and to remind
them that God loves them dearly, even if the world seems to have forgotten them. What about those who are food insecure in our
midst? It’s the same thing, but we add
some strong backs for unloading on the third Thursday each month. What about those in need of counseling for
mental health but who lack the resources necessary to pay for what it is
worth? Again, through our support of
Insight, which we all make possible, we are reaching into another community to
honor God, to remind them we think mental health is as important to God as
physical health.
I see some looks of understanding now. That’s right.
We are intentionally casting nets into communities we believe God is
calling us to fish. We are not in search
of a single fish. We are not looking for
a lost lamb, those God goes after them to.
We are a community ministering to several communities in our midst. And what does Jesus have to say about our
faithful obedience to His calling on our community? Do not be afraid; from now on you will be
catching people. Like the Chuck Norris
joke about killing, we have no chance at failure if we are obeying God. Now, success from God’s perspective may not
align with our own or that of the world, but that’s our problem. We know that when we obey God faithfully, He
accomplishes His purposes. Heck, we know
that when we disobey Him, He is going to accomplish His purposes without us;
but He desires that we all choose obedience and remember repentance when we
disobey. But the glorious news is that
we cannot fail. He has called us to
catch!
One last
lesson I want us to notice here in Luke’s lesson. We are in the season of Epiphany, the
manifestation of God in the work and person of Jesus Christ. What is the sign that manifests to the fishermen
that Jesus is of God? Right, the full
nets. Place yourself in the crowd on the
shore as you see this unfold. Would you
recognize the catch for what it is? Or
would you assume Simon saw a school and cast his net over it?
Jesus
gives the community of fishermen the very sign they need to identify Him. It is incredibly specific. They failed to catch anything the night before. Now they have so many fish that their boats
are sinking! Against all their wisdom
and experience, that cast of Simon should have been as worthless as all their
casts throughout the night. And yet . . . Simon immediately recognizes he is in
the presence of someone from God. Simon
has zero idea at this point that Jesus is the Anointed One of God, be he knows
without a doubt Jesus is from God. His
address of Jesus changes from one of Master to Lord. He bows at Jesus’ feet and begs Jesus to go
away because he is a sinful man. What
does Jesus do? He tells Simon not to
fear and invites him to follow Him. Such
is the confirming sign, that the fishermen leave everything behind to follow
Jesus.
Adventers
talk a good deal about our desire to see great miracles in our midst. Some go so far as to tell me that the lack of
big miracles hinders their ability to do God’s work in their lives. The problem with “grand” miracles is that
they are almost too big. Certainly, they
did not cause everyone to follow Jesus, as did the three fishermen in this
story. How many in the crowd turned to
God when Jesus fed the 5000 men plus women and children? How many in the crowds turned to God when Jesus
called Lazarus out of the tomb? Over and
over the so-called big miracles do not seem to cause mass repentance and more
determined faithfulness.
Notice,
though, the responses of those who benefit from the healing, the casting our,
the unplugging of ears, or the cure in a synagogue. How do the recipients often respond? They often, not always, but often recognize
the healings, the provisions, the miracles for what they are. And they become those who catch the people in
their respective communities.
Brothers
and sisters, each of us have particular stories, particular experiences with
God in our lives. We are called into a community
we call Advent to share those experiences, to test those experiences, to exhort
and encourage others in the same situation to trust God, who is incredibly
faithful to each and every one of us, and to take what we have heard, what we
have learned, what we know of Him into the communities in which we work and
play.
So
often, we think this process we call evangelizing is complex, that it requires
a specific set of words or actions or who-knows-what to be successful. Yet all it requires is faithful obedience on
our part. All we have to do is to listen
to God, to attune ourselves to His nudges or guides or whispers, and then to
act accordingly. We are each involved in
who knows how many communities out there, beyond these walls. And it is our involvement in those
communities that makes us fit ambassadors for His efforts to redeem them. Yes, we might risk our reputations? Yes, we might be perceived as not entirely
fitting in. But our job, as His sons and
His daughters, is to draw others into the only Community that truly matters,
the only Community that will exist long beyond our time in Nashville or even
this world. All He asks is that we cast
the nets which He has provided each of us, into the communities in which He has
placed us, and to fear not! He is in the
business of catching people into His saving embrace, and we know, thanks to how
He caught each one of us, what a great catcher He is, and the amazing love we
feel in that embrace!
In Christ’s Peace,
Brian†
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