Let Down the Nets

Luke 5: 1-11, page 728
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 deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”
Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked 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 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 of fish 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 people.” So they pulled their boats up on the shore, left everything and followed him.
Sermon
Telling a grandmother you’re not hungry when she thinks you need to eat is the definition of a pointless exercise. Any protest, “I don’t have time, I’ve already eaten, I’m a vegetarian,” can’t stop her once she’s made up her mind that you are too skinny, and it is better just to sit down for a while and start eating.
My own grandmother has been buying my sister Elizabeth poppy seed muffins from Sam’s for years. Every time my sister goes for a visit she eats these muffins bought especially for her, even though she hate’s them.
Neither of us can figure out how my grandmother got the idea that my sister loves poppy seed muffins, but when it comes to grandmothers or really anyone we love, we’ll all sometimes do things that we wouldn’t normally do, go along for the ride against our better judgment, eat muffins whether we like them or not.
So Simon, soon to be renamed Peter, goes along with Jesus even though he knows no fish will be caught. Like a grandmother who wants to feed you, sometimes it’s better to sit down and eat than try to explain the intricacies of fishing to someone who doesn’t want to hear your excuses. Simon just swallows down his grumblings, what comes out is polite, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything,” and don’t you know that if he didn’t love Jesus already he could have said all kinds of things - that we’re tiered and ready to go home as we’ve already fished all night, that trying to catch anything now is pointless as fish don’t school at this time of day, or “why don’t you trust me Jesus, I’m a fisherman, what can the son of a carpenter possibly know about fishing?”
We’ll always give it one more shot, even against our better judgment for the ones we love, so Simon Peter, though he already knew what would happen, says to Jesus, this man who had just raised his mother-in-law from the dead, “But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”
It may be easy enough for you to relate and find where you stand in this passage of scripture already. In one sense it isn’t profoundly faithful to go along reluctantly, but sometimes faith is just that – common sense tells you nothing’s going to happen, “But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”
Maybe you’ve sent out a million resumes already, and common sense has convinced you that it’s not worth it to face rejection on more time. The ones who love you can’t understand why you won’t but to you, one more letter of “we have received countless impressive résumés, but at this time we have decided to go with someone else” could break something that has been broken too many times already. In times like these faith can be as simple as, “I already know the answer will be no, but because you say so, I will try again.”
When people let you down, break your heart more often than any heart should be broken, common sense might say it’s time to get used to being alone – it hurts less than rejection after all – but when a dinner invitation comes, even though experience tells you how it’s going to end even before it begins, faith can be as simple as willingness to go anyway.
Simon, despite his better judgment goes along with Jesus – out to the deep water – prepared for nothing to happen, but just to be polite pretends not to already be disappointed, and lets down the nets.
The result of his mustard seed size faith is a mountain of fish, so many fish that the boat starts to sink.
And all at once Simon realizes what is going on here, who this Jesus is, and he is met face to face with the cruel realization of who he is. “Go away from me Lord; I am a sinful man!”
In some ways his reaction is surprising, you would think he would be happy, but like the prophet Isaiah, holiness so close shines like a bright light in a room built for interrogation. There’s nowhere to hide, there’s no secret you’ll be able to keep, and only condemnation can result if you believe yourself to be deserving of condemnation.
I think it’s a sad coincidence that the only two places left that still use pews are churches and courtrooms, making judgment maybe a subconscious theme of religious intuitions.
I know no one did it intentionally, but religious bodies often tend towards a self-righteousness that makes those outside their doors seem a little reluctant about how they might be received if they go in.
There’s a reason Jesus goes out to the seashore then. He had a message to bring, and it wasn’t just for the folks in the synagogue, it was for the folks who felt like they were too poor, too unclean, and too sinful to go where all the holy people go.
What developed in ancient Israel were an inside and an outside, a dichotomy of holy and sinful, a problem that came to the forefront in this country on buses where there was a front and a back.
Tiered of this kind of segregated society, African Americans organized a strike.
What we know is that throughout history societies have made it convenient for some to see themselves as better than others. Out of a desire for cleanliness, to preserve their lives, the religious in ancient Israel called crustaceans impure. Not meaning to, I assume, the bad thing is that the folks who handled those crustaceans on a daily basis sitting out on the shore cleaning their nets started to think of themselves as impure too.
It should be no surprise then Simon’s reaction to Jesus – what would a holy man be doing with a man who handled impure things, who had begun thinking that he himself were impure as well.
“Go away from me Lord; I am a sinful man!”
But again, Jesus, like a grandmother dead set on filling up an empty stomach, refuses to give up on a fisherman, refuses to see what society, what the synagogue, called unclean given his proximity to shellfish, refuses to relent his pride in this man un-successful in the eyes of the crowd given his lack of fish, refuses to give up believing in the value of this son un-worthy in the eyes of himself.
Where Simon had virtually given up, was washing his nets, ready to pack them up for the day, all that was left, a willingness to give it one more try, not because he thought it would work, but because Jesus who he loved asked him to; where Simon had given up not only on his catch of fish, but his worth in the eyes of God, having been beyond the teachers realm of influence, this teacher, this healer, this Jesus goes out to find him, not only to help him fish, but to help him see himself again.
So here we are.
Our failures have convinced us that it’s not worth trying again.
And we, ourselves, must be convinced that we are not the cast away-es of society, but are worthy of our value in the eyes of God.
So you must let down your nets if you don’t believe it, and see what God has in store.
Let down your nets and see that the God of all grace is not a cruel judge, but a grandmother who wants to fill you up, wants you to believe in yourself again.
Let down your nets in a world so secularized, so convinced that the only things of value are wealth, youth and beauty. Let down your nets in a world filled with men and women who are convinced that some are more important that others and that God would rather not have anything to do with them.
Let down your nets, if for no other reason than to prove wrong everyone who has ever doubted your worth. Because let me tell you something. No matter what anyone says, God wants to have something to do with you. Let down your nets and see.
-Amen.