©2002 Larry Huntsperger Peninsula Bible Fellowship

4/21/02

Peter And The Fish

4/21/02 Peter And The Fish

The Sundays we spend here at Solid Rock Bible Camp

never have seemed like great situations

for intense teaching times.

Camp is more for fun.

So, in honor of our camp day,

I’m going to spend most of the time we have together

telling you a story from the life of Peter.

If you read the gospels on your own,

it will be a story you are familiar with.

But the significance of what happens in Peter’s life

as a result of what happens in this event

may be something you haven’t fully appreciated before.

Sometimes, as we read the Biblical accounts of the disciples in Scripture,

it is easy for us to forget

that these men and women

really were just like us.

None of them were born with faith.

None of them entered this world with a heart trust in Christ and submission to Him.

Each of them,

just like us,

had to grow into their discovery of a faith-based walk with God

one step,

one choice,

one day at a time.

I am certain this was true in the life of Peter.

I don’t know if you’ve ever noticed it or not,

but there are two distinctly different points of commitment in Peter’s life

recorded for us during his early relationship with Jesus.

The first, found in Mark 1:16-20,

describes an incident in which

Jesus, walking along by the sea,

comes up to Peter, Andrew, James, and John,

and invites them to follow Him.

The second,

recorded for us in Luke 5:1-11,

involves a situation in which Jesus gives Peter a huge catch of fish.

There are some students of the gospels

who try to cram these two events together

and somehow form them into one event.

But my own study of the gospels

makes me certain they were not.

You see, I believe that with Peter,

as with all of us,

trust in Christ,

even when the Lord was right there in the flesh,

took time to grow.

And, although what I’m about to suggest this morning

does require granting me the freedom

to let my imagination run a little bit,

I believe that, at that first encounter with Christ on the beach,

Peter accepted Jesus’ call to discipleship,

but he did so believing that he had to finance that call on his own.

Most of you know that, before Christ’s entrance into his life,

Peter was a fisherman.

You may not know

that he was also married.

We don’t know if he had any children,

but we do know he had a wife,

and a home,

and several other family members who were dependant upon him for their daily needs.

Prior to Jesus’ appearance on the scene,

Peter spent his entire life fishing.

He had his own boat,

and he and his brother, Andrew,

along with their good friends, James and John,

ran their own little fishing business.

But once he accepted Jesus’ call to join the band of disciples,

obviously the fishing income stopped.

At that early point in his relationship with the Master

I think Peter didn’t dare bring up the money thing to Jesus.

And, in the imagined account I’m going to read to you this morning,

Peter decided that he could solve this problem on his own

by being a disciple by day,

and then sneaking off at night when Jesus wasn’t watching,

and go fishing.

He was doing

what we all do early in our walk with the King -

he was believing that there is some way

to isolate Jesus into controlled little compartments in our lives.

There was Peter the Disciple of Jesus,

and then there was Simon the Fisherman.

The belief that we can somehow

tuck our God away into some tiny section of our life,

and keep Him out of certain other areas,

is, of course, utter absurdity,

but it is real common stuff for us human beings.

It creates tremendous tension in our lives,

trying to keep some area out of God’s reach,

and eventually all of those protective walls we’ve constructed in our minds

will come crashing down,

but at the time it seems safer to us

than risking trust.

Now, here’s the way this thing plays out in the life of Peter.

Between the incident in Mark1:16-20

where Peter responds to the call to discipleship,

and the incident in Luke 5:1-11

where the thing with the fish happens,

Jesus takes Peter and the other disciples

on an extended teaching tour away from their home town of Bethsaida.

It was a remarkable experience for Peter and the others,

but it must also have created great tension within Peter

as he churned over how he was going to meet the needs of his family

if these trips with Jesus

were going to keep him away from his boat for so long.

So, with that as background,

I’m going to become Peter for the next few minutes,

and we’re going to pick up his story

at the end of that first teaching tour with the Master...

That first teaching tour with the Master was a wonderful experience for me with one significant exception - my anxiety over how I was going to provide for my family increased with every additional day I was away from home. My grand plan for night fishing was being postponed far longer than I had anticipated and, though I didn’t dare discuss the subject with Jesus, I was a mess by the time we finally returned home.

We arrived back in Bethsaida in the early afternoon, exactly four weeks from the day we left. In some ways it seemed as if I had been gone a year. So much had happened since that morning when I peaked out on a sea of damaged humanity in front of our house. It was wonderful seeing Ruth again and telling her all about our trip. I was relieved to find out that, during my absence, her needs had been abundantly met by family and friends in the community who knew I was traveling with Jesus. But it was also good to know I could once again take over that responsibility.

We were all exhausted from the trip, but I persuaded Andrew, James, and John that there was no telling how long Jesus would remain home and it was essential for us to implement our night fishing strategy immediately. We rested a few hours, ate dinner with the family, and then headed to the boats.

I cannot recall a worse fishing experience in my life than the twelve hours we spent on the Sea of Galilee that night. The wind howled making both the rowing and the fishing an agonizing experience. There was only a sliver of a moon and the near total darkness made it almost impossible to position our boats accurately, to see where our nets had been thrown, or what was in them when we brought them up. Not that the contents of the nets was ever a concern, however. Throughout the entire night we fought the waves, cast our nets, hauled them in, fought the waves, cast our nets, hauled them in, again and again and never caught a single fish. We went from frustration, to irritation, to helpless anger, to despair. As the sun rose we finally folded our nets and fought our way back to the shore.

The scene that greeted us on the beach was almost more than I could handle. Word of Jesus’ return home had spread quickly throughout the region. Jesus was standing at the water’s edge with several hundred people packed around him. Many at the back of the crowd were obviously attempting to squirm closer to the Master which only caused the mass to pack in around Jesus more and more tightly. His feet were already in the water but, with none of us there to establish a perimeter around Him, the crowd continued to surge forward.

We beached our boats a few feet on either side of Jesus with the hope of providing Him with some measure of protection. James, John, and Andrew hopped out and tried to clear a little area around Him so He could at least stand up without being driven into the sea. I went to the back of our boat and began cleaning our nets. I was grumpy and exhausted and in no mood for yet another mob scene.

Then, as I wrestled with a tangle in one of the nets, I suddenly felt the boat shift under the weight of someone jumping aboard. I turned around and saw Jesus looking at me.

“Say, Simon, why don’t we push out a few feet from the shore so I can teach without being driven into the sea in the process?”

He knew I was grumpy. He knew I was tired. He knew I had been out fishing all night. But He also knew I was finally ready for my first lesson in the difference between life in the flesh and life in the Spirit. He had me trapped and He was obviously well pleased with the arrangement.

Andrew gave us a push away from the shore, then jumped on board himself. We let the boat float out about thirty feet, then drop the anchor. As soon as the crowd saw that no amount of pushing and shoving would get them near enough to Jesus to touch Him they settled down, then sat down on the beach.

Jesus sat at the front of our boat and taught for several hours that morning. He spoke on one of His favorite themes - the Heavenly Father’s willingness and ability to provide for those who trust Him. His words sounded great, but everything He said just made me feel more grumpy. Talking about God’s care and provision was fine but, after fishing for a full night without a single fish to show for it, the application part of this whole thing left something to be desired.

When He finished His teaching He turned to me and said, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.”

I couldn’t let this pass without saying something. I was tired. I was hungry. I felt like I had just been preached at by a deeply sincere man who just wasn’t in touch with the practical realities of life. Maybe I didn’t know as much about the sacred writings as I should, but I knew a whole lot about fishing, and I knew there were no fish out there - not today, not in this location. It was time to introduce Jesus to MY area of expertise.

“Master, we worked hard all night and caught nothing, but at Your bidding I will let down the nets.”

There! That was as tactful as I could be. If He wanted to go on a little fishing trip after His morning teaching session I would do that for Him, but He might as well know the truth right now - there will be no fish in the net.

Andrew and I pulled the boat out a couple hundred feet from the shore. We both knew it was a terrible location, but after last night we also knew it didn’t really matter. This wasn’t about fishing, this was about giving Jesus a relaxing little boat trip and escape from the crowds for a few hours.

I must admit I became rather parental with Jesus at that point. If He wanted a fishing lesson I would give Him a fishing lesson. I went into great detail showing Him how to correctly hold the net for proper casting, how to coordinate the back, leg, shoulder, and arm muscles to get good distance from the throw. After introducing Him to the basics I gave a demonstration throw, dropping the net just where I wanted it to go.

With one painful exception several years later, that was the last time I ever cast that net. Few things in my life have impacted me more deeply than what took place during the next few minutes. Having completed Simon’s little lesson in professional fishing I started to pull the empty net back to the boat. Then, suddenly the water between our boat and the net began to churn and roll as if it were boiling. The turmoil under the surface was so intense it caused the boat to rock violently. The rope in my hand went instantly tight and I braced myself and pulled with all my strength. At the same instant I saw what was causing the sea to churn - fish!, hundreds and hundreds of fish, more fish than I had ever seen in one place at one time in my life.

I called to Andrew for help and he grabbed hold and pulled with me. As we strained at the ropes I peered over the side and was shocked to see what appeared to be several thousand fish all attempting to pack themselves into our net at once. It looked as though they were fighting for the honor of being caught. The weight of the net was far beyond our ability to handle and I turned my head to shore and bellowed for James and John to come help. By the time they reached us Andrew and I had been able to bring the edge of the net up high enough so that we could scoop fish into our boat. We scooped and scooped and scooped and scooped until the boat was so low in the water I was afraid we would sink. And still the net was packed with fish. We maneuvered the other boat along side the net and filled it as well, then rowed the boats to shore, dragging the half-filled net behind us.

The range of thoughts and emotions I experienced during that quarter hour of chaos was unlike anything I had ever known before. At the first sight of all those fish my initial reaction was the kind of elated greed I always experienced with a great catch. But it wasn’t more than a few minutes before it became obvious even to me that what was happening here had nothing to do with fish. At one point in the harvest process I glanced up into Jesus’ eyes and saw there once again what I had seen so many times before - He knew. He knew about my plan to live a double life, to be a disciple by day and a fisherman by night. He knew the plan was rooted in the great false foundation of my existence - my unquestioned confidence in my own natural abilities. He knew my commitment to Him was deep and genuine, but my practical trust in Him was almost nonexistent. He knew I understood the world of the flesh perfectly and the world of the Spirit not at all. And in that instant I knew why I had fished all night and caught nothing. I caught nothing because He had told the fish to go away, just as He now told the fish to come.

I wonder if you can understand the terror that thought created in my mind. It shook the great pillars of my life. It meant that my effort, my abilities, my determination, and my physical strength were not and could not be my bottom line. It meant I was free to crank out as much effort and energy as I wanted to, but somehow this man could control what resulted from that effort. I felt suddenly, terribly ashamed - ashamed I hadn’t talked to Him about my worries, ashamed I hadn’t trusted Him, and most of all ashamed because He knew what was in my mind.

I waded through the fish to where Jesus stood, dropped to my knees at His feet, the blurted out, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!”

I didn’t deserve these fish. I didn’t deserve His kindness. I didn’t deserve His friendship or His involvement in my life.

Jesus reached down, took my arm and brought me to my feet. He wanted to see my eyes, He wanted me to see His. He said simply, “Don’t be afraid, from now on you will be catching men.”

Don’t be afraid. Don’t be afraid of Him. Don’t be afraid of His ability to take care of my family. Don’t be afraid of the future He has for me. Don’t be afraid to walk away from our boat, our nets, and the illusion of security they seemed to provide. It was all about trust, of course - my willingness to trust Him. It was just a beginning, but it was that. I had still learned very little about the difference between life in the flesh and life in the Spirit. But at least my double life ended that day. I ceased to be a disciple by day and a fisherman by night. From that day forward I became a full time disciple of my Lord Jesus Christ. True, it was still a discipleship with deep roots in the flesh, but it was a start. And at that point it was all the Master asked of me because He knew it was all I was able to give. The teacher wanted my full attention, and now it was His. At last we were ready for class to begin.

I share that with you this morning for two reasons.

First of all,

it is always healthy for us to remember

that every human being who has ever lived

who has moved toward faith in Christ

has had to fight their way into that faith.

Because we begin

utterly and absolutely in the flesh,

without one single natural response within us that supports choices of faith in God,

we must always fight our way into the freedom that can only come through Him.

Don’t be afraid of that battle.

Certainly don’t condemn yourself

because those battles exist in your life.

They are to be expected.

The real issue is not whether or not the battles exists,

but rather whether or not we’re willing to accept and fight them,

one step, on day at a time.

True trust in God

is always a battle,

and it only enters our lives

one daily conscious choice at a time.

But I also share this Peter story with you

because there are very likely some of you here this morning

who have been trying very hard

to do the same thing Peter did -

you are trying to keep our Lord out of some major area of your life,

and the tension that battle is causing within you

is generating tremendous stress in your life.

With Peter it was a money issue -

with you it may be something else altogether.

But the battle is still the same -

do I really risk letting Him into this huge area of my life?

And to help with that battle

I conclude with just two more comments.

First, let me state the obvious -

He already knows all about the whole thing,

and He has from the very beginning.

You can pretend you’ve successfully kept Him out,

but the truth is,

you’re just like that three year old

who hides from daddy by covering his eyes,

believing if he can’t see daddy,

then daddy can’t see him.

And, finally,

I want you to know

that the stress generated by trying to keep Him out

is far greater than that which comes from letting Him in.

Trust in our God doesn’t come easily,

but once we move that direction

it brings a peace within our spirit

unlike anything else we’ve ever known.

We were designed by God

to live in trust with Him,

and only that trust

can truly bring us rest for our souls.