Two guys go on a fishing trip. They rent all the equipment:
the reels, the rods, the wading suits, the rowboat, the car, and
even a cabin in the woods. They spend a fortune.
The first day they go fishing they don't catch a thing. The
same thing happens on the second day, and on the third day. It
goes on like this until finally, on the last day of their
vacation, one of the men finally catches a fish.
As they drive home, they are both really depressed. One
turns to the other and says, "Do you realize that this one lousy
fish we caught cost us fifteen hundred dollars?"
"Wow!" says the other, "It's a good thing we didn't catch
any more!"
Another one. A man was stopped by a game-warden in a State
Park with two buckets of fish leaving a lake well known for its
fishing. The game warden asked, "Do you have a license to catch
those fish?"
The man replied to the game warden, "No, sir. These are my
pet fish."
"Pet fish?" the warden replied.
"Yes, sir. Every night I take these here fish down to the
lake and let them swim around for a while. I whistle and they
jump back into their buckets, and I take 'em home."
"That's a bunch of hooey! Fish can't do that!"
The man looked at the game warden for a moment, and then
said, "Here, I'll show you. It really works."
"OK. I've GOT to see this!" The game warden was curious.
The man poured the fish into the river and stood and waited.
After several minutes, the game warden turned to the man and
said, "Well?"
"Well, what?" the man responded.
"When are you going to call them back?" the game warden
prompted.
"Call who back?" the man asked.
"The FISH!"
"What fish?" the man asked.
Last one. The Reverend Dr. McStuffedshirt encountered one
of his less-than-faithful parishioners returning from a day's
fishing and engaged him in conversation. "Ah, Brother Jones," he
began in his best preaching tone, "You are a fine fisherman, but
I am a fisher of men."
Jones, determined to get home after a long day, replied, "So
I have heard. But I was passing your church last Sunday, looked
in the window, and noticed you had not caught too many..."
Too true. Too true. Of course, our lesson is the source of
that "fisher of men" designation. It too is a "fish story" of
sorts. It starts out with Jesus being pursued by the curious
crowd, folks who have heard about this amazing young man - his
healing miracles, casting out demons. What does he have to say?
So they press close, as the text says, "listening to the word of
God."
Too close, actually. Closer and closer to the water's edge
they come, finally prompting Jesus to impress into service a
beached fishing boat belonging to an acquaintance named Simon,
whose mother-in-law he had recently healed.
Simon was quick to agree. He had been quietly washing his
nets, his head angled to catch the words of Rabbi Jesus. Those
words may be all he catches today, he thinks to himself. After
all, he and his partners had been out fishing all night and had
caught nothing but an occasional nap. So Jesus climbs in, Simon
pushes off, and the teaching continues.
We have no clue as to how long the preaching and teaching
continues, but for awhile we expect. Finally, it is over. Simon
and his mates are ready to get home for some shut-eye in
preparation for another night's work - after all, night time,
especially the early morning hours before dawn, is best for
fishing, even if LAST night was not so good. Instead, Jesus
says, "Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a
catch."
"Say what?" Simon thinks to himself. "This is not the time
to be fishing, and the fish are not biting today anyway. And
besides, this rabbi might be special in SOME things, but he is a
carpenter, not a fisherman. Let's go HOME!"
But something about this Jesus overcomes the reluctance.
"Master, we've worked hard all night and haven't caught anything.
But because you say so, I will let down the nets." He beckons to
his partners, James and John, and together they sail the two
boats out from shore.
Now the fish story. The catch is humongous. Too big for
one boat, and even for the two boats together: so many flopping,
slippery fish that the boats are in danger of going under. Simon
has never seen anything like it. "WHOA! This rabbi is
something!" As the gospel account has it, "he fell at Jesus'
knees and said, 'Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!'"
The rabbi only smiles. "Don't be afraid; from now on you
will catch people." Or in the words of the old Sunday School
ditty that comes from this story, "I will make you fishers of
men, fishers of men..." And the conclusion is simple: "So they
pulled their boats up on shore, left everything and followed
him."
Which is more the miracle here? The incredible catch of
fish? Or the incredible catch of these men? They drop it all,
give it all up - their business, their home, their way of life,
and, if tradition is correct, their very lives themselves - all
to follow Jesus. To "catch people." And down through two
millennia of Christian history, that is how every generation of
followers of Jesus have understood our calling - to catch people.
The word for that is "evangelism," a word that makes good
Presbyterians turn pale and start fanning themselves. Paul
Harvey has noted, "Too many Christians are no longer fishers of
men but keepers of the aquarium."(1)
There are several ways to interpret that phrase, "catch
people." We could think of ourselves as the ones casting the
nets - we spread the word far and wide in hopes that we will
bring in another huge catch like the one that day at Gennesaret.
Legitimate. Or we could think of ourselves as the net - we are
the instrument the Lord uses to gather them in. Also legitimate.
But I wonder whether we might not better think of ourselves in
terms of BAIT. Fish bait. Unless they are born into the
fellowship, that is, after all, the way new disciples are brought
into the life of the church. Something attracts them, and most
often it is you and me. Eighty percent of the people who join
churches say they do it because someone - a friend or a relative
- invited them. For good or ill, we are BAIT.
A rural congregation stood near the intersection of five
country roads. When the new pastor stuck red pins in a map to
locate where the members lived, he noticed the majority clustered
along the north/south road. While visiting an older parish
member one day, the pastor asked, "Why do so many of our members
live on the north/south road and not east or west?"
"Years ago," she replied, "Joe and Melva Quimley lived up on
the north road. Then they bought a farm on the south road and
moved down there. The Quimleys were friendly, outgoing,
delightful people. They were always inviting people to church.
Not everyone they invited came, but some did!"(2) Good bait.
Another old fish story. A cold winter day. An old man
walked out onto a frozen lake, cut a hole in the ice, dropped in
his fishing line, and waited patiently for a bite. He was there
for almost an hour, without even a nibble, when a young boy
walked out onto the ice, cut a hole in the ice next to him. The
lad dropped his fishing line and minutes later he hooked a
Largemouth Bass. The old man could not believe his eyes but
chalked it up to plain luck.
Shortly thereafter, the young boy pulled in another large
catch. He kept catching fish after fish. Finally, the old man
could take it no longer. "Son," he said, "I have been here for
over an hour without even a nibble. You have been here only a
few minutes and have caught a half dozen fish! How do you do
it?"
The boy responded, "Roo raf roo reep ra rums rrarm."
"What was that?" the old man asked.
Again the boy responded, "Roo raf roo reep ra rums rarrm."
"Look," said the old man, "I can't understand a word you're
saying."
The boy leaned over, brought his hand to his mouth and spat
out a mess of bait. He said again, "You have to keep the worms
warm!"
You know, there may well be a lesson in that for us too. If
we are going to "catch people" as Jesus said, we had better use
attractive bait. What do the people we are trying to catch see
in us that would make them want to be here with us? Anything? I
hope. But I know all too well that what some out there see from
church folks is not very attractive at all. What was in the
paper yesterday? Another story about the Episcopal battle over
the consecration of a gay bishop, one from a Catholic diocese in
the midwest about how they are NOT going to do background checks
on staff who deal with children, one about Baptists in North
Carolina who are talking about not wanting to work anymore with
other Baptists with whom they disagree.(3) Hmm.
This past week I read a fascinating book that has been on my
list for a couple of years but I just now got around to it. It
was written by a magazine columnist and author, Barbara
Ehrenreich, who decided to investigate what it is like trying to
survive in this land of plenty on a relatively low or even
minimum wage in a job that would be fairly far down on the
employment ladder. The book is called Nickel and Dimed: on (not)
Getting By in America.(4) She found herself doing a number of
jobs: house cleaning, a nursing home aide, a retail clerk, and so
on. In Florida she worked for a time as a waitress in a greasy
spoon diner. She wrote of her encounters with bosses, co-workers, customers. She brought me up short with this though:
The worst, for some reason, are the Visible Christians,
like the ten-person table, all jolly and sanctified
after Sunday night service, who run me mercilessly and
then leave me $1 on a $92 bill. Or the guy with the
crucifixion T-shirt (SOMEONE TO LOOK UP TO) who
complains that his baked potato is too hard and his
iced tea too icy (I cheerfully fix both) and leaves no
tip at all. As a general rule, people wearing crosses
or WWJD? ("What Would Jesus Do?") buttons look at us
disapprovingly no matter what we do, as if they were
confusing waitressing with Mary Magdalene's original
profession.(5)
I doubt that her description would fit many Presbyterians,
but you and I both know folks like that. Talk about your rotten
bait!
As her account moves forward, Barbara talks of working for a
maid service in Portland, Maine. Not much money, of course, and
none for weekend entertainment. One Saturday night, to escape
her fleabag accommodations (all she could afford, of course), she
went to a Pentecostal tent revival. Lots of singing and
clapping, fiery preaching attacking "this wicked city" for not
turning out more souls to the revival..."which costs money, you
know; this tent didn't just put itself up - We're talking
overhead..." She writes,
The preaching goes on, interrupted with dutiful
"amens." It would be nice if someone would read this
sad-eyed crowd the Sermon on the Mount, accompanied by
a rousing commentary on income inequality and the need
for a hike in the minimum wage. But Jesus makes his
appearance here only as a corpse; the living man...is
never once mentioned, nor anything he ever had to say.
Christ crucified rules, and it may be that the true
business of modern Christianity is to crucify him again
and again so that he can never get a word out of his
mouth.(6)
Well, no it is not, Barbara, but your point is well taken.
One day long ago, Jesus came down by the water, followed by
a curious crowd. There was an encounter with some fishermen, a
huge catch of fish, and finally an invitation to "catch people."
And so it has ever been.
Now, please, be careful about the bait.
Amen.
1. Bible Illustrator for Windows, (Hiawatha, IO: Parsons Technology, 1994)
2. Pastor Bill Mains, Trinity Lutheran Church, South Milwaukee, WI, sermon entitled,
"Fishin'", via Ecunet, Sermonshop Sermons, Note #4333, 2/5/04 quoted from "The Parish
Paper: A Resource For Congregational Leaders" edited by Herb Miller and Lyle Schaller, vol. 11,
no. 7, January 2004
3. Warren Times-Observer, 2/7/04, C 3
4. Henry Holt & Co.: New York, 2002
5. Ehrenreich, p. 36
6. ibid., pp. 68-69
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