Formed
by Presence
September 8, 2013
BMC- Luke 5:1-11
(I Kings 19, John 6, & Jeremiah 1)
Introduction:
Formation
How
is it that we are formed? How is it that
we are made into who we are? And perhaps
more importantly, is it possible for us to be reformed, to be changed or molded
in new ways? Is it possible for us to
move beyond our circumstances and our shortfalls, our trials and our failures,
to be more than what we are?
We
are born with a set DNA. We have a
father and mother whose union led to our physical shape, a shape that
influences us and forms us in deeper ways.
We are shaped by physical abilities and attributes that we have as well
as by physical limitations and liabilities that we endure.
We
are shaped and formed by the circumstances and the context in which we live,
the culture in which we dwell. Events
happen and we make choices about how to respond to those circumstances and we
are shaped by those choices and their repercussions. People experience events in life that propel
them to greatness and they experience tragedies in life that ensnare them in a
quagmire of despondency.
And
we are shaped and formed by the relationships that we participate in. We are uplifted, loved, and infused with
confidence by people who take time to show that they care about us both in the
good and the bad. And we are dejected
and repressed by people who direct their hatred and anger toward us or who use
us for their own gain.
We
are shaped and formed by our physical DNA, our context in which we live and our
relationships with others. These, along
with other influences in our lives, form our narrative or our script out of
which we live. We know that we are
shaped and formed by these things. We
know that these things mold us and influence us in the choices that we make,
but I wonder if we believe deeply in the ongoing formation that can take place
through the presence of God in our lives.
Do
we truly believe in transformation? Do
we really believe that people can change?
Do we confidently believe that by the power of the Holy Spirit that the
miraculous can happen and that we can be lifted above our various
limitations? Do we believe that we can
let go of the flawed narrative or script that we live out of and choose instead
to live into God’s narrative for us?
Jesus Call His
First Disciples
- Tired but Obedient
This
morning, we engage with a text that invites us to consider more deeply what it
means for us to be formed by the presence of Jesus in our lives. It is a text that invites us to let go of the
worldly narrative that we live in everyday and instead to grab onto God’s
narrative for us. To engage with this
passage from the Gospel of Luke, I want to invite us to enter into this story
and to experience it from the perspective of Simon who later became Peter. It is the story of Jesus calling His first
disciples but I believe that when we dwell with this we may experience echoes
of our own calling to be followers of Jesus.
We too may receive the invitation to be reformed by the presence of
Jesus and the narrative of God.
Imagine
yourself at the water’s edge along the Sea of Galilee. It is mid-morning and you and your fishing partners
are cleaning up your fishing nets after a long, but unsuccessful night of
fishing. You are tired, hungry and
likely just a little bit grumpy. The sun
is rising in the sky and the heat of the day is coming on. As you clean your nets, you notice a crowd
surrounding a man nearby.
You’re
not sure who he is or what he is really saying based on the little snippets
that you overhear at times. But you see
the crowd around him growing and you find yourself glancing in his direction
with greater and greater frequency.
Somehow you feel a draw to Him within your very being. You are curious to know what it is that he’s
saying, what it is that is drawing an enlarging crowd around him.
And
then as you glance up from your work to see what was happening, you see him
look around and his gaze settle upon your boat.
As he walks over to your boat, you stand up straighter trying to
determine his purpose, wondering why he is moving toward the water. And as you stand up straighter with a look of
concern and wonder on your face, his gaze meets yours. And he asks you to put your boat out a little
from shore.
Without
fully comprehending why, you drop what you are doing, climb into the boat and
push off from shore. Without
understanding what it is, there is something about Him that is so compelling
that you do as he asks without giving it a second thought. It’s not that he demanded obedience of you or
required that you do as he said and yet how could you have said, “no?” Once you are a little ways out, the man then
resumes his teaching and you find yourself with a front row seat, spellbound by
what he has to say.
As
you listen to His words, you lose all sense of the passing of time, until He
finishes speaking and turns to you. He
looks into your eyes with a depth that is both comforting and unsettling. “Put out into deep water, and let down the
nets for a catch,” he says to you. “Put
out into deep water. Let down the nets
for a catch?” you think to yourself.
“Why would I do that? I’ve just
spent all night doing that.”
You
are tired. You have fished all night and
you haven’t caught anything. And now the
morning has passed and the afternoon has come on and you know very well that if
you caught nothing all night long, you certainly will not catch anything this
time of day. You have been fishing these
waters for years. You know what you are
doing and how to be successful and this isn’t the way it works. Yet something within you compels you to be
faithful and open. “Because you say so,
I will let down the nets,” you reply.
Now
let’s consider this for a moment. As far
as we know, this is the first time that Simon has really known Jesus. This is the first that he has met him in
person that he has been in Jesus’ presence.
He may have heard stories and talk about Jesus, but this is probably the
first that he has been in Jesus’ presence.
He is tired and perhaps a bit skeptical; and yet while Jesus’
instructions likely make no sense to him and probably seem like folly, he
chooses to be obedient to Him.
Tired
but Obedient. We know of others
throughut scripture who have been tired yet chosen to be obedient. In I Kings 19 after Elijah’s triumph over the
prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel, Queen Jezebel threatened to take his life. Elijah fled for his life. He departed into the wilderness and sat down
under a solitary broom tree. And in the
midst of his despair he asked that the Lord take away his life, that he might
be allowed to die.
In
the midst of his fatigue and despondency, an angel tended to him and gave him
food to eat and water to drink. After
resting and eating, he traveled on that nourishment for forty days to a cave in
Mt. Horeb. Who in the midst of bone
weary fatigue and without any provisions travels for forty days through the
wilderness? He was tired yet he was
obedient. He did what he was called to
do, though it likely made no sense to him at the time. And out of that obedience, he had a profound
experience of God on the mountain.
I
wonder how often, we too find ourselves to be tired. We have worked a long day
at the job. We are involved in many good
and important activities in our community.
We have participated in the same activities of faith year after year. We find ourselves weary of the work and
doubtful of the results when the nets we pull in are empty. We reach a point in which all that we want to
do is come to church and be fed.
And
we know what it means to be church, right?
Just as Peter knew what it meant to fish, we know what it means to come
together as a body of believers to love and care for one another. And yet when
we return to the shore with empty nets, we find ourselves tired and
discouraged. We wonder what is going on
and why things aren't turning out like we expect.
Peter
was tired and discouraged, but he was also obedient and open to God’s
direction, direction that likely made little sense at the time. He went out and did what he knew how to do,
but did so by God’s leading rather than his own. Could it be that even in our own weariness,
Christ is calling us to go back out and to cast our nets again, only this time
not by our own knowledge or ability.
Could it be that Christ is calling us to continue to cast our nets, but
to do so under the guidance of the one who made the fish, rather than based on
our own knowledge of the proper technique?
Could it be that Christ is calling us to continue to use our nets of
welcome and hospitality but to cast them in new places or in new ways?
- God is faithful
Look
at the results that Peter experienced.
He was tired yet obedient. And in
his choice to be obedient, God was faithful in bringing about tremendous
results, regardless of whether or not Peter’s heart was fully in it. Let us return to the story, experiencing it
as Peter lived it.
You
are tired and perhaps skeptical and yet obedient and open to God’s
direction. And so you let down your nets
likely doubting that anything would happen.
After all you hadn’t caught anything all night long. A part of you is humoring this stranger in
your boat knowing the folly of your actions, while a part of you is curious and
wonders if it could be different this time.
But
suddenly you know that this time is different.
Unlike all the times that you lowered your nets all night long and
waited never catching a single fish, this time is different. Suddenly you feel in the nets the tug that
tells you that you are catching fish.
And not just a few fish, you are catching a large school of fish. Your heart rate begins to rise. Your adrenaline begins to flow. You feel the thrill of the catch with every
fiber of your being as you realize that you are catching so many fish that your
nets are beginning to break.
You
soon know that this is more than you could possibly handle on your own. But you also know that you are not in this
alone. You have other partners who can
come in and help you to bring in this massive catch. You signal them and they come to help, but
even with their help, it is almost too much.
This catch of fish is so great that both boats are filled to the point
of beginning to sink.
Peter
is obedient. God is faithful. Peter listened to Jesus’ instructions and
despite whatever skepticism we hear in his voice, God is faithful. In fact God is abundantly faithful. God not only delivers a catch of fish, but
God delivers a catch that is beyond what Peter alone can handle, a catch that
is almost more than he can handle even with the help of his friends.
Later
in his travels with Jesus, Peter would again experience the abundant
faithfulness of Jesus. In John 6 we read
of Jesus feeding the 5,000. Once again,
Jesus was teaching near the Sea of Galilee and there was a large crowd.
Jesus
asked Philip where they could buy bread for all these people. Philip replied that six months wages could
not buy enough bread for all of them.
But Andrew chimed in that there was a boy with five barley loaves and
two fish, though that was not nearly enough to feed so many people.
After
having the people sit down and giving thanks, Jesus began to distribute the
bread and the fish to those who were there.
They were able to eat as much as they wanted and when they were
satisfied, Jesus told the disciples to gather the leftovers. They collected 12 basketfuls of leftovers.
The
disciples were obedient and Jesus was abundantly faithful. He took five loaves and two fish and
multiplied it into a meal that feed 5,000 people. But not only did it feed 5,000 people, it
satisfied them. It was enough that they
were no longer hungry. But not only did
it feed them until they were full, all 5,000 of them, but it also created enough
leftovers to fill 12 baskets. There were
more leftovers than the original food that they started with.
When
Peter was obedient even in doing that which may have seemed foolish, God was
abundantly faithful in supplying an overwhelming abundance of fish. When the disciples were obedient with what
little they had, Jesus was faithful in supplying an abundance of bread and fish
that fed and filled the crowd leaving more leftovers than what they started
with.
What
would it look like for God to be faithful to us out of our obedience? Out of our obedience to God’s direction,
perhaps even using unconventional methods, what would it look like for God to
be abundantly faithful to us? We are
called to be obedient. Jesus is the one
who provides the catch. What would it
look like for us to have full nets that nearly sink our boats. Can we even imagine that for ourselves?
- Our Response
But
perhaps a bigger question is “How will we respond to God’s faithfulness?” On Thursday at our Ministry of Worship
meeting we spent time praying with this passage. And out of our time of prayer one of the
observations was that Peter’s response seems a little out of place. He has just experienced this miraculous catch
and his response is repentance when we might expect wonder or excitement,
enthusiasm or praise.
But
let us re-enter the story of Peter being called as a disciple from his
perspective. You have just witnessed a
miraculous catch of fish that is beyond what you could have hoped for even
under the best of circumstances. You
have just witnessed a power that you do not understand. And you find yourself so overwhelmed by the
magnitude of it all that all you can do is to fall before Jesus and confess
your unworthiness. “Go away from me, Lord; I am a sinful man!” you declare.
You
and your companions are so astonished by this catch of fish that all you can do
is confess your unworthiness, to cast off your past that has entangled
you. But then it happens. As you kneel at Jesus feet laying bare your
brokenness, Jesus says to you, “Don’t be afraid; from now on you will fish for
people.” And upon hearing those words, a
burden is lifted from you and a new sense of purpose floods into your very
being.
Up
until now everything that you have known has been fishing, it is who you have
been formed to be. It is in your DNA,
your family heritage, and your cultural setting. Yet now after this experience of Jesus’
presence in your life, you have been reformed and repurposed. This experience of Jesus compels you
forward. It draws you away from all that
you have ever known. You walk away from
your boats, your nets and all that goes with it and you follow Jesus. You cast off your old narrative and take on a
new script, the script of the kingdom of God.
It’s
not so unlike Jeremiah’s call that he received in Jeremiah chapter 1. Some of us reflected upon this passage in
Sunday school this morning. The word of
the Lord came to Jeremiah. And in that
word, God named that before God had formed Jeremiah in the womb, before he was
born, that God had appointed Jeremiah as a prophet to the nations.
Jeremiah
replied, “Ah Lord God! Truly I do not know how to speak, for I am only a
boy.” In the presence of God, Jeremiah
named his weakness, his limitation. But
God said to him that he should not be afraid, that God would use him for God’s
purposes, to deliver God’s messages; to live into and speak out of God’s
narrative.
In
the presence of the miraculous, in the presence of God’s call upon us; how is
it that we will respond? Peter responded
with confession and fear. Jeremiah
responded an excuse that he did not know how to speak and that he was
fearful. But in both cases, God
responds, “Do not fear. I will use you
for my purposes. I will work through you
to bring about my kingdom realities.”
And in both cases, they followed.
Peter left all that he knew. He
left his boat and fishing nets, everything and followed Jesus.
Jeremiah
faithfully proclaimed the word of the Lord.
He acted as God instructed even when that meant ridicule from those
around him. He left behind his old
narrative and took on a new one.
How
will we respond? If indeed God is moving
in our midst and if indeed God responds to our obedience with abundant
faithfulness, how will we respond? If we
witness the miraculous in our midst, will we too respond with fear? Will we too doubt our abilities to carry out
that which God is calling us to? Will we
too be willing to leave behind all that we have known to follow where Jesus
leads us to go? If Jesus calls us out
into deep water and we casts our nets, and Jesus fills out nets with a catch
beyond our imaginations, how will we respond?
Conclusion:
As I dwell in this passage of Jesus calling his first
disciples, as I live into this story as Peter experienced it; I find myself in
awe at the way the presence of Jesus formed Peter. I notice that while he was tired, he remained
obedient. I witness God’s abundant
faithfulness that flows out of to his obedience. And I try to comprehend the depth of release
that Peter offers in confessing his sinfulness and then of leaving behind all
that he has known to follow Jesus.
Peter began a journey of letting go of the narrative that had formed him
his whole life to learn and live into the narrative that God has for him and
for us.
But those are just my reflections.
As you have dwelled with this story this morning, what is it that this
story invites you to wonder about? In
what ways does it invite you to imagine new possibilities? What are the things that it in invites you to
release before God? Take a moment to consider this in silence.
{Pause} {Pray
inviting people to release themselves to God}
Amen.
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