2 Corinthians
6:1-10
Luke 5:1-11
Every one of us has felt at some
point like the disciples did when Jesus Christ found them washing their
nets. They had fished all night and
caught nothing. Things had not turned
out as they had hoped, and they were disappointed, frustrated, and had already
given up. But when the Lord told them to
get back to work and let down their net just one more time, they did so and
caught so many fish that their net began to break and their boats began to sink.
What
a great surprise that was to them. They were all amazed and St. Peter fell down
before Christ and said, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord!” But
the Lord replied, “Do not be afraid.
From now on you will catch men.”
Then the disciples left behind their boats and nets and followed Christ.
That day probably began like any
other day for them. They were busy with
their work and who knows whether they expected anything out of the ordinary to
occur. It was just another day with the
same old routine and the same responsibilities and worries. But when they obeyed the Lord’s command, He
blessed them and challenged them to see that their lives were not simply about catching
fish, but about bringing people into the eternal life of the Kingdom of God. They heard that day a calling worth leaving
everything else behind.
Fishermen are famous for
exaggerating and telling stories about the size of their catch and the big ones
that got away. But these fishermen knew
that their skill and luck had nothing to do with taking in such a large haul of
fish. They had not been so successful
because of their abilities, for their best efforts all night long had produced
nothing. But as St. Paul wrote to the
Corinthians, “now is the acceptable time…now is the day of salvation.” In other words, Christ called and enabled
them to receive a blessing beyond their wildest dreams on that particular day. That was not, of course, simply for the sake
of success in catching fish. Instead, it
was a sign that they would become fishers of men. The Savior blessed and enabled them for a new
life, a new ministry which transformed and fulfilled the toil of their daily
lives. He called them to something completely
different from what they had known, and they were greatly surprised.
Like those fishermen, we are just flesh and blood,
created from the dust of the earth by the enlivening breath of God. In the world as we know it, we are subject to
death and decay and cannot even control our own thoughts and actions very
well. We cannot make fish swim into our
nets or bite our hooks, much less can we give anyone eternal life. And no matter what we do all day, we
encounter much that is well beyond our control.
The good news of the gospel,
however, is that our Lord is able to bless and transform our daily work, the
difficult situations we face, and all our struggles in ways that bring us more
fully into eternal life. Our salvation
is not a matter of escaping our bodies, this world, or even our problems. Instead, it is a matter of their fulfillment
in the God-Man Jesus Christ, the Second Adam Who heals every dimension of our
existence. No matter what we are doing
or experiencing, no matter how well or poorly it may be going, Christ is with
us, inviting us to make the same old frustrating and boring routine into a ministry
of the Kingdom, an icon of the salvation of the world.
Granted, the disciples were called
to a special ministry in the founding of the Church; they had to leave their homes
and occupations in order to serve the Lord full-time as evangelists, apostles,
and bishops. Some continue to be called
to serve today in ways that radically reorient their lives or lead them even to
become martyrs. But God calls most of us
to remain where we are in our familiar circumstances at work or school, often
in the same neighborhood and parish where we have been for some time. It is tempting to think that what has become
familiar and routine has no spiritual significance, that we are somehow second
or third-class in our service of the Kingdom because we remain in our same old
circumstances with the same old problems. But that would be a terrible error,
for St. Paul’s word to the Corinthians also applies to us: “now is the acceptable time…now is the day of
salvation.”
The Lord created every dimension of
our life and every bit of the universe.
He calls us and it to become holy.
No matter our circumstances, He calls each of us to offer our lives,
including our frustrations and failures, to Him for healing and
fulfillment. Just as He used a failed night of fishing for
the salvation of the world, He wants to use us for His glory in ways that we
cannot predict or fully understand.
Though it is beyond our spiritual or
rational comprehension, a central teaching of our faith is that Jesus Christ is
present to us in every human being whom we encounter every day, for we all bear
His image and likeness. He spoke the
universe into existence, so we are always on holy ground. He
calls every human being and the entire creation to shine with the light of His
glory. In all that we do, no matter what it is, we are to offer the world back
to God for His blessing. In this sense,
we are all the priests of our own lives.
In our daily struggles, He calls us all to become iconographers who bring
out the beauty of the world and all its inhabitants so that we all manifest more
fully the life of our Lord, so that the whole creation becomes more fully an
icon of His Kingdom.
In order for us to accept this high
calling, we must learn from St. Paul how to work every day as priests and
iconographers of the creation. Like him,
we need to show patience in our sufferings and problems. We must use even the difficult, frustrating,
or simply boring parts of our lives as opportunities to grow in faith, hope,
and love.
It is tempting to think how nice
life would be if we always got our way on our own terms and time table. But if that were the case, we would never get
over our self-centeredness and impatience.
We would never sympathize with others who were not so successful. We would have little chance of becoming
fishers of men if we easily caught everything that we pursued purely by our own
ability. We would probably become so
addicted to our own success that we would never leave behind our nets and
follow Christ.
Of course, no one’s life is really a
simple story of going from one success to another. As we all know in various ways, life is often
so difficult that it takes effort to resist the temptation to despair, to
simply abandon all hope of experiencing God’s presence and blessing in our
lives. It is so tempting to focus on our
failures, limitations, and distractions.
That is why we must embrace prayer, fasting, repentance, and other
spiritual disciplines in order to gain the spiritual strength to persevere, to
continue the journey of taking up our cross and following Him.
No matter how hard life is, God’s salvation
is not reserved for some other time and place.
“Now is the acceptable time…now is the day of salvation.” If we do not hear and respond to His calling
today, right now in our present circumstances, then when will we? If we wait for everything to become perfect
according to our own preferences, we will never obey Christ and play our unique
roles in the salvation of the world.
That was true for those first disciples and it is still true of us. Despite their disappointment, they had to let
their nets down one more time, even though they probably did not really believe
that the results would be any different from those of the previous night. But St. Peter had enough faith at least to
obey Christ’s command and to try one more time.
And that is when their lives changed forever.
The next time that we are tempted to
think that there is no hope for us in participating more fully and faithfully
in the life of Christ, let us at least have as much faith as those fishermen
who let down their nets one more time.
That is how they became fishers of men, great apostles and evangelists
who offered their lives to the Lord and became instruments of the salvation of
the world. By God’s grace, may the same
be true of us as we refuse to be distracted from hearing and obeying His call each
day of our lives. 
No comments:
Post a Comment