This gospel reading, well, you actually can read it in a literal, straightforward manner as a fishing story. And it is that. Indeed, it is a great and memorable fishing story; and, as is often the case with that genre, almost too much to believe. “You say you caught enough fish to sink two boats? Come on! Give me a break!” But after that miraculous catch of fish, when Jesus says to Simon Peter, “Do not be afraid. From now on you will be catching people,” it becomes very clear that Jesus himself sees in this fishing story a symbol, a metaphor. So, let me be quick to say, this is not just some modern, liberal, Jungian, Episcopal interpretation of scripture. Jesus himself sees in this fishing story a metaphor for something of much greater spiritual significance. Namely, how God calls us and catches us.
You see, Jesus is living, he is embodying, proclaiming and calling all people, including Simon Peter, me, and you, calling us to participate in a dramatically enhanced, significantly more fulfilling experience of this human life we share. A divine possibility, a higher human happiness, marked by a powerfully uplifting spirit of freedom and abundance, a life-giving faith, a radiant confidence, an inexhaustible joy, a contagious love, and, despite all the ups and downs which inevitably come with human life, an inner peace that is ultimately indestructible, that peace of God which surpasses all human understanding. This transformed experience of life is what Jesus calls the Kingdom of God. And he insists it is not only possible for us, it is in our midst, totally available, right here, right now. “Follow me,” he says, “and I will show you the way.” This transformed experience of human life is what the Apostle Paul means when he proclaims, “if anyone is in Christ, he/she is a new creation.” This is the higher human possibility, that higher happiness which the Gospel is proclaiming and which Jesus wants to catch and draw all people into - including us today. And so, this is the context in which Jesus calls the fisherman Peter to become a fisher of human souls. Do not be afraid. Follow me, and you will be catching people.
Now, it may help to recall that, in the symbolic language of sacred stories, the sea or being under water is used symbolically to represent the human condition of being spiritually “asleep.” And here, let me try to be as clear as I can be. The Christian Wisdom tradition holds that, for most people, most of the time, our usual state of awareness, what we would call our ordinary waking consciousness, is actually more like a sleepy-dream state, stuck so much of the time in a “me-centered melodrama,” a state of consciousness usually characterized by a rather chaotic succession of random thoughts, memories, associations, reactions and sensations, which seem to pop into our head from out of nowhere, driven by an ongoing, apparently endless set of self-referential questions: It’s like, instead of really seeing the world, we’re always looking at our own reflection in the window. “How well am I doing?” “How are people seeing me?” “Am I okay?” “Is it safe here for me?” “Do people like me?” “What did she mean by that?” On and on and on. The great spiritual teachers from time immemorial have characterized this “ordinary,” me-centered quality of human awareness as “sleep,” a state of consciousness from which we are called to wake up.
And incidentally, when I talk about “transformation” and “awakening,” I should make clear, again, that I am not using New Age terminology. I am speaking of Jesus’ core teaching. “You must be born again from above.” It’s about awakening to a higher possibility. “Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains just a single grain; but, if it dies, it bears much fruit.” Or perhaps most pointedly, “For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will truly find it.”
Again, in the symbolic language of sacred stories, the sea or being under water is used symbolically to represent the human condition of being spiritually asleep, not fully awake, not fully conscious of the light of God’s presence, of the glory of creation and the incredible gift of this fragile life and this beautiful world we have been given. Ralph Waldo Emerson once asked what we would do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. What would we do if the stars only came out once every thousand years. No one would sleep that night, of course. We would be ecstatic, delirious, made rapturous by the glory of God. Instead, the stars come out every night, and we - watch television.
On some level we know it is true. Spectacular sunrises and magnificent sunsets come and go on a regular basis, but somehow we are too preoccupied by other things to even notice the glory. Babies smile and crawl, explore, discover and delight, but we often miss the unfolding wonder of life because we are trapped inside our electronic devices or glued to our computers. Caterpillars weave their intricate designs, butterflies burst forth in glorious colors; indeed the very image of God is shining forth in the person right beside us, but we are largely unaware, usually so absorbed in that “me-centered melodrama” that we are, in effect, asleep to the glory of life shining around us. And, according to the Gospel, apart from the light of Christ, this is pretty much the human condition. We do not see the glory. We are like fish living beneath the surface of a dark sea, far away from the light above. This is the spiritual condition in which most people are living most of the time on a day to day basis. And, for the most part, we simply learn to adapt to the dark conditions of life beneath the surface of the sea. Except, as I always like to say, except, as Episcopalians, once a week at the Eucharist, we pop up to the surface, like a fish swimming up to grab a morsel of bread floating on the water, we pop up to the surface, grab that little piece of bread and then quickly swim back down into the depths of the sea for the rest of the week.
But, according to scripture, Christ is the one who is capable of walking on top of the water. Christ is the one who appears on the shore of the sea and calls people to follow him - up - out of the water - and into the freedom and fullness of life which God intends for us and all of humanity. You see, we were not meant to live like fish swimming our lives away in spiritual darkness beneath the surface of the sea. We were created to reflect the very image of God and to recognize it in one another, we were created to live and love in the light of God’s presence, we were created to breathe the clean, fresh air of the Spirit. Metaphorically, that is why the part of the church in which you are now sitting is called the “nave.” As I have noted before, the word “nave” is from the same root as the word “navy.” And it’s why the nave of a church is traditionally built, though upside down, the very same way a ship is built. If you look up, you can see it. For, so often, human life feels like we are swimming in a dark and turbulent sea. But Christ is the one who is capable of walking on top of the water, and as a fisher of human souls, Jesus is calling, drawing and pulling people up and out of those dark waters, into the light of God’s presence, into that higher happiness, into that higher life of divine freedom and abundance, joy and love, for which we were created by our God.
In our gospel lesson, Jesus is calling Simon Peter to share in this ministry. “Do not be afraid. From now on, you will be catching people.” And today, out of the dark, often turbulent sea of life, Jesus is calling you and me. “Do not be afraid,” he says. “Follow me, and I will show you the way that leads to light and life.”
I want to briefly note three details in this story which I, personally, find spiritually significant, and I will invite you to meditate upon them with me. Might even want to close your eyes, if you are comfortable doing so. First detail, Jesus says to Simon Peter, “Put out into the deep water.” As I try to hear God’s Word, what God is saying to me, to us, in this scripture, I hear God calling me, calling us, to go deeper. What would it mean for you - for me - for Jesus to say to us, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch”? Is he calling us, perhaps, to get in touch, once again, with something in our own depths, with our own deepest passion, our deepest truth, our deepest love, the deepest roots of our faith, perhaps some very important part of our being that we may have lost touch with or almost forgotten about? Perhaps Jesus is suggesting that what we are really looking for in our lives, the fulfillment, the joy, the higher happiness for which our hearts are really longing, is to be found not “out there” in the busy-ness and the externals of life, but “in here,” in the deep waters within. Right now, if you will, let down your nets for a catch ... and see what God has for you, in those hidden depths within.
Now, Simon Peter, of course, is resistant at first because he is convinced that there is nothing there, that those deep waters are already fished out. And this is the second detail I want to meditate on briefly. “Master, we have worked out there all night long and we’ve caught nothing. We have already fished these waters exhaustively. Take it from me, there’s nothing there.” The truth is that Jesus may indeed direct us to an area of our life that we think we have already tried and perhaps given up on. It could be a relationship which, on some level, you’ve given up on. Master, I’ve been fishing those waters for a long time and believe me, I’m pretty sure I’ve exhausted the possibilities. Or you may have given up on yourself in some way - your gift, your passion, your noble purpose, your dream, your calling. Speaking of calling, I have to say, personally, that I can relate to Peter on this point, having served in the same place, the same church for over 20 years now. It’s a long time. At several points over the years, I’ve turned to God in prayer and said, “Lord, I’m pretty sure these waters are fished out. There’s nothing left here. What more can I do?” But, each time, God has said, “go deeper.” Go deeper into your own soul, go deeper in your faith, go deeper with the people. Again and again, I have heard that as God’s call for me. “Put into the deep water, and let down your nets for a catch.” And each time I have done so, like Peter, I have been amazed at the depths of these waters and amazed at the abundance God provides.
At first Peter’s ego seems to bristle up and get in the way. That’s the third detail I want to meditate on. “We’ve been out there all night,” he says with the subtext, “and I know what I’m doing.” You can almost hear him thinking: “Look, I am a seasoned fisherman. This guy is a Rabbi. Fishing is my life. Where does this guy get off acting like he knows more about my life than I do?” But then in the next moment, there is a shift - a subtle self-yielding, a relaxing of defenses, a letting go of ego - “Yet, if you say so, I will let down my nets.” And sometimes this is all Jesus needs, just a little tiny opening. Simon lets go, for a moment, and trusts. And in this subtle act of surrender, this little “Yes,” in this little decision to follow, Peter discovers that Jesus indeed does know more about Peter’s life than Peter himself does. And in saying this little “yes,” Peter discovers the mystery and power of the gospel.
Dag Hammarskjold wrote: “I don’t know Who - or what - put the question. I don’t know when it was put. I don’t even remember answering. But at some moment I did answer, Yes - Yes - to Someone - or Something - and from that moment on I was certain that existence is meaningful and that, therefore, my life, in self-surrender, has a goal - a divine purpose.” Simon Peter, to his own amazement, having said that little Yes to Jesus, finds, in those deep waters, not emptiness but astonishing abundance, not the same-old-same-old but a true and inexhaustible newness of life.
“And when they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed Jesus.” We tend to put the emphasis on all that Simon Peter and his partners had to leave behind. But the truth is (as Barbara Taylor puts it): “Their minds were not on what they were leaving but on whom they were joining. Their hearts did not cleave to what was falling from their hands but on what they were reaching out to find, and in that God-drenched moment of their turning to follow, the miracle occurred.”
Jesus comes to us. All of this calling business, all of this catching business, begins with Christ’s initiative - his calling us and catching us and claiming us as his own. But it ends with our response. It ends with our willingness to let go of the old nets and surrender our life to God. Will you say Yes? And, I invite you to take these questions into your prayer. Will you turn to follow? Will you trust that Jesus may actually know more about your own life than you do? Will you yield to his direction and purpose for your life? Will you follow him?...
And, if the answer is Yes ... Do not be afraid. From now on, you will be catching people.