A Career Change for the Chosen

Luke 5:1-11

Last time we looked at the miraculous catch of fish, and saw Jesus’ character qualities of truth and knowledge. Thousands followed Him because of His truth that made everything make sense, and then His knowledge shined through because He knew where the fish were.

But this passage reveals 5 character qualities of Christ, so let’s look at the last three.

In the third point we see His power. His knowledge isn’t enough unless He can do something about it. So His omniscience blends now into omnipotence.  It's one thing to know where the fish are. It's another thing to have the power to gather them there.  And this is what stuns us in this story because we read in verse 6, when they had done what the Lord told them to do, put down the nets, the amazing result: They enclosed a great quantity of fish; a massive quantity, so much that the nets began to literally snap.  They just began to shred with the weight of this enormous mass of fish.  I mean, typically fishermen knew what the normal catch would be, and they had designed capable nets that would be able to handle with their time-tested cords, the kind of catch that you would get in the sea of Galilee.  Nothing like this had ever happened.  They were seeing an expression of divine power because there's no explanation for the volume of fish, other than the fact that Jesus not only knows where they are, but He has commanded an enormous number of fish, way beyond any imaginable school of fish that would ever be swimming together into this one place. Not only were the nets breaking, but the ships began to sink in v. 7. Just imagine the weight that would necessitate that.

Now the lake is lapping over the edge of the boats.  Peter and James and John and their companions and the folks that were there knew the Old Testament.  They knew that God is the Creator and that God is also the controller of His creation.  They knew…

Nehemiah 9:6

Thou, even thou, art LORD alone; thou hast made heaven, the heaven of heavens, with all their host, the earth, and all things that are therein, the seas, and all that is therein…

People say, "Well, you know, God couldn't have created the entire universe in six days, it takes a long evolutionary cycle of millions of years to produce this." That's because they don't believe the Bible, one.  And two, they don't understand the power of God.  God has so much power that creating this universe really was a small thing for Him.  He literally spoke it into existence instantaneously and sustains it by the same power and His power is never diminished.

Scientists struggle with the concept of a vacuum of nothingness. They can study space and the vacuum there. They can take any molecule and remove all matter, atoms, air, H, O, leaving nothing there but empty space.  When they do that they discover a most amazing thing.  Moving through that vacuum with nothing in it are short waves and long waves of energy. What's that?  That's why Einstein died in discouragement because he got all the way down to that and couldn't give it a chemical name and couldn't identify where it came from and what sustained it.  It is the primary source of power.  And what is it?  It's the very energy of God.  They have discovered that there's enough energy, enough power in those waves that you could light all the stars in the universe for eons.  The power is absolutely staggering.  We know something about the power because if you split one small atom, you can set loose a nuclear holocaust that ultimately can destroy the universe.  God has power.  There is power at a level in the universe that demonstrates that it must come from some source other than what can be understood by man's scientific enterprises.  This is the power of God.  And if God can do all of that, it's really no problem for Him to give a little poke of energy to the rear end of a fish to make sure it ends up at a certain point. Or He could just create them in place. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Peter was figuring out what he was dealing with.  In fact, in verse 8 Simon’s knees buckle and in verse 9 amazement had seized everybody.  Everyone is in shock.  It's a term that's used a couple of times back in chapter 4.  They were amazed at His teaching.  They never heard anybody teach the way He taught.  And in verse 36 they were amazed at His confrontation of the demon.  And now they're amazed at His power expressed over nature.

He was dealing with one who was the source of truth, one who knew everything that could be known and one who had power.  He was dealing with truth, omniscience and omnipotence. 

And that meant, fourthly, that he was in the face of divine holiness because Peter knew that the God of truth, and the God of omniscience, and the God of power is the God of holiness. 

He knew about fishing.  But this was not fishing.  What he had seen was not fishing.  Knowing where the fish are and controlling them--that's not fishing.  This was supernatural.  This had no human explanation.  Peter had heard Jesus teaching about the kingdom.  He had heard Jesus teaching about repentance and salvation and forgiveness.  He had heard that because he was sitting in his own boat, while Jesus was teaching it.  And he had heard it in the synagogue just prior in chapter 4.  And no doubt he had discussed it with Jesus when the Lord spent the day at his house and healed his wife's mother.  But no teaching left to itself would have brought Peter to where the Lord wanted him to come, apparently.  And so the Lord had a very special manifestation for Peter that shocked him and that was this occasion because the Lord wanted to get Peter to the place of recognizing his sinfulness.  Whoever he thought Jesus was when they first met, now there are no doubts that this is God.  He falls down, but he’s not just a worshiper, but he is frankly terrified because look at his words, "And he said, 'Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, oh Lord.'" This is that penitence that Jesus is after.  This is that poor, prisoner, blind and oppressed, that Jesus said He had come to preach the gospel to in reciting the words of Isaiah 61.  This is exactly the kind of attitude Jesus was looking for; not an attitude of prideful confidence, not an attitude of self-satisfaction, not an attitude of religious achievement, not an attitude of self-righteousness, but an attitude of brokenness.

And it's interesting to me that Luke always refers to Simon as Simon, up until chapter 6 verse 14, when you have the listing of the apostles and after that He always refers to him as Peter.  He is Simon up to 6:14; he's always Peter after that.  And he's never Simon Peter, except here.  Why is he Simon Peter here?  And I think the answer is because this is where Simon becomes Peter.  This is where the real transformation takes place, and so He gives him the full name.  This is Simon Peter.  This is the moment of his penitence.  Peter is crushed because he knows he's in the presence of holy God, that's why he reacts this way.  He is stunned by the presence of God and is only aware then of his sin because he knows if he can see God, God can see him and his sin.  And it's very traumatizing and intimidating and terrifying and he says, "Go away, go away."  He's afraid for his life.

Peter was crushed at the presence of the Lord. And we all should be crushed at His presence. One day the lost will be crushed BY His presence.

Often the reason why people get out of church is because it is an intimidating environment. They can’t be comfortable under conviction. Instead of responding to their guilt with repentance, they flee.  But that's nothing compared to literally being in a boat with the Creator.  That's why in Mark 4:41 when Jesus was in the boat and they said, "We're going to drown," He stopped the storm, and it says they were very much afraid because it was far more frightening to have God in your boat than to have a storm outside.  They were terrified.  They knew what they were dealing with--the Creator.

That's why Abraham in Genesis 18:27 said, "Am I speaking to the Lord?  Who am but dust and ashes."  This can't be happening.  Isaiah said I’m a man of unclean lips.  And then there's Manoah, in the 13th chapter of Judges.  Manoah has an encounter with a pre-incarnate appearance of Christ, and he goes home and says to his wife, "I've seen the Lord, and we will die."  And then there's Ezekiel who has a vision of God in Ezekiel chapter 1 and falls over in a coma.  And then there's John in Revelation 1 who has a vision of the glorified Christ and it says he fell over like a dead person, he was so traumatized.

One of the most interesting statements of all in regard to this is found in the 20th chapter of Exodus.  God is giving the 10 commandments and in verse 19 they said to Moses, "Speak to us yourself and we will listen, but let not God speak to us lest we die."  Moses, please we don't mind talking to you, just don't bring God down here.  You see, that's the overwhelming sense of sin.  That's the publican in Luke 18 beating his chest.  He won't even look up.  He won't lift his eyes.  He's afraid somehow that God might see who he is and he's crying, "God, be merciful to me a sinner."  It's the disciples in Matthew 17 on the Mount of Transfiguration who see the glory of Christ and fall over in a coma, literally frightened into unconsciousness.  This is what God seeks, a person with a broken and a contrite heart.  But you can't really see your sin until you see God.  And that's why the emphasis of ministry always has to be to exalt God, to lift up His name, to manifest His glory and His holiness because it's when we see Him for who He is that we see us for who we are.

v. 10        It was the same with James and John.  They were all literally shaken to the core.

Now in the terror of this moment Peter wants to send the Lord away, but the Lord wants to pull Peter closer.  What from Peter's viewpoint is so frightening that he wants to run is so encouraging to the Lord that He wants to embrace Peter.  At the very point at which the sinner feels the most alienation is the point at which the Savior is seeking reconciliation. 

And that brings us to the final attribute of God that is demonstrated here, divine mercy. 

You see, when it came to Isaiah being stunned by God, it turned out that the Lord called him into ministry.  When Job thought that he was the worst of sinners and needed to repent in dust and ashes was when God blessed beyond imagination.  When John on Patmos fell over out of sheer terror, the Lord awakened him, told him to get up and take his pen and serve Him by writing the Revelation.

Just at the point where you think you're on the brink of damnation because of your sin, you're actually at the brink of reconciliation because of mercy.  And I love this in verse 10. Jesus said to Simon, fear not.

Now let me just say as a footnote: There is a healthy fear of God, that causes us to cling to Him.  There is a positive fear of God. 

Deuteronomy 13:4

Ye shall walk after the LORD your God, and fear him, and keep his commandments, and obey his voice, and ye shall serve him, and cleave unto him.

There is the fear that wants to run away and there is another form of fear that seeks to cling to.  If a child has gotten himself into trouble by doing foolish things, there are some fathers who may not handle it well or maybe abuse them and as a result the child would rather work his way out of his own dilemma without the father because he fears the father.  On the other hand, there are children who have learned that they can cry out with all their might for a father to cling to because they understand the love and the tenderness of that father who will forgive their folly and rescue them.

There is the healthy fear of the sinner who wants to avoid the judgment of God.  He is the Father of mercies.  The same God can create terror in the unrepentant sinner and calm in the penitent one.

And then Jesus shows where mercy takes you, "From now on you will be catching men." Peter feared that he would be destroyed.  Instead he was called to preach, along with his friends.  You never have to be afraid to admit your sin. That's the point at which you will receive mercy. 

By the way, ‘catch’ is an interesting Greek word, zōgreō from two words, agreuō, to catch and zōon, life.  You're going to catch alive, is what it means.  They spent their life catching fish dead. Now they're going to catch men alive.  You catch fish for the purpose of killing them. You catch men for the purpose of giving them life. 

v. 11         Now let me tell you, folks.  This is the catch of all catches that they had dreamed of their whole fishing career and it might have been a temptation to say, "Well, I think the better plan than us following You to catch men is You come with us and we'll really catch fish and be filthy rich." 

Ill.—I can relate because of my brief success as a salesman [testimony] I could have been tempted to continue. I wish I was so holy that I simply chose to follow God back to ministry. But the truth is, I hated what I was doing.

In the case of the disciples, fishing was history. Goodbye long nights and smelly hands.  Initially they had followed Him part-time and this was now full-time.  This was the life they would live all the way to their death.  From this moment on they were permanently engaged in catching people in God's salvation net, the highest calling in life, the great commission.   They became the chosen disciples.

Jesus is God because He's the source of truth, knowledge, power, holiness, and mercy.  Only God calls sinners to reconciliation to Himself and commissions them to the great task of evangelization, catching men alive. 

How about you?  Have you come to that point in recognition of your own sin?  Have you come to the point where you wanted to run from God only to be embraced by Him through faith in Jesus Christ?  Feeling yourself utterly unworthy, do you now understand that you're called to be His disciple?  Thinking you're not even worthy to be a disciple, you have become worthy to become a proclaimer of the gospel.  And now you, like them, can give your life to that.  Not that you need to leave your career but wherever it is in your life that you live and move and have your being, that's the place where you have to live your life for the advancement of the gospel and catch men alive.  That's the Savior's work to which all of us have been called.