January 21, 2018 – Epiphany 3B
© 2018 Evan D. Garner
Audio of this sermon can be heard here.
What would you do if you
looked up from your desk one day and saw Jesus standing there? What would you
do if he said, “Come on; follow me?” If Jesus came to your office or your
school or your breakfast room or your back yard or wherever it is that you do
what you do and looked you in the eye and said, “Come, follow me,” what would
it take for you to say yes?
Given their celebrated
status in our tradition, it can be hard to remember that Simon and Andrew and
James and John were just ordinary fishermen, people like you and me, when Jesus
walked up to them. They had families to take care of and bills to pay. They had
chores to accomplish and careers to pursue. But, when Jesus saw them and said,
“Come, follow me,” immediately they left their boats and their nets and the livelihoods
that those things provided and set off behind Jesus. They didn’t know Jesus at
that point. Perhaps they had heard him preach and been impressed by his
charismatic convictions, but surely they didn’t know enough about the road
ahead of them to leave everything behind. Yet, when the call came, they didn’t
hesitate. What was it that Jesus said—what was it about his invitation—that
inspired those tradesmen to drop everything and follow him?
In his invitation, Jesus made
them a promise: “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” It’s a
strange image—the thought of casting a net or putting out a line and dragging
in human beings—but in those words Jesus was doing more than inviting these
would-be disciples to follow him. He was beckoning them into a ministry that
would take all of their knowledge and skills and abilities and experience as
men who worked on the sea and translate them into the transformational work
that God was doing in the world through God’s Son. Jesus wasn’t inviting them
to give up fishing in order to follow him; he was asking them to pursue their
life’s truest meaning by becoming fishers for God’s kingdom. And he is inviting
us to do the same thing.
What does it mean for us
to follow Jesus? What does it mean for us to fish for people? At times, it
feels like those who wish to be disciples of Jesus must leave absolutely
everything behind in order to follow him. And, for a rare few, that is the
call. But the vast majority of us are not asked to leave our whole lives behind
but to use them absolutely and completely for the transformational work of God’s
kingdom. You don’t have to be a fisherman. You don’t even have to like fishing.
But, if you want to answer Jesus’ call and follow him as a disciple, you have
to be willing to give up your life as you know it and instead use it to help
the world know the good news of the saving love of God in Jesus Christ.
But how are we ever going
to do that? How are we—how are you—going to find what it takes to bring others
into God’s kingdom? By being the kind of fishermen or teachers or police
officers or preachers or doctors or lawyers or bankers or builders who use their
craft in the service of God. You don’t have to be a card-carrying evangelist to
spread the good news. All you have to do is see and know that God is doing
something amazing in your life and in the world around you and then use your life
to tell others about it. You don’t have to go to seminary to be a disciple of
Jesus. That’s the beauty of his call. It begins right where you are with the
simple invitation to consider that there could be more, that the life you know
could be a part of something bigger and richer, that your life could find its
completeness by becoming a vessel for God’s work in the world.
And where does it all
start? It starts when we decide that we’re tired of sitting still. It starts
when we realize that with Jesus there could be more. It starts when we get up
and take that first step down the road after him. Jesus didn’t walk past Simon
and Andrew and John and James and say to them, “Follow me to the synagogue for
an hour or two and then you can go back home until we do it all again next
week.” Yes, God is here when we come together on Sunday mornings, and our
worship together may be the highlight of our week, but we come together not for
what happens within these walls but in order to be further equipped for the
work of the kingdom out in the world. When we walk back out that door, it’s up
to us to use our lives to show others what God is doing in the world.
Jesus is here with us
this morning. You have come near enough to hear him whisper to you, “Come,
follow me.” When you kneel at the altar rail to receive Holy Communion, listen
to what he says to you: “Come, follow me, and I will use you and your gifts to
show the world the transformational power of God’s love.” Isn’t that a call
that you want to answer? Will you take that first step?
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