Matthew 4.12-23 Fishers of men

Matthew 4:12-23

 

Now when Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee. He left Nazareth and made his home in Capernaum by the sea, in the territory of Zebulun and Naphtali, so that what had been spoken through the prophet Isaiah might be fulfilled: “Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, on the road by the sea, across the Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles— the people who sat in darkness have seen a great light, and for those who sat in the region and shadow of death, light has dawned.” From that time Jesus began to proclaim, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.”

As he walked by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon, who is called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea—for they were fishermen. And he said to them, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.” Immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went from there, he saw two other brothers, James son of Zebedee and his brother John, in the boat with their father Zebedee, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father, and followed him.

Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.

In today’s Gospel reading from Matthew we have an echo of last week’s reading from John’s Gospel where we read how Andrew, a disciple of John the Baptist, began to follow Jesus and in his turn brought his brother Simon to discipleship. We hear, too, an echo of John’s preaching from his regular one-point sermon, “Repent, for the Kingdom of God has come near” taken up by Jesus himself. John had been arrested and this seemed to be the cue for Jesus to take up his ministry to develop the religious revival that John had started. But we see too the new emphasis in the words that Jesus adapted from the Baptist’s message – Jesus came preaching repentance, as John had done: the message of repentance is less about remorse over sins one has committed and more about a reorientation of one’s whole life. Neither Jesus nor John simply wanted people to feel bad about their sins and to want to do better. They were saying that their audience needed to turn their entire lives in a new direction, which we see when Jesus adds something to John’s message: that the vision and presence of God has come near.

Although the detail of how these two fishermen became Jesus’ disciples varies between the two gospels, the key point remains the same: these two men had an encounter with Jesus which changed them. We also hear now of the brothers James and John and how their encounter with Jesus also brought them to faith. These four were not necessarily the cream of the intellectual or religious crop in those days. Jesus seems to go about recruiting his disciples in all the wrong ways in terms of modern recruitment principles. He doesn’t wait for those who are interested in his teaching to approach him and apply for a position as his disciples: Jesus goes to them. He doesn’t examine their credentials and discern their worthiness for association with him. He simply chooses two fishermen he sees hard at work in a lowly job that’s thankless and without success most of the time and finds these to be great qualities in would-be disciples.  Maybe there’s a learning point for us there. How often have we rationalised our unwillingness to act as disciples with the excuse, “I don’t have the skills? I’m not good at that”? Maybe following Jesus is less about knowing intellectually exactly what the path ahead looks like than simply knowing with the heart that the way we want to walk forward into the future is with Jesus at our side.

All four moved from what they were, to become something very different; from fishermen to disciples – and we catch a glimpse of the pattern of that discipleship as they followed Jesus around the area, “teaching in their synagogues and proclaiming the good news of the kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.”

Perhaps what we should remember is that Jesus’ mission is often referred to theologically as The Missio Dei, the Mission of God, God’s mission and all disciples of Jesus, then and now, share in that mission, that overall ministry. It’s not my personal ministry. It’s not your personal ministry. However that ministry is worked out in each of us, it remains God’s ministry and we are merely partners in it.

So, maybe we can imagine them as they began that ministry, moving incrementally from raw recruits and apprentices to an increasing partnership with Jesus in his ministry. When Jesus looked at those four, he realized that something about fishing was what he wanted in Christian discipleship. I believe Jesus chose the image intentionally. Fishing remains one of the great models of Jesus for the growth of the kingdom of God. Maybe in our age and culture we’re in danger of losing the image because we no longer go fishing - just like we no longer herd sheep or know what a shepherd does. We no longer plant seed in the ground and know what growth is. We no longer draw water from wells and know what living water is.

These fishermen surely represent all future believers whom Jesus summons to follow him. It may not be necessary for all to leave professions and possessions behind, but all must leave their world behind and enter the new world into which Jesus invites them. It’s a sobering and challenging idea: to what extent does each of us believe we’ve done that? To what extent as disciples have we left our own worlds behind us? To what extent have we entered into the new world Jesus invites us into? Well, the good news is that Jesus’ followers didn’t give up homes and families never to return. Galilee was a small area and they rarely travelled outside it. A far more likely scenario is the group gathered around Jesus and were out on the road, returning to their homes and towns regularly.  The group was rarely more than a half a day to a day's walk from their traditional homes.

In a sense, it might be easier to physically leave all the old behind and live our new, Christian lives somewhere else, but that doesn't happen to most of us. We remain living in our local areas, with our families, friends, colleagues and social networks and, like the disciples then, those are the focus areas for God’s ministry and mission through us.

Taken as a whole, then, these twin stories of the calling of four disciples make it clear that Jesus summons people from their relationships - brother, sister, daughter, son, father, mother, friend  - and from the midst of their everyday lives – fishing for them, but an infinite variety for us -  into a new set of relationships and to a new vocation. In these stories of the calling of the disciples, then, Jesus disrupts family structures and disturbs patterns of working and living. He does so, however, not to destroy but to renew. Peter and Andrew don’t cease being brothers; they are now brothers who do the will of God.  James and John don’t cease being sons; they are now not only the children of Zebedee but also the children of God. All four of these disciples leave their fishing nets, but they don’t stop fishing. They are now, as the kingdom of Heaven comes closer, fishers for people. Their past hasn’t been obliterated; it’s been transformed by Jesus' call to follow. We know that they have given up much, but they have gained more.

The passage gives us a little context: Jesus begins his preaching in Capernaum. Shouldn't the Messiah have begun his work as he ended it, in Jerusalem? Why Capernaum? Why the land of the Gentiles?" And Gentiles here means not just the non-Jews, but the non-religious. We’re to be like Jesus and his immediate followers in that we’re to be a light to the Gentiles, ministers to those who‘ve not already had an encounter with God. Jesus locates himself amongst the people on the fringes. How many people do we know who are on the fringes? Capernaum was also strategically located on a crossroad connecting the two major trade routes between Egypt and Syria.  Then, as now, news travels fast along the super highways.  Whatever Jesus said and did in Capernaum was quick to be heard far and near.

John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist church, understood this text well when he wrote: “Christians are to go into the hills and dales, the highways and hedges, the markets, the fairs, the barns and the villages. Christians are to go out everywhere with the Gospel.” Indeed, to the people on the fringes. For two centuries, the Methodist church was good at doing this. Have we lost some of that urgency in our dealings with others? We don’t seem to be spending much time fishing anymore. We talk about the importance of evangelism; we pray about it, we preach sermons about the role of Jesus as saviour, but not many people are actively fishing anymore in our congregations.

Most mainline denominations, work under a broad assumption that the development of personal faith in Jesus has already occurred in people's lives elsewhere and that church growth merely involves assimilating these "already converted" into the ongoing life of the congregation: we have “back-to-church Sundays” for instance.

Most denominations are unprepared and ill-equipped to reach out to non-Christians and engage them in a process that leads to an active faith in Jesus Christ. We tend to see ourselves as nurturers of the faith, rather than as catalysts in any process of spiritual transformation in the lives of others. We seem to work on the basis that if we serve our own people well, outsiders will see this and want to become insiders. What’s often missing is any desire to find out about the spiritual needs of outsiders.

We are the fish and what God promises us, who are dragged out of the water in the nets to die, is a resurrection, a new life, a new family, a new future, all under God's control, all within the Kingdom of Heaven, which has come near in Jesus.

We have very little control over our own lives, but as fish caught in the net of God's love, we can trust that we’re under God's control. We have to believe that being captured by God's love, that responding to the command to repent and die to self, that being raised to a new life by God, is not only right for us, but a message we need to share with others.