“Jesus Christ: Manifestation of God’s Callings”

The Fifth Sunday Of Epiphany – February 7, 2010

Judges 6: 11 - 24a/Psalm 85: 7 – 13/1Corinthians 15: 1 – 11/Luke 5: 1 – 11

Archbishop Loren Thomas Hines, D. D.

The gospel today speaks to us of hope.  It shares with us the provision of God in our lives.  It is amazing how that in our walk with God, as with our walk in every part of our lives, we really feel that what we do is our ability, is our energy, that causes things to prosper and to happen.  But in the lessons today that we read, each one of them share with the necessity of realizing that our strength, our wisdom, and all things come from God, through Christ to our lives.  That if anything good does happen, it is because He is at work within us. 

The story of Jesus at the lake of Gennesaret is amazing.  He saw two empty boats on the shore. Boats that had been used all night long have not brought in any results from a tremendous amount of labor and work.  They were empty.  They sat there as a declaration and a proclamation of man’s inability to accomplish a task on his own.  It speaks to us, it warns us, and it guides us that when we do things on our own energies, on our own inabilities, on our own mental capacities, the end result is emptiness.  It may seem that on a surface, there may be some success, but yet as we look at the reality of it, there is no fulfillment.  There is no satisfaction. There is this hunger, this desire for more and more.  We are never satisfied because we have not reached that place of fulfillment.

Jesus gets into one of the boats and He asks Simon Peter to take the boat at a little raise so that He could use the boat to minister to the people.  He wanted a little distance so that they would not crowd Him; they would not push upon Him.  He wanted them to relax, and He wanted to have the ability to minister to them freely.  Peter pushes the boat out just a little bit.  Jesus uses the boat, which was incapable of bringing forth a harvest all night long, with Peter’s permission and cooperation to minister to the crowd.  It does not give us an understanding of exactly what happened in that ministry. But every time Jesus ministered, great things happened so we can be assured that some awesome events were taking place.  It says that when He finished ministering, He said to Simon Peter, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.”  The response of Simon Peter was, “Master, we worked hard all night and caught nothing.”  Does this not sound like our lives?  Does this not sound like our efforts that we put into the things around us?  We think that we are doing great things.  We push hard yet the results are so shallow, so empty, so unfulfilling.  Peter said to Jesus, “At your bidding, I will let down the nets.” Peter heard the voice of Jesus, he heard the call, and he obeyed.  He went out deep.

Perhaps this speaks to us in the way we live our lives today because in most of our lives, we are not into the deep.  We are in the shallow.  We do not want a lot of responsibilities.  We don’t want a lot of energy that we must invest in something – in thoughts or in the work that goes into something that is very difficult and hard.  We want to just take it easy. We’ve come away from the things that have taken a lot of our energies and thoughts, and we find ourselves the easy way, the thing that doesn’t cause us much, or doesn’t take much of our efforts.  But Jesus said to Peter, “Get out into the deep water.” 

In Romans 11:33 it says, “Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!”  Here is where the depth is – knowing God’s ways; following God’s ways even though it seems that it is not acceptable where we are.  It means a deep commitment. It means a giving of all.  From the very beginning of Scripture, this is what we have been told, “You shall worship the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your mind, and with all your energy, your effort.”  This is what God wants of us – our all. He wants us out of the deep.  But for some reason, we find that so exhausting, that it takes so much of our time and our efforts and so we don’t put our whole self into our relationship with God – knowing Him, understanding Him, and walking in His ways.  We prefer the shallow that here in this particular story, Peter and the men had fished the shallow all night long.  There were no results.  They had put all their energies into that shallowness.  But Jesus said to Peter, “Go out into the deep.”  He did and when he put down his net,  when he followed the example of Christ, and when he followed the instructions of Christ, the fish were so many in the net that the net began to break. He had to call his companions to come and help him.  The depth, the deep water – giving of our all.  Not just getting our feet wet, but going in over our heads, giving our all to God.  Peter shows us the attitude that needs to come from us.  “I am not taking any credit for this.”  When he saw what had happened, he said to Jesus, “Depart from me for I am a sinner.”  He realized his efforts were of little value. He realized that all he had done was done out of self – rebellion against the principles of God.

In the story of Gideon in Judges, it is very much the same type of scenario.  Israel was in deep trouble because they were disobedient to God.  God had allowed Midian to take over and Midian was treating them cruelly.  Israel was crying out for God to deliver them.  The Midianites were taking away everything.  When a crop would come for harvest time, they would come in and take the crops – whether it was the wheat, the barley, the grapes, the oxen – whatever it was.  Whenever they were at a point of harvest or maturity, the Midianites would come and take them, leaving Israel with nothing.  We see the picture of Gideon deceitfully putting the wheat into the place where the wine should have been.  He was taking the wheat to its process, grinding it to make it ready to be used. He was doing it so that the Midianites, when they would see him, would not know what he was doing.  The angel of the Lord comes to Gideon and says to him, “The Lord is with you, O valiant warrior.”  Gideon responds and says, “What do you mean valiant warrior?  Look at me. Look at the situation we are in. Why do you say this to us?” The angel responds to him, “The Lord is going to use you to deliver Israel from the Midianites.”  The response of Gideon is, “My family is poor, and I am the youngest of the family. How can I be of value? How can I do this?”  The angel said, “Because the Lord is with you, I am with you. You shall defeat Midian as one man.”  We know the story that Gideon defeated Midian. Even though he was the youngest and was weak, he listened to the voice and the calling of the Lord.  As the Lord was there with him, he was obedient.  Yes, he made some mistakes. He was struggling to get to this point.  He was obedient and because the Lord was with him, he delivered Israel from Midian.

Paul also tells us in his writing in 1Corinthians how that it wasn’t his ability – even though he came from a great background; even though he had much education and his family was well known.  He admitted, “By the grace of God, I am what I am.” He was acknowledging God as the Source; acknowledging Him as that part of our lives that literally brings into us the ability to accomplish the impossible.  This week, in our meeting with the Bishops, the Patriarch said that God spoke to him and said to him, “Expect the impossible.   Not by your ability, not by your power, not by your schemes and your wisdom but because I have called you.  I have set you in order and I will accomplish My purpose and My will.”   Can we begin to see this hope that this brings to us instead of looking at our own abilities and our own efforts and trying our best to achieve the something that will impress others?  Realizing that which we have been able to accomplish without the grace of God, without God’s grace poured forth in us?

I love it when it says in 1Corinthians 15:10, “His grace toward me did not prove vain.”  In Ephesians, it says that God has given us grace upon grace, but it is we who have to be willing to hear the voice.  We have to be willing to go out to the deep.  We have to be willing to set the course and the direction in our lives. Otherwise, like Peter and his friends, we are going to spend time so much time and so much effort in getting things done and yet we end up with nothing.  Look at the example in the Gospel.  Peter and his friends were fishing all night long; but when they were obedient to God, just letting down the nets, they couldn’t handle the results.   Just being obedient to God – setting the principles of God’s ways; not following the worlds’ system; not bowing down to its deception; not bowing down to its fraud, but setting in our own lives the very commandments, the laws of God as the foundation of life.

We see how that in our lives, the easiest and the simplest effort, sometimes so easy, brings the greatest results.  When we have worked hard on our own schemes, our own thoughts, and our own ways, and trying to build ourselves or trying to gain esteem from others, it doesn’t work.  Even if at a time we reach that point where people look at us and bow to us, we come to a point in our lives that we lose it all because it was of us.  When Christ calls us, He also equips us. He empowers us.  That empty boat becomes a source of ability, of abundance.  It is a story of the church; it is a story of God’s commitment to man.  Even though the church was seemingly empty, when Christ came and got into the boat, the church began to be effective in changing the world. 

It speaks to us of the hope that we have in Christ, if only we will walk with Him. If only we will find ourselves committed to Him. “By the grace of God, I am what I am.  His grace did not prove vain.”  This is the hope that we have in our lives.  Peter and his brothers left the fishing and they went to walk with Christ.  Notice it was when things were going well with them that they left their profession for the work for the Lord.  It wasn’t because they could not make it.  It wasn’t because everything was confusing or empty. The boat was sinking.  The nets were breaking. Great was their prosperity. You would think that they would think, “Do you imagine what we can do tomorrow if we did this today?  Tomorrow can even be greater than today.  We can go out fishing deeper. Look at what could be.”  But they realize that prosperity came because of God in their lives.  They immediately left their boats and followed Christ.  I believe that this challenges us in our lives as we live the way of the world, the system that man has set.  If we begin to walk with Christ, we begin to see that God, by His grace, will cause great things to happen in our lives.  Peter, a fisherman, becomes the head of the Church because he listens to God.  And the grace of God, brings into his life ability, hope and fulfillment.  May we listen to Him.  May it not be that we look at our own abilities, or our capabilities, thoughts and talents, but we realize that we have all been called to be royal priesthood.  We have all been called to be a holy nation. And God will give us the grace to fulfill the calling.  And in so fulfilling the calling, the catch, the effect upon the community, the nation, will be great because we have listened to God.

In our meeting with the Bishops each morning, we, the Bishops, met in a chapel that is dedicated to prisoners that were being restored.  We were told that in this particular compound, there were one thousand prisoners. They are being trained.  They are out of the actual prison, and they are in a separate compound which has very little security.   They are taught and trained the ways of God.  Some of these men had been imprisoned for thirty to thirty-five years. Coming out and being trained, they are becoming to be useful citizens.  Their lives are becoming fulfilled.  I have talked to some of them personally, and I know that for many years, there were awesome changes in their lives.  On Thursday morning, in our worship, several of the prisoners were the ones who were playing the instruments for our worship.  They were in prison uniforms.  But the one who was playing the piano had such freedom – such an awesome freedom to express himself.  We sat in awe as we listened to him play.  It was as though as he had no hindrances, no problems in his life at all because out of the innermost being – his thanksgiving, his honor toward God – gave him the freedom to play like many professionals would play.  It opened the door to be able to worship the freedom because he had this freedom.  He was not bound, and he just let it flow out of his life.  Yet, in our understanding, he was incarcerated.  You look at the uniform. He is not free as far as his flesh is concerned, but he knows one thing:  God has forgiven him; God has restored him; God has made him a new creation and he has that freedom to express it in his worship.

If only we would understand the freedom that God has given to us. If only we would understand that He has taken away all the sin and the iniquity and He has brought into our lives His joy, and His peace.  It will open the door for us to be able to let Him be the Lord of our lives.  No fears, no anxieties.  No need to hold back because He has done so much for me. What can I not do for Him?  This story speaks so clear to us.  Listen to God. Be obedient to Him. Move out into the deep and He will bring the harvest of greatness into the Church and into our lives. May we listen to Him.  Let His grace be in our lives and bring forth His glory.