And Jesus, walking by the sea of Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers. And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. And they straightway left their nets, and followed him. And going on from thence, he saw other two brethren, James the son of Zebedee, and John his brother, in a ship with Zebedee their father, mending their nets; and he called them. And they immediately left the ship and their father, and followed him.
Matthew 4:18-22 (KJV)
Luke goes into more detail about this calling in Luke 5:4-11.
Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught. And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net. And when they had this done, they enclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake. And they beckoned unto their partners, which were in the other ship, that they should come and help them. And they came, and filled both the ships, so that they began to sink. When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord. For he was astonished, and all that were with him, at the draught of the fishes which they had taken: And so was also James, and John, the sons of Zebedee, which were partners with Simon. And Jesus said unto Simon, Fear not; from henceforth thou shalt catch men. And when they had brought their ships to land, they forsook all, and followed him.
There are several lessons in these passages of scripture but we will only address a couple of them in our time together today.
First, Christ told Simon Peter in Luke 5:4, “...Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.” It is important to understand that before any “fishing of men” is begun, we must have Christ by our side and we must follow His directions. We must “launch out into the deep.” Having a shallow or lukewarm experience with Christ will only produce shallow, if any, results. We must also go expecting to see spectacular results [...let down your nets for a draught (a draught is a large haul of fish)]. Also implied here is that we must go with no pre-conceived notions of what type of “fish” will end up in our net. Only God knows the spiritual condition of a person’s heart; and only He sends the convicting Spirit to that person. Let us not be guilty of frustrating the Holy Ghost by trying to “second guess” who will or will not be a good Christian candidate. Let us accept every one that God has put in the net.
Second, if we want to do great things for Christ, we must be spiritually prepared to go where and when Christ tells us to go. Simon offered the following excuse, “Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing:” No doubt Simon Peter was tired and had given his best effort in trying to catch a haul of fish that night. He also no doubt was very familiar with his field of labor, the Sea of Galilee. Isn’t that the way it is with us sometimes? We seemingly give it our best effort (trying to do it on our own, leaving Christ out of the picture); and then wonder why we see no results. Fortunately, Simon didn’t stop there but went a little further in his statement, “nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net.” When Christ comes on the scene, no matter how tired we are; no matter how familiar we think we are with the neighborhood we are trying to win to Christ; if we are obedient to His command, we are sure to see spectacular results. Praise the Lord!
Let us look at some of these spectacular results as recorded in Scripture:
In the second chapter of Acts, on the day of Pentecost, after the outpouring of the Holy Ghost, the Apostle Peter preached a powerful message which resulted in 3,000 souls being added to The Church of God. It didn’t stop there. Verse 47 tells us that, “...the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved.”
In the third and fourth chapters of Acts we see where Peter and John proclaimed to the lame man at the gate called Beautiful, “...In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth rise up and walk” (Acts 3:6). Again Peter preached another powerful message and “Howbeit many of them which heard the word believed; and the number of the men was about five thousand” (Acts 4:4).
Acts 5:12-16 tells us “And by the hands of the apostles were many signs and wonders wrought among the people;...And believers were the more added to the Lord, multitudes both of men and women. Insomuch that they brought forth the sick into the streets, and laid them on beds and couches, that at the least the shadow of Peter passing by might overshadow some of them. There came also a multitude out of the cities round about unto Jerusalem, bringing sick folks, and them which were vexed with unclean spirits: and they were healed every one.”
Of course we cannot omit the spectacular event recorded in the tenth chapter of Acts with the outpouring of the Holy Ghost upon the Gentiles. This opened the door of opportunity for all of us to partake of the wonderful blessings provided by the blood of Jesus Christ!
We could go on and on of the many spectacular events recorded in Scripture of God’s wonderful grace that is available to all mankind. Saints, this same power is with us today if we will only exercise it as Peter and the rest of the apostles did in their day. Do not let Satan defeat us with the lie that the power recorded in Scripture was only for the Apostle’s day. It is just as powerful today as it ever was – all we have to do is “Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.”
Let us become “fishers of men!”
Originally published in the May and June 2013 issues of the “Arise Shine” publication.
