Sermon 01/27/08 (Matthew 4:12-23)

“Gone Fishin’”
Matthew 4:12-23
Rev. Désirée H. Gold
St. Mark’s United Church of Christ, Baltimore, MD
Sunday, 27 January, 2008
Third Sunday after Epiphany

 If you’ve ever been fishing, or if you know someone who goes fishing, you will know that the fishing trip is somewhat of a sacred rite in American culture. The fishing trip requires weeks of planning, and men speak with reverence about their catches: 
“Hey Bob, I caught one THIS big last week!” “Aww, Jim, that’s nothin’, buddy! Mine was THIIIS big!!!” It is known as a legendary opportunity for male bonding, and a boy’s first fishing trip is seen as an initiation into manhood: “Son, the guys and I have decided to let you come on the annual fishing trip this year.” “Ah, REALLY, dad? Do you mean it?!” Up North (places where it’s 25˚ below zero, for example), people even brave the bitter cold of winter, sitting for hours in the middle of a lake in a tiny unheated shack, patiently awaiting a bite on their hook.

Yes, the fishing trip has an element of the sacred to it. It is common knowledge that a dedicated fisherman (or -woman) does not like to be interrupted while engaging in this sacred rite: “Shhh, the fish are biting!” Yes, if you interrupt a fisherman, your message had better be urgent! In today’s scripture lesson, Jesus does just that. He interrupts a group of fishermen and with just words, he turns their world upside down.

Granted, Simon and Andrew, James and John, were not out for the Galilean equivalent of the modern American fishing trip. For these four men, fishing was not a pleasant pastime but a necessary duty, their very livelihood. But would Jesus’ interruption seem any less rude or out of place to them? If someone were to show up at the office and say, “Leave your desk, follow me, because I have something else for you to do,” we would think the person was nuts! “Okay, first of all, who are you, and second of all, go away! Can’t you see I’m busy?!” We wouldn’t think of actually following this person who had interrupted our work day. Yet Simon and Andrew, James and John, immediately left their nets and followed Jesus.

How do we respond to Jesus’ call? Are you ready to just drop what you are doing and follow? And what is it Jesus is calling you to do? Regardless of where that call leads you, following Christ’s radical example can involve drastic life changes.

There are two aspects in which we are called to follow, to answer Christ. The first involves what we could call the “corporate” call, the call that begins with Jesus’ own words, “Repent, and believe in the good news!” This is the call we have all received as Christians. We are called to shift our lives to the lessons we hear throughout our scriptures: to help the poor, who are all around us. To embrace the outcasts, whoever they may be in our society. To truly love our neighbors -- even the ones who drive us crazy. In short, we have been called to not only read the gospel but to act upon it. By so doing, we will be able to “fish for people,” as we embody that which Jesus taught us.

Theologian Walter Brueggemann describes this aspect of Christ’s call as a complete rewriting of the modern American life script. In order to follow Christ we must let go of our greedy consumerism, our sense of entitlement, our need for safety, our assumption that everything should have an easy fix and that no issue is “so complex or so remote” that we humans cannot solve it. Brueggemann, in quoting the words of another preeminent theologian, Karl Barth, suggests that we have been called to enter “the strange new world of the Bible.” In Brueggemann’s words, we must realize “that there is at work among us a Truth that makes us safe, that makes us free, that makes us joyous in a way that the comfort and ease of the consumer economy cannot even imagine.” Once we realize that Truth, it will become easier to recognize the work to which Christ is calling us: to love the neighbor, to help the poor, to embrace the outcast, to do all of those things that seem so difficult when we read our scriptures.

This “corporate” call is of utmost importance if we are to make up our minds to follow Jesus. But there is another aspect of Christ’s call too. This involves our individual call, that which we need to discern both as congregations and as single human beings. While we are all called to help the poor, to embrace the outcast, to love our neighbors, it is important to discern where God is leading us to concentrate our energies. Will we, as a congregation, set up a food pantry (as several of you determined to do when two hungry men came to our church last Sunday), engage in health care ministry (as we do with the wellness center), support Earl’s Place, or do something else -- something that we’re not doing right now? As individuals, will we volunteer at such organizations or help those in need in some other way, such as donating goods or funds? ...Or will we speak out for the outcasts, either by making a specific effort to open our church doors wide or by finding other ways to reach out to those who struggle for acceptance in our society, whoever they may be? Or, will we concentrate on loving neighbors? Perhaps we will set up a ministry of mediation and reconciliation, or as individuals make a concerted effort to invite into our homes -- or at least reach out to -- the people we have the most difficulty loving.

Dropping what we are doing and following Jesus may involve a change in our career paths. For me, it involved a call to ordained ministry. For some, it will involve leaving a high-paying corporate job, or a job that seems nothing but drudgery, or a job in which we simply do not feel that we are living the life that Jesus is calling us to live. Or, as the church, it may involve changing our entire mission strategy, discerning what, as a congregation, Christ is calling us to do. Perhaps it will involve making the church building accessible to disabled people -- something it would be very good for us to do. Or it may involve doing something that we have always thought would be too difficult but that, nonetheless, our prayers tell us we are being called to do.

Regardless of whether answering the call will involve changing our jobs or how many chores we do around the house to help our parents, or our church buildings, or the programs we offer, it should involve a shift in our way of life, no matter how much we think we are already doing. Answering the call will involve dropping what we are doing and turning to God in prayer, beginning the difficult but all-important task of discerning that call. How will you help the poor? How will you welcome outcasts? How will you love your neighbor? And can you, will you answer, when Jesus calls? Are you able and are you willing to drop what you are doing and enter “the strange new world of the Bible”? Think about it. Pray about it. And listen. Now let us pray.