2020.01.26 | Fishing Methods
Today’s scripture reading about Jesus calling Peter and Andrew to come and fish for people reminds me that I haven’t fished for fish for years. I think the last time I went fishing was when my daughter Lia was about five or six years old. For some reason unknown to her father and myself, she became intensely interested in learning to fish. So we bought her an inexpensive rod and reel and found a few places in the Bay Area where she could do a little bank fishing. I think Pastor Arlene even took her to Lake Chabot once when the rod and reel were first new. Before that, my most successful fishing adventure was when my older brother Bob took me trout fishing in a remote part of Oregon and we caught enough trout to have a very delicious dinner over a simple campfire.
If you read today’s Bible story carefully, you note that the brothers Peter and Andrew were casting nets, a time-honored method of fishing that is still used the world over. Despite seeing them engaged in what was probably their daily living, Jesus calls them to follow, for he will make them fishers, not of fish, but of people. And, remarkably, they drop their nets and follow in what many a Bible student has called an act of radical obedience. Radical, because as Gospel of Matthew tells the story, Peter and Andrew have little or no reason to trust Jesus, having never seen him preach, teach, or heal prior to his simple command that they drop their nets and become fishers of people.
There’s something compelling about this story and about what Jesus says: I will make you fishers of people. Over time, many Christians have taken up this invitation to Peter and Andrew and made it their own, taking it as the essence of their own call or mission in the world today. They are fishers of people, spreading the Christian faith far and wide, in the hope of attracting others to their faith and to their church. And some of these people who take this “fishers of people” approach most seriously are quite successful at collecting whole schools, if not teaming oceans, of fish-people to them.
If you doubt this, take a peek sometime at the Wikipedia page for mega-churches in America which claims there are 1,500 churches with average weekly attendance over 2,000 people and that there are 50 churches, sometimes called giga-churches, with average weekly attendance between 10,000 and 47,000. And, there are about 80 churches here in California, including many right here in the Bay Area, with an average attendance between 2,000 and 5,000. As I said, fishing for church-goers is serious business for some and some catch not just schools of fish-people, but teaming oceans of fish-people.
But before the question of how or why catches us and swirls us in an all too familiar whirlpool of speculation about why some churches grow and some churches contract, let’s take a step back and review what we know about fishing in general and see if it gives us any insight into how we, both as individuals and as a church, might want to consciously respond to Jesus’ invitation to Peter and Andrew to be fishers of people.
First, there are many methods of fishing. For our purpose of thinking about Jesus’ call, I’ll divide them into three categories: 1) illegal methods, 2) legal but extremely challenging methods, and 3) common & effective methods.
Illegal fishing methods include:
Cyanide Fishing: A deadly chemical is hosed by divers into a fishing area to stun the fish and make them easier to catch live for sale either for consumption or aquariums. The downside is that the residual cyanide almost always hurts the target fish, surrounding organisms, and coral. Not unlike conservative mega-churches that disguise their teachings behind rock music and talk show-style preaching.
Blast Fishing: Fishers on shore or in boats drop dynamite into water bodies, using its concussive power to stun or kill the fish so that they float to the surface and can be scooped with a net. Again, the downside is damage to the surrounding ecosystem, but also overfishing and harm to the fishers themselves. Not unlike Christians who use a “you’re going to hell” salvation theology to frighten people into their faith and to exclude those who are non-conforming.
Bottom Trawling: An extremely destructive fishing method where a massive, weighted net is dragged along the seafloor, capturing fish and destroying everything in its path. Not unlike when conservative Christians plow their teachings into local or national politics and negatively affect the rights of women to their bodies, the safety and security of children, the rights of LGBTQ people as well as the rights of people of other faiths and immigrants. Like the bottom trawler in action, their very particular Christian world view trumps all other life.
There are many more illegal methods of fishing, but let’s turn to a few that are legal but challenging.
Fly Fishing: A beloved past-time of the hobbyist which requires special rods and lures and a casting technique that takes some practice to perfect as it simulates the lightest touch of the fly on the surface of the water. The danger here is that the fisher is often lost to the contemplative art and skill of fly fishing, just as the Biblical scholar is sometimes lost to all but the history, tradition, and literature of the Gospel.
Deep Sea Fishing: A favorite recreational fishing past time that involves boarding a boat, travelling far out to sea, some very specialized equipment, including a heavy duty rod, a chair with a seatbelt and a winch, all in the hopes of landing one big fish. Not unlike the well-equipped evangelist who travels to a distant country with the hopes of converting its President; success is not completely unimaginable but the productivity is questionable.
Ice Fishing: You can use fairly standard fishing equipment but you need a frozen lake and a way to safely cut a circle in the ice. It reminds me of the man who cut a hole in the ice, looked down, and heard a voice say: There’s no fish there. So he moved a couple of yards and cut another hole, looked down, and heard the voice say again: There’s no fish there. He decided to try one more time and the same thing happened, so he yelled: Is that you, God? And the voice replied: No, but I am the rink manager. Like a lot of things all kinds of churches are doing now to appeal to younger people, it sometimes seems like a lot of work in all the wrong places.
There are other legal but challenging methods but let’s turn to my last category: common & effective methods of fishing. There are many but two are tried and true, tested by families for generations:
Bank Fishing or simple rod & reel fishing: It can get expensive & complicated but usually, it’s affordable and just as simple as putting bait on a hook and dropping or casting the line into water. The tricky part is figuring out what the fish are biting, which highly dependent on what’s not available in their surrounding ecosystem. Like local ministry, the art of bank fishing may focus on being able to discern what people need in the local area.
Nets: The ancient art of fishing with nets involves watching carefully for fish and then and only then spreading a clean and well-cared net over them, as if to say: these are mine; I’ve got them covered. Jesus not only recruited net-fishers, he himself was a quintessential net fisher, often pointing out to his disciples where people really were, what they needed, and in many cases, covering them himself with the fling of his arm.
If these are our fishing methods – illegal, legal but challenging, and common & effective – I will choose common & effective every time. I do not believe we can be fishers of people unless we see and respond to what people need, be it food, fellowship, friends, or a little help with language, law, or liberty – and we do so without harm toward others or the world in which we live.
All this is just food for thought about what it means to be a fisher of people, because, all metaphor aside, people aren’t fish to be caught or food but people with hearts and minds and ears of their own. As I was studying today’s scripture and Jesus’ invitation to Peter and Andrew to become fishers of people, I was struck by two thoughts often offered by Bible scholars about this passage.
First, it’s commonly acknowledged that Jesus and his followers as well as the early Christians who heard this story were undoubtedly familiar with a long tradition in Judaism and in the surrounding pagan religions of using fishing metaphors to describe how God calls people to new lives and new work. They would have recognized that through Jesus, God was at work. And, second, if this is a recognizable story of God’s call, how remarkable the effect of Jesus’ two words “follow me” on Peter and Andrew and on the history of Christianity.
My friends, at the invitation of Jesus, we too are fishers of people, recipients not just of a metaphor but of a tradition of being called to follow Jesus and to respond to God. We make it complicated, sometimes too complicated. I invite you to remember your own call and how and when you decided to follow Christ and/or adopt the values of compassion and justice he represents for our world. There is no bait, no lure, and no explosive as powerful as the word of Christ to change lives. May you listen to him, may you embrace and share his words, and may you be, in your own way, in your own method, a fisher of people for a God who calls each and every one of us. Amen.