Is 6:1-2a, 3-8
In the year King Uzziah died,
I saw the Lord seated on a high and lofty throne,
with the train of his garment filling the temple.
Seraphim were stationed above.
They cried one to the other,
“Holy, holy, holy is the LORD of hosts!
All the earth is filled with his glory!”
At the sound of that cry, the frame of the door shook
and the house was filled with smoke.
Then I said, “Woe is me, I am doomed!
For I am a man of unclean lips,
living among a people of unclean lips;
yet my eyes have seen the King, the LORD of hosts!”
Then one of the seraphim flew to me,
holding an ember that he had taken with tongs from the altar.
He touched my mouth with it, and said,
“See, now that this has touched your lips,
your wickedness is removed, your sin purged.”
Then I heard the voice of the Lord saying,
“Whom shall I send? Who will go for us?”
“Here I am,” I said; “send me!”
Lk 5:1-11
While the crowd was pressing in on Jesus and listening to the word of God,
he was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret.
He saw two boats there alongside the lake;
the fishermen had disembarked and were washing their nets.
Getting into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon,
he asked him to put out a short distance from the shore.
Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.
After he had finished speaking, he said to Simon,
“Put out into deep water and lower your nets for a catch.”
Simon said in reply,
“Master, we have worked hard all night and have caught nothing,
but at your command I will lower the nets.”
When they had done this, they caught a great number of fish
and their nets were tearing.
They signaled to their partners in the other boat
to come to help them.
They came and filled both boats
so that the boats were in danger of sinking.
When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus and said,
“Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man.”
For astonishment at the catch of fish they had made seized him
and all those with him,
and likewise James and John, the sons of Zebedee,
who were partners of Simon.
Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid;
from now on you will be catching men.”
When they brought their boats to the shore,
they left everything and followed him.
BACKGROUNDER
Jesus causes a very specific miracle for Simon Peter, his brother Andrew, and their friends, James and John. They are fisherman, who caught nothing that night. Jesus commands Peter to set out into the deep. There they have a huge catch of fish.
Something in Simon Peter becomes aware that he is in the presence of God. How would you feel if you were seeing God face to face? Peter realizes his sinfulness before God. His unworthiness is so overwhelming that he tells Jesus to depart from him, because he is sinful. We may also feel so ashamed by our sinfulness that we might want God to go from us.
Sin itself is a bitter fruit of our fallen human condition. We are each responsible for every sinful thing we do: our thoughts, our words, our actions, our desires. Sin includes our failure to do the things which we should do. All of us are under the power of sin, ever since original sin, the first human turning away from God. Our unworthiness to even approach God is real, and something which we cannot deal with.
We are all like Peter, when we are stuck in sin, and even worse, in shame. In the Old Testament, we see the same thing going on when Isaiah calls himself doomed, and unclean, when God appears to him in the Temple of Jerusalem.
We need to see the miracle of the fish in this light. Jesus reveals his divine power to Peter and the other fishermen – that’s why we hear of their astonishment – so that they can begin to learn that their unworthiness is not the end of the story.
Consider that his words to Peter are also words addressed to all of us sinners. First, Jesus says, “Do not be afraid”. These words of Jesus promise us all freedom from sin and shame. No matter our sin, or our shame, there is a way out: Jesus is the way, the only way. How would you feel if you knew that you are able to be set free? How would you feel if you know that God himself wanted to set you free? Jesus will give his life for us to open the way.
Interestingly, this is not enough. Jesus tells Peter that he will be catching men. Peter, once he has been set free, will then be drawn into Jesus’s mission. His personal salvation draws him into Jesus’s mission of setting people free. A day will come when Peter will be sent out by Jesus, in the power of the Holy Spirit, to proclaim freedom to all sinners.
There is the most amazing invitation in this encounter. You and I can also be set free from sin and shame. We can draw near to God, who draws near to us in Jesus. We too can be given the power to become fishers of men, to help set others free.