"Do You Fish?" Sermon: Matthew 4:18-22

“Do You Fish?”

[Matthew 4:18-22]  

March 4, 2012 Second Reformed Church

            Last week we began looking at five foci – or principles – of church growth.  The first principle, which we looked at last week, is the Word of God must be central to our lives and worship if we are to grow as individuals and the Church.  We must have a Bible, read our Bibles, believe our Bibles, and obey what God has said in our Bibles.

            We also noted that when we talk about “church growth,” we do not merely mean increasing the number of people who attend any given worship service or increasing the amount of money in the offering plate.  We saw that God tells us that it is God’s job to “add[] to [our] number” (Acts 2:47b. ESV).

            God is Sovereign over salvation; we cannot force people to believe and become part of the Church.  We’ll say more about that in a minute.  However, lest we go to the opposite extreme, let us understand that you and I – but especially you – must be engaged in evangelism.  In fact, that is our second foci or principle:  if we are to grow as individuals and the Church, we must obey Jesus’ Command to evangelize.  If we are to grow as individuals and the Church, we must obey Jesus’ Command to evangelize.

            Well, what does that mean?

            In the section of Scripture just before this morning’s text, we read that Jesus spent forty days in the wilderness preparing Himself for His Ministry.  Once that time was up, He came out of the wilderness and chose twelve men to be His inner circle – the apostles.  Our text concerns the call of the first four apostles, though what we learn here applies to all.

            “While walking by the Sea of Galilee, he saw two brothers, Simon (who is called Peter) and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen. And he said to them, ‘Follow me,’”

            Let us understand first this morning that Jesus commands the apostles – and us – to follow Him.

            The phrase that is translated “follow me” in our text is in the imperative – it is a command.  Jesus does not say, “If you guys would like to follow Me, I will do this and that.”  He does not ask them, “Hey guys, would you like to follow Me and be part of my new ministry?”  What Jesus said, literally, is “You, get over here, get behind me.”

            Jesus commanded Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John to follow Him.  And this would not have been as shocking as it may seem today.  In that day, teachers were often peripatetics – that is, the teacher walked around town, and his disciples – his followers – his students would follow behind him, listening, learning, and interacting with their teacher.  Walking behind the teacher was a sign of respect:  the teacher leads, because he is the teacher.

            This method of commanding the student to follow may have been strong, but it was not unheard of, and it is how we understand biblical salvation.  Jesus said, “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him. And I will raise him up on the last day” (John 6:44, ESV).  They key word is “draw,” and we often read this as though Jesus said that the Father “entices” or “woos” a person to salvation.  For example, “Hello, woo-hoo, would you, could, you, please believe in Me?”

            But that is not what the word means.  Here, the word “draw” comes from the imagery of pulling a heavy, full bucket of water up from the bottom of a deep well – you draw the water up, and from the imagery of dragging a fugitive into court – you draw him into the court.  In both cases, the word could be translated “drag” and means “compelled.”  We compel a bucket full of water to come up from the bottom of the well, and we compel a fugitive to come to court.  Similarly, God compels us to believe – to salvation. “No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me [compels] him.”

            We noted last week that no one comes to God of his or her own free will:  we naturally hate God and seek to run away from Him and rebel against Him.  God has to go after those He has chosen to be His and drag us back to Him, changing out our heart of stone and replacing it with a heart of flesh. God said, “And I will give them one heart, and a new spirit I will put within them. I will remove the heart of stone from their flesh and give them a heart of flesh,”

(Ezekiel 11:19, ESV).

            Jesus commanded the apostles to come and follow in a similar way that God commands us to come to Him in salvation.  We are compelled to believe and follow Jesus, just as these fishermen were.

            “’ and I will make you’”

            Let us understand, secondly, that Jesus promises to empower – to make – the apostles – and us – exactly who He wants us to be – and able to do what He wants us to do.  God empowers us through the giving of God the Holy Spirit, and then we receive grace to do the work God calls us to through the reading and hearing of the Word of God preached, through the Sacraments – including the Lord’s Supper, which we plan to receive this morning, through prayer, and so forth.

            Jesus said, “I did not say these things to you from the beginning, because I was with you. But now I am going to him who sent me, and none of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ But because I have said these things to you, sorrow has filled your heart. Nevertheless, I tell you the truth: it is to your advantage that I go away, for if I do not go away, the Helper will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. And when he comes, he will convict the world concerning sin and righteousness and judgment: concerning sin, because they do not believe in me; concerning righteousness, because I go to the Father, and you will see me no longer; concerning judgment, because the ruler of this world is judged.

            “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you” (John 16:4-15, ESV).

            Jesus promises to equip them for the work.  The work that Jesus called the apostles to in this passage – and calls us to as well – is work that we cannot do on our own – Jesus makes us able to do this work.  And Jesus gives us the Holy Spirit to be taught and guided as Christians.

            “fishers of men.”

            Thirdly, Jesus made them “fishers of men.”

            Have you ever been fishing?  When I was young, my father would take me fishing in Cape May.  We would walk out on the jetties and cast our line out into the sea – and on a few occasions, we also went out in a boat.  You put food or an attractive lure on the line, throw it in the water, and wait for something to bite.

            Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John, practiced a larger scale of fishing, where they would throw nets into the water and wait to see what would swim into it and get caught in it, and then they would haul the fish in.

            Notice, neither with a fishing line, nor with a net, does the fisherman try to convince the fish to put the hook on or to swim into the net.  No fisherman will ever lean over the boat and say “Here fishy, fishy, come into the net I’ve set out for you – bite the hook on my line.”  No, what they do is throw out the line or net and wait.  They do not cause the fish to bite the hook or swim into the net.  They cast out and patiently wait.

            The same is true with evangelism – with fishing for men, which is why Jesus used the expression.  We are to throw out the line and wait for God to draw – compel – a person to it.  The line that we throw out – the net that we throw out – is the Gospel.  Our job is to tell people the Gospel – that’s being a fisher of men.  God draws – drags – the people in as He will.  Evangelism is not about getting one more person to pray “the sinner’s prayer” – it is to clearly present the Gospel and see what God does with it.

            And you might be saying to yourself, “It’s all well and good for the apostles to tell people about the Gospel, and it’s all well and good for you to tell people about the Gospel, but that’s not my thing.  I don’t know how to do it.  I’m not comfortable telling other people anything about Jesus.  Anyway, isn’t it the pastor’s job to do the evangelism?”

            And so we need to understand that God has called – commanded – all Christians to be evangelists.  Everyone here who believes savingly in Jesus must tell others the Gospel.  Where does it say that?

            Listen to these Scriptures:

            The first two texts were spoken to the eleven apostles, but we understand what Jesus said to apply to all Christians throughout time, as we see in Scripture – in texts like the others I will read following it:

            “And he said to them, ‘Go into all the world and proclaim the gospel to the whole creation’” (Mark 16:15, ESV).

“And Jesus came and said to them, ‘All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age’” (Matthew 28:18-20, ESV).

            “And there arose on that day [the day of Stephen’s martyrdom] a great persecution against the church in Jerusalem, and they were all scattered throughout the regions of Judea and Samaria, except the apostles. Devout men buried Stephen and made great lamentation over him. But Saul was ravaging the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison” (Acts 8:1-3, ESV).

            “Now those who were scattered because of the persecution that arose over Stephen traveled as far as Phoenicia and Cyprus and Antioch, speaking the word to no one except Jews. But there were some of them, men of Cyprus and Cyrene, who on coming to Antioch spoke to the Hellenists also, preaching the Lord Jesus. And the hand of the Lord was with them, and a great number who believed turned to the Lord” (Acts 11:19-21, ESV).

            The example we receive of the text is that all of the Christians of the early Church applied Jesus’ Command to evangelize to themselves.  They recognized that evangelism is the duty of every Christian.  Every Christian must tell other people the Gospel.

            If we are to grow as individuals and the Church, we must obey Jesus’ Command to evangelize.  If we are to grow as individuals and the Church, we must obey Jesus’ Command to tell other people the Gospel.

            Remember, evangelism is not getting someone to commit to anything, much less get them to convert to Christianity.  Remember, conversion is God’s job, not ours.  We do not have the authority or the ability to cause someone to convert.  We do, however, have the command, and the ability – given to us by Jesus through God the Holy Spirit Who lives in us – to evangelize – to tell other people the Gospel.

            So, fourth, we see, we must know what the Gospel is!

            What is the Gospel?  Paul gives, perhaps, the briefest summary in I Corinthians:  “For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep” (1 Corinthians 15:3-6, ESV).

            The Gospel is relating something that happened in history.  You don’t need to be a great theologian to tell someone what the Gospel is – you could even be a fisherman.    Here’s the Gospel:  Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.  Can you remember that?  Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.  Do you believe it?  Evangelism is telling those historical facts to others.  And all Christians must tell others.

            “I can’t do it,” some of you are thinking.  I am too inhibited to go door to door and tell people.  I’m not good at talking to strangers.

            Evangelism is not about going door to door.  Do you know any of your neighbors?  Do you have any friends?  Do you know the name of your mail carrier, or the clerks at the stores where you shop?  Do you ever talk to any of these people?  Do they know you are a Christian?  Have you ever said, “Would you like to visit my church, we give away free food”?

            If the people you are regularly in contact with have no idea you’re a Christian, something is wrong.  They should know by the way you act and the things you say.

            Every Christian is commanded to tell those few historical facts.  Then it’s God’s job what He does with them.  Our job is to tell people:  Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.

            Let me give you and unexpected example:  On Wednesday, I went to Whole Foods to get some information and a couple of items that are not available in the other stores I shop in.  I said “hello” to the healthy food specialist, whom I met at a book signing in February.  Since February, I have attended some of her healthy cooking classes, and most of the time I was wearing my clerics, so she knew I am a minster.  I had said nothing to her about the church or the Gospel – until Wednesday, when she asked, “May I ask you a question about religion?”

            I spent the next hour and a half listening to her story, and I told her that we believe that everyone is a sinner, and because we are sinners, we are separated from God, and we can’t make things right.  I told her that I preach and we believe that Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.   She asked a few questions related to her story, and thanked me for talking with her, and I gave her my card and invited her to worship with us.

            That’s evangelism.  I didn’t give her any fancy theological stuff.  I didn’t press her for a decision.  I told her that God and humans have a problem, and the only way to make things right is to believe that Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.  What God does with that is up to God.  But, I told her the Gospel and I left it open to her to ask more questions.

            Are you able to do that?  Repeat after me:  Jesus came to earth.  Lived.  Died for our sins.  And physically rose from the dead.  Again:    Jesus came to earth.  Lived.  Died for our sins.  And physically rose from the dead.  One more time:  Jesus came to earth.  Lived.  Died for our sins.  And physically rose from the dead.  Have you got it?  Are you able to say that to someone that you know well?  If not, can you say, “I’d like you to visit my church, my pastor has something he wants to say to you”?

            “Immediately they left their nets and followed him. And going on from there he saw two other brothers, James the son of Zebedee and John his brother, in the boat with Zebedee their father, mending their nets, and he called them. Immediately they left the boat and their father and followed him” (Matthew 4:18-22, ESV).

            Fifth, and finally, let us notice that the fishermen:  Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John, followed Jesus immediately.  They immediately knew the authority in His Voice and followed Him as He commanded.

            What about us?  When Jesus commands us to do something, do we immediately drop everything – even the very life that we were leading – to follow Him?  Are we ready and willing to drop everything when Jesus calls?  Can we do any less for God Who became human and allowed Himself to be put to death for us – for our sins – and then physically rose from the dead, so we would be right with God?

            In our text, we see five things:

            Jesus commands us to follow Him.

            Jesus gives us the indwelling of God the Holy Spirit, and with Him equips us to do everything He has commanded us to do.

            Jesus has commanded us to be “fishers of men” – evangelists.

            That means we are to tell others the Gospel:  Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.

            And since Jesus is our Savior, we ought to obey Him immediately.

            Brothers and sisters, if we are to grow as individuals and the Church, we must obey Jesus’ Command to evangelize.  If we are to grow as individuals and the Church, we must obey Jesus’ Command to tell others the Gospel:  Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.

            Let us pray:

            Almighty God, we are intimidated by the task of evangelism.  Forgive us for our sin, and give us the grace to be able to open our mouths and say, “Jesus came to earth, lived, died for our sins, and physically rose from the dead.”  Increase our love for others that we would pray and desire to let others know the only way to be right with You.  As we receive the bread and the cup in the Sacrament of the Lord’s Supper, put those words in our mouths, give us love abounding, so this week – and even this very day – we would have the opportunity and would, indeed, tell others the Gospel.  In Jesus’ Name, Amen.