Fish Story

“Follow me.”

It wasn’t about striving to make one’s way through the world, an immense journey that ends in satisfaction or disenchantment; it was about Jesus first two words to the disciples that spoke entire worlds to those who would be disciples.  Follow me.  At this point, forget about leading, working on five year projections or mission statements or any other kind of tomfoolery that gets in the way of the correct positioning to Jesus.  The immediacy of Jesus statement still resounds to this very day.  It’s about following – practicing and imitating – the ways that Jesus portrays how God loves the world.

 I would have loved to be a professional fisherman.  There is nothing better than exiting the resort, fishing pole in hand, smell of the lake (or whatever body of water that beckons) the sound of the water and freshness of the wind every day.  Imagine what a beautiful thing to wake up to the thought that the only thing you would be doing for the day was to toss out a line, perhaps catch a few wriggling fish, toss them back and return to solid ground for a shore lunch.  I can’t imagine getting tired of the fishing life,

But I bet some of the disciples did.  It doesn’t sound like it took much convincing to have Simon and Andrew, James and John to drop their nets and hurry after the one who had been proclaiming a gospel, a good news, to the people.  Repent – drop everything and everything that you’ve known before and follow.  Mark’s recounting tells the whole story, and it doesn’t take many words for the first four to find their way into Jesus’ nets:

When he had gone a little farther, he saw James, son of Zebedee, and his brother, John, in a boat, preparing their nets.  Without delay, he called them, and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men and followed him.  Mark 1:19,20

James and John were doing what professional fishermen have to do: they have to prepare for the next day’s work.  There weren’t sitting in the coffee shop drinking their third latte as the crew assembles the boat, gets the gear ready and makes sure the coordinates to the fishing hole are entered of the GPS.  In order for life to occur, James and John have to do the hard work themselves.  Preparing nets is tedious and back-breaking work, holes are spotted and mended, and each net must be disentangled before they are tossed back out over the water.  An overlooked hole or kinked rope could mean the difference between a day’s catch and a day’s discontent.

It is no surprise that when Jesus approaches them presumably with the competition (Peter and Andrew) in tow, that James and John throw their nets to the hired men and make their leave.  Of course they would be back, but this diversion is probably something that they’d been dreaming of: no fishing for the day.  Or, more importantly, no fixing nets, no fish smell, no waves, nothing to remind them of any other day.  Now, this slightly famous person, this Jesus, is calling them from the boat telling them that they will fish like they’ve never done before.  All that they need to do is follow. 

Follow.  It really is the key word, isn’t it?  When we talk about churches who want to delve deeply into what they believe to be discipleship (ironic that the word ‘ship’ is at the end of ‘disciple’ as if somehow discipleship should be the method of locomotion for the church) we have this picture of a committee of people who sit in a dark room trying to figure out the correct conditions for when fishing for men and women will work.  They might scratch their heads taking the temperature of the water:  Do we have any volunteers who will go door to door?  Does anyone do that anymore?  What’s the weather right now?  How is the pastor doing?  Is she or he setting the course correctly?  Do people see the vision that he or she sees; do they see the storms that are brewing?  How about the equipment – has the stewardship committee been doing its job?  Do we have enough money for the correct (al)lure of programs that will draw people into the building?  Maybe more importantly, what is the condition of the boat?  Is it leaking?  Has it been taking on water or is it seaworthy?

These are all questions that most churches ask before they even begin to think about what a ‘discipleship program’ looks like, and yet how often do they (we) ask the question, “Who are we following?  Where is Christ leading us?”

For some reason, Christian discipleship in most churches looks like this with regards to the fishing analogy:

A church trolls the local waters, usually in the more affluential parts of the city, seeking the trophy fish (a.k.a young families).  Churches want to see young, middle class people, with young, middle class children to have old, middle class churches that have little connection with where God’s word is leading them.  The lure is usually a youth program or a slightly more contemporary service that sheds tradition like ballast so that the young families can see that there is something more ‘for them.’  Forget about sacrifice and forget about ‘commitment’; we’re just glad you’re here! 

The church might attract this young family, snag them, if you will, and get them to come to church for a while.  After some time together, the congregation will assume that the young family is now on board; they’ll take their picture, as if this young family truly was a trophy fish, put the picture in the newsletter like a fisherman posts his trophy snapshot on Facebook, and enjoy how much work they’ve done.

Meanwhile, this family, which now seems very much like a fish, is put in the live-well, or worse yet, dragged behind the boat, until it is half dead.  When they first attend the church, they don't remember these ideas: We just want you to know that we are not expecting anything of you other than to show up, put your tithe in the offering plate, bring your kids to youth events and join a committee.  Oh, it would be good if you could be involved in the women’s events and perhaps come to the men’s breakfast and if the kids aren’t doing anything else, they can serve meals at every opportunity.

This family, this trophy family to the church, is as good as dead and will swim away at any chance.  It’s not as if they haven’t gotten anything out of the church – they’ve gotten a good beating and a nice understanding of how church politics work – but they haven’t gotten a meeting with the Christ who longs for them to follow into deeper communal relationship.

When Christ called the disciples, he said ‘Follow me and I will make you fishers of men and women.’  Where is Christ leading the church today?  How are we part of the S. S. Discipleship?  How can the church of today realize and remember that when Jesus said ‘I will make you fishers of men and women’ he meant it was catch and release?