Surprise!

The Fifth Sunday after Epiphany

February 9, 2025

Luke 5:1-11

 “Surprise!”

Without a doubt, life is full of surprises. Some of these we welcome, and others, we do not. For example, a surprise birthday party might be a thing that some people would love to walk into, while others would not be comfortable with this at all. Some people like surprises and others don’t. Let’s do a quick poll: raise your hand if you like surprises. Now raise your hand if you do not like surprises. On this Super Bowl Sunday, who knows what surprises await us as the reigning Super Bowl champions, the Kansas City Chiefs, take on the Philadelphia Eagles at the Super Dome in New Orleans. It’s the same match-up that we had in the Super Bowl several years ago, and so is there a surprise in store today? We shall see. In today’s Gospel lesson, we see a number of surprises as Jesus reveals to Peter that he will no longer be catching fish, but people. The message for this day, based on that Gospel lesson, is entitled “Surprise!” May the Lord’s rich and abundant blessing rest upon the preaching, the hearing, and the living of his Word for Jesus’ sake.

The first surprise is how Jesus commandeers Peter’s boat in order to preach to the crowd there on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. That body of water goes by several other names, Sea of Gennesaret and Sea of Tiberias. I love how that opening verse in today’s Gospel puts it, how “the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God” (Luke 5:1). Do we in our own lives have such a holy hunger today for hearing the Word of God? May the Lord give us that desire and hunger to hear that Word of God! Jesus already knew Peter so it wasn’t like Jesus was stealing his boat. As we heard in the Gospel lesson for last Sunday (Luke 4:31-44), Jesus had visited Peter’s house and healed his mother-in-law. But Jesus hadn’t yet called Peter to come and follow him. After a fruitless night of fishing, Peter and his partners were washing the nets, and since the boat was unoccupied, Jesus used it as a makeshift pulpit. That’s good for us to remember that Jesus can still use things that we think aren’t useful anymore. That boat, unused by Peter in that moment, would become very useful for Jesus. The Lord Jesus calls us to take a new and fresh look at our lives and the things in them, and maybe even people that we may have given up on and let go of, just like Peter did after his overnight fishing expedition. If something doesn’t work for us, we’re usually pretty quick to toss it aside and move on. But Jesus shows us that the things we’ve discarded may still be put to good use for the kingdom of God. A good question – actually a prayer – for us to consider is this: “Jesus, what would you have me do here? How would you have me use these things for your glory?” We may get a surprising answer to that prayer as whole new possibilities are revealed by the Lord; possibilities that we had never considered or imagined.

The second surprise is the miraculous catch of fish. Jesus the carpenter instructs Peter the seasoned fisherman on how to fish. That’s pretty surprising, too, and it would have been very easy for Peter to go off on Jesus about how he didn’t know anything about fishing, etc. But no, that’s not what Peter does when Jesus tells him to put out into the deep and let down his nets for a catch. Peter responds in simple faith and trust: “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets” (Luke 5:5). And then, miracle of miracles, there are so many fish that the nets were breaking and that not one, but two, boats were needed to haul in the catch – so many fish that the boats started to sink! In our own lives, when we’ve been toiling away, working hard with little to show for it, it’s easy to become weary and discouraged. We would do well to remember Peter’s response to Jesus here. Despite previous efforts which yielded nothing, the Lord may have a surprise in store for us. Yes, he may call us to go back and do again what we’ve already done, as he did with Peter, but with the Lord’s blessing, there may well be something incredible that happens. And if this happens, it is not because of our own efforts, but through the working of the Lord. He simply calls us to be faithful and trust in him. “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch” (Luke 5:4), Jesus said to Peter, and he says to us today. So often we are content with just playing around in the shallows where it’s safe. Jesus calls us to venture forth into deeper water. Will we do that, and discover the surprise that is there from Jesus?

The third surprise is that Jesus gathers poor sinners like Peter, like you and me, to follow him and become fishers of men and women, young and old, all people. Peter’s response to this miraculous catch of fish is to ask Jesus to leave. Peter recognizes that he is sinful and that Jesus is holy, which is exactly what Isaiah felt in the presence of God as we heard in the Old Testament lesson (Isaiah 6:1-8). Sinfulness and holiness don’t go together, but that is the very thing Jesus came to fix. Our sinfulness – the evil we have done and the good we have failed to do – were taken to the cross where Jesus suffered and died in our place. A great exchange took place there as the sinless Son of God bore our sins in his own body on the tree of the cross, and we received Jesus’ righteousness and purity. Through this, we have received the full forgiveness of all our sins. We have been declared acceptable and pleasing to God, clothed in the robe of Jesus’ own righteousness. And then what? After Peter spoke, Jesus’ response was this: “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men” (Luke 5:10). That is God’s word to people in Scripture who are troubled, fearful and uncertain, like Peter was, and like we often are. First, there is the reassurance from the Lord himself, “Do not be afraid,”, and then there is the assignment: “From now on you will be catching men.” The Lord has work for us to do! This God-given work for the kingdom of God may come to us in surprising ways; in places and with people we would never have imagined. The Lord would work through each one of his children – every man, woman, and child – to be fishing for people, connecting each of them to Jesus. Wherever God has placed us in this life, that is our mission field.

After this miraculous catch of fish, we are told that Peter, James and John left everything and followed Jesus. Does that seem incredible to us? We also are following Jesus day by day. We look to him for everything we need so that our following and our fishing may glorify Christ. God help us to do this for Jesus’ sake. Amen.