Fishers of Men

I took my boys fishing in the Elk River this spring for their first fly fishing trip. I waded out beside by my eight-year-old, knee deep in the cool waters trying to match one of my flies to the bugs buzzing around my head. Near the opposite bank, where the water was shaded by an oak that reached out over the water, I pointed towards the boulder that pierced the surface and said “if I were a fish, that is where I would be.” It’s difficult to guess who was more surprised by what happened next; me, my son, or the fish, but sure enough, our first cast landed upstream of the rock and floated into the small ripple; then disappeared. Fish on.

When Jesus called Peter and the crew to follow him, he called them to leave their commercial fishing business so he could make them fishers of men. Norman Maclean opened A River Runs Through It with the childhood thought “that all first-class fishermen on the Sea of Galilee were fly fishermen and that John, the favorite, was a dry-fly fisherman. When I don’t catch a fish, I can say “a bad day fishing is better than a good day at work.” When Peter didn’t catch fish, he and his family went hungry. They didn’t fish with a rod and reel but casted nets from the side of their boats into the dark waters and drug the haul back to the boat. When Jesus called the disciples, they had been fishing all night and came to shore empty handed. Jesus urged Peter to go out again and try to catch some fish one more time. Peter was an experienced fisherman who just got shut out. He was tired. He was frustrated. He no doubt wanted to go home and forget about it. But, he listened to Jesus and cast off, and caught the motherload (Luke 5:1-11).

The fly-fisherman looks at what the fish are eating and changes his bait to match their appetite. He then slips into the water and presents the bait while hiding the hook. He thinks “If I were a fish, what would I want to eat?” He goes to where his prey will be, and presents his decoy to the trout. Commercial fishermen cast their net, deep and wide. As Jesus showed Peter, man casts the net, but it is God that puts the fish in the boat. In evangelism, we need to freely “cast” the true gospel deep and wide, without discrimination. We need to proclaim the truth of the gospel, knowing that it is God that “catches” the soul of man. It does no good to win men to a false, imitation gospel with deceptive tactics and providing the bait he longs to hear just to get them in church while making them a twofold more child of Hell. Preach the truth and trust the power of the true gospel. Spread the true gospel net and pray God will give the increase.