A quick article to get back in the saddle on the ultimate purpose of my blog.
It’s Friday night after two days of a “guided” walleye fishing excursion with my brother. We went to Chamberlain, South Dakota, and our guides took us out on Lake Francis Case on the Missouri River. This is the first time I’ve gone fishing in 15 years, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. My brother had told me our guides (wound up with a different one each day) would do most of the work for us, and they did.
Of course, as a pastor, I couldn’t help but think about Jesus telling (strongly suggesting?) Peter and Andrew, “Come, follow me, and I will send you out to fish for men” (Matthew 4:19). I see some definite parallels between the guided fishing experience and Jesus’s call for Peter and Andrew, and indeed all of us, to be fishers of future followers of Christ (how’s that for alliteration!).
One thing that struck me as my brother and talked about the experience was when my brother said, “If I had brought a boat up here to fish on my own, I wouldn’t have had a clue where to go to find the walleye biting.” The guides, of course, knew the perfect spot to catch them, and it was about 10 miles downstream from Chamberlain. If my brother and I had come on our own, there’s no telling what kind of success or failure we would have had without a guide.
Another benefit of having the guide was that they handled all the “dirty work” of fishing for us; ALL of it. They provided the boat, the bait, and the fishing poles. They put the bait on the hook for us every time. They removed the fish from the hook when we caught them. Some were too small to keep and had to be thrown back; the keepers went in the “box” to keep them fresh while we were on the lake. They even cleaned the fish for us at the end of the day, put the flesh in zip-locked bags, and held them in a freezer for us to pick up and take home at the end of our trip. The only thing we had to do was drop the line in the water (no casting, since we were trolling in a boat) and wait for the fish to bite. And we didn’t have to wait long. We each caught our limit, including the guide, both days, so we were quite pleased with our experience, and plan on doing it again.
It was a wonderful experience and a chance to spend some quality time with my brother. I hadn’t had many opportunities to do that most of my adult life, because I had lived in a different State for 23 years. As I get older, I find I value this family time more and more. That was the main purpose and goal of the trip, and we accomplished that.
But the preacher in me wanted to reflect on this first and foremost, because I won’t be preaching again until Father’s Day, so I wanted to put up a post in the interim. The second reason for making this post is that my little diversion down the rabbit hole of PEMDAS has been causing quite a stir it seems. This weekend, as it did two weeks ago, is seeing an incredible spike in people accessing my article on a viral math problem. Something is definitely afoot. More on that later. Basically, I wanted to assure you that my blog has not been abducted by a math nerd (I’m the math nerd who owns the blog) and that I’m not converting the blog permanently to a math blog.
Back to fishing: Perhaps you’ve already figured out where I’m going with all this talk about a fishing expedition. Jesus told us: “The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field” (Matthew 9:37–38). Jesus knows the best places to fish for men, just like our guides knew the best place to go to catch walleye. Jesus says the harvest is ready: those who are called to go out and fish for men don’t necessarily have to do the hard work of preparing a field (or a lake) for harvest. God has already taken care of that. This isn’t to say that we shouldn’t go where God has not (at least to the casual observer) prepared something, namely because discerning what or whom God has prepared is not always obvious to the naked eye.
Our job, then, is to put the “line in the water,” so to speak. As Christians, we may need to put something shiny and sparkly in front of people to get their attention and draw them in. When it comes time for us to fish for future followers, we don’t always know how people have been brought to a place to where they’ll respond to the enticing message of the gospel.
Of course, we don’t want to take this analogy too far. We don’t (or at least, I hope we don’t) flay those who’ve responded positively to the Gospel message, dip them in batter, and fry them. Let’s not be ridiculous now. The “throwbacks” are akin to those who have responded to the gospel in some way, but for whatever reason, they’re not ready to jump in fully. This is made apparent by the parable of the sower (Matthew 13:1–15). Not everyone is going to be immediately convinced by the signs and situations God is putting in their paths, so it’s okay to let them go and grow for now. God may still be working on them.
Jesus is our guide for when we’re called to fish for men. We don’t need to have any special knowledge necessarily, just the willingness to cast the line and hopefully draw them in. Others who have been convinced in that manner should do just fine sharing that hope with future followers. If you do happen to be one of those who is laying the groundwork for the gospel in a place that needs quite a bit of preparation, God bless you! Your apostolic mission is what keeps the body of Christ advancing on earth.
I do hope you’ll forgive me for my little math diversion. I wish you all happy fishing as you reach out and share the love of Christ with those whose hearts and souls have been prepared to receive it, and to those who still need more preparation.
Peace,
Scott
My opinions are my own.
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