Today’s study takes us to the Sea of Galilee, also known as Lake Gennesaret in the Bible. This is a freshwater lake located in the northern region of Israel (Galilee). In Jesus’ day, fishermen regularly worked on this lake. Read the portion of today’s text contained in Luke 5:1-11. Our story opens with Jesus standing near this lake while people are crowding around Him to hear Him teach the Word of God. Jesus was becoming somewhat well-known already for His teaching and His miracles and He could usually draw a crowd.
Jesus saw two empty boats by the shore of the lake, which had been left there by some fishermen who were nearby cleaning and repairing their nets. Jesus climbed into one of the boats, one belonging to a man named Simon, and asked him to push out a little way from the shore. Remember that Simon and his brother Andrew had met Jesus about a year earlier when they had been at the Jordan River to see John the Baptist and had spent the day under Jesus’ teaching (John 1:35-42). Jesus was no stranger to Simon and so Simon did as Jesus asked. This enabled Jesus to sit down and teach the people in the crowd from the boat.
When Jesus was finished teaching the crowd, He asked Simon to push the boat out into deeper waters and to cast out his nets for some fish. Simon and the other fishermen had been out on the lake all night, working hard, yet had not caught any fish. Sometimes, the conditions just aren’t right and the fish aren’t biting. Simon would have been tired from working all night and probably wasn’t very enthused about throwing the nets back out there in these conditions. He explained this to Jesus, but then he said that he would still put the nets back out there, because Jesus had asked him to.
Simon, whom Jesus had given the name Peter (John 1:42) was already a believer in Jesus and had been for about a year. Notice that, even though he was an experienced fisherman and knew that the current conditions were not right for catching fish, he still obeyed Jesus’ instructions… and he obeyed immediately. Do we respond this way when God leads us to do something? We may not always understand why God is leading us to do a certain thing, but we should always be willing to obey God’s leading/teaching/Scriptures, even when we do not entirely understand the reason.
We can see from verses 6-7 that, as soon as the nets were cast, they filled up with so many fish that they started breaking. Simon and his boatmates had to signal their friends who were in the other boat to come over and help them manage this large catch. Both boats ended up being so full of fish that they began to sink. Jesus not only filled their nets, but He filled them to abundance way beyond any and all expectations. Never be afraid to ask God for assistance when things are not going your way and you need help accomplishing your tasks. He is able (Lam 3:23).
I love what happens in verses 8-10. Simon is so humbled by what has occurred that he falls down at Jesus’ knees. Witnessing what God can do often has the effect of making us so aware of how far short of Him that we fall. Even though Simon was a believer saved by grace, being in the presence of God made him confess his sins and declare how unworthy he was to be in the Lord’s presence. He had great humility. God is so holy and sovereign over all His creation. The fishermen were absolutely astonished at what had happened and by the number of fish they had caught. We know that Simon’s partners, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, were also there and amazed.
Jesus told Simon not to be afraid… He was going to make them fishers of men. Jesus uses this opportunity to indicate the type of life to which He was calling them…a life of evangelism. They would be doing God’s work helping men to understand the Gospel call. They were fishermen and so Jesus used fishing terminology (Matthew 13:47-50). Compare this to the analogy we saw Jesus use with the people of Samaria, who were rural farmers (John 4:34-38). Verse 11 tells us that the men responded by pulling their boats up onto the shore and left everything (business, equipment, livelihood) to follow Him. James and John, along with their father Zebedee, were partners with Andrew and Simon Peter in what was a very prosperous fishing business. It was large enough to employ hired men (Mark 1:20) and was a lot to leave behind. And we know from I Cor 9:5 that Simon Peter also had a wife who came along with him and followed Jesus as well.
Read the account of this event given to us in Matthew 4:18-25. While Matthew’s Gospel gives us less detail, we still see, essentially, Jesus calling the men and them immediately leaving everything to follow Him. This account tells additionally that James and John not only left their business but family as well.
Verses 23-25 go on to tell us that Jesus continued going throughout Galilee and the types of things He was doing in His ministry there. And we are told, finally, that through this ministry, large crowds from all over Israel came and followed Him.
Record Romans 10:14 in your journal.
Responding to God: Worship God for His power, strength, and sovereignty. Commit to living in immediate obedience to Him, eagerly responding to His every call. Speak to Him about any personal or professional struggles in which you may need His help and seek His assurance that He is able. Commit to making the work of God a priority in your life and ask Him to help you recognize those opportunities where hearts are ready to hear His word and be brought into the catch. Pray for others who are laboring for the Gospel.
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