Into the depths - Luke 5

Think of Christianity as ‘a religion’ and you are in danger of setting it in stone.

Read the two parts of Luke’s story, the Gospel according to St Luke and the Acts of the Apostles and you get the feeling that Christianity is something dynamic, it’s something that’s on the move.

Think of those opening chapters of Luke – people are on the move – Zechariah going from home to Jersualem, Mary travels from Nazareth to Elizabeth’s home – Mary and Joseph travel from Nazareth to Bethlehem, from Bethlehem Jesus is taken to Jerusalem.  Then they return to Nazareth – [factor in Matthew’s account of the flight to Egypt not mentioned by Luke] and at 12 we catch a glimpse of them setting off for Jerusalem again.

As the story opens with John the Baptist  he’s on the move into the wilderness, he’s preparing ‘the way for the Lord’;  you sense there are crowds of people pouring out from Jerusalem into the wildnerness and through the wilderness to the Jordan, and back again.

And among the crowds who come to John is Jesus – he’s on the move – down through the wilderness into the Jordan and back out again.

And then John is put into prison.  His movement is finished.

It’s not just that Jesus is then on the move.  But somehow the thing that John started cannot be made into something static, cannot be put behind walls, cannot be imprisoned.

Something’s on the move.

As Jesus takes up the mantle of John and sets out his program in that gathering together of the Synagogue in Nazareth you cannot help but feel he’s on the move.

They try to stop him in his tracks – and hurl him over the cliff but verse 30

He passed through the midst of them and went on his way.

Then it’s down to Capernaum and then back to a wilderness place .  The crowds want him to stay put.

But Jesus is on the move!

He said to them

“I must proclaim the good news of the kingdo of God to the other cities also; for I was sent for this purpose.”  So he continued proclaiming the message in the synagogues of Judea.

Something’s on the move.

Jesus is on the move.

What’s on the move has begun in a special way with John the Baptist.

And you get a very real feeling that Jesus has taken on the mantle from John.

This is not the very start.  There is a strong sense of history – that this is something that goes right back to Elijah and Elisha – the line of the prophets – but even more than that it goes right back to the beginnings of time – as Luke’s genealoty that takes the story right back to Adam suggests.

You might think the story stops with Jesus.

No sooner has the story of Jesus begun than we realise that it’s on the move again.

It cannot be confined to Jesus.

The very next step in the story is in the  heading at the start of chapter 5

Jesus calls the first disciples

Again, the whole story is a story of movement.

Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God,

 Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret, and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God,

Jesus is hemmed in … but there’s no tying him down -

2he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. 3He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.

Wouldn’t it have been great to have eaves dropped on what he said.  Well Luke has provided us with a massive clue.   It’s back in Luke 4 – I must proclaim the kingdom of God’ – that’s what he is doing here.   The rule of God breaking in on the world – God’s rule involves good news for the poor, sight for the blind, release for the captive – it’s all about freeing things up, getting things on the move again.  Taking the chains off people and getting them moving.

This is powerful stuff.

And what’s more this rule of God has to do with  ordinary every day people’s lives.

I’m not sure whether a fishing boat can get stuck in a rut!

Fishermen certainly can.

Maybe Jesus could see it.   Simon had not only been there by the shore listening to the teaching of Jesus – Simon had seen how his mother-in-law had been healed of a fever by this Jesus.

You can imagine him being interested – interested enough to offer Jesus a boat to get in.

But no more.

The shore by Capernaum look across towards Tiberias.  That brand new city built by Herod Antipas as a Roman resort town where you have big banquets and party a lot.

Just along the shore from Capernaumn, half way between there and Tiberias, in the 1980’s they discovered a fishing boat dating back to the first century.  You can learn a lot from it.  It’s bigger than you might think – it could easily take a dozen and more people.  It’s been hard used, repaired and repaired until it can be repaired no longer.  Look at the reconstructions the archaeologists can make of the city of Tiberias and you can tell that there’s a fishing industry going on around here.

The fish of the sea of Galilee are unique to that landlocked mini-sea – and they are still a delicacy.  Mark tells us that this was not just a family fishing it was a business that employed people.   It was part of a business bolstering up the Roman world of Tiberias and its banqueting.

This is the world of the fishermen of Galilee.

And Jesus has something for that world …

4When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.’ 5Simon answered, ‘Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.’

It’s interesting just to see Simon’s reaction.  There’s something about Jesus that means you respond.  This Jesus had healed his mother in law.  The words of Jesus get you going.

Put out into deep water.

I just want to pause there a moment.

I love that image.

We imagine Jesus enters into our lives and makes things all right.

AT this point he says, put out into the deep water.

We’ve been responding today to some of those big questions why is there so much suffering in the world?  Where is God when I need him?

Jesus comes into our everyday world – and then asks us to put out into the deep.

That’s not a place we want to go to.

It’s a place we shy away from.

The depths are the place where God isn’t.

Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord hear me.  That Psalm 130.  We were looking at Psalm 88 – another Psalm that’s in the depths.  And a song that was all about crying to God from the deep.

There are times when Jesus asks us to put out into the deep.

And then something happens.

Jesus moves into Simon’s everyday world.

6When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. 7So they signalled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink.

When you encounter God you might expect the meeting to solve things.

But for Simon it makes things worse.  It’s almost as if he finds it too overwhelming.

He senses something of God in Jesus … and he is only too aware of his inadequacy.

 8But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!’

I find this a great source of encouragement.  The inadequacy of the ones who are among the greatest of Jesus’ followers.

Simon Peter shares a sense of amazement with the others.

 9For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken; 10and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon.

There’s a fear in Simon Peter’s reaction.

And Jesus

Then Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid;

You can track this through the story so far – there’s been a lot of fear around – for Mary, for Elizabeth, remember those shepherds.

And the word that jesus uses for peter is the word that’s been used before.

Do not be afraid.

Then the whole thing is on the move again.

 from now on you will be catching people.’ 11When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.

What is startling about this is the way Jesus is on the move again.

Jesus has taken up the mantle from John and things are on the move.

But now he is getting others to be on the move.

They are to follow him.

And they are going to go into the places where people are in the depths.

The man suffering from leprosy has all his movements limited – but Jesus gets him on the move again and the crowds are on the move following him once more.

The man who paralysed who is lowered through the roof – it’s not so much that he gets him moving by enabling him to walk, though that does happen but in the story it’s the forgiving love of God that really gets this man moving again.

Fishermen caught up in the Roman fishing industry are on the move now with Jesus entering into the depths and getting people on the move … as if that’s not bad enough, then Jesus calls Levi, who is one of the Roman publican sitting at the tax booth taking money from the local people to support the extravagences of Rome – things are on the move – so much so that that night there’s a great party and it’s the tax-collectors who are there.

There are people who want religion to be static.   To be true to the law.

But no – doctors don’t spend time with people who are well, they spend their time with people who are trapped in by illnesss  - and they get them on the move.

This is new wine – a new way of thinking that is yet rooted in the God of the ages – and things are on the move.

Don’t retreat into a religion that is static, follow the call of the one who gets people moving again … and expects us to be on the move.  Even if that means pushing out into the depths to touch people who are trapped in all manner of circumstances.

Jesus comes with healing, with forgiveness, with the love of God that gets people moving again.