They Left It All Behind

Gospel	Luke 5:1-11

They left everything and followed him

Jesus was standing one day by the Lake of Gennesaret, with the crowd pressing round him listening to the word of God when he caught sight of two boats close to the bank. The fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats – it was Simon’s – and asked him to put out a little from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat.

  When he had finished speaking he said to Simon, ‘Put out into deep water and pay out your nets for a catch.’ ‘Master,’ Simon replied, ‘we worked hard all night long and caught nothing, but if you say so, I will pay out the nets.’ And when they had done this they netted such a huge number of fish that their nets began to tear, so they signaled to their companions in the other boat to come and help them; when these came, they filled the two boats to sinking point.

  When Simon Peter saw this he fell at the knees of Jesus saying, ‘Leave me, Lord; I am a sinful man.’ For he and all his companions were completely overcome by the catch they had made; so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were Simon’s partners. But Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on it is men you will catch.’ Then, bringing their boats back to land, they left everything and followed him.

Some read this passage of Luke and see in it a touching story of the faith that Peter had.  At the beginning of the story, we see nothing of the sort.  Jesus preached for a bit in the boat then he told these professional fishermen to go on out and drop their nets for a catch.  Peter speaks for the whole crew and says sarcastically that because Jesus, a landlubber, told him to do so he would.  He also made sure that Jesus knew that they had fished all night and had only caught water in their nets. If they, who were professional fishermen, who had fished all night and came up with empty nets could not coax a fish out of the water, what did he think that he knew that they didn't?  

So they put out the net just to satisfy this landlubber and prove that they knew best when it came to fishing.  They pulled in the nets and discovered a catch so large that they had to signal for another boat to come out and help them.  They got back to shore and Simon begged Jesus to go away because he was a sinful man. Jesus told him not to be afraid because as of that day they will become fishers of men.  Simon, James, and John left everything and followed Jesus, much to the chagrin of Zebedee who had given up his two sons to the ministry of Jesus.  James and John from that day forward were known as the "Sons of Thunder."

How do you make the leap of faith and give up everything to follow Jesus?  The first step has to be acknowledging the fact that no matter how much you own while you live that someone else will take it over when you die. We do not really own anything that we think we do.  We might have the exclusive use of something, for example, the house on the land mentioned on a deed somewhere. But even this does not follow us to the grave. Everything we have is a gift from God.  God as the owner of same, can take it away whenever He feels like it. 

I guess in the end we all will approach God with nothing, the same way as we entered this world.  Are we ready?