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This Week's Sermon THE FIFTH SUNDAY after the EPIPHANY 07 February 2010 "The Miracle of the Church" Luke 5:1-11 LSB Series C Pastor Philip G. Meyer Soli Deo Gloria!

The Gospels of Epiphany teach us to look at the miracles of Jesus on two levels. Last week we heard how Jesus has broken the power of the kingdom of darkness and how his miracles underscore that fact. Today presents a miracle of a different sort. It isn't a healing, but a miracle of abundance, like the water Jesus turned into wine at Cana. The miracle points not just to an abundance of fish, but of people. The boat becomes a picture of the Church. On a certain level we get it when we hear Jesus tell Peter, James, and John that he was changing their vocation from men who caught fish to men who caught people.

Years later Peter would write in his first letter that a boat is a picture of the Church, linking the Church to the ark of Noah [1 Peter 3.18-22]. The ark was the salvation of the eight people God saved in the flood. From that time on, the Church has been thought of as the ark of salvation. Indeed, early Christians looked up at the curved ceilings of their sanctuaries and noticed how they resembled the bottom and sides of a ship, just as ours does. They called the place where the people gather the nave, Latin for ship. The image is repeated for us in our rite of Holy Baptism because of Luther's prayer, often called the "Flood Prayer."

Almighty eternal God, who according to your righteous judgment condemned the unbelieving world through the flood and in your great mercy did preserve believing Noah and his family, and who drowned hard-hearted Pharaoh with all his army in the Red Sea and did lead your people Israel through the same on dry ground, thereby prefiguring this bath of your baptism, and who through the baptism of your dear Child, our Lord Jesus Christ, have consecrated and set apart the Jordan and all water as a salutary flood and a rich and full washing away of sins: We pray through the same your boundless mercy that you will graciously behold this [name] and bless her with true faith in the spirit so that by means of this saving flood all that has been born in her from Adam and which she herself has added thereto may be drowned in her and engulfed, and that she may be separated from the number of the unbelieving, preserved dry and secure in the holy ark of Christendom, serve your name at all times fervent in spirit and joyful in hope, so that with all believers she may be made worthy to attain eternal life according to your promise; through Jesus Christ our Lord.

One cannot cease to be amazed at the physical miracle Jesus does here by the lake. After Jesus finishes teaching the people from the boat, he tells Peter to put out into the deep to get a catch of fish. Even before he got into the boat, Jesus knew what he was going to do. Nothing happens by chance. But Peter objects at first, telling Jesus that they had worked all night and had caught nothing. In his whole life Jesus had never caught a fish while Peter had been catching fish nearly his whole life! Luther says that Peter was saying, "If there were fish to be caught right now, I would know how to catch them!" [House Postils, vol. 2, p. 286]. It's an important point for us to remember. Yet, Peter obeys the word of Jesus. His reason tells him something else. His experience tells him something else, but he agrees.

The miracle happens. Peter, James, and John catch so many fish that their nets began to break. They called to the other boat to come and help them and soon both boats are filled to overflowing with fish, so many that Luke tells us that both boats were in danger of sinking! It is a miracle and Peter is now aware that he is in the presence of more than a mere man. He recognizes that Jesus is true God. A sense of his own sinfulness overwhelms him and he asks Jesus to go away because his sins condemn him, especially his sin of not believing the word Jesus had spoken.

All of this is a picture of the Church, as I said, and you get it to a certain extent. Many have picked up on the matter of "catching men," and so we have Christian men who wear fish hooks on their jacket lapels. I think that while they mean well, it is an entirely offensive gesture to those outside the Church. For some people catching a fish with a hook is cruel and inhumane. Think of the hooks used. They are designed so that the fish cannot easily get free from them. The hooks embed into the flesh of the fish's mouth. To be caught means that the fish dies. It's not a pretty picture for the fish. If we say that the job of the Christian is to "hook people for Christ," then some people are going to run the other way, and for good reason. They don't want to be treated in a way that makes them helpless.

That's not the picture in this text. It is 21st century man superimposing his culture and thinking onto the text. Commercial fishing uses nets. Nets are cast or dragged. There is no hooking going on. Jesus used this metaphor to describe how God works in filling his kingdom.

"Again, the kingdom of heaven is like a net that was thrown into the sea and gathered fish of every kind. When it was full, men drew it ashore and sat down and sorted the good into containers but threw away the bad." (Matthew 13:47-48, ESV)

Luther explains this metaphor in the meaning of the Third Article of the Apostles' Creed.

I believe that I cannot by my own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ, my Lord, or come to him; but the Holy Spirit has called me by the Gospel, enlightened me with his gifts, sanctified and kept me in the true faith.
In the same way he calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth, and keeps it with Jesus Christ in the one true faith.

First of all, this work is not our work, but God's work. So much of what is traditionally called "evangelism" makes it man's work. You have to do this or that. You need a whiz-bang presentation designed to "hook" the person you are trying to get. It doesn't matter if you even call it "leading someone to Jesus." Some people get led by the nose! That's not really what Jesus is saying when he says that the disciples will "catch" men.

Think again of the net. The net is cast out, very broadly, gently. It engages all sorts and kinds. As the men draw it ashore, they sort the catch. Not all remain in the Church. The nets of the Church are Christ's Word, Holy Baptism, Holy Absolution, and the Lord's Supper. By these means he "calls, gathers, enlightens, and sanctifies the whole Christian Church on earth . . " And it is through these same means that he keeps us in the true faith unto our end. God gathers people by means of his Word and Sacraments.

God works wherever he wants. God works faith when and where he wants. The Augsburg Confession says it best:

V. [THE OFFICE OF THE MINISTRY] 1 To obtain such faith God instituted the office of the ministry, that is, provided the Gospel and the sacraments. 2 Through these, as through means, he gives the Holy Spirit, who works faith, when and where he pleases, in those who hear the Gospel. 3 And the Gospel teaches that we have a gracious God, not by our own merits but by the merit of Christ, when we believe this.¹

God casts his Gospel net far and wide when his servants proclaim the Gospel. Not all those who hear it will believe it. Some will reject it. We leave the results in God where they belong, not in our methods, as though we merely need the right fishing technique.

The disciples cast their nets into the deep and brought the fish into the boats. The nets of Word and Sacrament are cast into the sea and people are drawn out and rescued. They are not caught for death because they are being rescued from death. They are being drawn out for life. You were drawn out of the deep through the waters of Holy Baptism and made safe and secure in the ark of Christendom. God the Holy Spirit drew you into Christ's kingdom by means of your Baptism.

It is a miracle that God rescues so many people in so many places. Peter didn't think Jesus knew when, where, and how to fish. God often fishes in places that we would not. He casts the net of the Gospel in places like Sudan and brings in many to his Church. He rescues sinners out of unlikely places like China and other nations hostile to the Gospel. Man would not think of casting the net of the Gospel in places like that, but God the Holy Spirit does.

This boat into which you have been placed, this holy ark of Christendom, will be preserved until the end of days. God the Holy Spirit will continue to do his work of gathering sinners into his Church where the blood of Christ washes them clean and fits them for service. The Apostle Paul speaks of striving to excel in building up the Church [1 Cor. 14.12b] in our Epistle today. As the others were called to assist Peter, James, and John in bringing in the catch, so God calls you to assist in this life-giving work of the Gospel and Sacraments. Whatever talents, abilities, and resources God has given you, you are to use in this vital work. You haven't been called to leave your vocations to serve as were Peter and the others, but to use your vocation to support the work of gathering others into Christ's kingdom of life through your prayers, your time, your abilities, your income. Impure as we may be, sinful as we may be, Christ uses us in this life-saving work because he cleanses us for service in Word and Sacrament.

God will have his catch of saints because he wills it. It is the greatest privilege of life that he uses us to accomplish his saving purposes. May God continue to bless your vocations as the net of Christ's Gospel is thrown far and wide. Indeed, the whole process is a miracle of his grace!

In the name of the Father, and of the + Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

¹Theodore G. Tappert, The Book of Concord : The Confessions of the Evangelical Lutheran Church, 31 (Philadelphia: Fortress Press, 2000, c1959).