Daily Devotions
“Don’t be afraid; from now on you will catch men.” Luke 5:10
Summer provides a good opportunity to go fishing. At the beginning of His public ministry Jesus met the disciples at their own lake and then used fishing imagery to call them into His service.
Jesus unveils His fishing plan. Starting with a miracle on the lake, He calls the disciples to follow Him. For three years He trains them. Then He goes to the cross to pay for their sins, rises from the dead, and commissions them for a worldwide fishing trip. He calls us to a similar fishing trip. Made His own in Baptism, we learn from Him, and we witness in family, community, nation, and world.
But we face obstacles to our fishing. The disciples struggled with catching men, because they were provincially bound to Galilee and constantly worried about unfavorable fishing conditions as opposition to Jesus mounted. We often live provincial lives as well. How difficult we find it to picture Christ coming for people of every city, state, tribe, and nation! We become so preoccupied with daily unfavorable fishing conditions that we lose sight of God’s international plan.
The Lord reveals His fishing method. He saturates us with His powerful, life-changing Word. Peter heard that Word from the pulpit of his boat before launching on that Galilee fishing adventure. And we hear that Word in worship and Bible study. Jesus applied that Word to the daily experience of the disciples. How could they ever forget the miraculous catch of fish, the mountaintop transfiguration, the footwashing, the holy meal, the nail-pierced hands of the risen Lord? No wonder they responded to His call. We too respond to His ongoing call as “fishers of men international.”
PRAYER: Lord, help me to become a fisher for You in my family, community, nation, and in the world. Amen.
(Devotions from “My Daily Devotion” by Dr. Stephen J. Carter, copyright 1988 CPH. All Rights Reserved. No part of this publication may be printed, reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior written permission of Concordia Publishing House. For ordering information, please contact CPH at 800-325-3040 or visit www.cph.org.)