If You Aren’t Fishing, Then You Aren’t Following Series

You can’t go fishing unless you go out to where the fish are found. People without Christ aren’t knocking down the doors of our church to get in. We have to go out after them. That’s why the Great Commission of Jesus begins with the word, “GO.”

In Luke 14 Jesus compared the Kingdom of God to a man who threw a party. All the local VIPs were sent invitations. But they all came up with phony excuses why they couldn’t come. Jesus said, “Then the master told his servant, ‘Go out to the roads and country lanes and make them come in, so that my house will be full.’” (Luke 14:23)

God wants His house to be full. We’re not talking about the church house, but the household of faith. There are thousands of people who aren’t yet in the Family of God, and God wants us to go after them and tell them that God loves them.

Max Lucado wrote, “Jesus wasn’t crucified in a church building over a baptistery between an organ and a piano—in front of a bunch of coats and ties. He was crucified on a cruel cross between two hardened criminals. He wasn’t crucified in a nice neighborhood, but at a crossroads of the world so cosmopolitan that his crime had to be written in three languages. He died at the kind of place where thieves cursed and soldiers gambled—and that’s where we need to take the Gospel.”

2. GOOD FISHERMEN UNDERSTAND HOW FISH BEHAVE

One of my favorite episodes of the “Andy Griffith Show” was about fishing. Opie was little and Aunt Bee came to visit on a trial basis. She was trying desperately to fit in so Opie would like her. She agreed to go fishing with Andy and Opie. She didn’t know much about fishing because she was holding her bait a few feet above the surface of the water. When Opie pointed it out, Andy was quick to give an answer that saved Aunt Bee any embarrassment. He explained to Opie that Aunt Bee was such a good fisherman that she was fishing for “flying fish.” That satisfied Opie. It was obvious Aunt Bee didn’t understand how fish act.

If we are going to reach people for Christ, we must understand their world. We need to study our culture without buying into it. You don’t have to become a fish to understand how a fish acts. You don’t have to become a lost person to understand them either.

That means we should intentionally make friends with people who don’t know Christ. The sad truth is the longer a person follows Jesus, the fewer friends they have who need Jesus. That’s only natural. We want to hang out with other Christians. But Jesus was a friend of sinners. He spent time eating and fellowship with the worst of the worst. The Jewish leaders criticized Jesus for eating with sinners. He responded that only sick people need a doctor. The Jewish leaders were sick too; they just wouldn’t admit it.

In Luke 16 Jesus told one of His strangest parables. He talked about a dishonest accountant who cooked the books of his boss. He was going to get fired. But before he lost his job, he approached his master’s customers and gave them deep discounts on what they owed his boss. He was hoping that after he was sacked, they would repay his gesture. His boss heard about it and complimented him on being so shrewd, and he let him keep his job. Jesus summarized the parable by saying, “The master commended the dishonest manager because he had acted shrewdly. For the people of this world are more shrewd in dealing with their own kind than are the people of the light.” (Luke 16:8)