You are talking to someone about something, something that you know is true with all of your heart. And right in the middle, of making your most convincing point, they stop you and they say those words that bring a sudden end to all discussion. “ That has not been my experience!” They say. And it’s over. You have been submarined. For experience is a most powerful trump card in almost any circumstance or conversation.
And that’s understandable. The majority of our learning, comes from experience. We touch, we see, we taste, we feel, we hear, we try this and that and we learn the truth about so many things from our experiences.
Experience is a great teacher. But it is, by no means, the only teacher. Experience, though often a good source of truth is not the source to which all other sources must bow. To make one’s own experience the trump card in truth leads to a closed mind that is incapable seeing beyond itself . Reality is, by no means limited to our experiences. Simon Peter would learn this as Jesus the Son of God began to lead him beyond his experience.
The big crowds were starting to gather around Jesus as news of his teaching and his miracles spread around the region of Galilee. Jesus was near the Lake of Gennesaret, which is another name for the Sea of Galilee, which was really not a sea, but a lake because it is fresh water.
So Jesus was standing there, by the shore of this big lake; the people, captivated by his presence and the gracious words which he spoke, felt the need to get closer to him. His words were like a cool spring of water in the middle of a desert and they were wanting to drink as deeply as they could. And so they were pressing and pushing and backing Jesus up against the the lake. So Jesus, very cleverly climbed into one of the boats that was there, and asked the owner of the boat to put out a little from shore. The owner of the boat was Simon Peter.
Taking a seat in Peter’s boat, Jesus began to teach the people. The physical situation was as natural auditorium of sorts....The shoreline, sloping down toward the lake, would make the classic amphitheater. Everyone could see. Everyone could hear. The Morning Sun, the fresh smell of the Lake, and the words of the Lord. It must have been cool.
After Jesus had finished speaking, he turned to Simon Peter and said something that seemed rather odd. He says “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.” Now the reason this seemed so odd is because it stood in deep opposition to Peter’s own experience! For Peter was a professional fisherman. Fishing was not merely a pastime, but how he made his living! He didn’t merely dabble in understanding the ways and means of fish, his very livelihood depended on it! And from what I’ve read, the type of fishing that is done in that lake, does not happen in deep water, but rather nearer to the land and to the shoals. Add to that his most recent experience of working all night and catching nothing, and you’ve got a pretty strong argument against putting the nets out anywhere, much less into deep water.. As any fisherman knows, when the fish aren’t active, the fish aren’t active. Everything from Peter’s experience was adding up against the Lord’s command.
But there was something about Jesus, something about his teaching, that caused this rough and tumble fisherman to relent, albeit with some rather serious reservations. “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”
Personal experience versus the obedience of faith: The inner struggle of inner struggles. You know it well, don’t you? For, like Peter, you have quite a bit of experience in living. You have learned to depend on your experiences to direct your life and to help you make decisions. But wait, the Lord Jesus has entered your “boat.” In one way or another: through your baptism or through the Word of God, he has placed himself right smack in the middle of your life. He is your Savior and Lord. But he is also the doorway into a reality that is much bigger and much more amazing than your experience!
Through his atoning sacrifice for your sins; by his death on the cross he has put you into a forgiven relationship with your father in heaven. In so doing, he has introduced you to the reality of God! And now, he urges you onward. Urges you to live your life in full view of the fact that there is a reality beyond yourself; a reality that is beyond your own experience.
Think of the things that he has said to you! “Whoever lives and believes in me, will live even though he dies.” Everything in the world, everything that you’ve seen, everything that you have experienced tells you that this cannot be true. And yet, you believe otherwise Don’t you? Jesus has called you to let down your net to receive the abundance of eternal life, and you have done so. You have believed.
That is perhaps one of the first things that all Christians come to believe. But Jesus would lead you onward. Your fishing trip with him has only begun. There are other things that Jesus has been urging you to do by faith. And so far you might have only doing it sporadically . Like prayer for instance. He prayed all the time while he was with us, and he urges us to be very active in our prayers. But as often is the case, our minds are jaded by all of our experiences. “I’ve tried praying before but it doesn’t work!” We say in the privacy in of our own minds. In stark contrast to our experience, Jesus says “Ask and it shall be given, seek and ye shall find, knock and the door will be opened.”
But there’s more, Jesus tells us to be generous. He says “Give and it will be given to you. A good measure, pressed down, shaken together and running over, will be poured into your lap.” (Luke 6:38). This too, violates everything we know from experience. Experience has taught us to be very protective of what we have. Experience has taught us that we have to be extremely frugal if we are ever going to make it. We’ve got our retirements to worry about after all! Jesus’ command stands in contrast to everything our experience tells us. He tells us to not worry about what we’re going to eat and what we’re going to wear. He tells us to consider the birds and the lilies. He tells us that God will provide! While our Experience tells us that we are the ones who provide for ourselves. And so like Peter, if we ever do get around to obeying him, we do it reluctantly and with hesitation.
But Peter hesitated for only a moment. And though we wasn’t completely sold on the idea of going to deep waters and casting his nets out one more time, he said “Because you say so, I will let down the nets.”. And what happened next? They caught such a large number of fish that there nets began to break! They had to signal their buddies to come and help them! Both boats were now filled to the gunwales and were about to sink!
And from this, Peter got clearer picture of just who this Jesus was! He drops to his knees. He calls him Lord. Having now witnessed something that was well beyond the realm of his experience, he was completely awestruck. He realized how unworthy he was; how sinful. But Jesus assuringly said, “don’t be afraid.”. For you see, Jesus knew all about Peter. He knew he was a sinful and impetuous man. But he still wanted him to be his man. In the same way he knows all about you. If he has reached out to you, if he has spoken to your heart, if you do now stand in the faith, it’s all because he has chosen you to be his man or his woman or his boy or his girl.
Well, somehow, Peter and his buddies and Jesus made it back to shore, it says that they “left everything and followed him.” Their nets, their boats, their business. They left behind what had heretofore appeared to be the substance of their lives! They had once thought that fishing was what life was all about. Not anymore. They were beginning to see that Jesus was the way, the truth and the Life.
So what if Peter would have refused to go out into deep water and let down his nets? What if he had used his own personal experience as the trump card. What if he had said, “Jesus, I like you and everything, but you simply don’t know fishing like I do! I’m tired, The fish aren’t moving, and deep water is no place to catch fish!” What if Peter had said that? Peter would have missed one of the greatest and meaningful God given experiences of his lifetime. The story would have had a completely different ending. They would have brought the empty boats to shore, and Peter would not have not seen what he saw.
Christians often privately wish that God would be more “real” to them. Yes, they believe in Jesus. They believe that he forgives and saves and redeems, they repent of their sins; they like to hear his words; they are indeed Christians, but they are aching to see the reality of the Lord in their everyday lives. But that doesn’t happen very often. For far too many, Jesus is kept confined to Sundays and perhaps also life and death emergencies. All other situations, however, are guided by personal experience. He has promised to answer our prayers, but we say “sorry, that’s just not my experience” He has promised that the Lord would provide for us so we can be generous and we say “sorry, that’s not my experience.” He has told us to speak boldly about him to others, has told us he’d give us the words to say but we say “sorry, that’s not my experience.” We pull the trump card on him. We compare his commands to our experience and we tune him out. We remain in our boats, we fuss over our nets and we miss out on a lot of the stuff that Jesus would show us. Oh he’s still with us, and wants us, and loves us, and saves us, our Lord knows exactly what we’re like and is very patient with us, but because of our unwillingness to follow his commands, we’re missing out on a lot of the cool stuff he’d like to show us during our lives. He’d like to take the faith that we have in our heads and hearts and bring it out into our lives and give us a much broader experience.
As Peter looked up at the Lord from his knees, Jesus said “ Don’t be afraid, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Fast forward to the day of Pentecost. Peter is fishing. Not in the Gennessaret, but in a sea of people from all over the world that had come to Jerusalem for the feast of Pentecost. And the net that he used was the Gospel. The good news that God saves people through the death and resurrection of his Son. And people are coming to faith by the droves as Peter preaches this Gospel. He saw the words of Jesus coming true before his very eyes as people from all over the world were swimming into the net he was given to cast. Some 3000 people came to believe in Jesus on that day and Peter got to be a part of it.
We cannot expect to see everything that Peter saw, we are not apostles, that’s what God called him to do. But we can expect to see the working of the Lord in our every day lives. What exactly that means for you I cannot say. What things does God have in store for you? Where we will he take you? What will he show you? Follow him and you’ll find out. “ Observe whatsoever he has commanded.” You already know the ways of the world , for you are experienced in such things. But do not let your experience become your own personal prison. Hear the voice of the Lord as he calls you to take hold of the greater reality of his care and love for you. You won’t be disappointed. AMEN
