Fishing for People: Sermon for January 22, 2006
As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea-- for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, "Follow me and I will make you fish for people."(Mark 1:15)
Here in the midwest, as in most of America, our vision, our understanding of fishing is as a singular pursuit. A fisherman takes a rod and reel, baits the hook, casts out into a river, a stream or a lake. You may put very little effort into fishing just cast your lure out there somewhere, plant your poll and sit back; you may put a great deal of effort into fishing creating your own "flies" and casting repeatedly to mimic the actions of living insects. But little effort or a great deal it is a singular pursuit a one-on-one confrontation between the angler and the fish.
The poet Don Marquis has written, rather correctly, I think: "Our idea of fishing is to put all the exertion up to the fish. If they are ambitious, we will catch them. If they are not, we let them go about their business." (Prefaces, New York; London: D. Appleton and Company, 1919.)
I believe that American singular notion of fishing, that it is a one-man, rod-and-reel, catch-one-fish-at-a-time operation, colors the way we American Christians have understood Jesus's call to Andrew and Simon, which is, in fact, Jesus's call to all of us. We have understood evangelism to be a one-on-one operation; one Christian going out into the stream of humanity, casting about to catch one sinner, and dragging that sinner into church, then going back to cast about again and, hopefully, catch another sinner.
Perhaps that is why we Episcopalians shy away not only from the activity, but from the very word "evangelism." We see in it something akin to the single angler standing on the river bank casting his bate into the stream, and with that view of evangelism we feel about it as comedian Steven Wright has commented about fishing, "There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot." One-on-one personal evangelism feels like "standing on the shore like an idiot."
However, the fishermen of Galilee were not anglers. They were (and still are) seine fishers ... they are not interested in catching one fish at a time: they drop nets into the sea and pull up hundreds or thousands of fish at a time.
When Jesus called them to be fishers of men, or fishers of people as the N.R.S.V. has it, he was calling them to an audacious ministry to reach many, many folks with the Good News of God's Salvation ... not just one or two at a time.
It is an outrageous calling! Some, I'm sure, would say it is over-broad; some would say it is too big, too ambitious, too presumptuous; some, I'm positive, would even say it is arrogant. But it is precisely what Jesus was calling Andrew and Simon, and James and John the sons of Zebedee, and all the Apostles and all the disciples in that time and every time since, to do ... not cast about catching one sinner at a time, but to cast a net into the ocean of society and pull in a huge haul of human beings all with souls longing for God.
I believe what the Psalmist wrote in today's Gradual (Ps. 62:6) is true of every human being:
For God alone my soul in silence waits; *
truly, my hope is in him.
I believe that deep within each human being is a longing for the Lord, a hunger for God. If we do cast our net into the ocean of humanity, every man, woman and child who may be caught will have a deep, deep craving for the Divine.
Jesus' called his disciples to the audacious, outrageous, enormous, even arrogant ministry of fishing the sea of humanity and gathering great numbers of people to the Good News of God's Salvation. But Jesus did not call the Apostles, and he does not call us to be concerned about how great those numbers may be; Jesus did not call them and he does not call us to "grow the church." Jesus called them and he calls us to be the church and to preach the Gospel. He called them and he calls us to cast the Gospel net, but not to be greatly concerned about the number of fish the net may catch.
We at St. Paul’s have expressed our understanding of this calling in our parish mission statement published on the cover our bulletin: we have set before ourselves a vision fully as audacious, outrageous, enormous, and maybe even arrogant as the call to be fishers of men.... We have claimed that we are engaged in the ministry of inviting "others to join us in proclaiming the Gospel through worship, prayer, learning and reaching out in mission and ministry." It is an audacious, outrageous, enormous, and maybe even arrogant claim, but I believe it is a faithful response to the call to be fishers of people.
Andy Stanley is a Baptist preacher in Atlanta, Georgia. About a decade ago, he and a few others started North Point Community Church in a suburb of that city. Today, 5,000 people attend church at North Point every Sunday. In envisioning the ministry in which they were engaging, in the leadership of North Point Church saw their activities as occurring within three kinds of environment. Stanley describes them this way:
1. The foyer environment, where people are made to feel welcome as a guest.
2. The living room environment, where they're treated like a friend.
3. And the kitchen environment, where they're made to feel like family.
Everything we do hangs on one of these hooks, or we just don't do it. The goal is to move people from the foyer to the living room to the kitchen. (Leadership, Invite Them Into the Kitchen, Winter 2000, page 24.)
When I read that, it struck a chord with me; it sounds like the way the church ought to be.
Next week, at the annual parish meeting, I will share with you the statistical information that we are required to report to the diocese and the national church. It shows, I’m sorry to say, that we've not been as successful at North Point Community Church has been, if one gauges success only by numbers of persons attending church. But that is not the only measure of Christian growth.
Loren Mead, the Episcopal priest who founded The Alban Institute, a church consultancy organization, has written that there is much more to church growth than numbers of worshipers. "The character of the community, the relationship between the congregation and its community, the nature of the congregation's understanding of its primary mission all these and more are a part of what we mean by growth." (More Than Numbers, Alban Institute, 1993, page 14.)
Mead also writes that what he calls "maturational growth," in which the members of a congregation "challenge, support, and encourage [one another] to grow in the maturity of their faith, to deepen their spiritual roots, and to broaden their religious imaginations," must be "at the center of the agenda" of every congregation. (Ibid., pp. 40, 59.) I believe this congregation has experienced and continues to experience "maturational growth." Over our nearly two hundred year history, St. Paul’s has weathered some tough times, but we have matured as a community and as persons within that community, we are each striving to "lead the life that the Lord has assigned." (1 Cor. 7:17) As we mature in our faith, deepen our spirituality, and broaden our religious imaginations, we make the Gospel nets we cast into the ocean of souls.
I believe, too, that we have experienced and will continue to experience what Mead calls "incarnational growth." He writes that there are two elements of such growth: Building and Sending. About building, he says:
Congregations must build themselves up as religious communities, as bases from which ministry is done. They need first to get clear that this is their primary business. They are in business to help people find God and be found by God, to build a community in which God's Word is studied and reflected upon, a community in which people are nurtured, healed and fed. (Ibid., page 100-01.)
This is our primary task: to be the people of God gathered, nurtured and fed at God's table.
The second element of "incarnational growth" is sending. Mead writes:
The flesh through which the values and meanings of the Gospels will make impact in the social order is the flesh of people who are nurtured in congregations. Theirs are the feet and hands and brains that will grapple with the ambiguities of the world.... (Ibid., page 101.)
In terms of today's Gospel metaphor, ours are the feet and hands and brains that will cast the net into the sea of humanity. In terms of our own congregational vision statement, ours are the lips and the voices that will invite others to share in mission and ministry.
I am not greatly concerned about our membership statistics. This congregation and many like it have seen fluctuations up and down in their numbers of active members and worshipers; such fluctuations are caused by many factors, many beyond our control. Numerical growth is not controllable, nor is it something which we should seek as a primary goal. Our primary goal is maturational growth as individuals and incarnational growth as a community. In a word, our primary goal is to live the Gospel, or in God’s words to Jonah, to get up, go to the community around us, and proclaim to it the message. If we do that, we need not be concerned about numerical growth, or financial growth, or program growth -- they will happen.
Andrew and Simon, and James and John, were called, and we are called, to be fishers of people, to invite others to join in worship, in prayer, in learning, and in reaching out. We have recognized that call and, as individuals who are maturing in their faith, and as a community both building and sending, we have claimed it as our own.
Let us pray: Lord Jesus Christ, you called Andrew and Simon, James and John, and us to be fishers of people that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit that we, casting the nets of our lives into the streams of humanity, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen.
Here in the midwest, as in most of America, our vision, our understanding of fishing is as a singular pursuit. A fisherman takes a rod and reel, baits the hook, casts out into a river, a stream or a lake. You may put very little effort into fishing just cast your lure out there somewhere, plant your poll and sit back; you may put a great deal of effort into fishing creating your own "flies" and casting repeatedly to mimic the actions of living insects. But little effort or a great deal it is a singular pursuit a one-on-one confrontation between the angler and the fish.
The poet Don Marquis has written, rather correctly, I think: "Our idea of fishing is to put all the exertion up to the fish. If they are ambitious, we will catch them. If they are not, we let them go about their business." (Prefaces, New York; London: D. Appleton and Company, 1919.)
I believe that American singular notion of fishing, that it is a one-man, rod-and-reel, catch-one-fish-at-a-time operation, colors the way we American Christians have understood Jesus's call to Andrew and Simon, which is, in fact, Jesus's call to all of us. We have understood evangelism to be a one-on-one operation; one Christian going out into the stream of humanity, casting about to catch one sinner, and dragging that sinner into church, then going back to cast about again and, hopefully, catch another sinner.
Perhaps that is why we Episcopalians shy away not only from the activity, but from the very word "evangelism." We see in it something akin to the single angler standing on the river bank casting his bate into the stream, and with that view of evangelism we feel about it as comedian Steven Wright has commented about fishing, "There's a fine line between fishing and standing on the shore like an idiot." One-on-one personal evangelism feels like "standing on the shore like an idiot."
However, the fishermen of Galilee were not anglers. They were (and still are) seine fishers ... they are not interested in catching one fish at a time: they drop nets into the sea and pull up hundreds or thousands of fish at a time.
When Jesus called them to be fishers of men, or fishers of people as the N.R.S.V. has it, he was calling them to an audacious ministry to reach many, many folks with the Good News of God's Salvation ... not just one or two at a time.
It is an outrageous calling! Some, I'm sure, would say it is over-broad; some would say it is too big, too ambitious, too presumptuous; some, I'm positive, would even say it is arrogant. But it is precisely what Jesus was calling Andrew and Simon, and James and John the sons of Zebedee, and all the Apostles and all the disciples in that time and every time since, to do ... not cast about catching one sinner at a time, but to cast a net into the ocean of society and pull in a huge haul of human beings all with souls longing for God.
I believe what the Psalmist wrote in today's Gradual (Ps. 62:6) is true of every human being:
For God alone my soul in silence waits; *
truly, my hope is in him.
I believe that deep within each human being is a longing for the Lord, a hunger for God. If we do cast our net into the ocean of humanity, every man, woman and child who may be caught will have a deep, deep craving for the Divine.
Jesus' called his disciples to the audacious, outrageous, enormous, even arrogant ministry of fishing the sea of humanity and gathering great numbers of people to the Good News of God's Salvation. But Jesus did not call the Apostles, and he does not call us to be concerned about how great those numbers may be; Jesus did not call them and he does not call us to "grow the church." Jesus called them and he calls us to be the church and to preach the Gospel. He called them and he calls us to cast the Gospel net, but not to be greatly concerned about the number of fish the net may catch.
We at St. Paul’s have expressed our understanding of this calling in our parish mission statement published on the cover our bulletin: we have set before ourselves a vision fully as audacious, outrageous, enormous, and maybe even arrogant as the call to be fishers of men.... We have claimed that we are engaged in the ministry of inviting "others to join us in proclaiming the Gospel through worship, prayer, learning and reaching out in mission and ministry." It is an audacious, outrageous, enormous, and maybe even arrogant claim, but I believe it is a faithful response to the call to be fishers of people.
Andy Stanley is a Baptist preacher in Atlanta, Georgia. About a decade ago, he and a few others started North Point Community Church in a suburb of that city. Today, 5,000 people attend church at North Point every Sunday. In envisioning the ministry in which they were engaging, in the leadership of North Point Church saw their activities as occurring within three kinds of environment. Stanley describes them this way:
1. The foyer environment, where people are made to feel welcome as a guest.
2. The living room environment, where they're treated like a friend.
3. And the kitchen environment, where they're made to feel like family.
Everything we do hangs on one of these hooks, or we just don't do it. The goal is to move people from the foyer to the living room to the kitchen. (Leadership, Invite Them Into the Kitchen, Winter 2000, page 24.)
When I read that, it struck a chord with me; it sounds like the way the church ought to be.
Next week, at the annual parish meeting, I will share with you the statistical information that we are required to report to the diocese and the national church. It shows, I’m sorry to say, that we've not been as successful at North Point Community Church has been, if one gauges success only by numbers of persons attending church. But that is not the only measure of Christian growth.
Loren Mead, the Episcopal priest who founded The Alban Institute, a church consultancy organization, has written that there is much more to church growth than numbers of worshipers. "The character of the community, the relationship between the congregation and its community, the nature of the congregation's understanding of its primary mission all these and more are a part of what we mean by growth." (More Than Numbers, Alban Institute, 1993, page 14.)
Mead also writes that what he calls "maturational growth," in which the members of a congregation "challenge, support, and encourage [one another] to grow in the maturity of their faith, to deepen their spiritual roots, and to broaden their religious imaginations," must be "at the center of the agenda" of every congregation. (Ibid., pp. 40, 59.) I believe this congregation has experienced and continues to experience "maturational growth." Over our nearly two hundred year history, St. Paul’s has weathered some tough times, but we have matured as a community and as persons within that community, we are each striving to "lead the life that the Lord has assigned." (1 Cor. 7:17) As we mature in our faith, deepen our spirituality, and broaden our religious imaginations, we make the Gospel nets we cast into the ocean of souls.
I believe, too, that we have experienced and will continue to experience what Mead calls "incarnational growth." He writes that there are two elements of such growth: Building and Sending. About building, he says:
Congregations must build themselves up as religious communities, as bases from which ministry is done. They need first to get clear that this is their primary business. They are in business to help people find God and be found by God, to build a community in which God's Word is studied and reflected upon, a community in which people are nurtured, healed and fed. (Ibid., page 100-01.)
This is our primary task: to be the people of God gathered, nurtured and fed at God's table.
The second element of "incarnational growth" is sending. Mead writes:
The flesh through which the values and meanings of the Gospels will make impact in the social order is the flesh of people who are nurtured in congregations. Theirs are the feet and hands and brains that will grapple with the ambiguities of the world.... (Ibid., page 101.)
In terms of today's Gospel metaphor, ours are the feet and hands and brains that will cast the net into the sea of humanity. In terms of our own congregational vision statement, ours are the lips and the voices that will invite others to share in mission and ministry.
I am not greatly concerned about our membership statistics. This congregation and many like it have seen fluctuations up and down in their numbers of active members and worshipers; such fluctuations are caused by many factors, many beyond our control. Numerical growth is not controllable, nor is it something which we should seek as a primary goal. Our primary goal is maturational growth as individuals and incarnational growth as a community. In a word, our primary goal is to live the Gospel, or in God’s words to Jonah, to get up, go to the community around us, and proclaim to it the message. If we do that, we need not be concerned about numerical growth, or financial growth, or program growth -- they will happen.
Andrew and Simon, and James and John, were called, and we are called, to be fishers of people, to invite others to join in worship, in prayer, in learning, and in reaching out. We have recognized that call and, as individuals who are maturing in their faith, and as a community both building and sending, we have claimed it as our own.
Let us pray: Lord Jesus Christ, you called Andrew and Simon, James and John, and us to be fishers of people that everyone might come within the reach of your saving embrace: So clothe us in your Spirit that we, casting the nets of our lives into the streams of humanity, may bring those who do not know you to the knowledge and love of you; for the honor of your Name. Amen.
posted by Father Eric | 7:41 AM
1 Comments:
Good stuff. Familiar to me, but well adapted to Medina. Did you improvise again on 2/5, or do you have that one sitting around waiting to be uploaded?
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