Wow!
James Tissot (Nantes, France, 1836–1902, Chenecey–Buillon, France). The Miraculous Draught of Fishes (La pêche miraculeuse), 1886–1896. Opaque watercolor over graphite on gray wove paper, Image: 6 3/4 x 9 11/16 in. (17.1 x 24.6 cm). Brooklyn Museum, Purchased by public subscription; click on image to link to source.
For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken …. –Luke 5:9
The lectionary schedule of readings for this Sunday places the text from the prophet Isaiah alongside our reading from the Gospel of Luke. Something that Isaiah’s story shares with Peter’s story is an encounter with God so profound that it seems to engender a feeling of dread. When visiting the temple, Isaiah feels the overwhelming presence of God. “Woe is me!” he cries. “I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips . . .” Peter, seeing all the fish where recently there had been none, exclaims, “Depart from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!”
The stories remind me stories told by many pastors to explain their call to ministry. Perhaps you’ve heard such stories about someone who resisted an impression from God, who tried to put it out of mind. Some have said that in running away from God, they ran into God in other places. Ministry was something to be escaped rather than embraced, until, finally, the one being called stopped struggling, listened, and followed God in a new direction.
How about you? Have you ever recognized the hand of God at work in your life in a way you never expected or imagined? How did you feel? Was it an exciting and joyful mountaintop experience, or were there things about the experience that made you uncomfortable? If it felt uncomfortable, then you’re in good company: The prophets and apostles felt the same.
Most of you know that I grew up in Michigan, son of a father who loved to fish. Through the years, I’ve shared a few fish stories from that early part of my life. Sometimes, fish stories are about the large catch, or the big one that got away. But the fish story we heard in today’s text is less about the fish and the fishermen, and more about Jesus, and what the episode reveals about him.
Simon Peter had returned from a night of fishing on the Lake of Gennesaret, better known to us as the Sea of Galilee. Luke tells us that Peter was in business with James and John, and that they had not yet become Jesus’ disciples. They were interested was in washing their nets and repairing their equipment. But Jesus caught their interest and drew them in to help him. Jesus appreciated Peter’s service. So after the last lesson had been taught, Jesus told Peter to put out into deeper water and let down the nets for a catch.
Peter was reluctant. He had fished all night, caught nothing, and was tired. Suddenly the nets were full, and Peter was surrounded by fish flopping and dancing around the deck of his boat. His emotions moved from surprise, to wonder, to awe. It looks like Peter realized he was in the presence of something supernatural, and that knowledge scared him deeply. “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!”
Maybe another way of describing the stories from Isaiah and Luke is that both are instances when God’s power is revealed, and those who see it recognize something so perfect that it makes them despair of being so imperfect. But a state of despair is not where God leaves them. God reshapes their terror of the holy into reverential awe, an awe that inspires and empowers their ministries.
Some of you have read books by Anne Lamott, a rather unconventional Presbyterian living in California, who writes in a way that sometimes feels uncomfortably raw in its honesty. Once, someone asked Lamott about her prayer life, and she famously said that the two best prayers she knows are her prayer upon waking, “Help me, help me, help me,” and her prayer before sleeping, “Thank you, thank you, thank you.” Then, Lamott went on to say that she practices a third, short, one-word prayer: “WOW!” She advised that we should say “WOW!” to God at least once a day.[1]
What if we created our own free translation of scripture using this word. “… They caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “WOW!” For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish ….”
Where in the world do we see something God-inspired and say “Wow”? “World Vision,” an international Christian organization (and target of the current USAID funding freeze[2]), sees God at work in global ministries that have helped to free girls from childhood marriages, to free children from forced labor, to curtail dangerous diseases by providing clean water and vaccines, to reduce infant mortality rates, and to reduce the number of people living in extreme poverty by about one-billion people since 1990.[3] Wow! Naturally, my thoughts turn to the work of St. Jude Children’s Hospital, the compassionate care and hope for a cure provided to thousands of children every year. Wow!
On a personal level, maybe you pray “Wow!” when you see the sonogram heralding the entrance of a new baby into the world, when you read a letter from a friend providing tender care to an aging parent, or when you celebrate the anniversary of a couple who have loved one another through the changes of many decades. Maybe you pray “Wow!” when you see an act of personal kindness or hear a story of self-sacrifice.
These days, many of us are worrying about many things. Perhaps it feels difficult to look and listen for even one God-inspired thing in the day you’re living. Perhaps you look in vain for what Frederick Buechner once described as the “glimmering through of grace.”
I’ve shared with some of you a book by Kate Bowler entitled The Lives We Actually Have. It contains one-hundred “blessings,” prayers for imperfect people living through imperfect days, people like you and me. A portion of one seems perfect as my prayer for you today:
God, this season has been such a slog
That it’s hard to remember what it was like
To be surprised by wonder.
I no longer notice the little things
That used to stop me in my tracks ….
Refresh me, oh God.
Remind me of the loveliness found in today.
Surprise me with the details I have lost the eyes to see ….
Blessed are we who ask for hearts that are soft,
For eyes that are awake, for ears that are open, for hands to hold the wonder that is here, now.[4]
In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
NOTES
[1] As remembered by John M. Buchanan, “Reverence,” a sermon delivered at the Fourth Presbyterian Church, Chicago, 8 February 2004.
[2] https://time.com/7212791/usaid-christian-foreign-aid-freeze-evangelical/
[3] https://worldvisionadvocacy.org/2019/11/05/10-reasons-were-thankful-that-god-is-at-work-around-the-world/
[4] Kate Bowler and Jessica Richie, The Lives We Actually Have, New York: Convergent Books, 2023, pp. 46-47.
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