Home » Thoughts for the Week » Gone fishing (12 May)

Gone fishing (12 May)

The thought this week was written by Nick Lear, EBA Regional Minister.

One of my favourite programmes on TV is Mortimer and Whitehouse: Gone Fishing. Two comedian friends (Bob Mortimer and Paul Whitehouse) both had cardiac problems and to help Bob overcome the trauma of his surgery Paul invited him to join him on a fishing trip. As well as relating to some of the cardiac-related conversations I love the banter between the two friends and the gentle pace of the programme, which matches the patience needed when fishing. It’s a relaxing programme to watch.

Contrast that with the scene in John 21, where Peter and his disciple-buddies had gone fishing back on his home territory of the Sea of Galilee. They had been out in the boat all night repeatedly casting the nets and consistently catching nothing. As the morning dawned, they headed back to the shore – a tired, dispirited, cold and hungry group.

Can you imagine being on that boat? How are you feeling about it?

Then a stranger on the shoreline asked them whether they had caught anything. John enigmatically (and perhaps diplomatically) says that they answered, “No.” I suspect they may have said more than that, but even if that is all they said the word probably was spoken with a lot of frustration.

The stranger tells them to try again. He tells them to cast the net on the right side of the boat. Remarkably, despite the wasted night and exhaustion, and burying any sense of indignation at someone else telling them what to do, they did so. Perhaps they remembered the earlier occasion when someone had suggested they try again after a fruitless night of fishing. It took some courage for them to decide to listen to the suggestion and try one more time, on the right side of the boat when all they probably wanted to do was reach the shore, go home, warm up and dry out.

As we know, just like the previous occasion, when they tried to pull the net back in it was heaving with fish. This time there were too many to bring on board!

There’s so much more that happens after this in John’s narrative. But I want to stop here and reflect.

Why had Peter and co. gone fishing? John tells us that resurrected Jesus had already appeared to them twice before, so why were they in Galilee, and why were they fishing for fish rather than people? The answer to the first is found in what the angel told the women (as Mark records in 16:7) – that Jesus was going to Galilee. I suspect that the answer to the second is that, for Peter, Andrew, James and John at least, this was something comfortingly familiar. Everything else was so far beyond their experience that perhaps they needed the security-blanket of a night’s fishing to help them work it all out.

And now, for us, there is the prospect of the lockdown easing. How do we feel about that? It may be that, following the pandemic, lockdowns and restrictions, many of us are feeling like the disciples. Perhaps we are tired and dispirited, fed up and almost ready to give up.

While many churches have managed to use video conferencing, social media, phones and some have even produced paper newsletters to keep in touch and to try to carry on with the ministry to which Jesus has called us it’s just not the same is it? It’s inadequate. Even when we have been able to be in the same building for services, we have had to remain socially distanced, wear masks and refrain from singing and that does not scratch where we are itching. Maybe we just want to go back to the way things used to be – to resume the comfortingly familiar and feel the security-blanket of doing what we have always done before wrapped around us. I understand that.

But, as John pointed out to Peter, “It’s the Lord” who’s asking us to try again: to cast our nets on the right side of the boat. Is he asking us to consider doing things differently, to listen to him afresh and discover new aspects of ministry and mission in which he wants us to engage?

For each church, and perhaps for each believer, exactly what ‘cast your net on the right side of the boat’ means will be different. There may be some answers in the discerning process we went through as an Association during lockdown 1. From those sessions we discerned several key themes we felt God was reminding us about:

Discipleship is more than programmes

Discipleship is relational

Discipleship happens where God places us

Discipleship in lockdown makes new connections

Discipleship means still listening to God and going deeper with God

You can read about these themes in more detail here: What might God be saying – Collation of Zoom discussions – Eastern Baptist Association

I wonder too whether casting our nets on the right side of the boat may also mean fishing where the fish are. What I mean is that we are called to minister in the name of Jesus to our communities, and right now (and perhaps for the foreseeable future) two of the greatest needs will be around economics and well-being. Debt, unemployment, job-insecurity, food poverty and so many other financial issues have been aggravated significantly by the pandemic and lockdowns. In what fresh ways might Jesus want your church to help people with this?

And the emotional and mental health of our nation has taken a pounding by the pandemic. People have been forced into isolation, human contact has been minimal, people have been separated from those they love and there is a collective and individual sense of bereavement and loss in our country. In what new ways might Jesus be asking you to minister in this context?

I accept that I have asked quite a few questions and given relatively few answers. The reason for that is that I believe that each church locally will need to discern what ‘cast your nets on the right side of the boat’ means for you. It will be different for each of you because you have different resources available (time, people, money), different skills to offer, and different contexts in which you minister. But perhaps the image of being asked to cast your net on the right side of the boat would be a helpful way to begin the discernment together.

May the Lord bless you abundantly, and through you bless those around you immensely.

Nick and the EBA Team