Preached at Holy Cross, Seend and St Mary’s, Potterne
Hebrews 9. 24-28; Mark 1. 14-20
“And straightway they forsook their nets, and followed him.’”
James Tissot, The Calling of St Peter and St Andrew (1886-94), now hangs in the Brooklyn Museum.
Our Gospel reading today is one of the most famous of all Biblical passages, when Jesus calls on some fishermen to become “fishers of men”, and they drop everything to follow Him.
This can seem a little intimidating. We’re not all made to be the sort of people who just walk away from their jobs to convert the world. Most of us don’t have the right sort of personality, and some of us might be just a little too old for that sort of thing. More to the point, some of us might have responsibilities that we just can’t walk away from. Especially, we might have people we just can’t walk away from. I always feel a little sorry for Zebedee when I hear this reading, as his sons James and John simply walk off the job to follow Jesus.
Here are two little things to think about in relation to it. Firstly, remember that not all of Jesus’ followers were called to be apostles. The apostles are certainly in the centre of the action in the Gospels, but Jesus clearly has other devoted disciples who live in fixed places. Do you remember Jesus going to stay with his friends Mary and Martha in their home? Do you remember how, when Jesus and the apostles arrive in Jerusalem on Palm Sunday, He clearly has other followers there who have made preparations.
You may very well not be called to follow Jesus like Peter and Andrew. You may instead be called to follow Jesus like Mary and Martha.
Here’s another thing to think about. As well as reading this passage literally, it has a spiritual meaning of abandoning whatever is holding us back from following Jesus Christ. We follow Christ spiritually, not physically, and we follow Him to the Crosses that we all bear sometimes, and then through that on to our Resurrections. So the question to ask here is what is there in your life that you need to forsake to follow Christ? What is there in your soul that prevents you from truly following Jesus spiritually? What is there in you that needs to be abandoned?
That’s a lifelong journey. It’s something that you should take a little step on every day—but as I know we’re not all always that good and I’m certainly not that good very often, it’s something you should do most of all when you come to Holy Communion, and make your confession to God in your heart.
Most of us are called to follow Christ in the place where we are; some of us are called to something different—but mostly we aren’t. And it’s in the place we are that we’re called to be fishers of men, not necessarily by explaining our faith to people, although that’s a good thing if we can do it, but definitely by showing a life formed by that faith.
And the basis on which we are fishers of men is this—that each of us is a sinner, and we reach God’s salvation not through our own efforts but in this—that by shedding His blood Christ has washed away our sins and opened the way to eternal life for us. That’s what our first reading, from Hebrews is all about.
When we follow Christ, we do that in the full knowledge that we’ll never follow Him perfectly. And we don’t seek to discard those things that prevent us from following Him more closely to earn God’s favour or God’s love, for we already have those things. We seek to follow Christ more closely because that is how we can live our life with the greatest joy and fullness in this life, and best prepare ourselves for our lives in the world to come.
Now glory and honour be to the Holy and Undivided Trinity, the Father who made us, the Son who redeemed us, the Spirit who sustains us, this day and forevermore. Amen.
Top image: The Sea of Galilee near Magdala. © Gerry Lynch, 9 November 2024.
Amen