Lectionary Readings: Third Sunday after the Epiphany
Have you ever had a moment in your life where everything all came crashing in at once? Not in a bad way. Not like things in your life were falling apart. But that things all came together in one single moment, and everything made so much sense – a true sense of clarity – that you could no longer understand or look at things the same way again.
These sorts of things often happen when we are little, and help us to grow up. It’s those moments when we realize that those strict rules that our parents gave us aren’t because they are mean or unfair, but because they want to keep us safe. Or that first fight in a relationship, when everything feels like it’s all over, only to realize that people forgive, and forget, and that there is life beyond an argument. Or that moment that kids realize that the world doesn’t revolve around them, and that what they say and do doesn’t just affect them, but also affects everyone around them. Maybe it’s because they see how their own behavior made their mother or father cry, or that taking more food at a picnic meant someone else didn’t eat.
These types of events are life-changing. They change the way we view the world, and they usually strike deep into how we see ourselves, and they can make us want to change both ourselves, and the world around us.
This is, it seems, part of what is happening in the Gospel today. This week, just like last week, we hear the story of Jesus’ first disciples, but we hear it from a different perspective. The same disciples are mentioned in both stories. Last week, we saw Andrew, a disciple of John the Baptist, follow Jesus, and then bring his brother into the group after he had spent time with Jesus and realized he was the Messiah. This week, we see Jesus walking along the shore of the lake where Andrew and his brother Peter are fishing.
And Jesus says, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”
What we have in Matthew’s Gospel are these words of Jesus, and these men drop everything, and they follow him. But they’re not just dropping the things they are doing and the items they are holding. They are essentially giving up how they make their living. They are giving up fishing – their means of income – in order to follow this man walking along the shore. A man who said, “Follow me and I will teach you to fish for people.”
What does that even mean?
Imagine that you are living a hundred years ago. There’s new things being invented, it seems, almost every day – or at least new ideas are tossed around as though they might be true. New ideas they speculate and offer hope.
Imagine that you have a small home business where you build birdhouses and sell them at the local farmer’s market, and one day, as you’re painting one of the houses, a man walks up and says, “Follow me, and I’ll help you build houses that scrape the sky!” And you say, “Huh? What does that even mean?”
Or, you have a little business carving toys out of wood. And one day, you are carving a toy bi-plane, and you’re trying to put a smile on the head of the pilot so that people will enjoy this toy, and a man walks up and says, “Follow me, and I will help you build flying machines that sound like thunder, and let people pierce the heavens!” And you say, “Huh? What does that even mean?”
In neither one of those two situations do I believe that you would drop everything you’re doing, give up your business, abandon your families, and just follow the man on the possibility of learning a trade that sounds like a fever dream.
But this is what’s happening to Andrew and Peter, and James and John. They drop everything, for a man who says, “Quit trying to catch fish to sell. Come, follow me and catch people.”
What does that even mean?
Now, we all know what it means, since we have the benefit of hindsight. We can look back and realize that Jesus meant to make these people who spread the Good News of the Kingdom of God. People who invited others not only to see the Messiah, but to meet him in person. People who showed others the beauty of a life of serving and walking with God, rather than walking in circles, hoping one day to make it over the mountains to where the greener pastures are.
But at that moment, on the shores of Lake Galilee, what Jesus said probably sounded to them a bit like nonsense.
So, clearly, there had to be something else going on. Did he just have a look in his eyes that said, “Trust me, I’m a good guy.” Did Jesus actually say more? Did he explain the future of the world in great detail, so the disciples could understand exactly what they were getting into? Or did the disciples have a moment where they understood those words in perfect clarity – where everything came together, and they suddenly just understood that there was a bigger world out there, beyond their own hopes and dreams, beyond the scope of their own lives, and beyond the futility of merely surviving from one day to the next: catching fish, selling fish, eating fish, sleeping, and waking up to do it all again.
To drop everything, to leave family and income just to follow a strange man who walked by them on the shores of Lake Galilee meant that something that these men heard or realized at that moment was compelling enough for them to leave everything behind for this future promise. There was something so real and unique in what Jesus said or did that they felt it needed to happen, and they left their livelihood for this grand future promise of “fishing for people.”
Have you ever felt that compulsion? That compelling reason for what Jesus has in store for this world and the next? And, more importantly, how you might be involved in this grand and compelling adventure?
If last week was all about trying to understand our own motivation on why we first started following Jesus, then this week is all about trying to explain what that great shift in thinking was that accompanied our first steps: what was it that compelled us?
What took us from a private confession of faith to a public profession?
What took us from a personal faith to a corporate mission?
What took us from an academic understanding of what Jesus taught, to a life that embodies the teachings of Jesus?
That question has as many answers as there are people who believe.
Right now, in this world, there are a lot of compelling reasons that get people to jump in and pick up the mantle for a cause. There are a lot of compelling reasons for why people do what they do. And most often, those who can articulate exactly why they do what they do find the most people who are willing to stand up and join their cause.
Some of those causes bring harm to other people. Some of those causes bring damage to nations and people. Some of those causes stand in direct opposition to the teachings of Christ. But because those people who follow that cause are able to provide a compelling reason for why people should stand up and work with them, they often find a way for their evil to triumph over good. For their version of what is right to shape the world around them – all for their own glory.
Just like the disciples of Jesus were compelled to follow him, and who helped to shape not only a nation but also a world with the knowledge of the Kingdom of God, so we too can help shape even just a small part of this world. Not for our own glory, but for the greater glory of God.
When each of us is able to explain and articulate exactly what it is that compelled us to drop everything and follow Jesus, to follow the teachings of Jesus that bring peace, and life, and love, then we will become those who “fish for people.”
When Jesus first started out, he began by preaching, “Repent, for the kingdom of heaven has come near.” And I’m sure that at that time, there were people who were asking, “What does that even mean?”
Jesus meant that with his arrival on this earth, that the Creator intended for God’s will to be done, on earth, as in heaven. That we who followed Jesus would forgive others for their sins, and be forgiven by them for our own; and that all people would seek to serve and love one another, just as God loved them.
And those disciples at the shores of Lake Galilee must have understood what Jesus meant by that, all the things in their mind came together at that moment to help them see this bigger picture, and it compelled them to want to change their lives and thereby change the world.
Our own faith may start out private. It may start out personal. But when our own faith becomes public and communal, we begin to see the inklings of that future promise that Jesus talked about: what it means to actually “fish for people.”
Because then, people will see in us, and in what we do, an inkling of what it means that the kingdom of heaven has drawn near.
[This sermon was delivered at St. Alban’s Episcopal Church in Wickenburg, AZ on January 25, 2026.]