Sermon — February 6, 2022
The Rev. Greg Johnston
“Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips,
and I live among a people of unclean lips!” (Isaiah 6:5)
Welcome to my annual report.
No, I’m just kidding. But this is a fitting set of readings for a Sunday on which we’ll vote to elect the new leadership of this parish, with two new wardens and four new Vestry members. Our readings today grapple with the overwhelming sense of responsibility that can come with a transition, in any area of life. If you’ve ever gotten a promotion at work, or taken on a leadership role in a community organization, or become a parent, you’ve probably felt that combination of dread and commitment, of “Woe is me!” and “Here I am! Send me!” Even simply to babysit for a few hours for the first time is to enter into a terrifying realm of smoke and fire and quaking thresholds; surely they’re not about to entrust me with this child? And then they do, and there you are, and it’s okay. Hopefully.
Of course, these new responsibilities come with many benefits, including some of the greatest joys and satisfactions in life: the ability to practice new skills or finally use the ones we have, to make a bigger impact on the world, to see our children as they change and grow, to eat anything we want from some random people’s fridge while we’re babysitting. It’s not so bad.
If you ever have any anxiety about new responsibilities, just read one of the gospel stories about Simon Peter. I always love these stories, because for a chief apostle, he’s such an ordinary guy. He is both a clumsy, bumbling leader, and a model for who we all should be, and that should be a comforting thing, because—while we may never catch prodigious numbers of fish, or go to lead the Church of Christ in Rome, we probably also won’t warm ourselves by the fire outside the place where Christ is being sentenced to death and deny we’ve ever heard of the guy, so we’re not doing too badly, overall.
I want to make a few observations about leadership, responsibility, and discipleship from our Gospel reading this morning.
First: It begins with saying yes, despite our doubts. Jesus asks Simon Peter to come out into the water and cast his net, and Simon is a bit skeptical. “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing…” he says. “Yet if you say so…” He’s not sure it’s the right time or place for him to try putting out his nets, but he trusts the one who’s inviting him into it, and he says yes, and amazing things happen.
Things that are somewhat too amazing, in fact. Observation #2: our successes can be as overwhelming as our failures, if not even more so. You can imagine that Peter and his companions were a little disappointed to have caught no fish, wasting a long night’s labor. But it’s not the end of the world. Yet the success that comes when they follow Jesus’ invitation really could be the end of the world: “they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break…and they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink.” (Luke 5:6-7) Their failure is a disappointment; their success is a catastrophe. These are ordinary people, small-time businessmen; their nets and their boats are all they have. And there is always a risk in trying something new, in ascending up a new run on whatever ladder we’re climbing. It’s just as true for a church or a neighborhood. If we want to grow, in numbers or in ministry, there’s some risk. I wonder: What would it look like for our church’s boats to be so full of fish in 2022 that they began to sink?
Observation #3: the opportunities and possibilities of this new thing can and should come with a serious sense of humility. Just as Isaiah cried out, when called to speak the words of the Lord, “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips!” Peter, too responds with humility. “Go away from me Lord, for I am a sinful man!” And yet Peter didn’t go away, “he fell down at Jesus’ knees.” (Luke 5:8) In fact this is too weak a translation. It was an ancient posture of supplication to kneel down and grab onto someone’s knees; if you were begging someone for your life, you’d grab their knees and plead with them. So Luke writes that Simon “fell toward Jesus’ knees,” and you can imagine Jesus’ amusement at the sight. “Go away from me, Lord!” Peter cries. Um, sir. Those are my legs.
It’s a powerful symbol, though, of a spiritual truth: when we realize that we are unworthy to answer God’s call, that we can’t fulfill the vision God has for us, what we need is not to push God away, but to lean in closer; not to reject the calling, but to accept God’s gracious response to all our failings.
And we can lean in closer to one another, too. That’s observation #4: leadership is not an individual characteristic, but a communal effort. “James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon” on the fishing boats become his partners in ministry, the inner circle of a web that stretches from Jesus; to James, John, and Peter; to the Twelve; to the five hundred Paul names and more. Their leadership is a collaborative calling of which none of them is worthy on his own, and yet to which they can respond if they bear one another’s burdens along the way. And this is why we lead the church as a Vestry of which, at this point, the majority of our adults have been members. It’s why we work as teams and raise children as villages. We cannot bear the burden alone. But together, we can.
And even together, sometimes we can’t; and yet that is the greatest observation at all. Sometimes we try things and we fail. Sometimes our efforts simply aren’t good enough. Or at least we think they’re not. And Jesus responds to our inadequacies and limitations by inviting us into even greater growth, even greater responsibility. Your boat’s sinking? You’re a sinful man, not worthy of catching so many fish? “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” (Luke 5:10) And so the simple “fishermen” becomes the “fishers of men,” on the way to a lifelong pursuit of an ever-greater harvest.
So many of you bear the burden of responsibility in your lives. Maybe it’s at church, in formal or informal leadership, on the Vestry or the Building Committee, as stewardship chair or with the ECW, or in a thousand other ways. Maybe it’s at work, or at home, or in school. You may sometimes feel that you’re not good enough for the responsibility you bear. But God’s response is not to smite you for your failings. It’s not to judge you for your flaws. It’s to take you as you are, an ordinary person, good but not perfect, and to give you the strength to answer the call, so that when God asks you, “Whom shall I send?” you hear the unexpected sound of your own voice: “Here am I; send me!” (Isaiah 6:8) Amen.