Sermons for the Month

Angling without an Angle
DATE: January 23, 2000
SERVICE: Epiphany III
TEXT: Mark 1:14-20

“To all of you Saints here this morning, grace and peace to you from God our Father, from His Son, Jesus Christ and His Holy Spirit. AMEN

Back in 1980, Denny Brauer was earning his living as a mason and pursuing his true passion on the side -- bass fishing. One day he revealed a desire that no doubt shocked his spouse to the core. He announced that he wanted to move from their home in Nebraska to a place where there's "more water," so he could wet his line on a full-time basis. No more bricklaying for Denny, he told his wife. From now on: professional fishing.

I bet you can imagine his wife's delight. Yeah, right. As if. Comments Jack McCallum in Sports Illustrated, "Deciding that you wanted to make a livable wage as a bass angler in '80 wasn't quite as risky as deciding that you wanted to make a livable wage as, say, a marble shooter, but it was close."

But guess what? Denny's wife said, "Let's go," and moving to where the fish were was the right move for this fisherman and his family.

Two decades later, Brauer has a Saturday-morning fishing show on ESPN, The Bass Class with Denny Brauer, not to mention two instructional videos and a couple of books. He has endorsement deals with so many companies -- 12, according to his count -- that when he goes out to fish, he looks like a stock-car racer festooned with brand-name logos. In one recent year, Brauer fished in 15 tournaments and made between $600,000 and $800,000 in prize money and endorsements (Jack McCallum, "Reeling in Dough," Sports Illustrated, August 24, 1998, 40).

Bass fishing is big business these days, with fishermen crowding lakes and tuning in to ESPN to watch experts like Denny Brauer do their "flippin' and pitchin'." You can't channel surf very far without coming across at least one show with a man in a boat casting a line and whispering instructions to his disciples. The fishermen of this country love to dote on Denny and copy his casting, but for Christians, this popular pastime raises a question: Are we equally serious about studying the technique of Jesus of Nazareth, who called us to be fishers of people and to reel in disciples?

[INTERACTIVE: Step into the center of your chancel with a fishing rod and reel, and cast a weighted line -- without hook! -- down the church aisle. Continue telling this short scriptural story from memory as you reel in your line.] "As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the sea .... And Jesus said to them, 'Follow me and I will make you fish for people.' And immediately they left their nets and followed him. As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. Immediately he called them; and they ... followed him" (Mark 1:16-20) [Return to pulpit].

Jesus was an enormously effective evangelist, inspiring people to drop their nets and follow him. If "fishing for people" were a marketable sport, the Man from Nazareth would no doubt join the Man from Nebraska with his own show on ESPN! But the question for us as we cast our lines into the perplexing postmodern pool around us is this: How do principles of successful fishing apply to evangelism? The answer is this: When Jesus takes us on an angling adventure, he not only shows us where and how to drop our lines, but reminds us that it's "no limit" fishing.

The first bit of advice that Jesus whispers to us is to "go to where the fish are." Words of wisdom that are a no-brainer, really ... but so often ignored. Why is it, brothers and sisters, that we so often sit back and wait for a catch to come to us, without exerting the slightest energy to reach the waters where the fish are flocking?

Sportsman Angus Phillips describes the importance of location in one of his reflections on a Chesapeake Bay fishing trip: "We sped across the bay into a rising sun, stopping twice to cast unsuccessfully to small schools of breaking fish that wouldn't strike top-water lures." Angus and his fellow anglers could SEE some fish, but couldn't hook them, so what did they do: Keep trying? No way! They moved on to better waters.

Angus reports that his companion Billy Brener "monitored the fish finder and idled around till he spied a school of fish on the bottom in 30 feet of water. We baited double-hook bottom rigs with chunks of fresh, soft crab, lowered the baits down with three-ounce sinkers, and drifted them across the undulating bottom contours."

"I'm having a bite!" Brener said, and they all laughed, remembering a Spanish colleague who used that curious expression, "I'm having a bite!" Soon they all were having bites, mostly croakers in the 10- to 14-inch size range, with occasional sea trout of 14 to 18 inches thrown in. Just past lunch time they stopped to count and came up with a total of 10 trout, 25 croakers and one bluefish.

"Under the rules we could have kept going till we had four times as many," boasts Angus Phillips, "but why make a pig of yourself?" (Angus Phillips, "Conscientious Anglers Aid Summer Fishing Sites by Knowing When to Say When," The Washington Post, June 29, 1999, D9).

Are we "having bites," fellow fishers of people? If not, we're probably fishing in the wrong spot. It doesn't work simply to change the message on the church signboard. It doesn't work to prop open the doors on Sunday morning. It doesn't even work to pride ourselves on being a friendly congregation, and to welcome the visitors who somehow manage to make it out of bed, get the kids dress and into their cars and down the street and through our doors and into our pews. If we want to make a big catch, we've got to go to where the fish are! And where is that? Well its not our neighbor who already has a church home but it is the new neighbor who doesn't. It's going where the unchurched are: at the Rotary or Kiwanas or the Club or the Spa or the Wellness Center (you will find a lot of them there). It's learning to hang-out with them and learning from them then inviting them.

Let me add here that much fishing today involves being downright deceptive. Hence the words "bait" and "lure." We try to trick the fish into believing that what they're biting on is something that it isn't. Jesus went to where the fish were, but once there, cast a net and grabbed them. No deception. No tricks. No lures. Just a net, and the bigger and wider -- the better.

Let's be like Angus Phillips and Billy Brener, crank up our congregational fish finder, and idle around until we spy a school of potential disciples. If the fish are families with young children, they will be strolling around a community fair, where we can set up a booth with balloons and brochures. If the fish are young adults, they will be looking for opportunities to have an adventure and serve others, so how about offering a mission trip to an impoverished region in this country or abroad? We can put up flyers where this group tends to swim -- at the local health club! This is "no limit" fishing, so we'll catch whatever we can.

If we're going to reel in disciples, we've got to cast a wide net. This means taking another look at worship and Christian education and opportunities for prayer and fellowship that truly nurture the souls of today's spiritual seekers. Researchers such as Dean Hoge of Catholic University have found that what many baby boomers are looking for are high-quality Sunday school and youth programs, uplifting worship experiences, and meaningful, authentic small group experiences.

So what should we offer the souls that swim by us? Contemporary praise songs and drama in worship? Special ministries for singles, children and youths? Computer courses, with a chance to work on the church's web site? Saturday prayer groups and Wednesday evening classes, as well as country and western dance lessons? Don't laugh -- more and more churches are doing it, and they're netting people for Christ!

Fortunately, our call is to hook people for the most life-enhancing and soul-expanding of reasons: a connection with Jesus Christ. We are reeling in disciples not to fill our pews or fix our budget, but to get people in tune with the Divine, and to introduce them personally to the Source of salvation.

"Everywhere I look I see signs of a resurrected Redeemer," says Methodist evangelist Billy Key. "I see people changed within and without, made anew, reborn, changed from a self-seeking egotistical personality to a Christ- centered and unselfish personality. The only explanation that I know is that Jesus is still alive." There's just no limit to what Christ can do with a person who has been hooked by the Gospel, and no limit to what we can do when we talk about the powerful presence of Jesus in our own valleys of sorrow and trouble and fear and uncertainty and sin. In the end, evangelism is really not a message, asserts Billy Key. It is, instead, "persons with a message that they cannot keep to themselves" (William R. Key, "The 'What Is' and 'How-To' of Evangelism," www.evangelize.org/articles/article22.htm, The Foundation for Evangelism Web Site, July 6, 1999).

Does this describe you? Do you have a message that you cannot keep to yourself? A truth that is too good to hide? A "fish story" about your faith that gets bigger and better every time you tell it? If so, you'll be following in the steps of all the great anglers who have succeeded in reeling in disciples. When you go fishing for people, there's no limit to what God can do through you, and no limit to the number of people that you can help to get in tune with Jesus.

AMEN

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