Fishers of People by Ps Michael Podhaczky

Matthew in 4:19 of his gospel recorded that, Jesus called some of His disciples to follow Him and He would, “make them Fishers of people.” Alternatively, as the New Living Translation puts it, “I will show you how to fish for people.” These were already trained commercial anglers working on the Sea of Galilee. Namely, they fished there for a living. They knew the hard work involved in fishing. There was the continual preparation of the boat, sails, nets, hooks, lines and the mending of any broken equipment from the trip ready for the next day’s fishing. They needed to decide, which end of the lake of Galilee they were going to fish, what time they were going to head out on the water. They also needed to watch closely the weather, i.e. was it going to be windy, stormy, rainy, or fine the following day.

Having done all this, they actually needed to do the hard work and go out and catch the fish, getting smelly from handling the fish. Not to mention the conditions that they needed to contend with, namely, getting wet through in rough seas, cold or possibly even sunburnt. Once they had caught their quota of fish, it was back to shore to unload and sell the fish. Then came the cleaning and preparation of the boat and equipment in readiness for the next day’s fishing. If that was not enough, then they had to clean the fish if they wanted to eat. It was only then, could they actually sit down, eat, and enjoy their hard-earned meal. Wow, there is so much involved in the process.

So, when Jesus called them to be fishers of people this is what Jesus was talking about. Lots of the same hard work goes into fishing for people to bring them into the Kingdom of God. They were not (and could not) going to make themselves into divine anglers for people instead, Jesus would do that in preparation for what needed to be done. If their fishing (i.e. their work in sharing the gospel and discipleship) was to be successful, this training and equipping was to be done in them first by God, so that they could continue the work when He left. This is the same for us in our fishing for people today. That is, first we need to be made into fishers of people by God Himself. Then there is a lot of hard work to do before and after a catch. Are you ready to do your bit as a fisher of people?