I’ve been waiting for the flood waters to recede so that I can take my daughter Nicola fishing in the

Cowichan

River, near where we live.  Nicola, of all my children, has caught my virus for the sport, for which there is no known cure.  We tried, despite the weather and the swollen waters, to go recently anyhow.  It was a wet grey Saturday, the rain pelting down hard, but she was bent on going nonetheless.  So we drove to a place I know (don’t even bother asking, because no fisherman worth his fly rod will share such secrets).  The rain fell, and drenched us.  The river’s silty waters rode high up its banks and made casting tricky as threading a camel through a needle’s eye.  We broke out a new lure, fresh from the package, a yellow spoon with a flame of red sundering its middle.  Very flashy.  We snagged it third cast, and lost it to the torrents. 

                But we couldn’t have been happier.  As I said, we’ve got the virus.  No cure. 

                Jesus liked fish, and fisherman.  At least four of the disciples – Peter, Andrew, John, James - were chosen from the ranks of the fish trade.  And Jesus, whenever he ate, tended to pick the fresh water menu item.

                I think he understood the virus well. 

                So it’s men like me, and girls like Nicola, who hear with extra poignancy and potency his words, “Now you will become fishers of men.”  He knew what to say to get our attention.  He knew what would pique our interest.

                Could evangelism and discipleship be that captivating?  Could a life of trying to win the hearts of men and women be for us, for all of us, what fishing is to my daughter and me: a thing you’d wake early, and suffer loss, and endure bad weather just to do?  A thing you’d go long stretches empty-handed just for the thrill of that moment when the line goes taut, the rod bends, and the chase is on?

                Yes. 

                One thing the Lord is teaching me (and, as Jesus said, what he whispers to me in secret I will shout from rooftops) is that when we fail to lead lives of witness – showing and telling others what it is to follow Jesus – we are not so much cheating God as we are robbing ourselves.  We are missing one of the best parts about following Jesus. 

                He wants us to go fishing. 

                Why, rain or shine, would anyone want to lay around the house?

 

Shalom,

 

Mark Buchanan