One Fish, Two Fish

This is taken from my notes for a lesson I taught the children in our At Sea theme. I felt that this was one of the more important lessons in this lesson series.


Matthew 4:18-20


And Jesus, walking by the sea of Galilee, saw two brethren, Simon called Peter, and Andrew his brother, casting a net into the sea: for they were fishers. And he saith unto them, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. And they straightway left their nets, and followed him.

How many of you have been fishing before? If you have, than, more than likely, what you did was considered sport fishing. You probably baited a hook for a particular kind of fish, and wrestled him out of the water using a rod, reel, and your own strength. Sport fishing is so called because it is not intended for commercial or life-sustaining purposes, but instead for the enjoyment of the fisherman.

A commercial fisherman typically is not trying to pull a prize fish out of the water, nor is he generally preoccupied with the type of fish that is captured in his nets. A commercial fisherman's main goal is to get as many fish out of the water and into his boat as he possibly can. This is why a fisherman will use a net instead of the line and reel that most sports fishermen will use, because a net does not care what kind of fish you are, it only wishes to pull you into the boat.

This is how we, as Christians reaching to a world that is lost, must also act. When we go fishing for men, or soul-reaching, we must not pick and chose who will try to get in the boat. We must not cast a line with a baited hook that only "our" kind of people will want to bite, and we certainly must not practice catch and release. What we must do is cast our nets into the sea of mankind, and pull in all of those who our nets can encompass. It doesn't matter if they act different than we do, or talk different, and it doesn't matter if we think that they are Christian material. The only thing that we need to do is cast our nets, and pull as many into the boat as we can.