My text this morning will be
found in the Gospel of Luke chapter 5. Luke chapter 5. I suppose of all the apostles of
our Lord Jesus, I identify more with Peter than any of the rest.
You see a whole lot of me in Peter. Verse 1 says, and it came
to pass that as the people pressed upon him, that being the Lord
Jesus, to hear the word of God, he stood by the lake of Gennesaret,
which is the Sea of Galilee, and he saw two ships standing
or anchored by the lake. But the fishermen were gone out
of them and were washing their nets. Now, this day started out
for Peter just to be another day at work. Fishing was a pretty
rough trade in our Lord's day. It was hard work. And the strenuous
life of a fisherman often required long hours and a strong physical
physique. The occupation of a commercial
fisherman in our Lord's day was somewhat dangerous. One of my
favorite shows on TV now on the History Channel is called Deadliest
Catch. These guys go out into the Bering
Sea and crab fish. One of the most dangerous jobs
there is. Anytime you have the elements
of cold, weather, water, waves, and all that, dangerous. No doubt
Peter was a strong man physically, but no doubt he was a strong-willed
man. No doubt, Peter more than likely
had an outspoken personality. We see from the gospel narratives
that he wasn't at all shy about expressing his opinion. And in
our story, we discover that Peter and his brother Andrew and their
partners, James and John, had been fishing all night. And then
you consider or throw in the sin factor, I call it. that's
found in all of us, it'd probably be pretty safe to say that Peter
and his partners were more than likely they weren't in a very
good mood. Been fishing all night, caught
nothing. They were tired as they finished
up the day. They're washing their nets. They're
wrapping up a long work shift. They're ready to go home. And
this being the case, Peter and his partners probably weren't
too interested in attending a preaching service. Verse 3 says, and he, the Lord
Jesus, entered into one of the ships, which was Simon's, being
Peter's, and he prayed. He desired him that he would
thrust out a little from the land, and he sat and taught the
people out of the ship. And don't we see here again the
irresistible and sovereign influence that God the Son has. None can
resist His will. None can hinder His purpose.
None can alter His way. None can question His providence.
Now, not just anybody would have jumped into Peter's boat and
requested this of him. Not just anybody would have been
uninhibited to request this of a rough fisherman who wasn't
in a good mood. Remember, Peter's a pretty tough
character with a pretty quick temper. He's the same man that
cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest when they
laid hands on Christ arrest him. And I can tell you this much,
Peter wasn't trying to cut off his ear. He's trying to cut off
his head and he missed. Pretty rough character. Peter
couldn't resist the Lord's request though. None can. Verse 1 tells
us that these things came to pass. All things come to pass
because God causes them to. All things are predestinated,
predetermined beforehand, according to the purpose of Him who worketh
all things after the counsel of His own will." And I didn't
make that up. That's what Ephesians 1 verse 11 says. God's going
to have His way and He's going to do according to His own will
and purpose. Where? Well, in the armies of
heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth. And what? None
are going to stay His hand and none are going to say unto Him,
what doest thou? Verse four, now when he had left
or finished speaking, our Lord said unto Simon, that being Peter,
launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a draught.
And that word draught there means a haul, a load. In other words,
launch out into the deep and let down your nets again, we're
gonna catch a bunch of fish. Now remember, these men had washed
their nets, they're ready to go home. They were done for the
day. The last thing they wanted to
do was to go fishing again. And that's why Peter says what
he does in verse 5. And Simon answering said unto
him, Master, we've toiled all night, and we've taken nothing. And I don't know if you do, maybe
it's just me, but seeing myself a lot like Peter and seeing how
I am by nature, I hear just a little bit of frustration in Peter's
words. He's respectful, yes, but I believe
also frustrated and why not, in all fairness to Peter, keep
in mind that he's a professional fisherman. He's no novice at
this thing called fishing. He knew about fish. He knew how
to fish. He knew about boats. He knew
about nets. He knew about the waters. He
knew that they weren't biting, as fishermen say. They're not
biting. We've toiled all night and didn't
catch a thing. Master, we've toiled, we've worked all night,
and we've taken, we've caught, earned, obtained nothing. We
know what we're doing. We're fishermen. We've been doing
this for a long time and there's a spiritual lesson here, friends.
Religious men and women can toil and work all their lives and
never earn a smidgen of God's grace, mercy, or favor. Any fruit
or increase of heart in a sinner is the work and the doing of
God. And that becomes apparent to Peter and his friends shortly
when their boats are so full of fish that they begin to sink. We must pause here for in this
verse we find a great lesson that must be revealed to us by
God. Here are some words, a phrase,
even an attitude if you want to call it that, that would profit
us greatly to learn. Here we find a principle that
God teaches all his people by experience. Verse 5, Master,
we've toiled all the night and have taken nothing. Nevertheless,
at thy word, I'll let down the net. Obedience. Obedience to our God and Savior
is never the less and always the more. Never the less, but
always the more. How profitable it is to our souls
to trust in the words of our Savior. No matter how we feel,
no matter how opposed we may be, no matter how experience
has taught us different, no matter how indifferent the child of
God may feel or be, the command of God, the believer, learns
to say, nevertheless, at Thy Word. You see, the Word of God
is our supreme rule. True faith is believing the Word
of God, even when it's contrary to our experiences and beliefs. To obey the Word of God always
honors God, who works all things together for our good. Shouldn't
we obey that being the case? Who works all things for our
spiritual profit, who works all things to great gains for our
soul. Nevertheless, that thy word applies
to all the affairs of life. Peter, the professional, learns
that the sea of Gennesaret is full of fish. But he also learns
that God determines if you catch them. He also learns that God
determines where you catch them. And God determines how many you
catch. And this applies to our preaching.
This applies to our witnessing. Preaching is spiritual fishing.
We plant and we water, Paul said, but God gives the increase. We
throw out the nets, but God has to fill them. We fish, but God
catches. As God's servants, we plant and
we water, but only God gives the increase. Have we learned
that yet? And why is that important to know? Well, Paul tells us
in the very next verse there, I won't have you turn, but he
says, Neither is He that planteth anything, and neither He that
watereth nothing. But God that giveth the increase,
He's everything." Friends, God is not going to share His glory
with another. He gets all the glory in the
salvation of sinners. Now, we need to know that it's
God whom we have offended. David said, we quote this verse
all the time, Psalm 51.4, David said, against thee and thee only
have I sinned and done this evil in thy sight. All our sin is
against God. He's the one that's offended.
He's the one that we've offended. It's God that has to be appeased. And it's God's justice that must
be satisfied. If we're ever to have any kind
of a fellowship or relationship with God, God's going to have
to be appeased and His holy law and justice is going to have
to be satisfied. Now the Gospel is the message
of how God satisfied Himself. That's what the Gospel is. Not
how we satisfy God, but how God satisfied Himself. And we ought
to be ecstatic that salvation is of the Lord. For sinners cannot,
cannot themselves satisfy God. You see, to save sinners, God
had to satisfy Himself. God had to provide for Himself
a sacrifice. God had to provide Himself in
the person of Christ as the sacrifice. Salvation is of the Lord. What's our message? Christ and
Him crucified. We say that all the time. What
does that mean? It means that God did for God. God died for God so that sinners
might be saved. God came into the world to perfectly
keep and fulfill His own law so that sinners might be saved.
And Christ, as God the Son, died in the place of the offending
sinner. And even though he knew no sin,
the scriptures say that he was made to be sin for his people. Salvations of the Lord. God had
to satisfy his own justice. The law of God says guilty. Every
man, every woman, that the whole world's mouth may be stopped,
all guilty before God. You, me, all of us, guilty before
God. God had to satisfy His own justice
so that certain chosen redeemed sinners who were given to Christ
might be saved. And I tell you, because of that,
because it's not by a work of righteousness that I do, I have
a confident hope that I'm a fish in the Lord's net. I don't have any confidence or
hope in myself, but I sure have it in Him. I sure have it in
my Lord, who loved me and gave Himself for me. Now the Lord
is going to convince these fishermen that they can toil all their
lives and have nothing until and unless God sovereignly fills
their nets. He's teaching a lesson here.
And it was after this that our Lord made these fishermen fishers
of men. So He's teaching a principle
here, a truth that will stick with them the rest of their lives.
And in verse 6 we read, And when they had this done, they enclosed
a great multitude of fishes, and their net broke. Their net
broke. And they beckoned unto their
partners, which were in the other ship. Now, usually they worked
with two boats, and one boat would hold one end of the net,
and the other boat would hold another end of the net, and they
would go along parallel together and drag the net through the
water to catch the fish. So in verse 7, they beckoned
unto their partners, James and John, which were in the other
ship, that they should come and help them. And they came and
filled both the ships, so that they began to sink. Now if we
stopped right there, we could all say that that was an amazing
story. It is. That's an amazing story,
but it's no fishtail. But I tell you what makes this
story the most amazing, other than it's a true story, is what
happened next. It's an amazing story because
it's a story of amazing grace. That's what makes it amazing.
God's amazing grace. Look at verse 8. And when Simon
Peter saw it, saw what was going on here, saw all these fish in
the net and in the boats, he fell down at Jesus' knees saying,
Depart from me, For I am a sinful man, O Lord." Why did Peter say
that? Well, three reasons, really.
First, he was a man. Secondly, he was a sinful man.
And thirdly, he knew that this was God that stood before him. Being a man, he felt amazed.
He was overwhelmed in the presence of such a one as Christ. He the
infinite easily overwhelms the finite, doesn't he? Can you imagine
what's going through Peter's mind here? Same thing that would
have went through ours, I'm sure. He must have thought about how
he and the others had toiled, worked all night and had taken
nothing. And now he sees his nets tearing
and his boat sinking with the abundance of fish. And I'm telling
you, he was humbled both as a man and as a fisherman. He had just
heard Christ speak with the authority, the Scripture says, with which
no other man had ever spoke. And now he sees this man's authority
even over the fish of the sea. And Peter's humbled. humbled
as a man, humbled as a fisherman, and humbled as a sinner. If God
ever truly shows you Christ, you too will be humbled. How
do I know that he was humbled as a sinner? Well, again, verse
eight, he fell down to Jesus' knees saying, depart from me,
for I'm a sinful man, O Lord. You see, that's the effect that
standing in the presence of the Almighty will have on a sinner. That's it. You know, our sin
is never shown so black as when it's seen in the brightness of
Christ's pure and holy light. In Him was life, and the life
was the light of men. And the light shineth in darkness,
and the darkness comprehended it not. And the darkness in man
will never comprehend this glorious gospel unless God gives men and
women eyes to see it. Isaiah said, In the year that
King Uzziah died, I saw also the Lord sitting upon a throne
high and lifted up, and His train filled the temple. Then said
I, when did Isaiah say this? After he saw. He said, then said
I, woe is me. I'm undone. I'm a wretch. I'm a sinful man. I'm a man of
unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst of a people of unclean
lips. For mine eyes have seen the King,
the Lord of hosts. Job said, I've heard of thee
by the hearing of the ear, but now what? Mine eyes seeth thee. My eyes have been opened, and
now I see you, wherefore I abhor myself. I hate myself. I find myself detestable and
repulsive and I repent in dust and ashes. Why? Because I see
the King. I see the Lord high and lifted
up. God's going to make His people
see some things. And here in our text, when Peter
sees that Christ has all authority and all power over all things,
he says, depart from. I'm not worthy to be in your
presence. I'm a sinful man, oh Lord. And
I'm telling you, what a wonderful blessing to be humbled by the
Lord now in this life. There's a day coming when those
who do not know Christ will pray for the mountains to fall and
cover them. and they shall go into the holes
of the rocks and into the caves of the earth for fear of the
Lord and for the glory of His majesty when He ariseth to shake
terribly the earth." Oh, I'm telling you, it would be best
to bow to Him now. This humility does not come to
men and women unless and until God reveals His Son to and in
you, dear sinner. Paul said, O wretched man that
I am, But he didn't say that until he saw something. What
did Paul see? He saw that there was another
law in his members warring against the law of his mind. Paul didn't
see his wretchedness until he saw that inward war that kept
him in captivity to the law of sin. Paul said, I don't do what
I should because of sin. I do the things that I shouldn't.
Why? It's that sin, that captivity
of sin. I want to do the right thing,
he said, but how to perform that which is good, I find not. Why? Because of sin. We're going to
have to see some things about ourselves. Peter did. He said, Lord, I'm
a sinful man. We're going to have to see some
things concerning our God and Savior. When Peter saw just a
little who of Christ was, he fell down in submission and humility. And let me tell you, if you've
ever seen, so will you. Peter's physical position here
revealed his spiritual humiliation. He fell down outwardly because
he'd been brought down inwardly. And it's a great grace to be
humbled. But he giveth more grace, Paul
said. Wherefore he saith, God resisteth
the proud, but giveth grace to the humble. What a work of grace
humility is. It doesn't come to us by nature.
Man by nature is proud, haughty. And if God does not reveal himself
to a sinner and show them their inability and unwillingness to
bow to Him, they'll remain in their arrogance and pride. God
says, I'll punish the world for their evil and the wicked for
their iniquity, and I'll cause the arrogancy of the proud to
cease and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible. Isaiah 13, 11. Either God's going to cause us
to see these things in this life by and through His mercy and
grace to us, or He'll leave us to ourselves until the day of
judgment when He then reveals to us our end and pours out His
holy justice upon us. What great mercy to see and know
Christ now. Do you have an interest in the
things of Christ? It's a simple question. Do you? Do you see your exceeding sinfulness? Peter did. Do you see that there's
no other who can justify you and redeem you from your sin
and still be just? God's holiness and His justice
cannot be compromised to save you. God can't just sweep sin
under a rug. The wages of sin is death, and
so the sinneth that shall die. Sin's got to be dealt with. Jesus
Christ must substitute Himself in your place, the just for the
unjust, to bring you to God. Do you desire to be forgiven?
Or do you desire that Christ depart from you? You know, here
Peter prays a prayer that needed to be amended and revised. And over time, Peter's prayer
would change. Here he says, depart from me,
for I am a sinful man. But a bit further down the road,
when many of Christ's disciples left and followed him no more,
do you remember what he said then? Christ said, will you leave
me also? And he said, Lord, where will we go? Thou hast the words
to eternal life." Oh, there was a change in his way of praying,
wasn't there? Depart from me, I'm a sinful
man. Lord, where else would we go? Thou hast the words to eternal
life. How thankful, heavy, laden, and
laboring sinners ought to be that Christ bids them to come
unto Him now. Come unto Me, all you that labor
and heavy laden, and I'll give you rest." It would have been
better for Peter to have said, come near to Me, Lord, for I'm
a sinful man. Come to Me, Lord, I'm a great
sinner. That would be a prayer of faith,
wouldn't it? Lord, since I'm a sinner, I see that I need You,
I need Your help. I need the help that only You
can give. Lord, only you can do for me what must be done.
Lord, if you depart from me, I'll forever be lost. Don't depart
from me. When God truly humbles a sinner,
He'll give that sinner a desire to know and serve the very one
who does for them what they cannot do for themselves. And it's not
out of merit. It's not to try to earn merit
or deserve God's salvation. It's out of love for Christ.
I don't want to be displeasing to He who loved me and gave Himself
for me. Do you? Here's something else that we
see in our text. When the child of God sees Christ, His authority,
His power to save, they are astonished. Look at verse 9. For he, Peter,
was astonished, and all that were there with him, at the draught,
at the load, at the amount, multitude of the fishes which they had
taken. Do you find God astonishing?
Is the God you know astonishing? Are you astonished at the Lord
Jesus Christ? For years men preached to me
a Jesus who was anything but astonishing. The Jesus that modern day religion
preaches is not astonishing, actually he's pathetic. And I
don't say that with any pride or arrogance, I say it with a
broken heart. But not the Christ of the Bible.
He's astonishing. He's amazing. He's astounding. He's incredible, isn't he? Not enough adjectives in our
language to describe him. Peter and all that were with
him were astonished at the draught, the haul, the multitude of the
fishes which they had taken. And look at verse 10. And so
was also James and John, the sons of Zebedee, which were partners
with Simon. And notice what the Lord says.
Fear not, from henceforth thou shalt catch men. what proof we have here, also
that the Lord meets His people where He needs to in order to
convince us who He is and what He can do. These men being fishermen,
professional fishermen, had seen many things on the open sea.
I can assure you there were not many things that Peter and Andrew
and James and John hadn't experienced as fishermen. When it came to
fishing, they had pretty well seen it all. Yet Christ does
something that they would truly be astonished by. Christ did
something that they'd never seen before in their profession. Our
Lord meets us and He proves to us and He astonishes us with
His power and His ability and authority as God to do all things. He shuts us up to knowing that
as God, He can do anything and everything. Has God shown you
that? Are you astonished? That was
the thing that astonished me when I heard the Gospel. God
showed me that Jesus Christ could do anything and everything. I
could do nothing. And He could do everything. God
made me see that I couldn't save myself. God made me see that
I couldn't provide what He required. God made me see that I would
not save myself. I would not come to Him that
I might have life. God made me see that if I was
ever to be spared from the wrath of God to come, Christ was going
to have to save me. He's going to have to call me,
draw me with the cords of love. Give me the ability and the will
to believe. Is that not the case with you?
And aren't you still astonished that He would? And these men would see greater
things than this. Look at verse 11. And when they
had brought their ships to land, they forsook all and followed Him. Now you know the rest of
Peter's story. One day the Lord Jesus sat down
with his closest friends, the twelve, and he said, time's coming
soon when I'm going to be delivered into the hands of wicked men
and I'm going to be crucified. And Peter boasted that he wouldn't
allow Christ to be put to death, and that if need be, he would
himself die with him, or for him, or with him. Yet before
the rooster crowed, the next morning Peter denied his Lord
three times. And you know how that Peter was
crushed. Oh, he was crushed, greatly saddened,
not only by his Lord's death, but because of his own faithless
and sinful actions. God's people are harder on themselves
than anyone else can be. Isn't that the truth? That's
so true. We're harder on ourselves, aren't we? Yet when the Lord
rose from the dead and the angel appeared unto Mary Magdalene
and Mary the mother of James, that angel said, you go thy way,
tell his disciples and Peter that he goeth before you into
Galilee. There shall you see him as he
said unto you. Go tell his disciples, but be
certain that you tell Peter. Because Peter, I'm telling you,
he's down on himself. He wouldn't forgive himself. Well, before I close, let me
show you one last thing. Turn with me to the Gospel of
John chapter 21. John chapter 21. Look at verse 2. It's amazing. This is after the Lord's been
put to death, put in the tomb, and He's risen and appeared.
And verse 2 says, there were together Simon Peter and Thomas,
called Didymus, and Nathanael of Canaan, and Galilee, and the
sons of Zebedee, James and John, and two other of His disciples.
If I've counted that right, I think it's seven out of the eleven
that are left. And Simon Peter said unto them, I go fishing. I'm going fishing. It's just
too much. And they say unto him, we also
go with thee. And they went forth and they
entered into a ship, and that night they caught nothing. Don't you just know what's going
through Peter's mind right now? Don't you know that this brought
back some memories to him? The same thing had happened three
years before when he had first met the Lord Jesus Christ. They
told all night. Didn't catch a thing. How's the
Lord going to restore Peter? The same way He revealed Himself
to him in the beginning. Look at verse 4. But when the
morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples
knew not that it was Jesus. And then Jesus said unto them,
Children, have ye any meat? Have ye got any fish? Have ye
caught any fish? And they answered him, No. And
he said unto them, cast the net on the right side of the ship,
and ye shall find. And they cast therefore, and
now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes.
And therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter,
it's the Lord. James was there with them too
that first time. He said, this is the Lord. Only
the Lord can do this. It's the Lord. And now when Simon
Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girt his fish's coat unto
him, for he was naked, and he did cast himself into the sea."
And Peter was intimately acquainted with this scene, wasn't he? He'd seen it before. He'd been
here before. So what did Peter do this time? Well, instead of
falling to his knees, because of his sinfulness as he did three
years prior, he forsook his boat. He forsook the fish. He forsook
his fishing buddies. He forsook the nakedness of his
shame. He forsook all his dashed hopes. He forsook his depression. He
forsook the pain of his loss. And he came swimming to Christ
with nothing but love for his Savior. You see, the one whom
he loved had suddenly appeared, and he couldn't get there fast
enough. He just jumped in the water. If you're without Christ, may God first show you your need
of Him, and then show you Him. Show you who He is. What He's
able to do. for sinners. And I'm telling
you, if He does, you won't be able to get to Christ fast enough. No. You'll come to Him naked
with nothing of your own. Amen.