In our post-Christian, post-Evangelical country with its many keyboard warriors who enjoy arguing about the truth of their theology online, I think it is helpful for us to take a step back and look at a spiritual interpretation of Luke 5:1-11. In this passage, we see a calling to spiritual introspection through our Lord’s request to the Apostle Peter to launch into the deep.
Laboring at Night
At the beginning of the passage, we see a group of fishermen, among whom is Simon Peter. They’ve labored all night but caught nothing. Symbolically, what does this tell us?
The night represents ignorance and spiritual darkness. They are searching for truth and meaning, letting their nets down into the depths of worldly philosophies, ideas, and enjoyments. But every time, their nets come up empty. For there is no truth or meaning in the vanities of this world.
This is life for everyone outside of Christ, outside of His Church; the life of everyone who doesn’t make Christ the center and gravity of their life. Solomon experienced such spiritual darkness and cried out, “Everything is meaningless, a chasing after the wind.”
Cleaning Their Nets
The fishermen sit at the shore, washing and cleaning their nets. This signifies some level of introspection and self-awareness. We could so they are analyzing their broken methodology for capturing truth.
This is a good sign, for even though they haven’t found truth, they’re not sitting about idly. They haven’t found what they’re looking for, but they haven’t given into the temptations of laziness or nihilism. They keep trying. And such a heart is something Christ can work with. And he does…
The Request
Christs climbs into Peter’s boat and asks him to push off a little bit from the shore so that Christ can speak to the crowd without being overwhelmed by them.
We could argue Peter had every right to refuse this request. He had been up all night, he was physically and probably emotionally exhausted. Instead, Peter obliges the request.
Such an acquiescence can begin the journey to know God. Why? Because it’s a selfless act requested by someone else that seemingly provides no immediate benefit. However, Peter puts down the work that was important to him so that he can serve someone else who needs his help.
When we do such a thing, two things happen: (1) We’re serving Christ Himself in our neighbor who needs our help. (2) We are getting out of our own heads, which can be extraordinarily helpful in showing us a bigger picture than we had previously understood. It shines a perspective on us that we might have been blind to before.
Launching into the Depths
So, Peter is quietly serving the needs of another when God starts to shine a bit of truth into his heart. As he sits at the feet of Christ in the boat, something stirs in his heart, he hears Truth itself speaking to him. But they are still in the shallows.
When Christ completes His teaching, He turns to Peter and commands him to “Launch into the deep.” Unlike previously, this is a command and not a request.
What are the depths? They are the interior place of mystery, danger, and the unknown. Within each one of us are wonderful things as well as dangerous monsters that will consume us and those around us. The depths are unsafe, and it is best to journey there with Christ.
The Obedience
Here, Peter weakly protests. They’ve been up all night. He’s done this before and knows it didn’t work. He is fully of legitimately good excuses why this won’t work. Many people are the same in our post Christian society. They’ve heard a hundred reasons why faith in God and the Church won’t work. They’ve heard the arguments of the Neo-atheists and the nihilists and they’re not sure it’s worth it.
Some of these people even have a hundred reasons they don’t think God would want them. They’ve made a mess of their lives, they’ve failed, they’ve done some terrible things.
But Peter doesn’t linger in disobedience, indecision, or excuses. Instead, as soon as the excuses are off his lips, he turns to obedience. He doesn’t try to argue with God; he doesn’t tell God His plan won’t work. Instead, he obeys, even if he lacks faith and is thinking to himself, “This isn’t going to work.” We too must obey God’s command to launch into the depths of our heart.
The Catch
What happens next? Peter goes into the depths. He’s done this a thousand times before, but this time is different. It’s different because he’s with Christ; he has Christ in his vessel.
There’s a massive catch of fish, so much that the nets begin to break and the boats sink a little. Rather than being excited, though, what does Peter do next?
Worship & Repentance
Peter falls before Christ and worships. This signifies enlightenment in the heart of Peter. No longer does he reckon Christ a good moral teacher, or even a great man, he perceives that Christ is holy. The presence of the Holy moves Peter to humility. He cries out, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man.”
If ever we truly encounter God or a great saint, we will also recognize our unworthiness. Those who truly experience God’s presence aren’t moved to pride by it, they don’t think of themselves as something special. Instead, they realize just how far they are from being holy. Peter has such an experience himself.
When the gifts of grace and mercy come upon us through the indwelling of the Holy Spirit, we too will be moved to humility and repentance.
Brought into the Light
Let’s go back to the fish that are caught. What do these things signify? This upward motion of the fish from the mysterious depths of darkness is the bringing up of every part of our being and laying it before Christ.
We must bring forth our dark secrets, our sinful past, our attachments to this world with its vanity and pride. Confessing our sins is the beginning of this. Yet such self-awareness, especially in the presence of Christ, will make us see how unworthy of God we are; of how unworthy we are to have Christ in the vessel of our hearts.
Peter is ashamed of his darkness and offers Christ a way out, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man.” Thanks be to God, Christ is not looking for a way out of our hearts. Instead, He wants our entire depths, all the big and little evils swimming in the murky waters of our hearts. He desires to catch these things in the net of self-awareness and repentance so that they can be brought upward into the sunshine of grace and mercy. Such is the only path to healing.
Healing & Apostleship
This obedience to the call of God, which began with a selfless act, brings grace, mercy, and light into the heart of Peter – and likewise into our own hearts. Peter has repented and is washed clean by Christ. Now that Peter has gone through these things, Christ confers upon him apostleship, “You will be a fisher of men.”
A Proper Order
In our impatient world, people think they need to do something for God, argue about their faith online, or engage in evangelism before they’ve received healing themselves. It’s important for us to remember there is a proper order, a divine order. Instead of hearing about Christ or Orthodoxy and immediately telling everyone around us how right we are and wrong they are, we should follow the order we found in this story, which is the following:
- We must be diligent with whatever good knowledge we possess right now, not allowing laziness or nihilism to tempt us into a worthless life.
- We must respond to the call to help others; to serve and meet the needs of others. This is a twofold calling that gets us out of our own heads and helps us to not be as selfish.
- When Christ finds in us a willing spirit, He will ask us to launch into the depths of self-reflection. The tools of prayer, fasting, and asceticism help in this journey. Additionally, the writings of great spiritual instructors can help us to see many blind spots in our lives (see “Developing the Spiritual Life” in my Resource page for some examples). It’s nearly impossible to do it without the guidance of spiritual giants who have gone before us.
- Next, we repent of what we find in our hearts. We confess everything to God and our spiritual father, and then we turn away from those things.
- After confession and self-reflection, we must accept God’s mercy and love. Imagine if Peter had cried, “Depart from me…” and then refused to listen to anything Christ said afterward. The whole event would have been worthless. Neither self-pity nor self-absorption are the calling. Both of those are vices that destroy us. If we churn up nasty things from the depths of our hearts, we need to accept that God still loves us – even though we’re not the person we thought we are.
- At the end of this passage, it says that Peter and the others forsook all and followed Christ. We do this by forsaking what we used to base our identity in, what we used to find our self-worth in, and sinful pleasures and egoism. We now have to find our identity and self-worth in Christ, in knowing that we are beloved children of God. Any other identity that we make for ourselves is a false idol.
- Lastly, if God so calls us, we may then bring the Gospel to others like Peter. Whether that’s through ordination, speaking and writing about the truth, raising godly children, or ministering to the needs of others in various ways. There are innumerable ways to do this.
Physician, Heal Thyself
If we skip any of these steps, then even if we’re speaking the truth to others, it won’t profit us or those who hear our words. We can’t possibly “speak the truth in love” (Eph. 4:15) if we ourselves have not encountered Love Incarnate.
We need healing first before we can become a healing presence to others. Otherwise, we become hypocrites, for we have not first “removed the plank from our eye before removing the speck from our brother’s eye” (cf. Matt. 7:5). Even our Lord Jesus Christ, who was perfect, waited until He was thirty years of age before beginning His ministry. There’s a time and a place for God’s plans for our lives.
The path of healing takes many, many years – even decades. Be patient with God and yourself on this journey. With God’s help, you’ll realize you’re not the person you thought you were. In fact, you’re a selfish ball of entangled passions. But that’s no reason to give up. “Let us not grow weary in doing good,” as the Apostle tells us (Gal. 6:9). Introspective work accompanied by genuine repentance is some of the best work we can do in this life. May God bless our efforts!