Thursday, January 28, 2010

A new day

Do you ever feel you've stepped off into a new world, a new time, a new life? Peter must have thought that. Like so many fishermen who grew up in the area around the Sea of Galilee long ago, his life was pretty much preordained. He would fish until he was too old to fish. No more, no less. Nothing about colleges and businesses and such. Fish or starve was his lot.

Then one day a man who was walking along one of the many beaches of the lake, which is what it is though the Hebrew word translates sea, called to Peter (then called) Simon and his brother Andrew who was in a small boat 50 feet or so out into the lake. This man, whom Simon had heard of since he had moved into the little town called Capernum that Simon called home, was named Jesus. Jesus screamed into the little wind that always blew between the sets of mountains that crowned the lake. "Com with me. I'll make a new kind of fisherman out of you. I'll show you how to catch men and women instead of perch and bass."

Simon would think later of that moment when he was about to be crucified upside down (in humility since his Lord Jesus was crucified rightside up). Simon and his brother hadn't even stopped to think it over when they dropped their nets and pursued a completely new life with this man.

Answering God's call (through his beloved Son Jesus) does that to you. You're never the same, though indeed you might want to be at times.

Peter would prove to be just as human as you and I. He made his Lord's day when he was the first to recognize who Jesus really was. He faltered and failed his Lod by denying him after the cross. He is all that we want to be and all that we are and those two things often don't coincide.

I dropped my nets and followed and look what has happened: The Saints are in the Super Bowl and I'm not working the game, nor even the buildup to the game. There is no doubt I would be, not because of any talent but because everyone at the newspaper is. Yet, I'm on the outside looking in. I'm outside the gates of Jerusalem wishing I was at the temple.

Jesus walked the paths of Galilee looking for a few people only He could see would be those that changed the world. He used synagogues for meting places and taught people God's truth. God's kingdom was his theme. He healed and he changed and he made differences in both Jews and Gentiles.

And one day the crowds go so big that they forced him to climb a heal and teach. He said "You are blessed when you get your inside world -- your mind and your heart -- p;ut right. Then you can see God in the outside world."

Simon Peter had to get his mind and heart right to see the risen Jesus. We have to get our minds and our hearts right to see the plan He has for us.

Life is new every day with Jesus. Live it like that.

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