FISHING IN OCCUPIED TERRITORY

 Sermon preached by the Rev. Michael Anderson Bullock

[Isaah 9:1-4; 1Corinthians 1:10-18; Matthew 4:12-23]

One of the struggles I have in taking scripture seriously (that is, not literally nor as an abstract idea or metaphor) – one of my struggles is that no matter how hard I try, I am tempted to focus on what is I can recognize and leave it at that.  We have an excellent example of this interpretive temptation in today’s gospel – a lesson that contains the very familiar scene in which Jesus calls his first disciples.  Seeing two Galilean fishermen [Simon and Andrew] casting their nets for fish, Jesus saunters up to the shoreline and apparently out of the blue says, “Follow me, and I will make you fish for people.”[1]

It’s hard not to dramatize this scene – even to romanticize it, and imagine this passage with its own background music, complete with a focusing drumroll. Now don’t mishear me.  I am not denying the dramatic element of this defining scene nor Jesus’ call to “Follow me”.  The issue of being called by God – something only the hardest of hearing miss or dismiss matters a great deal.

So it is that in this vein I deeply appreciate Frederick Buechner’s lively and clarifying definition of “vocation”: “Vocation” coming from the Latin, vocare, “to call”.  Buechner writes: “There are different kinds of voices calling you to all different kinds of work, and the problem is to find out which is the voice of God rather than of Society … or the Superego, or Self-interest.”[2]

Amidst all these voices calling to us, Buechner suggest two basic guidelines for discerning one’s vocation.  “By and large,” he writes, “a good rule for finding out [which voice is which] is that “[t]he kind of work God usually calls you to is the kind of work (a) that you need most to do and (b) that the world most needs to have done.”[3]

Offering an illustration of this twofold guideline of (a) following your deepest passion and (b) what the world most needs to have done, Buechner explains, “If you really get a kick out of your work, you’ve presumably met requirement (a), but if your work is writing TV deodorant commercials, the chances are that you missed requirement b).”

“On the other hand,” he continues, “if your work is being a doctor in a leper colony, you have probably met requirement (b), but if most of the time you’re bored and depressed by [this work], the chances are you have not only bypassed (a) but probably aren’t helping your patients much either.”

Buechner returns to his understanding of vocation, writing, “The place God calls you to is the place where your deep gladness and the world’s deep hunger meet.”[4]  “Vocation.”

Applying this perspective on vocation to today’s gospel scene, Jesus calls his first set of student-followers.  His apparent “cold-call” invitation to Simon and Andrew (and eventually to the others) must have melded both men’s passion for fishing with the hunger that Jesus will be seen uniquely to fill.  Yet, beyond the important vocational issues we can easily recognize from this and the other biblical call scenes, I need to move beyond this familiar recognition to ask a probing question.  The question is this: How – how. does one fish for people in Jesus’ Name?  What are the qualities of such fishing that are different – say – from acquiring votes for “Most Popular in Class” or selling the most deodorant to be sales leader?

I’m not a fisherman, although the few times I have been taken out to fish have been enjoyable.  But having said this, I do know that there are different ways to catch fish and not all ways of catching fish translate well to catching people – especially if the fishing is done – as I say -- in Jesus’ Name.

The specific point I wish to make in this sermon is that hauling people in with great nets most likely does not serve Jesus’ call to follow him faithfully.  For instance, there is a form of fishing that is often used in commercial fishing ventures that casts a heavily weighted dragnet into the water and trolls the sea bottom to catch fish efficiently in large quantities.  However, the dragnet process indiscriminately captures everything in its path and also destructively rakes up the seabed, to the extent that not only is the propagating life in the seabed uprooted but also the damage caused by such raking deteriorates the quality of the ocean water.

Dragnet fishing may provide large numbers for a catch, but not only is a good deal of the chaotic catch not usable for the fish market, who among us would advocate this as a model for catching people – not to mention fishing in Jesus’ name?  Yet, (and here is my point’s application), this is precisely what President Trump and ICE have done in terms of addressing our nation’s pressing immigration problem.  In the name of Jesus and of all fishing for all God’s people, what is being done by our government is wrong.  It is inhumane.  It is destructive.  It is not of God.

If we will allow ourselves to look beyond the familiar and lovely invitation Jesus makes to Andrew and Peter to follow him, we will unavoidably encounter the historic, chaotic, and destructive dragnetting that triggered the Jesus Movement itself.  This insight will also allow folks like us to recognize the dragnetting in the actions of ICE.

In terms of this gospel call, I wish to point out that the too-often hidden contextual reality in which Jesus invites his followers to join him in living faithfully and actively – this invitation – the one we heard in this day’s gospel --occurs in “occupied territory”[5].  And increasingly, if you and I choose to follow Jesus, we must recognize that we also exercise our vocation in occupied territory.

That Jesus offers his vocational invitation to follow him in occupied territory is clear, if – if we pay attention to the specific geographic references in today’s gospel account.  For instance, this entire scene gets triggered by the arrest of John the Baptist.  Matthew’s first point is: “When Jesus heard that John had been arrested, he withdrew to Galilee.”[6]  For centuries, Jerusalem – the City of David – had been occupied by foreign empires.  Galilee, overshadowed by this occupation, was safer because it was a backwater region.  So, to begin his public ministry, with some margin of anonymity, Jesus went home to the Galilee.

Moving from his hometown of Nazareth, he moved to the lakeside village of Capernaum, where he would locate his place of operations.  Nestled in the hills of Zebulun and Naphtali, the words of the Prophet Isaiah (the ones we heard both today and at Christmas) were now completed (in Matthew’s counting) by Jesus’ words and presence: “Land of Zebulun, land of Naphtali, road to the sea, over Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles.  ‘The people who walked in darkness have seen a great light; those who lived in a land of deep darkness – on them light as shined.’”[7]

Beyond the emerging energy of being called to follow Jesus, Matthew creates a quiet “theological geography”[8] by providing the names of towns and regions that for centuries lived amidst pervading darkness and death.  These geographical references provide historical allusions 700 years of Isreal’s experience of suffocating foreign occupation -- first by the Assyrians[9] and in Jesus’ time the Romans.

“Galilee of the Gentiles” is the telling, coded phrase.  The non-Hebrews, the Gentiles, the foreign empires possessed and oppressed the outlying Galilee region and most significantly the City of Jerusalem.  Yet, as Matthew indicates, that centuries-long reality of darkness had now been broken by the light of God’s Christ.  Jesus, seen by Matthew as fulfilling the Old Testament event of Exodus, that is, God’s people moving from exile and occupation to new and free life – Jesus now picks up where John the Baptist left off and takes up the daring (not to mention, the dangerous) proclamation that the reign of God had broken into the world.  Hence, the fulfillment of Isaiah’s vision: “… for those who sat in the region and shadow of death, light has dawned.”  Jesus and the movement that surrounds him even now is a New Exodus with no kings but God alone!

In terms of this New Exodus, what is the proof of the pudding of its reliability, its reality?  In Mattew’s telling, there are three elements, and Jesus embodies them all.

The first is that Jesus preaches a pastoral invitation and warning to “repent”.

As far as we know, the first word recorded from Jesus’ first sermon was “repent”.  A familiar word commonly mis-identified with harshness and judgementalism, “repent” indicates both an invitation and a caring warning because “repentance” means “turn around”, as in you’re headed in the wrong direction.  “Repent” also means “turn around” the way you think and, therefore, the way you live.

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) has a saying along these lines.  They refer to “stinking thinking”.  How we think and what we think needs to be changed, if new and sober life is to be expected, not to mention hoped for.  So, the first element of the New Exodus, given by Jesus in the occupied territories, lies in the proclamation that danger lies ahead, unless and until we “turn around” and face to receive God’s transforming embrace.

It is also (I believe) the message that followers of Jesus need to offer in our own time of living in occupied territories.  We cannot proclaim the need to “turn around” the direction our country is taking without first also turning our own lives around.  You can’t give away what you don’t have.

The second new Exodus element that Jesus models is the place where the “calling” of followers occurs.

After readjusting our operational GPS to orient with God’s true north, Jesus invites individuals to join him in learning how to live the God-life and how to share it with those they meet.  It is the invitation to join in the New Exodus from fear and death.  This is to say, Jesus teaches us to “fish for people”, not to hook them or snare them but rather to attract and gather them into a Godly community.

Again, many AA groups conclude their meetings with the loud, corporate refrain: “Keep coming!”  That’s new-life fishing!

Matthew concludes today’s gospel scene with the third quality of the New Exodus.  It is also given within occupied territory.

Matthew tells us that “Jesus went throughout Galilee, teaching in [the people’s] synagogues and proclaiming the good news of [God’s] kingdom and curing every disease and every sickness among the people.”[10]

This to me is the actual proof of the pudding that Jesus and his movement are the light in the darkness.   It is also a challenge to us now as followers of Jesus who live in occupied territory, that our vocational work needs to be about teaching the God-life – which is outlined in our own Baptismal vows.  Moreover, the impact that Jesus made among the people in the occupied territories stemmed from the fact that he healed all their diseases and the sicknesses that occupied and enslaved their lives.

In the Name of Jesus, this is what we can do.  It is what we need to do in our own occupied territories: Cure the dis-ease that is rampant in our nation; and bring “salvation” (that is, the health and wholeness) that overcomes the sickness of hatred, intimidation, and death.  This salvation work, this “health and wholeness” work is what it means to “fish for people” – in Jesus’ Name.

In our small but faithful way, St. Philip’s is already involved in such work, as in the Pioneer Valley Power Pack program, where we facilitate the weekly feeding of over 250 school students in Easthampton.  We also do healing work through our ecumenical feeding program, Take and Eat, where every month we organize and then join Roman Catholics and Congregationalist in buying the food, cooking the food, packing the food, and delivering the food to those who receive the services of about 100 Meals on Wheels, which does not provide weekend meals.  Take and Eat does!  In addition, for decades, St. Philip’s has been a reliable stalwart in the feeding and clothing work done by the Easthampton Community Center.

These outreach programs are how you and I are teaching and demonstrating the reality Jesus’ New Exodus.  In this work, we are healing some of the dis-ease of our region over food insecurity and isolating loneliness.  And the reason all this and more is needed is because we live and move and have our being in occupied territory – a territory that seeks to shun God’s light and life.  We, in our battle between faith and fear, won’t have that!  Our baptismal vows say so.

I close with the Collect of this day and occasion.  God “collects” us with this prayer and promise.  May we dare to live more nearly as we pray.

Give us grace, O Lord, to answer readily the call of our Savior Jesus Christ and proclaim to all people the Good News of his salvation, that we and the whole world may perceive the glory of his marvelous works, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.  Amen.

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[1] Matthew 4:19.

[2] Frederick Buechner. Wishful Thinking, p. 95.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Ibid.

[5] Andrew McGowan. “Galilee of the Gentiles: Jesus in Occupied Territory,” Epiphany 3, 2026.

[6] Matthew 4:12.

[7] Matthew 4:12-17

[8] Andrew McGowan. “Galilee of the Gentiles: Jesus in Occupied Territory”, Epiphany 3; Year A, 2026.åßå

[9] 2 Kings 15:29.

[10] Matthew 4:23-24.