The Peter Example

It seems to me that Peter was a frustrated fisherman.

I came to this conclusion because in two different passages of scripture, I see Peter toiling all night without catching any fish.

This either means these passages happened to catch him on bad days, or he had those bad days often.

Whatever the case, it’s my thinking that though Peter may have very well been a professional, hardworking fisherman, fishes just had a way of avoiding his net.

After one of his bad days in Luke 5 however, I see him move from his frustrating day job to the cutting edge of what was happening in his generation, upon Jesus’ invitation.

On His new job, among other things, Peter got to travel the region with Jesus, he got to see Moses, Elijah and the transfigured Jesus on the mount, he was named one of three members of the governing board of the ministry, and he walked on water – things a local fisherman could only dream of.

Things did get a little rough around Jesus’ arrest and crucifixion. But weeks later, Peter bounced back.

Now empowered by the Spirit, he preached a sermon that got 3,000 saved in one day; healed a man lame from birth, using him as a sermon illustration; and broke jail solo, though he had a group on the outside coordinating his escape.

And what’s more, his lifetime was not enough to exhaust the impact of this great Apostle. He left an enduring legacy, letters and unmatched exploits, for someone who could have died, one of many fishermen.

One thing remains clear. We would never have met the Apostle Peter, had he stayed on his day job – his source of livelihood and comfort zone.

Is this a post encouraging anyone to quit their day job? No!

Unless of course they receive an invitation, to be part of something that is going to be trans-generational. Where they would not have to do as much hard lifting as they currently are, where they wouldn’t have to go home some days without fish – without reward, and where this reward need not be measured in remuneration, but in lives touched.

This is the moral of the story:

Sometimes you have to be willing to abandon what you started, to end up in a place, where what you started could never have taken you.