Fish are Friends, Not Food

This past weekend, I decided to go fishing. Yes, I am a female. Yes, I wanted to go fishing. I enjoy it; however I am lacking in fishing skills!! After hardly an hour, my friend and I gave up and drove home. Shortly after, I posted this Facebook status:

Fishing today made me realize how impatient I truly am. It made me think of Jesus, calling his disciples to be "fishers of men" (Matthew 4:19). I realized the way I fish for fish, impatiently and on my watch, is the way I fish for people: impatiently and on my watch.

More on this realization to come.

             -Me (Facebook), March 21, 2015

So I told myself I would write a blog post on this thought later. I was not entirely sure where the thought would take me. 

Over the past few days, my mind and thoughts shifted towards something else. I began seeing some frustration in my heart towards the Church (Big C, Corporate Church). While God has done amazing work in my heart, softening it towards brokenness I had seen in the Church, I still get caught up on some things. The thoughts and feelings were set off by something a professor said in class.

We were discussing the Gospel of Luke. We were saying Luke paints a picture of Jesus that shows Him as a compassionate, loving Jesus who spends time with and hangs out with sinners, prostitutes, tax collectors, the poor, etc. He had challenged his congregation years ago with this, he said,

"Jesus hung out with these people. The outcasts. Do you think they liked hanging out with Him?

Yeah, they did. So why don't they like hanging out with us?" 

              -Freddy J

Wow. That made me sit back and my chair and think. Clearly if people we could call "the least of these" enjoyed hanging out with Jesus, but do not enjoy hanging out with me...then we are not acting like Jesus.

So often we want to minister to people and "push our God down their throat" for lack of better terms. I think we hear Jesus calling us to be "fishers of men" and get frustrated when the fish are not biting. We get frustrated that the fish do not want what we are offering. 

Hear me on this, I am not saying we should negate the gospel and give others what they would like to hear. I fully believe we should and are called to spread the Gospel, the Good News of Jesus!

However, I think often we want to skip to that part. Skip to the fish biting. But we leave out relationship. We do not want to take the time to get to know people, wait for them, answer their questions, listen to their thoughts, attempt to understand their point of view, let alone hang out with them! We want it to be convenient. Something like, "Hey, i dropped my little warm on my hook in the water, it's about time some fish start biting."

No! We need patience. I am so guilty of this. While I have developed some patience over my few years, I have a long way to go!

I want for myself, and the Church, to become more like Jesus. To hang out with, do life with, show love and patience towards the least of these. Instead of dropping a worm, or a church invite card in their lap. Why don't we drop a conversation? Why don't we get to know who they are and where they came from? I want to look at a few stories of Jesus in order to grasp a better understanding on what it would look like to simply be with the outcasts in our society.

I like the story of the women who touched the edge of Jesus' robe (I also really like that Jesus wore a robe...can we bring that back?) (Luke 8:40-47)
Jesus was on his way to Jarius's house (v. 42). Jarius was a leader of the local synagogue (v. 41) . His daughter was sick and dying, so he asked Jesus to come with him in order to heal her (v. 42).
Now to the women...
I imagine Jesus walking with a crowd of people (sort of like the crowd that walks down the hallway in high school and takes up the ENTIRE hallway. Clearly those people must be important! Anybody walking past Jesus the other way, I am sure thought the same thing.) 

As Jesus went with him (Jarius), he was surrounded by the crowds. A women in the crowd had suffered for twelve years with constant bleeding (she had spent everything she had on doctors), and she could find no cure. Coming up behind Jesus, she touched the fringe of his robe. Immediately the bleeding stopped.

"Who touched me?" Jesus asked.

Everyone denied it, and Peter said, "Master, this whole crowd is pressing up against you." 

But Jesus said, "Someone deliberately touched me, for I felt healing power go out from me."

I imagine half of the disciples waiting for Jesus or God to smite someone unworthy of touching the robe of Jesus, while the other half is ready to throw out whoever touched Him. 

When the woman realized that she could not stay hidden, she began to tremble and fell to her knees in front of him. The whole crowd heard her explain why she had touched him and that she had been immediately healed. 

Meditate on that for a minute. "Try this one on for size" as Freddy J would say. Can you imagine? The emotions she must have been feeling had to have been so intense. I am sure it took a lot of work to even push through the crowd to even get a gimps of Jesus, let alone touch his robe. Then the excitement and awe of being healed, then the terror that comes wondering what Jesus will say or do to her. 

"Daughter," he said to her, "your faith has made you well. Go in peace."

Jesus never rebukes this women from touching her. He does not get annoyed with the commotion. He simply says, "Daughter, your faith has made you well. Go in peace." I can only imagine the gentleness and compassion in his eyes. 

Later in Luke's Gospel, we come across the story of Zacchaeus (Luke 19:1-10). Zacchaeus is a tax collector. In fact, he was the chief tax collector in the region. 
Tax collectors were hated in Jesus' day. They were in the margins of society. Think about it, you probably would not be found of the person who knocks on your door every year and says, "Hi, I need 30% of your income. Uncle Sam says so. Thanks." Not only this, but Tax Collectors then would often take a portion for themselves. Verse 2 says Zacchaeus had become very rich, suggesting he was very sly with his "tax" collecting.
When Jesus sees Zaccheus, does he condemn him for taking money? Does he send him off? Does he just ignore him? No. Jesus doesn't even mention it. He simply says he wants to be a guest in his home. Jesus wants to hang out with Zaccheus, the chief tax collector.

Would you look past the ugliness of someone's sin and hang out with the outcasts, the marginalized, the overlooked?

Time and Time again, we can see Jesus showing grace, mercy, compassion, and love, towards the least of these. He establishes a relationship. He shows patience. 

So what?

When we are fishing, when we are evangelizing, it is essential to remember that the fish, the people, are friends. I do not think we should speak the Gospel to someone with the intention to "win them over" or to "gain" something for ourselves, whether that is bragging rights, or favor with God. I think we should do it because we love them. They are our friends.

Fish are friends, not food. Fish are the people. May we seek relationship with them. They are our friends. They are not something to be won over or earned. They are not food.

"Fish are friends, not food."

             -Bruce (Finding Nemo)

 

 

Sometimes It Takes a Wrestling Match

So often I find myself doing things my way, trying to get what I want, instead of keeling before the King and declaring "Lord, have Your way...Not my will be done, but Yours."

I am a lot like Jacob. I am a deceiver. I deceive in order to get my way.

Jacob has a history of deceiving others in order to get his way. In fact, the name Jacob sounds like the Hebrew word for "heal" and deceiver." Jacob began his deceiving habits with gaining his brother's birthright:

"One day when Jacob was cooking some stew, Esau arrived home from the wilderness exhausted and hungry. Esau said to Jacob, “I’m starved! Give me some of that red stew!” (This is how Esau got his other name, Edom, which means “red.”) 

 “All right,” Jacob replied, “but trade me your rights as the firstborn son.”

-Genesis 25:29-31 

Later on, Jacob deceives his father in order to receive the blessing:

"Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Come closer so I can touch you and make sure that you really are Esau.” So Jacob went closer to his father, and Isaac touched him. “The voice is Jacob’s, but the hands are Esau’s,” Isaac said.But he did not recognize Jacob, because Jacob’s hands felt hairy just like Esau’s. So Isaac prepared to bless Jacob.“But are you really my son Esau?” he asked.
“Yes, I am,” Jacob replied.
Then Isaac said, “Now, my son, bring me the wild game. Let me eat it, and then I will give you my blessing.” So Jacob took the food to his father, and Isaac ate it. He also drank the wine that Jacob served him. Then Isaac said to Jacob, “Please come a little closer and kiss me, my son.”
So Jacob went over and kissed him. And when Isaac caught the smell of his clothes, he was finally convinced, and he blessed his son. He said, “Ah! The smell of my son is like the smell of the outdoors, which the lord has blessed!"
-Genesis 27:21-27

So how did Jacob pull this off? Isaac was old and turning blind (27:1), so he could not see that this son was clearly not Esau, but Jacob. Jacob felt like Esau because his mother used to skin and fur of a goat to cover Jacob's smooth skin. Jacob smelled like Esau because he was clothed in Esau's clothes. 

Now Jacob has deceived his way into getting the birthright, meaning he gets 2/3 of Issac's estate when he die. He has also deceived his way into getting the blessing of his father. Well, Jacob's deceiving will come around to kick him in the butt down the road.

Jacob later meets a beautiful girl, named Rachel. Jacob discusses with Rachel's father, Laban, and they decide Jacob will work seven years for Rachel to be his wife. So, Jacob works seven years, they have a celebration, and Jacob wakes up the next morning to find not Rachel in his tent, but Leah, Rachel's older sister. Laban had deceived the deceiver. Jacob agrees to work another seven years in order to finally marry his love, Rachel. (Genesis 29:1-30)

One night, Jacob is alone in a camp when a man comes and wrestles him:

"This left Jacob all alone in the camp, and a man came and wrestled with him until the dawn began to break. When the man saw that he would not win the match, he touched Jacob’s hip and wrenched it out of its socket. Then the man said, “Let me go, for the dawn is breaking!”
But Jacob said, “I will not let you go unless you bless me.”
“What is your name?” the man asked.
He replied, “Jacob.”
“Your name will no longer be Jacob,” the man told him. “From now on you will be called Israel, because you have fought with God and with men and have won.”
-Genesis 32:24-28

This man turns out to be an angel. Verse 25 points out Jacob's stubbornness once again: "When the man saw that he would not win the match, he touched Jacob's hip and wrenched it out of its socket." Jacob was so desperate to win, the angel had to break his hip. 


Jacob had three options in this scenario. Fight. Flight. Or freeze. Jacob chose to fight. He didn't just fight, he held on for dear life. After the fight, the angel renames Jacob, Israel. Jacob means "heal grabber", Israel means "God wrestles." Jacob went from a heal grabbing, deceiving man, to a man who wrestles with God. The angel did not leave Jacob, this shows that God won't let go. 
God finally gets his way with Jacob. Of course, Jacob forced him to do it the hard way, but God gets his way.

This brings me back to us. To me. To you.

Sometimes it is going to hurt. God might have to break us. We may walk away with a limp, sometimes it takes a wrestling match:

"Sometimes it takes a wrestling match for God to have His way with us."

-Dr. Mark J. Mangano