When Jesus Steps Into Your Boat, Surrender Becomes Freedom

We open Luke 5:1–11 and watch a quiet shoreline turn into a turning point, where empty nets, breaking nets, and a crowded boat lead Peter from fear to surrender. We trace five unexpected blessings that move us from effort to obedience and from success to surrender.

• partnership impact story from the dental clinic in Hot Springs and 21 gospel responses
• reading Luke 5:1–11 with context on Sea of Galilee and Peter’s craft
• empty nets as a doorway to reliance, not defeat
• breaking nets and small boats revealing God’s larger provision
• Peter’s confession and the mercy of unanswered prayer
• do not be afraid reframing calling and identity
• leaving the greatest haul to follow Jesus in complete surrender
• daily cross-bearing as the pattern of discipleship

If this resonates, share it with a friend who needs courage today, subscribe for more teaching grounded in Scripture, and leave a review to help others find the show. What fear is Jesus asking you to lay down right now?

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:03

Hello and welcome to the FBC El Doredo Sermon Podcast. My name is Taylor Gere and I have the privilege of being the pastor here at First Baptist. And I want to thank you for listening into our sermon this week. And I want to tell you this if you're in our area and you don't have a church home, we would love to see you any Sunday morning at First Baptist El Doredo. Will you join me now in listening to our sermon from this week?

Partnership Story & Gospel Impact

Reading Luke 5:1–11

Unexpected Blessing: No Fish

Breaking Nets And Small Boats

Peter’s Confession And Unanswered Prayer

Do Not Be Afraid: Calling Reframed

Complete Surrender Over Success

Daily Cross-Bearing & Invitation

SPEAKER_01 0:34

Good morning. It is good to be with you all this morning. I want to invite you, if you would, to take your Bibles and make your way to Luke chapter 5. We're going to be looking at Luke chapter 5 this morning. And I have been blessed already to be with you today. Goodness, what a great time of worship. You all are blessed with some great musicians and uh great praise team. Appreciate Dustin as he has led us this morning in uh in worship and and just an honor to be able to uh spend this time with you this morning. Just appreciate the spirit in the room. It looks, it feels like y'all really want to be here. And as an outsider coming in and being a guest with you today, that goes a long way. And I can sense that. And I'm thankful for that. And that's a great blessing. And you don't ever want to assume that is always the case. So thankful for the spirit uh here in the church and uh your love for the Lord that we've already declared uh through song. I'm I'm thankful for the ministry of the church here and thankful for Pastor Taylor, thanking him for the opportunity to uh be able to stand in and share God's word with you while he is away, and really appreciate uh his ministry and his family being here, and and I know that you all do as well. Uh we're gonna be looking at a passage of scripture here in just a moment, but uh lest I miss an opportunity to just briefly share a word of thanksgiving to you for the way that you partner together with other churches around the state. I know when I was here a couple of years ago, you heard me share a lot about uh ways partnership occurs with uh with other Arkansas Baptist churches around the state of Arkansas, but just one very practical way uh happened just yesterday. There was a uh clinic that took place in the Hot Springs area, a medical dental clinic uh that was provided by Arkansas Baptist. You helped to fund that clinic. You might you wouldn't have even known it happened, but but you all were there, were present there through your giving. And uh yesterday they saw 116 patients in this dental clinic, and they pulled 155 teeth. Okay, so I don't know if that's a good if that's a success. I don't know how you measure that, but pulled 155 teeth. Of those 116 patients, 21 of them responded to the gospel message with a desire to follow Jesus. And so you all were present in that, and absolutely. Uh, and so so whatever you were doing yesterday, the Lord had used you, had used your generosity, had used the generosity of First Baptist Church to have a hand in how he was working yesterday in Hot Springs. So very grateful to you for that. We're gonna be looking at a passage of scripture uh this morning, and so uh we're gonna read this in a moment, and it may be very familiar to you. Uh, for some of you uh who are here that maybe have never encountered this or watching online, uh, then uh then this may be new to you. But let's let's follow along here, Luke chapter 5, beginning in verse 1. It says, So it was as the multitude pressed around him, that is around Jesus, to hear the word of God, that he stood by the lake of Gennesaret, or the Sea of Galilee, as we know it as, and saw two boats standing by the lake. But the fishermen had gone from them, and they were washing their nets, and then he got into one of the boats, which was Simon's or Peter's, and he asked him to put out a little from the land, and he, that is Jesus, sat down and taught the multitudes from the boat, and when he had stopped speaking, he said to Simon, Launch out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch. But Simon answered and said to him, Master, we have toiled all night and have caught nothing. Nevertheless, at your word I will let down the net. And when they had done this they caught a great number of fish, and their net was breaking, so they signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and to help them. They came and they filled both boats, so that they began to sink. And then Simon Peter, when he saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish which they had taken. And so also were James and John, the sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And then Jesus said to Simon, Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men. So when they so when they had brought their boats to land, they forsook all and they followed him. Let's pray. Father, this is your word. You have inspired it. We are gathered here this beautiful Sunday morning, declaring our allegiance to you. And so as we encounter this passage of scripture, we pray and invite your Holy Spirit to use this passage to teach us to be the followers of Jesus that we need to be for your glory and for the advancement of your kingdom. In Jesus' name I pray. Amen. Have you ever gotten a gift you uh you you didn't really want? Anyone ever had that happen before? Our our youngest son is turning twenty this uh this Tuesday. And um, I have gotten so many gifts for my children that they really didn't want. We're down to just giving money. Are y'all anybody there? You know, when you're 20, that's all you want anyway, I guess. But uh I remember one time hearing a story uh by a longtime pastor of Bellevue Baptist Church, Adrian Rogers. He uh he once told a story of having conducted a wedding for a very well-to-do family in the church. This has been years ago. And uh following the wedding, they gave him a gift and they handed uh Pastor Rogers this uh this little box and he opened the box and it was a pair of very formal white gloves. And as he opened the box, he thought to himself, you know, I don't know. It just in his own mind, of course, he was appropriately appreciative to the giver, but he thought to himself, I don't know that I'm ever going to use these. So he closed the box, he took them home, and he put them up on a shelf in his closet, and a long time passed. And one day, after this long passage of time, he was going through some things in his closet and he saw that box, didn't even remember what it was, pulls the box out, opens the box, it's those gloves. He replays in his mind the memory of having done that wedding and the unusual nature of that gift, and he thought, well, while while they're out, I'm gonna put them on. And so he takes one out and puts it on, and his hand reached uh it hits some resistance there in the glove, pulls his hand back out, and he digs around in that finger that he hit resistance in. It's a piece of paper that's in that that's in that finger. He pulls it out, it's a hundred dollar bill. He looks in the other fingers of that one glove, every finger had a hundred dollar bill, and he pulls the other glove out, every finger had a hundred dollar bill. This is years ago. They had given him a thousand dollars and it had sat in his closet the whole time because he thought they'd given him a gift he never was ever going to use, really didn't even want to begin with. We're gonna look at a passage of scripture this morning here in Luke chapter five, and it is a great story. And there are so many wonderful lessons in these 11 verses here in Luke chapter 5. And I must confess to you, I'm impacted somewhat because uh this past December, I had the privilege, somebody in our church paid our way, my wife and and and I, our way to where in in December I was standing on the shore of the Sea of Galilee at Capernaum. Now, I can't ever read this passage the same, having had that experience. And I don't know if y'all have been to Israel, okay, but if if this family's never been, sometime you've got to send them. Okay, you've got to send them. All right, so that's my uh that's my commercial for some anniversary or whatever. But um I'm not gonna talk anymore about that. It was a great experience. I could spend the rest of the time talking about it. That's not why we're here today. We're gonna look at this passage of scripture, and and as I read this this week and as I was preparing for this this week, I must confess to you, um, and I don't know whether I ought to share this with you or not, which that statement certainly gets everyone's attention, but uh that preparing this message may have been for me this week, all right? So if it is, then y'all just have to endure me sharing a message that the Lord intended for me. But as we as we look at this passage, as I as I thought through it this week, prayed through it this week, I've I've I've preached this passage before, certainly. And for those of you who are teachers in Sunday school, you've taught it before, and and I want us to look at it from a from a different perspective today, and that is I want us to talk in terms of unexpected blessings. And what we're gonna see in this passage of scripture is there are some gifts God gave to Peter in these 11 verses that Peter never knew he needed. And so we're gonna look at those today. If you if you like keeping notes, then I've got five of them. If you just looked at your watch thinking he's got five points, I hope they're succinct. They will, they will be. But these are things that the Lord is teaching me. So, y'all, if you if this isn't for you, you're just along for the ride. All right, Kobe, y'all just bear with me here as I as I work through what the Lord is teaching me in terms of unexpected blessings. We find this scene unfold here on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. A huge crowd has gathered. Jesus' popularity is it is amazing. People from all over have heard about the miracles, they've heard his reputation growing. And the crowd is there on the shore of this body of water. It is so big, they're pressing against him, and he's got to have a more effective way to teach. And here are these two boats, and he gets into the one that belongs to a man. This passage describes him in Luke as Simon. We know him to be Peter. He gets into Peter's boat, and Peter takes him out a little way from the shore, and he begins to teach the people. And once the teaching is done, then comes the encounter that is going to define history for us. Jesus, we find here, looks at Simon Peter. He says, Okay, Peter, now I want you to go out into the deep, launch your nets out into the deep for a catch. And and the first, the first unexpected blessing that we find in this passage of scripture this morning, and when I when I say this, you're gonna know the direction I'm going. First unexpected blessing. The first gift God gave to Peter on that day is no fish. There were no fish. Because the the Lord, he says, now launch out into the deep, let your nets down for a catch. And did you catch how Peter replied to Jesus in this passage of scripture? What he said is, Lord, Master, we have fished all night, we have toiled all night long, and we have caught nothing. We have caught nothing. What do you think is going through Peter's mind as he hears Jesus of Nazareth say to him, Now go out into the deep and let your nets down for a catch? Peter is the expert. Jesus is not the expert fisherman. Peter is the fisherman. Jesus is a carpenter, he's a builder. Now he's becoming known as a rabbi. He is not a fisherman, and they have fished all night using their expertise. Any crappie fishermen in here? They knew where every brush pile was, if you will. That's not their way of fishing, but they knew all the spots. They knew them all, and they knew where to go to catch the fish, and they'd gone to all of those locations. They let down their nets time and again, and they had not caught a single fish. Not one. Jesus makes this request of them. We don't know if if they were in such close proximity and how loud the conversation was. Maybe the crowd could hear. Maybe that put a little pressure on Peter to be willing to go out and do what Jesus asked. Obviously, he has respect for Jesus. He refers to him here in uh in this passage in verse 5 as master. But it's interesting to note that as Peter does this, we know he assumed they were not going to catch anything. We've worked at this all night long. We've gone to every spot. There is no there's no reason to bother with this. And that is what makes what's about to happen that much more amazing. The guys that knew the lake better than anyone else had worked all night long and hadn't caught anything. And it would be a different story, would it not, if they'd have come in from a night's fishing and they'd have had a pretty good night. Yeah, we caught a few fish. There was it was a pretty good evening. That was not the way the story unfolds. The Lord has stepped into the boat of Peter on the morning following a night when they have caught absolutely nothing. And have you ever found yourself thinking, maybe in in prayerful conversation with the Lord, the words of Peter, Master, we have toiled all night and we have caught nothing. You ever found yourself looking around at where you find your yourself, your situation, and you think to yourself, we're working hard, but there's not necessarily a whole lot to show for it. The results, the maybe the success, if you will, from a biblical perspective, certainly the fruit. The song we sang a moment ago about being connected to the vine, the Lord's call on our lives is to bear fruit, and and this awareness for Peter that he had tried his hardest to catch fish and he had failed. And that's where the gift comes in. When I become aware that I can work as hard as I possibly can, put forth my absolute best effort, and it not result in what I hoped it would, I think that positions us very well to do some great work, to see some great work done by the hands of the Lord. So so no fish, I think, was a was an unexpected blessing. I want to move on to the second uh blessing that the Lord sent to Peter this day, and that was breaking nets. We find here that as they go out and they let down their nets, uh, we're gonna we're gonna see what unfolds here in just a minute, but it's interesting to note how were the fishermen introduced into the story? I don't know if you you caught that as we read it a moment ago. You you have this huge crowd of people who are listening to Jesus teach. Is Peter in that crowd? He is not in that crowd. Okay, just let's let that soak in for a second. He did not think it important enough to stop what he was doing and throw in with everybody else to hear Jesus teaching. He is instead, he's fished all night, he's off to the side, it says in verse 2, washing that their nets. They have they have worked all night, they're getting their nets washed, they're getting them repaired, they're getting their them prepped for the next night of fishing. And so for Jesus to come along and say, let down your nets for a catch, it had to be doubly painful. Two reasons. One is Jesus, he doesn't know what he's talking about, he doesn't know how to fish. That's Peter's first reaction. The second one is, we just cleaned our nets, we just got them ready. And he wants us to go, he doesn't know how how long it takes us to do this, he doesn't know how much work is involved, and and yet they do it anyway. He goes out and he lets down his nets, and then came the fish. And and they grab hold, and we can only try to replay in our mind what this scene must have looked like, but they grab hold of these the net and they begin to pull this net in. And the end of verse six, what does it say about the net? It began to break. The net begins to break. There are so many fish in it, as they begin to pull this in, it begins to break. And it's and as he sees this taking place, it says at the beginning of verse 7, they signaled to their partners in the other boat. We know them later on in the passage to be James and John, to come and to help them pull in all of these fish. So you have breaking nets that are being being pulled in very carefully because of all these fish, and then they get all these fish out of the nets into both boats. And how does it describe it? The boats are so full, they are almost swamped. And that's how many fish are in these boats. They're about to sink. This passage of scripture says. And what I think is such an interesting thing to note here is Peter's net, Peter's net was adequate for the fishing he did on a normal night. And his boat was plenty buoyant for a normal night's fishing, but his gear wasn't prepared for what Jesus was about to send his way. His net was too weak, his boat was too small, and I think that is exactly how the Lord wanted it. And I'm telling you, I look at this passage and I think about this, and Jesus, he could have looked at Peter's net, he could have sized up Peter's boat, and he said, Never mind, Peter, I'm gonna use somebody else's gear. That is not what he did. And I want you to know today that if you find yourself sitting here this morning and maybe you've had a rough week, maybe you've met with some challenges or some failures, even, and you find yourself sitting here thinking about your woeful inadequacies. And I don't know if you ever do that or not. I'm I've do that from time to time. I can find myself thinking about all the things I'm not good at, all the things that I wish were different about me, all the ways I'm insufficient, if you will. And if you ever find yourself there, remember that the net Peter brought that day, it wasn't sufficient. The boat Peter had that day, it was not sufficient, and that positioned him to see God do something that in a way made it even more amazing what he was able to do. Because guess what happened with the net? It was breaking, but just just it held together long enough to get the fish in the boat, and the boats did not sink. They made it back to shore. God was able to use what Peter had to offer, and that's what made what happened that day all the more amazing. Third uh unexpected blessing that we find in this passage of scripture is unanswered prayer. Unanswered prayer. As these fish are being brought in, there's a lot going on. The nets breaking, signals to the partners to come over. They put all the the fish into these two boats, the boats are on the verge of being sunk. And and Peter is formulating his response to what he is seeing before his eyes. And I am so thankful that day that the words that came out of Peter's mouth weren't, hey, let Jesus, let's form a partnership. This fishing thing's gonna work out great. That is not his response on that particular day. It says here in this passage of Scripture, we're able to see in verse 8, it says, When Peter saw it, when he saw this huge catch of fish and all that was unfolding around him, he fell at Jesus' knees. Jesus is seated in the boat with all these fish around him. He fell at Jesus' knees, saying, Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord. What an interesting reaction on this particular day as this huge catch of fish unfolds. Depart from me. It wasn't depart from me because you broke my nets. It wasn't depart from me because you're about to sink my boat. It was Peter saying and coming to an awareness that the man who was sitting in his boat, he wasn't just a carpenter, he wasn't just a rabbi. The man sitting in his boat was the one who had the ability to control the depths of the sea. And in that moment, his only response was unworthiness. I am unworthy to be in your presence. And his extreme sense of unworthiness led him to declare and pray, if you will, because here Jesus, God himself sitting in the boat, he prayed to the Lord and said, Go away from me because I am a sinful man. That's all he knew to do. All he could muster was a request of Jesus to leave his presence. And aren't you so thankful Jesus chose not to grant his request? It was in that moment that Peter prayed to the Lord and throughout this prayer, please go away from me. And Jesus just totally disregarded it. I am not even gonna, he didn't even address the prayer. He didn't, he's gonna speak in just a moment, but but I am so thankful for all those times that I pray prayers, things that I think are best, things that I wish would happen, and the Lord does not answer in the way I see fit because He knows things I don't know. God knows things about my life, my circumstances, my future, my purpose, all of my family, all of it. He knows things that I do not know. Unanswered prayers can be a great blessing from the Lord. That leads me to the fourth thing. It segues well into the fourth one, and the fourth unexpected blessing is not knowing the whole story. Not knowing the whole story. Obviously, Peter he is terrified at who is sitting in his boat. This man has the ability to do things that Peter would have never in a million years thought possible. He can control the fish at the bottom of the Sea of Galilee. Who is this man? Peter was afraid. He was terrified. And so we find Jesus' response here when when Peter shares this prayer, it says in verse 9, he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish which they had taken. So were James and John, the sons of Zebedee. They were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, Do not be afraid. From now on, you will catch men. Do not be afraid. From now on, you'll catch men. What could that possibly mean? I know Peter's story. For those of you who have read through scripture, y'all know Peter's story. And you can take the time to read through the rest of the Gospel of Luke. You can read through Matthew and Mark and John and the book of Acts, and you can read 1st and 2 Peter. And we don't know every facet of his story, but we know Peter's story. We know how this unfolds. We know how the story ends. And Peter, had he known the full story, he had a lot to fear. He had a lot to be afraid of. Had the Lord right there in the boat on the Sea of Galilee spoken of all that awaited Peter, his heart would have melted with fear. But that wasn't what mattered at the moment. All that mattered at that particular moment was the one who filled the net, saying, Do not be afraid. Do not be afraid. We can think about what awaited Peter. That journey, that this day is just the start of a journey. That day was going to include some tremendous trials, some tremendous tribulations, but with it some unbelievable triumphs that only God could accomplish through this man. And yet none of that was explained. Yet all that was said was, Do not be afraid. From now on you'll catch men. If we were to look in Matthew's account of this, in Matthew, and in Mark's account, what Jesus calls them to that day, he says, Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men. That is how it's reported in those two gospels. And so Jesus is saying, Do not be afraid. Follow me. A couple of years ago, I was while I was here, I preached out of John chapter 21. And in John chapter 21, we once again find Peter in a boat in the Sea of Galilee. You find this time Jesus standing on the shore and saying, Hey, let your nets down on the other side of the boat. And you remember what happened. They catch this huge catch of fish. They bring them onto the shore. And Peter once again has an encounter with Jesus following the resurrection. This time of uncertainty where Jesus, or excuse me, Peter knows the facts about Jesus, but he doesn't know what to do with it yet. And it was at that moment, once again, that Jesus, in a way that is reminiscent of what occurs at the Sea of Galilee in Luke chapter 5, what does he say to him? Follow me. He re-emphasizes that once again. Peter, the call has not changed. The call is do not be afraid. Follow me. And so as you you think about this today, what do you fear? What is your greatest fear in life? I want to encourage you sometime this week, this isn't positive thinking. Okay, y'all just bear with me, but sometime this week, make a list of what it is you fear. And then try to identify what is your greatest fear in life. And as followers of Jesus Christ, you know what Jesus would say to us? Whatever it is on that list, do not be afraid. Follow me. That's his call to all of us who have surrendered our lives to him. It is a call to set aside our fears and to follow him. And that leads to the final gift this morning, the final blessing, if you will, and that is complete surrender. It was a call to complete surrender. We find here, this is if we stop and think about this, I don't know how long Peter Incorporated had been fishing the Sea of Galilee. Hands down, this is the greatest day of fishing he has ever had of all the days and nights he's ever spent on this body of water. There's no doubt, there's no comparison to what they observed that day, to all the fish they caught that day. How did he respond? After he says what he does about the Lord and requesting him to leave his presence, and the Lord says, Do not be afraid, what did he do? Well, look at verse 11. It says, So when they brought their boats to the land, they they forsook all and followed him. The greatest day their business had ever had was the day they decided to give it up and follow Jesus. You know, it's interesting because we can stop here and we don't we're not gonna take the time to think of all that awaited Peter. We can, without without looking on the in the passages I'm referencing, we could flip over to Acts chapter 2. And this same man, this old crusty fisherman, all he wanted to do was spend the rest of his life fishing on the Sea of Galilee. He just wanted to provide for his family. It was what he knew, it was what was familiar to him, it was the way he was going to make a living. Surely he would have been content with that, and yet this same man, if you fast forward three years ahead, he is standing on the Temple Mount in front of thousands of people, and he is proclaiming the message of Jesus, and day one of the church, 3,000 people become followers of the Lord Jesus Christ because of the message preached through this man, this fisherman, who was just from the backwoods of the Sea of Galilee. We were able to see on the pages of scripture that it's it's in chapter four that Peter stands in front of the ruling group of religious leaders, the Sanhedrin, there in Jerusalem and is called to give an account for his actions, and he is filled with such boldness and stands toe-to-toe with those religious leaders, filled with the Spirit, that they have to conclude, even though he's uneducated, even though he's a hick from the hills of Galilee, he has been with Jesus, and it is so evident because of the boldness with which he spoke. He wasn't just this fisherman from the Sea of Galilee anymore. And then we're able to fast forward to the fact he's the leader of the early church. The book of Acts makes that clear. You get to Acts chapter 12. Acts chapter 12, Herod has already put to death John, the other fisherman, the up the one of the disciples, the first disciple to be killed for his faith, and Peter's being held. And it the Bible says in Acts 12, Herod was going to put Peter to death the very next day. That sounds terrible. Goodness. What a terrible end to an amazing story. Many of you know how the story ends. The Lord miraculously delivers Peter, but how does the angel find Peter that night as he approaches Peter in prison? He is so soundly asleep he has to like kick him awake, you know. He is he is sleeping so soundly the night before he's going to be executed because surely that night he replayed what happened that day on the Sea of Galilee when Jesus of Nazareth stepped into his boat and gave him such a huge catch of fish, it no longer made him want to pursue fishing, it made him want to pursue Jesus. And it was the pursuit of Jesus that gave him a peace that passed human understanding to guard his heart and mind, and it was that peace that would allow him to, with joy in his heart, face execution because he knew who Jesus was, and Jesus had total control over his life. He gave it all up that day. They pulled their boats up on land and they followed Jesus. How is this possible? It's because they surrendered that day. You know, I'll never catch a huge I'll never have a huge catch of fish on the Sea of Galilee. I sat in a boat on the Sea of Galilee, incidentally, but I didn't have a net or a Zebco 33 or any of that stuff with me. But that's never never presumably gonna happen. I am never gonna stand in front of thousands of people on the Temple Mount and preach the message of Jesus in that setting. I'm never gonna travel the Roman Empire preaching the gospel. That's not the call. But nor is the call worldly success. The call placed on Peter wasn't I gotta get bigger boats, I gotta get stronger nets. That never crossed his mind. That wasn't what the Lord had in store for Peter. What is the call? The call is surrender. That is what Jesus calls every person to is surrender. You know, a verse of scripture I've had to wrestle with here is just a few pages over in the Gospel of Luke, verse 14, or excuse me, chapter 14, verse 33 says these words, Jesus' words are whoever of you does not forsake everything he has cannot be my disciple. You ought to get your Bible out. Matter of fact, I don't mind if you get it out right now and don't pay another pay attention to another word I say. You need to get your Bible out and you need to read Luke 14, 33. Whoever of you does not forsake everything he has cannot be my disciple, and you start praying and ask the Lord to show you how what that means for you as a 21st century American who is seeking to follow the Lord. It's not a call to success, it is a call to surrender, and it sounds risky. Matter of fact, there are times when I think it sounds terrible. But we don't know the whole story. God knows the whole story. He knows when, he knows what I'm gonna do from this day forward, He knows how He can use me. He knows the day of my death, He knows everything that's gonna happen between now and then, and if if I'm willing to pull my boat up on the shore and let go of it, even in the midst of the most success I've ever enjoyed, potentially, if that's where you find yourself, it is so freeing. And it's Jesus' call. Don't be afraid. Don't be afraid. Do we really trust this Jesus so much that we're willing to surrender it all and follow him? I'm gonna invite you, if you would, please bow your head and close your eyes. Listen, if you're here without a relationship with Jesus, if you have never come to a point where you are willing to turn from your sin and surrender your life over to Him today, that the invitation for you this day is, yes, to believe. You need to believe the facts, believe that Jesus died on the cross, believe that he rose from the dead. Then you need to recognize, like Peter did that day, that you're a sinner. I've had to come to terms with the fact that I'm a sinner, and I need to ask Jesus to forgive me of my sins, to have a desire to turn from my sin, and then to surrender my life to the Lord. And if you think that sounds too risky, if it sounds too terrible, let me say as someone who's on the other side of that decision, once you've done it, you're gonna wonder why you've waited so long. Come to faith in the Lord Jesus today. Let go of that boat, let go of that net. It's tearing anyway, it's not gonna last forever. You need to give your life to the Lord. Same invitation in a different sense is for those of us who are believers this day. Just like Peter needed reminding in John 21, three years after what happened here in Luke chapter 5. Today's a reminder for us. God doesn't call us to live just like everybody else does while claiming Jesus is the Lord of our lives. That's not the call placed on a Christian. The call is to surrender to Jesus. And another place in the Gospel of Luke, in Luke chapter 9, verse 23, Jesus says, if anyone would come after me, he must deny himself. He must take up his cross daily, every day, and follow Jesus. Every day I'm gonna want to get back in that boat. Every day I'm gonna want to go back to the old way of living. I'm gonna let that net down, and I know the probability is I'm gonna work real hard, and ultimately it's not gonna amount to anything, and that's why every day I've got to get out of bed and I've got to recognize that the highest priority in my life over everything else is to surrender that day to Jesus. He's the God who can fill my net, he's the God that can fill my boat, he's the God that controls my future. What am I afraid of? Don't be afraid. Follow me. Lord, we call on you this day. You know, Lord, that it would be hypocritical of me to stand up here and give any indication that every day of my life I've taken up my cross and followed you. As a matter of fact, I think what is so convicting to me about this passage of Scripture is all the days I have not done that. All the days I've been content just toiling all night, not catching anything. It is so tempting for us to be able to mingle the worries and cares of this life with professing Jesus as Lord. And I pray for all of us who are Christians in this room, take us back to that moment when you rescued us from our sin, that moment you filled our net, that moment we recognized who you were, and the call you placed on our lives to surrender it all and follow you and remind us every day that is still the call. It doesn't matter who I am, it doesn't matter what I do, it doesn't matter how long I live or where I live or how much I accomplish or what my reputation is, none of it matters. The call is to pull our boats up on shore, surrender it all and follow you. Lord, if there's someone here today that professes you who knows they're far from surrendered, work in their heart right now. Help them to come to terms with, to grapple with, and come to terms with the call to follow you and let them forsake it all. Surrender it all and enjoy having you be the Lord over every facet of their lives. For those in this room that do not know you yet as their Savior, Lord, I can't imagine living another moment without you. Lord, open their eyes and their heart to the truth of who they are as sinners and the truth of who you are as their glorious Savior. And let them respond to you in faith this day. Thank you for this time. We've had to look into your word. Please work now in our hearts and lives. It's in Jesus' name that I pray. Amen. We're going to be standing down here at the front. I'm going to be standing here. If you'd like to pray about something, if you'd like to talk about what it means to be a follower of Jesus, you come at this time. As we stand, you respond as the Lord leads.