[First published 2018]
Not long after Father God brought Jesus the Messiah back from the dead by His Spirit, the One who’s the radiance of His glory went once again in search of His ex-fisherman friends. Of the two sets of brothers who’d been partners in the fishing trade on the Sea of Galilee before deserting their nets to follow a peripatetic teacher, their boss had an exceptionally severe crisis of self-confidence.
GONE FISHING!
So this ‘son of Jonah’, named Simon, decided to return to the simple life of sitting in a boat with buddies and dragging a net in the hope of getting a catch – but it proved to be an exercise in futility!
A few years earlier on that inland sea, the four fishing partners encountered and had been ‘called’ by The One to follow Him. Jesus amazed the crowds there with His teaching and had asked Simon if He could address them from his moored boat. Jesus knew the men had worked hard all night without having caught anything because, when He’d finished speaking, He told Simon to sail into deep water and lower his nets despite the fruitless night – Simon was overwhelmed by the result! They’d got such a large number of fish that another boat was called for – then both began to sink with their massive weight!!
So Simon changed his tune. Upon hearing Jesus’ instruction he’d objected because of the poor night, yet respectfully referred to Him as “Master” – but in amazement at the fresh catch breaking nets and sinking boats, Simon addressed Him with the superior term of “Lord”; thus suggesting he was beginning to understand the status of this astonishing teacher. In the account by one of those partners, John, they’d previously met Jesus immediately after His baptism in the river Jordan and Andrew had brought his brother Simon to see Jesus, who then spoke of his identity and implicit destiny, “You are Simon son of Jonah. You shall be called Cephas,” (which is translated ‘A Stone’, Petros/Peter: John 1:42).

After that huge catch of unspecified quantity, Jesus called Simon into his destiny: “Do not be afraid. From now on you will catch men!” That is, a fisher of men. When they’d landed their boats the four foresook all and followed Him (Luke 5:10-11). Continue reading














After a prolonged but useful delay in chatting with telecoms engineer in our street (after a month of blocked outgoing email with ISP TalkTalk) am back at the desk catching up and find Veronika’s latest is on the above news, as posted on her 












