Fishing on the wrong side of the boat
John 21:6 KJV [6] And he said unto them, Cast the net on the right side of the ship, and ye shall find. They cast therefore, and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes.
It had been about three-and-a-half years since Jesus first began to call his Apostles at this same sea of Tiberias, which is also called the Sea of Galilee and lake Gennesaret. Reading in Acts, we learn that Jesus walked among various assemblies of disciples for 40 days after the Resurrection. Paul relates to the Corinthians how during this time period that Jesus appeared to a gathering of upwards of 500 people at once. All of the previous information in this paragraph is just a small list of many other things Jesus did, which John references in the last sentence of The Gospel of John. It is the third time he has privately met with his original disciples after he had risen from the dead.
Gathered here at this fishing trip are our Lord’s key men, whom he charges to pick up his mantle to carry on the mission, much like Elijah instructed Elisha in the Old Testament. Jesus is making sure his inner circle, and Peter in particular, completely understand what to do with the keys to the kingdom that he promised them as recorded in Matthew 16:19. This is a warning not to become like the previous generations which failed, in particular the Pharisees, who sold their souls for the love of money. Remember how Jesus referred to the Pharisees as a generation of vipers (See Matthew 23) and servants of their father the devil! (See John 8)
Jesus being the Lord who created the heavens and earth, who left his throne in Heaven to became one of us. This Jesus is uniquely qualified to speak to any of us in terms that we as individuals and fellow laborers can understand. He is teaching his fishing buddies in a language they have used all their lives. I don’t mean he is speaking Aramaic, Hebrew or the Galilean dialect from their hometown—he is speaking in terms of their livelihood, a way they have earned a living from childhood. This is a “Nicodemus thing,” an earthy example that we, the created, might understand a Godly concept our Creator, the eternal spiritual being, ordained.
As a lifelong fisherman myself and a student of the Bible, I get what Jesus was saying to Peter and his fishing friends. Paraphrasing it he says: Hey guys, you’re fishing on the wrong side of the boat.
Remember, most of these same guys had a very similar experience at their first recorded encounter with Jesus, in which he spoke similar words to them. See Luke’s account of the first call of Peter and the guys in chapter 5 of The Gospel of Luke. Matthew 4:19 sums it up concisely when he records Jesus’ immortal words: “Follow me and I will make you fishers of men.”
I’m afraid that many of us Christians today are fishing on the wrong side of the boat.
Let me explain.
We have built our nice fancy church buildings and are waiting on the lost to come to our lovely buildings. We sit in these church buildings waiting on the lost to come and wonder why the only people we see saved are the children of our church members or a few VBS attendees that we rarely ever see again.
Somehow we have adopted that misquoted line from the Field of Dreams movie, “If you build it, they will come.”
Building a physical building and waiting for the lost to come to us is not what Jesus charged his Apostles to do. We need not look far in the Gospels to know that building a temple and waiting is contrary to the Word!
Mark 16:15 KJV [15] And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
Now don’t get me wrong; there is nothing wrong with having dedicated places of worship. But worship is exactly what our church buildings should be for. Most of the lost are outside of a true fellowship of believers’ church walls.
Mark 16:15 KJV [15] And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
Jesus tells his disciples “Go, preach, saying the kingdom of Heaven is at hand.”
He didn’t tell them build physical buildings, then sit and wait for the lost to come to you. Remember Jesus’ parable of the great supper in Luke 14:23: “And the lord said unto the servant, Go out into the highways and hedges, and compel them to come in, that my house may be filled.” He didn’t say wait for them to come to you.
Ask yourself: Would Paul have been saved if Ananias had refused God’s call to go to Paul? Would the Ethiopian have been saved if Phillip had ignored the Holy Ghost and not went to Gaza; or refused to preach to the Ethiopian sitting in a chariot in the middle of a desert? What might have happened to Cornelias had Peter refused God’s vision and not gone to his home to preach? The list of Christians seeking out the lost is quite lengthy.
If we all started fishing Jesus’ way, we would need bigger nets and buildings to train the catch in.