Bible Study series: Luke 5:1-11. Peter’s life was changed. Then he had to be trained and grow into his calling.
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In the next link to the original chapter, I comment more and offer the Greek text. At the bottom you will find a “Summary and Conclusion” section geared toward discipleship. Check it out!
In this post, links are provided for further study.
Let’s begin.
Scripture: Luke 5:1-11
1 And so it was that while the crowds pressed around him to hear the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret. 2 He saw two boats sitting by the lake. The fishermen left them and were washing the nets. 3 Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to push out a little. Then he sat down, and from the boat he began teaching the crowds.
4 When he finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Launch out to the deep and let down your nets for a catch!” 5 In reply, Peter said, “Master, we have worked hard the whole night and caught nothing! But at your word, I’ll lower the nets!” 6 After they did this, the nets closed up around a large number of fish, and their nets were about to tear. 7 Then they signaled to their partners in the other boat, to come out to help them. They came and filled both boats, so that they were about to sink.
8 When Simon Peter saw this, he fell at the knees of Jesus, saying, “Depart from me, because I am a sinful man, Lord!” 9 For fear overcame him and everyone with him at the catch of fish which they caught. 10 Likewise also for James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Don’t fear. From now on, you shall be catching people alive!” 11 When they brought up their boats on to the land, they left everything and followed him. (Luke 5:1-11)
Comments:
In Luke 4:38-41, Jesus and Simon knew each other, and Simon witnessed miracles. But here in this wonderful section, they seem not to know each other. Explanations: first, Luke, the inspired author, is entitled to rearrange his story. Luke 4 foreshadowed the more intimate knowledge Peter was about to acquire about his Lord. Second, Peter may have come to know Jesus in Luke 4, and his witnessing all the healings prepared his heart to obey the Lord’s command to launch out into the deep. Third, Peter may have needed to process what he was witnessing and needed his own miracle before he surrendered and repented. He got one: a miraculous catch of fish. As a fisherman, this miracle spoke to him and convinced him.
Some interpreters believe that this section is a commissioning, not just a calling.
Please read this post tpo sort out other issues:
Jesus Calls Certain Disciples in Four Gospels. Do the Accounts Contradict?
1:
Jesus already had a widespread fame on the west side of the lake of Galilee. A healing and deliverance ministry will draw the crowds.
“word”: it is the Greek noun logos (pronounced loh-goss and is used 330 times in the NT). Here Jesus was discoursing and speaking about the kingdom of God—though the text does not “kingdom”—but no doubt he explained to them the basic teachings that get unfolded in the rest of the Gospel.
“Gennesaret”: it is the Lake of Galilee and comes from OT Hebrew “Kinnereth” for this same lake (see Num. 34:11).
2-3:
Jesus just did not commandeer the boats while they were in use. “Get out!” No, they were sitting on the shore. So he got in Simon’s boat when it was idle on the shore and told him to push him out a little I used “push out,” but “put out” is a little closer. A boat from the first century was dragged out of the mud in the shallows of the Lake of Galilee, and archeologists named it the “Jesus boat” (you may google it).
“He sat down”: that is the normal posture of a teacher back then. But there is a practical matter. Don’t rock the boat—literally!
“teaching”: sometimes in a formal setting like a classroom or another confined setting, other times in a casual setting. Here he was in a formal setting, the synagogue. He spoke with authority, unlike the teachers of the law and Pharisees (Luke 4:32; Matt. 7:28-29). This is what the Spirit does through a surrendered heart and mind. It was his habit and custom to enter their synagogues and teach the people (see 4:15). He combined a teaching and healing ministry. His insight into Scripture was profound. This is what the Spirit does through a surrendered heart and mind. Some Renewalists of the fiery variety don’t teach, but evangelize and shriek and freak, after they read one verse or two, and put on a show. How much time do they put in to study the Word? Jesus had a full ministry: teaching, healing, miracles, and deliverances.
4:
Jesus was so confident in his miraculous powers that he could tell Simon, the experienced fisherman, that he was about to get a catch. Sometimes you got to believe it before you see it.
5:
It just wouldn’t work. Peter was a man of nature, a man of the water. He and his partners worked all night and caught nothing. So why would it happen now? Peter stopped and reasoned for a second. Okay, okay! At the word of Jesus, he would do it, even though he was exhausted from the nighttime labor. It is a sure thing that Simon Peter never saw a miracle like this, since they reacted so strongly. It is a miracle that is tailor-made for fishermen. They understood that two boats just don’t fill up to the point of sinking without the miracle of God.
“word”: the noun here is rhēma (pronounced ray-mah), and the rhē– stem is related to speaking, and the –ma suffix means “the result of.” So combined, the noun means a “spoken word” (though it does not always mean that in every context and is sometimes synonymous with logos). Nonetheless, here Jesus had spoken a word to Peter, and the man obeyed it.
6:
I like what Commentator Morris writes: “Obedience brings results! Peter and his friends let down the nets and enclosed a great shoal of fish” (comments on vv. 6-7, emphasis original).
I wonder whether Jesus got a “word of knowledge” that this catch of fish would happen, or whether he just made it happen because he was God in the flesh, a reality we do not share. He and his Father were in perfect cooperation, and he heard from his Father perfectly, so he and the Father worked this nature miracle. The Father through the Spirit can also give us knowledge about nature miracles; that is, he is willing to work them.
5. Gifts of the Spirit: Workings of Miracles
2. Gifts of the Spirit: Word of Knowledge
We should pray for nature miracles, particularly ones that provide food for people. Jesus was Lord back then, and he is Lord today. He can still work them. There are many miracle stories about soup kitchens not running out of food until the last person is fed. But please note that Peter had all the equipment that could contain the miracle—the boat and the net and practical actions. He pushed out to the deeper water. If you want a miracle, you got to move into the deep, spiritually speaking. You need child-like faith to believe God for a miracle, but to receive the miracle you need to understand the deep things of God, or else you will not be able to handle it. To get his miracle, he had to lower the net. Then the nets began to tear, and he needed help, next verse:
7:
I like to imagine the signals Peter gestured to his partners. No doubt they saw what was happening and either stood there gawking or been on the verge of launching the second boat. Simon’s signals prompted them to act. The school of fish must have stayed put for the men in the second boat to lower their net so their boat also was about to sink. Clearly this was a nature miracle of the first order.
8:
Luke compressed the time, for in the next scene Peter is falling at the knees of Jesus. The (future) apostle either leaped out of the boat and swam to shore and let his partners do the work, or he rowed the boat ashore and then kneeled before his master. Either way, Luke, the infallibly inspired author, is allowed to arrange the sequence of events as he saw fit.
Did Peter embrace Jesus’s knees? The verse is silent. But it is a moving scene. Peter reacted as he felt it. He was not worthy to stand in the presence of such a remarkable man. The fisherman knew what level of miracle this was. He usually reacts with his emotions, sometimes excessively. From here throughout the Gospel and the first fifteen chapters of Luke-Acts, I picture Peter as husky and bold. I admire him.
“sinful”: it is the adjective hamartōlos (pronounced hah-mahr-toh-loss and used 47 times and 18 times in Luke), and it means as I translated it. It is someone who does not observe the law, in this context. But here Peter also felt his sin—he was sinful. Peter was a Jew, so he was not ethnically outside of the covenant people. However, let’s explore the term more thoroughly.
BDAG, a thick Greek lexicon, which many consider authoritative, defines the adjective as follows: “pertaining to behavior or activity that does not measure up to standard moral or [religious] expectations (being considered an outsider because of failure to conform to certain standards is a frequent semantic component. Persons engaged in certain occupations, e.g. herding and tanning [and tax collecting] that jeopardized [religious] purity, would be considered by some as ‘sinners,’ a term tantamount to ‘outsider.’” Non-Israelites were especially considered out of bounds [see Acts 10:28].)” “Sinner, with a general focus on wrongdoing as such.” “Irreligious, unobservant people.” “Unobservant” means that he did not care about law keeping or observing the law.
Do you fail to conform to certain standards? Maybe you did break the demands of moral and religious law. Pray and repent, and God will accept you.
Let’s look at the related noun hamartia (pronounced hah-mahr-tee-ah). A deep study reveals that it means a “departure from either human or divine standards of uprightness” (BDAG, p. 50). It can also mean a “destructive evil power” (ibid., p. 51). In other words, sin has a life of its own. Be careful! In the older Greek of the classical world, it originally meant to “miss the mark” or target. Sin destroys, and that’s why God hates it, and so should we. The good news: God promises us forgiveness when we repent.
Bible Basics about Sin: Word Studies
Human Sin: Original and Our Committed Sin
“Lord”: this is the standard noun for Lord: kurios (pronounced koo-ree-ohss). See my post on this title, which in many contexts has the connotation of the Lord God of the OT.
Luke is signaling his readers that this is high Christology.
9:
“fear”: the noun combines astonishment and fear and is used only here and in Luke 4:36 and Acts 3:10, so it seems only Luke liked the word, but not very often. In Greek older than the NT, it meant “astonishment” and “amazement” (Liddell and Scott), but it is easy to see that in this context, fear and amazement would come upon the original viewers of this miracle. There is nothing wrong with that emotion hitting you right between the eyes when it is a reaction towards God, not your circumstances. Fear God and live (Deut. 6:24). Fear your circumstances and cower. You choose which option is best (the first one)
Bock: In Peter’s reaction and the huge catch of fish, “Grace is at work. An unworthy Peter and his companions receive and observe the benefits of a gracious God through his agent. They re overwhelmed. Thus, the awe that is in view here is focused first of all on the visit of a holy God—much like Elizabeth’s awe in 1:43. Holiness and awesome knowledge are displayed in God’s working through Jesus. Second awe is fueled by the recognition that this God would be so kind to them in providing the bountiful catch. Third, the catch also points to Jesus’ greatness and power … Jesus is the agent of God’s beneficence” (p. 460).
10:
Luke says, almost in passing, that fear and amazement also overcame James and John. I like how he mentions that they were Peter’s partners. This was a business venture, a business partnership. But where is Andrew, Peter’s brother? As it happens, the highly abbreviated parallel accounts show Andrew was there (Matt. 4:18-22 // Mark 1:16-20). However, Luke’s focus was on Peter, and he puts in parentheses James and John. But the partnership, surely between the two pairs of brothers, fits the logic of history. It is hard to believe that these men who lived close by each other did not know each other. And sure enough, they did. A wonderful little detail.
“do not fear”: this is the typical verb for fear. It can mean “afraid” or “awe.” Jesus reassures Peter in the same way that the angel offered in the infancy narrative (1:13, 30; 2:1; and see Acts 18:9; 27-23-24; see Gen 21:17; 26:24; 28:13).
Remember, Peter fell at Jesus’s knees. Maybe his fear paralyzed him. So no doubt the Lord touched his shoulder or head and commanded him not to fear.
“In Jesus’ presence, Simon need not fear the Holy. After his confession, Jesus does not speak forgiveness but of his ‘future service.’ Jesus does not flee from sinners but seeks them out (19:10), recruits them (5:27), and saves them (19:9). Simon remains a sinner but one who is commissioned to gain other sinners” (Garland, comment on 5:10).
11:
After such a miracle, it was psychologically probable that they would leave everything. So Peter, James and John (and Andrew) left everything—what about everyone? How did Peter’s wife feel about this? Did she say, “Just don’t leave the area!” No doubt she was in the crowds and saw the miraculous catch. If so, she must have realized that this was the right thing for him to do. But did she cry some tears? We don’t know. But later on she did accompany him on his ministry tours (1 Cor. 9:5).
“catching people alive”: When Peter and the others capture men and women alive, they will show them new life in Christ. The main image of the verb is that Peter and others have just been launched on a rescue mission, a rescue from danger, to save alive (Num. 31:15; Deut. 20:16; Josh. 2:12) (Bock, vol. 1, p. 461). So it could be translated as “capturing alive.”
Fisherman imagery: Jer. 16:16; Ezek. 29:4-5; Amos 4:2; Hab. 1:14-17 (Bock, ibid.). By catching people alive and letting them flop around in the bottom of the boat, Peter and the others are following a prophetic calling.
“Most transparent is the nexus [connection] between catching fish and proclaiming the word: success in fishing, under Jesus’s authority, is a prophetic symbol for the mission in which Peter and the others will participate, while Jesus himself, in his word and miraculous deed, is himself engaged in ‘catching’” (Green, comment on vv. 1-3).
Peter begged Jesus to depart from him because Peter was a sinful man. “Instead of having his wish granted that Jesus depart from him, Simon ends up following him … ‘The same power that prompted Simon to fall at Jesus’ knees now lifts him into God’s service’” (Garland, quoting Craddock in his commentary).
GrowApp for Luke 5:1-11
1. Jesus asked for one of Peter’s boats. What material object have you had to surrender to the Lord? How did you feel? What happened?
RELATED
11. Eyewitness Testimony in Luke’s Gospel
3. Church Fathers and Luke’s Gospel
2. Archaeology and the Synoptic Gospels
1. The Historical Reliability of the Gospels: Introduction to Series
SOURCES
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