Peters Faith

This last week in my New Testament class we learned about how Christ called Peter to take his boat out and to cast his net into the water after he had been fishing all night. Because Peter had the faith in Christ his nets filled with fish. This is how I’ve always looked at this story. But I never thought about it from Peters point of view. Fishing is Peters job. That is how he makes the money to provide for his family. The best time to catch the fish is at night as well. Could you imagine spending all night working at your job and not earning a single dollar? By the end of your shift you are probably tired and you really just want to go home and go to bed. I am sure this is how Peter felt. So at the end of the night he brings in his boat and nets and begins to clean his nets. As soon as he is done cleaning his nets Christ comes and asks Peter to take him out onto the water so that he could teach the people. Peter obeys although I’m sure he was exhausted and really didn’t want to do it. Then Christ tells Peter to cast his nets out again. Now Peter is a professional fisherman. He has done it his whole life and he knows that the best time to fish is during the night. Once the sun rises the fish tend to leave. Asking Peter to cast his nets back out is like working retail and completely closing the store only to have your manager tell you to open back up. You know that nobody is going to come especially since you are normally closed at that time, but you do it anyway. Peter knew that there wasn’t going to be any fish, but in Luke 5:5 he says “Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net.” I can’t imagine how hard that would be for Peter to be able to have the faith to do what he did. But because he trusted in the lord he caught so much fish that they had to bring out another boat to get it all. That takes some serious faith.

Stop Trying To Do It Alone

So I got this assignment for my New Testament class. I’m supposed to write about what I have learned that week from my personal reading and from what we were taught in class. But I don’t actually know what to write about. I have all of these ideas floating in my head. I could talk about the superlatives and Moses and his conversation with God. Or I can talk about Moses and his interaction with Satan. Or I could talk about “worlds without end”. All are very good topics but I can only think of how to write the beginnings of them. I can’t finish any of the thoughts. So I guess I’ll give you the beginning of one of my thoughts and see where I can get it to go.

If you know me well then you know that I really like to do things on my own. I love being able to claim that I completed a project all by myself. And I hate asking for help. If I ask for help then I can’t say that I did it all by myself. So most of the time it doesn’t matter how badly I need help, I won’t ask for it because I have this hope that I can do it by myself. I’m not sure if this is how Moses felt when he had his encounter with Satan. Moses had just got done talking to God face to face and God called him his son. But he didn’t just call him his son. He used a superlative using the most supreme way that he can to claim him. Shortly after Moses had just been talking to God, Satan showed up and told him that he is only a son of man. Moses tried three times alone to get Satan to leave but he would not. Then he realized that he could not do it alone and said in Moses 1:21 “In the name of the Only Begotten, depart hence, Satan.” It was only when Moses called upon God that Satan left.

I think sometimes in our daily lives we forget to call upon God when we are in need of help. I know I do. When I am in times of struggle I think that I am alone. Satan is constantly telling me that I am in this alone and that there is nobody out there to help me. I forget that I am not in this alone and that I have the help of my Heavenly Father whenever I need it as long as I remember to ask. I need to remember to ask my Heavenly Father as well as the people around me who love me and want to help me. Once I learn that I will be able to conquer so much more.