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.