Grazing Grace

BY GREG A. LANE

It was the final day of our vacation at the beach in Sea Grove, Florida. Since we had to leave by 9 a.m., I got up extra early to get in a couple hours of surf fishing before traveling home. It was still dark outside, and the moon shone brightly on the water. The surf was relatively smooth, so it appeared to be perfect conditions for good fishing. I thought I was going to be the first person on the beach, but I was wrong. There was one other person already on the beach sitting in a chair with fishing rod in hand. Had it not been for the brilliant moonlight I probably wouldn’t have noticed him. I have no idea how long he’d been sitting out there before I got there, but he was “in it for the long haul” because he had quite a setup with him ... fishing rods, canopy, chairs, tackle box, etc.

I was excited to get to spend my final hours at the beach surf fishing. With the aid of the bright moonlight, I cautiously waded out to knee-deep water and cast my line out to deeper water. It was about 6 a.m.

Slowly but surely, the moonlight began to fade as the morning sun began to rise at 6:30 a.m. Thirty minutes had passed by and I hadn’t had a single nibble on my line. I looked back toward the beachand saw a couple other fishermen on the shore getting ready to try their luck as well. I looked back into the vast ocean, and at the beautiful pinks and purples of the early morning sky and gave thanks to God for a beautiful day. I continued to cast my line with great expectations for a trophy fish to strike.

An hour had passed, and I hadn’t caught one fish. I looked to my right and left and saw that the surf was now dotted with silhouettes of fishermen all up and down the coastline, casting their lines into the deep. In me, there was a feeling of camaraderie with each of these men who had awakened early to try their hand at fishing. They were here to enjoy a vacation with their families, just like me, but they had something in them that drove them to the beach earlier than all the other vacationers. That feeling you get when you hook a big fish and pull him in to shore ... there’s nothing like it!

As time passed, I realized I had been fishing for an hour and a half without a single hit on my line, but it didn’t deter me or dishearten me in the least bit. I began to reflect on this passion within me, and within the hearts of all fishermen, who ignore all the discouragement they face when fishing for hours without any luck.

I remembered the first meeting Jesus had with the fishermen of Galilee who had been fishing ALL NIGHT LONG without catching a single fish. I gained a greater appreciation for those men because of their stick-to-it-tiveness. I understood how they could do it. I contemplated the passion inside the heart of the fisherman who denies every negative sign they’ve experienced and continues to throw in their line, just one more time, saying, “Maybe this will be the cast where I catch the big one!”

ALL NIGHT LONG they had fished. Not just one hour ... not just a couple of hours ... ALL NIGHT LONG they had cast out their nets without catching one single fish! To those who are not fishermen, it sounds completely foolish, but the true fisherman understands how they could do it ... how they could keep on fishing when it seems completely useless to do so.

I think that’s part of the reason why Jesus chose fishermen for His very first disciples. There’s something in the heart of a true fisherman that Jesus finds very appealing. You see, a fisherman pursues something he can’t see. The success he seeks is in an unseen realm ... under water. Sometimes there’s no evidence at all that there are any fish in the water. He hopes there are. He envisions fish “out there” where he casts his line. He pictures himself hooking that “big one” and reeling it in, with rod bent over, about to break in two. He rehearses in his mind the story he will tell his buddies of how he battled against that monster-sized fish as he reeled him to shore. Yet there’s no solid, concrete evidence that there’s even one single fish out there! In spite of the fact that he can’t see anything to encourage him to cast his line one more time, he does it anyway. He doesn’t give up just because the last cast didn’t yield a fish. In his mind, he says, “Maybe this next cast will be the one!”

People who have to catch a fish every time they cast their line just don’t get it. If they get bored and give up after just five minutes because they didn’t catch anything, they’re not true fishermen. They don’t have the vision it takes to be a fisherman. They don’t have the faith that it requires. Yes, faith is a MUST. The true fisherman knows anything he catches and brings into the “visible realm” must first be captured in the invisible, unseen realm, and that takes some patience and fortitude.

Listen, everything you REALLY want in life is in an unseen realm. There’s love, joy, peace, and hope “out there.” But if you want to bring it into this visible realm, you’ve got to cast your line (or your net) by faith. You’ve got to have patience and endurance. Success will come eventually, but it may not happen overnight.

Maybe, when you started reading this story, you thought it would end with me catching an enormous fish as a reward for my diligence and effort. That’s where you’d be wrong. I spent two whole hours fishing that morning … without catching anything… without even one single nibble! Yet, if Jesus stood on the shore and yelled out to me like He did to those Galilean fishermen 2,000 years ago, “Cast just one more time,” I surely would have obeyed Him.

Do you have the heart of a fisherman? Can you face the discouragement that comes in life, but still maintain hope and vision? Are you willing to cast your line “one more time,” or have you given up?

If you do have the heart of a true fisherman, maybe you can hear the voice of Jesus calling you: “Follow me, and I will make you fishers of men” (Matthew 4:19).