Isaiah 9:1-4                              No gloom

1 Corinthians 1:10-18               No divisions

Matthew 4:12-23                     Follow me

            You fisher folk should be happy today.  Our Gospel Lesson is all about four fishermen:  Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John.  Jesus chose these four men as his first disciples.  You who claim fishing as part of your identity may feel honored.

            Of course these fishermen did not go fly fishing for trout.  They did not bring their tip ups out to go ice fishing.  They probably would not sit down with you and wax ecstatic over lures and would mount the big muskie on their family room wall.

            These men were commercial fishermen.  They worked long hours in boats with nets.  Some people speculate that they were like share croppers, only they didn’t share crop land.  They share cropped a big lake, which I would compare to Green Lake, on whose shore our Pilgrim Center is located.  They were part of the lower strata of society.  Perhaps akin to day laborers.  Nobody special.

            These were the kind of people whom Jesus challenged to “get on board” with him in the Gospel movement.  He welcomed them to climb aboard the good ship of Grace, where they would all be together to experience beautiful sunsets, blustery storms, and surprising developments.

            On this day of our annual meeting and in the middle of the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, this little fish story of Jesus on the shore of Galilee offers us some insights.

1.         On this Annual Meeting Sunday, this fish story reminds us that each of us is also called to “go fish.”  Jesus was inviting Peter, Andrew, James, and John to come on board and reach out with more than their nets.  He was inviting them to reach out and invite others to change their ways and live under the sign of the FISH.  (Jesus Christ, God’s Son, Savior)

            Today Jesus invites us to be inviting Christians, who have learned to follow Jesus and let Jesus be the leader of our lives.

            One of the challenges for us is to practice hospitality.  Our Deacons and Deaconesses have purchased a sign that we can use outside the church, like it is now ----- or perhaps when we are selling brats on a summer day ----- or when we are participating in the Heritage Days summer parade.  This is one way of letting others know who we are and that we welcome them.

            A more important way is simply by our actions and attitudes. 

The smile we offer to one another, especially to those we don’t know or don’t know very well.

The care we show for another in need.

The effort we make to be outward looking.  Just this week Doris Bakker showed me an interesting series of articles in the Moody magazine.  The magazine contained a series of articles on welcoming.  One suggestion in particular caught my attention.  It was the “three minute rule.” The leaders in a particular church were challenged to make sure that they took at least three minutes before or after worship to talk with someone they did not know. Hmm.

            Of course such  a suggestion is easier for those of us who are extraverts.  But those of us who are introverts can also reach out with a hand shake or smile.

            Each of us is called to serve God in our own way ----- and we don’t have to go far away.  Sometimes we think that those disciples left their nets forever and went faraway.  One of my clergy colleagues pointed out to me on Thursday that actually the disciples were rarely more than a day’s journey from home in Capernaum.  Perhaps they went back every once in a while for some fishing there.  And then they went back out to fish for people.

2.         On this Ecumenical Sunday, this fish story also reminds us that we are “all in this boat together.”  The symbol for the World Council of Churches, a world-wide communion of Protestant and Orthodox churches, is a boat with a mast shaped like a cross.  I have a little poster in my office with such a boat.  Around it you see the word “oikoumene” - Greek for the “whole world.” From it we got our English word “ecumenical.”

            Today we will be using a prayer from another world-wide Christian organization, the World Alliance of Reformed Churches.  Karen and I were privileged to attend the 29th General Council of the World Alliance in July and August.  It took place in another hemisphere and on another continent, in the country of Ghana on the continent of Africa.  We people in the Reformed family of churches trace our Christian liniage back to people with names like Calvin, Zwingli, Bullinger, Knox, and Brown ----- leaders in the 16th century Reformation.  We confess with some 70,000,000 brothers and sisters throughout the world the Jesus Christ is Sovereign and rules over all our lives.

            Here in Neillsville today we will be praying for many churches that come from other Christian families:  Roman Catholics, Lutherans, Pentecostals, Evangelicals, Methodists.  As we pray for these other Christian churches we remember Paul’s advice to the Christians of Corinth.  We might take his concern about divisions in the church as a condemnation of the variety among Christians.  If you read Paul correctly you will find he is concerned about division, not diversity, and that he pleads for unity, not for uniformity.

            We might take that as good news.  We don’t all have to be alike.  Not among the various churches here in Neillsville and not within our own congregation.  When I came here one of you remarked that there are various viewpoints among our members.  That’s appropriate for a UCC congregation.  There is little slogan we use in our national ad campaign:  “No matter who you are and where you are at on life’s journey, you’re welcome here.”   Those are good words to remember as we go downstairs for our Annual Meeting today.  We’ll be making some decisions, not momentous, earthshattering decisions, but important decisions nonetheless ----- about a constitution and about a budget.  We will be receiving a plan the physical layout of our building.  Perhaps there will be some surprises.  Who knows.  Whatever transpires, we will be challenged to remember that “we are all in this boat together.”  This good ship called Neillsville United Church of Christ.  I have noted on other occasions that if you turn our worship space upside down it would form the hull of a ship.  That is why the formal name for this part of the church is nave ---- meaning ship.  From that word we get the word navy.  And that’s no fish story.

            Well, all of you folks that love to stand over a hole in the ice looking for fish ----- and all of you folks that would prefer to be inside baking cookies or at least moving around in the outside on some skis or a snowmobile ----- Jesus calls you, just as he called Simon Peter, Andrew, James, and John on the shore of Galilee so many years ago.  Jesus challenges you to “go fish.”  Jesus welcomes you into his good ship Grace, where we can sail together.  Get on board!