Catching on...

As a kid who grew up spending weekends and summers at the lake, I spent long hours fishing. By “fishing,” however, I actually meant “catching,” “reeling them in,” having something to measure – a “keeper.” I knew about lures and bait. I knew about “good spots” to anchor and also how to troll with the wind. The old, blue, 3-horse Evinrude on the back of the boat spent most of its time with its prop tipped up out of the water because it was only there to bring me home. It was too noisy for fishing; those who fish move quietly.

I didn’t know then about “catch and release.” In my experience, fish weren’t released; they “got away.” In my stories, the “big ones” got away. But in truth, a lot of little ones did too.

That’s the way I probably would have understood God’s grace back then. If an adult were to have sat me down to explain God’s grace to me as a child, I would have been thinking that grace was getting away when you’re caught. When a fish gets away, it’s the fish that’s clever or lucky. Or maybe grace would have seemed like getting what you want. Another day of swimming free, in road-less waters, darting among feather-soft perch weeds where I could hide and feed.

However, one of my Sunday school teachers did explain to me that back in Jesus’ time, they used nets. I remember that because I also remember thinking to myself, ‘Well, then, no one gets a ripped jaw that way.’ (I wasn’t all that skillful with setting the hook.) Perhaps there was more to this.

I also grew up spending weekends year-round at church. Turns out that grace is better than getting what you want. It’s getting something you couldn’t even dream up and finding that it is just what you want! Grace is God’s way of making something impossible, possible. Grace is like a being a fish who learns there is a whole sunshiny, green world above water and then discovering, wonder of wonders, that you don’t have to wring oxygen out of water after all, straining out a molecule here and there just to exist. Discovering you can breathe air directly and there is so much of it!

Even back then, it would have been clear to me that this would take a miracle. That no fish would be clever enough to pull it off. Or even believe such a thing if it were taught in fish schools. The catch-and-release survivors would be sure to show up and tell their own stories, stories that made themselves look good.

Our church tradition sets forth three movements of faith: guilt, grace and gratitude. Guilt is facing reality. This is who I really am. (Guilt is not news, really, despite my objections and avoidance.) Gratitude is our motivation for following Jesus, for loving and going and speaking and lifting and serving. (Yes, gratitude -- not the expectations of others or guilt or persuasion or our generosity.) In between is grace.

Yet, sometimes the church doesn't make sense to people. After all, who wants to hear about their sins week after week? Who wants to be judged? Or who wants to be prodded continually to do more for others? “I have all I can handle to work and to make time for my family and myself. No, thanks. I don't want to get hooked on anything else. Don't want to be caught up in anything like that.” They’re right to some extent. You can’t pick up the practices of faith and assume that is the whole of it.

The truth is that neither guilt nor gratitude makes any sense without grace. They go against the current of everything we know. Can we stop squirming and trying to get away long enough to realize we are being rescued, not caught, by the hand of God? Do we know this Jesus who chooses to spend time in the boats of fisherman? Can we fully realize that his bloodied hand is covered in his own blood, not ours? Grace doesn't make any sense without the cross.

For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God (1 Corinthians 1: 18)

"Much Grace..." Pastor Shirley