Luke 5:1-11
Peter’s Last Refuge
Title of the message - The A is attached to the word TYPICAL. It
comes from the Greek. A, AN, ANTI is attached to a word and when it
is, it makes the word mean the opposite. ANTI-CHRIST - the opposite
of Christ. ATYPICAL means the opposite of typical.
Are you a typical Christian? I love typical Christians but typical
Christians don’t usually accomplish much for Jesus. The atypical
Christians do.
Typical Christians:
1. Tend to be the coaches.
2. Tend to be the spectators.
3. Tend to be the critics.
Typical Christian is not very flattering term but there are other
terms, along the same line, which are even worse.
Are you a mediocre Christian?
a middle-of-the-road Christian?
a run-of-the-mill Christian?
an undistinguished Christian?
a half-hearted Christian?
God does not want you to be typical. He wants you to be the opposite.
In this story, Peter begins as the typical Christian.
1. Peter was more comfortable taking his orders from Christ along
the shore or in the shallow water.
2. Why? If Christ let him down, he would have a safe, gentle
place to land.
Peter was a typical Christian but on this day, Peter is taught to
leave the comfort of the shore and to follow God out into the deep.
I. Peter’s Last Control
A. Typical morning - The fishermen had been out all night. It
would be early as they would be unloading any fish caught,
mending their nets, and preparing the ship for the next run
before going home to rest. Jesus was out early teaching and
the crowd begins to gather.
B. \\#3\\ Jesus first asks Peter for the use of his ship as a
floating lectern, but after the lesson, Jesus commands
\\#4\\ Peter to take the ship out to sea and lower the nets.
C. Don’t think Jesus was rude. I don’t think He was anything but
gracious, but He was blunt and authoritative.
D. Jesus wanted to meet all three Peters. Indeed, Jesus wanted
all three Peters to surrender to Him. It appears that two
Peters had met and mostly surrendered to Peter, but there was
at least one holdout.
E. Who are these three Peters?
1. INLAND Peter
a. Inland Peter had the most extensive relationship with
Jesus.
b. \\#John 1:35-51\\ Jesus had called Andrew, Inland
Peter, Philip and Nathaniel to the ministry.
c. \\#John 2:1-11\\ Jesus has gone to Cana with Inland
Peter and the other eleven disciples where He had
turned water into wine. (Galilee to Cana was 17
miles.)
d. \\#John 2:13-25\\. Inland Peter had followed Jesus to
Jerusalem, as the crow flies, Jerusalem was 80 miles
from Galilee, where he had seen Jesus cleanse the
temple.
e. \\#John 3:1-21\\ While in Jerusalem, Inland Peter saw
Nicodemus come to Christ and on the way back, Inland
Peter observed the woman at the well \\#John 4:1-42\\
being redeemed.
f. Once back, Inland Peter also watched as Jesus had
healed the Nobleman’s son at Capernaum
\\#John 4:43-54\\.
g. By now, Inland Peter knew that Jesus was Someone
special, but that was all on land.
2. SHORELINE Peter
a. SHORELAND Peter had only know Jesus for a few hours
but he was comfortable letting Jesus borrow his boat
to preach from.
b. Shoreline Peter was not a bad guy.
(1) He was generous - He let Jesus use his ship.
(2) He had been gracious - He stopped his work and
listened.
(3) He was tired - He had been out all night. That
makes his generosity and graciousness all the
more rare.
(4) \\#5\\ He was even submissive on the shore. He
called Jesus MASTER.
(5) However, there was one more Peter that we need to
meet.
3. \\#4\\ DEEP WATER Peter
a. This is the Peter that Jesus wanted to meet.
b. I believe Jesus had several reasons for commanding
Peter to take Him into the deep water.
(1) To meet and win deep water Peter, which was about
to happen.
(2) To give Peter a blessings, perhaps for his
kindness to Jesus.
c. But to meet DEEP WATER Peter, Jesus will have to get
to Peter’s last refuge and haven, the deep water.
d. Even though INLAND and SEASHORE Peter have surrendered
to Jesus, Peter had kept part of his life locked away
from Jesus.
e. It was his DEEP WATER LIFE. On the DEEP WATER,
PETER was still CAPTAIN.
f. The DEEP WATER was Peter’s COMFORT ZONE, his
CONTROL ZONE.
F. Typical Christians are just like Peter. They are mostly
surrendered to Jesus but not completely surrendered. They
have kept a part of themselves for themselves.
1. Work?
2. Home?
3. For most it is what they consider play, i.e. fishing,
hunting, shopping
G. The places you have kept may not be sinful places of
themselves.
1. The sin lies in the fact that you have kept part of
yourself from the Lord.
2. For Jesus to be Lord at all, Jesus must be Lord of all!
II. Peter’s COMPROMISE
A. Peter could have turned the Lord down flat. He had many good
reasons to do so.
1. They had been out all night and the fish just were not
there.
a. Don’t be afraid to try something that failed before.
b. Failure and success are not as much our concern as
faithfulness and effort.
c. The things that failed without Jesus are not
indicators of the things that can be accomplished
with Jesus.
2. Obviously, the nets had been cleaned and stored for the
next night’s fishing. It would be a lot of work to do
that again.
a. Don’t be afraid of work.
b. You cannot catch a fish if you do not drop the net.
3. They had been up all night and were probably ready to go
to bed.
4. Jesus was not fisherman.
B. Let’s stand up for Peter.
1. He had done more than most. He had surrendered 2/3’s of
his life to Christ.
2. Even though he was tired, he was willing to stay up to
listen to Jesus and even to take Jesus out in his boat.
C. \\#4\\ But the real compromise started when Jesus commanded
Peter to drop his nets.
1. I can hear what Peter might be saying as he has the men
host the sails.
a. "Who does Jesus think He is? I’ve given days out of my
life to serve Him. He ought to leave me alone and
let me make a living."
b. "This is my ship, my nets, my labor, my livelihood."
2. But, to his credit, Peter does not say any of that out
loud. What Peter does say is found in verse 5.
Luke 5:5 …Master, we have toiled all the night,
and have taken nothing:
3. Notice that most of what Jesus commanded in \\#4\\, Peter
agreed to in \\#5\\.
4. There was a small difference. "net" not "nets."
5. Why the difference?
a. I believe it was Deep Water Peter’s way of maintaining
control.
b. Peter was willing to compromise on his sleep, his
ship, even his net; but he was not willing to
surrender his authority on the deep water.
D. Here we have Peter giving almost everything.
1. He was a surrendered INLAND Peter.
2. He was a surrendered SHORELINE Peter.
3. Even DEEP WATER Peter was willing to comply with 99% of
what Jesus wanted!
E. It does not matter what you have surrendered. All that counts
is what you have not surrendered!
1. Here is what marks the typical Christian. The typical
Christian has not surrendered all to Jesus.
2. A typical Christian must have surrendered his soul.
3. A typical Christian may surrender his Sunday morning but
keep his Sunday night.
4. A typical Christian may surrender his Sundays but keep his
Wednesdays.
5. A typical Christian may surrender his church days but keep
his Saturdays.
6. A typical Christian may surrender his church life but keep
his home life.
7. A typical Christian may surrender his home but keep his
job.
8. A typical Christian may surrender his job but keep his
hobbies.
9. It is not what you have surrendered that makes you typical
it is what you have kept!
III. Peter’s Capitulation
A. Before the days is over, DEEP WATER Peter will surrender to
Jesus, but why?
1. He will not be defeated by force.
2. He will not be dominated by reason.
3. He will be disarmed by God’s kindness.
B. Jesus worked within the frame work of Peter’s compromise.
1. I never advise compromising with Jesus.
2. Jesus is Lord not servant.
3. Jesus is such a gracious Lord that in this case, He
accepted the single net that Peter offered.
4. Not only did Jesus accept it, Jesus poured the blesses He
had intended for all the nets into the one net.
a. \\#6\\ The single net broke.
b. \\#7\\ Peter called another ship over who also dropped
their nets and the two ships were so full that they
began to sink.
C. The goodness of God moved Peter.
1. \\#8, 11\\ Deep Water Peter immediately surrendered to
Jesus.
a. Don’t be afraid to surrender to a better Captain!
b. Don’t be afraid to surrender all.
c. Jesus is only concerned about pouring good into your
net.
2. We know that Peter will not be perfect, but he will be
surrendered on the deep water from now on.
a. When the ship starts to sink, Peter won’t try to save
it. He will go get Jesus.
b. It will be on these same deep waters that Peter will
walk on water.
c. After the resurrection, Peter will leap from the
safety of his ship into the deep waters to swim back
to shore to see Jesus.
The life of the typical Christian needs no faith, takes no risks,
makes no sacrifices, offers no commitments, and sees no new horizons
because he stands securely in his COMFORT ZONE of CONTROL! The
atypical Christian surrenders all.
B. Peter was going to make a compromise.
1. Deep water Peter was badly outnumbered.
2. Both inland Peter and seashore Peter were convinced that
Jesus was Someone special.
3. Now Jesus was pushing Peter to take Him to Peter’s refuge.
<OutlineIndex> <Close Window>
