Kendall's Notebook Page 21
Sermon: Making Others Look Good
By: Kendall Brown
Text: Luke 5: 1--11
February 8, 2004
The lesson today is frequently followed by a sermon on evangelism or church growth. Jesus’ call to his disciples has been the cornerstone Scripture supporting our duty to share the Gospel with others for generations. If the nets of your lives have been made full because of the presence of Christ in your little boat then share him, who brought you fullness, with others, who are still fishing in the darkness of spiritual blindness. And so forth. We have heard the story told and retold many times. Because of that I found myself looking for a little different tack this morning.
A different slant on today’s lesson comes to me by thinking about Luke’s treatment of Peter. We receive a clue that there is something special about Peter for Luke by simply looking at the parallel Gospels, those are Mark and Matthew, and how they present this same story. Matthew’s account is found in Matthew 4: 18-20 and Mark’s account is found in Mark 1:16-18. To get a glimpse of the difference between Luke and the other two Synoptic Gospel writers, let us look at Mark’s account which is very similar to Matthew.
“And passing along by the sea of Galilee he saw Simon and Andrew the brother of Simon casting a net into the sea; for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, “Follow me and I will make you become fishers of men.”
Mark tells in two verses what Luke takes eleven verses to tell. From what I hear many people around here would choose Mark over Luke to be their preacher any day!
But the difference in the telling of this tale by the original storytellers is not simple a matter of Luke being more wordy. All those extra words are in Luke because Luke does something that Mark and Matthew don’t do. Luke tells us a lot about Peter. The extra words are all added because of Luke’s focus on Peter.
That gives us a clue about Luke. For Luke, Peter was an incredibly important person. Luke also wrote the book of Acts and there tells us about Peter’s leadership of the early church. Luke lived and wrote while Peter was the church’s leader and it was of supreme importance to Luke to present the fledgling church’s first leader in a credible and inviting manner. In today’s parlance, you could call it “putting a positive spin on the story.” As Luke played the role of the church’s public relations officer he put the church’s best and brightest side to the world.
The connection that Luke made between the telling of today’s lesson and the book of Acts is even in the symbolism found in today’s lesson. From the earliest days of the church, a boat has been a symbol for the church. In today’s lesson, Luke tells us that Jesus climbed into Peter’s boat. Jesus was in Peter’s boat. In the early church, there was much controversy over who would lead the church. Would it be Peter, or Paul or James the brother of Jesus himself or someone else. Now, living with that controversy going on in the background, don’t you think that if you were listening to Luke’s story in the early days of the church that you would get the idea pretty plain and quick about just whose boat was the Flagship of the Fleet. Peter’s boat! In case you missed that point, Luke reiterates it. He tells us the other boats gather around Peter’s boat and then also start having their nets filled to overflowing. The other boats could be the other churches, such as the one in Corinth or Ephesus, or Thessalonica or Athens. But it is plain – Peter’s boat is the one that carries the freight with weight.
I want to insert an editorial aside at this point. Before the phone lines burn up this afternoon with all the talk about how I am now trying to turn Christ Church into a Catholic Church, let me add a footnote here. I recognize that there is a difference between the importance of Peter in the early church as its leader and the infallibility and centrality of the Pope, who continues to hold the office of Peter in Rome. Every good Protestant can recognize, affirm and honor the importance of Peter’s leadership, just as Luke did, without subscribing to the authority of the Bishop of Rome.
Luke’s giving Peter a little glow in his presentation of Peter to the world is not limited to this one story in Chapter 11. Luke does not tell us about the weaknesses of character and personality flaws of Peter that can be found in the other Gospels. The Journal “Homiletics” includes the following words in its commentary on this passage.
“One can understand Luke’s particular characterization of Peter through that which Luke omits ….” which can be found in Mark’s Gospel and the additional details that Luke adds about Peter,…”which are not found in the other Gospels. First, Luke has eliminated or discounted the gospel traditions about the rebuke of Peter (Mark 8:32-33?Matthew 16: 22-23) after the passion prediction.
Homiletics, February, 2004, p. 37.
Matthew states the rebuke with the most criticism of Peter. His words are: “But he (Jesus) said to Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan! You are a hindrance to me; for you are not on the side of God, but of men.’” Matthew 16:23. Luke makes no mention of Peter’s protest against Jesus saying that he must die, and certainly, Luke does not mention Jesus’ rebuke of Peter. Not one word!
In another story, Luke treats Peter with a soft touch. In the story of Jesus and his disciples in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus asks his disciples to watch while he goes off alone to pray. Jesus returns to find the disciples sleeping. Matthew and Mark tell us that Jesus said the following to his disciples upon his return: “Simon, are you asleep? Could you not watch with me for one hour? Matthew and Mark tell us that Jesus chastised Peter specifically. But notice the change as you listen to Luke’s account of this same Maundy Thursday scenario. “And when he rose from prayer, he came to the disciples and found them sleeping for sorrow, and he said to them, ‘Why do you sleep? Rise and pray that you may not enter into temptation.’” Luke does not name any disciple, most especially Peter, who is specifically cited by Matthew and Mark.
Luke is also a realist. He is well aware of the stories about Peter that circulate in the early church, most especially the story about Peter’s denial. Luke is as bold about telling the details of Peter and the maid who questioned him about his association with Jesus as any other Gospel writer. (Luke 22: 56ff, Matt. 26: 69ff and Mark 14: 66ff.) However, Luke adds a detail to the story of the table conversation in the Upper Room that gives Peter some wiggle room. Luke tells us that at the table Jesus said something to Peter that he said to no one else. “Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith many not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” (Luke 22:31) Matthew and Mark again do not tell us about this address to Peter by Jesus. A long time before Flip Wilson and Geraldine, Luke tells us that Jesus himself gave Peter permission to say, “The Devil made me do it!” Only Luke among the Gospel writers tells us this detail.
The greatest authentication and affirmation of Peter is offered by Luke in one small sentence in Luke 24:34. In this post resurrection story the disciples have returned from Emmaus and are greeted by the eleven who are gathered together. The Emmaus disciples are told that the Lord has risen and appeared to Peter. Only Luke tells us this story about the resurrected Lord’s singular individual appearance to one disciple – Peter.
As we read Luke closely, and pull from the text his treatment of Simon Peter, it becomes clear that Luke worked hard to present Peter in the best of light. Peter’s story in Luke reminds me of a parishioner, who was the manager of a Zayres store. David’s store was located in a transitioning neighborhood in a large New England city. When he was assigned to the store, the store was riddled with problems. The changing neighborhood created a hostile environment for business. The store itself was suffering from stolen merchandise from the floor and funds from accounts. Morale was low and profits were spiraling downward. The store was targeted by corporate management for closing as soon as the lease ran out.
David turned it around. Under his management the store became one of the company’s most profitable in the greater urban area. The loss from shoplifting and employee pilfering was stemmed. The store and its parking lot took on the appearance or an island of urban renewal in the middle of a sea of urban blight.
The store became a center for the community that lived around it. Every time you went there, you would be greeted at the door by youth, men and women from some neighborhood church or organization, holding a bake sale in the space provided for them at the front of the store.
I often talked with David and once I asked him what was his philosophy about management that guided him in all that he was doing. He said it was real simple and that he got if from the Bible. His philosophy was a managers rewrite of the golden rule, “Love your neighbor as yourself.” But for David that meant that his job as the manager was to make all the employees look good. And vice versa and in return, he taught and encouraged his employees that their number one duty was to make him look good. And that they did. David would never berate an employee in front of other employees. He would never judge someone without personally checking out the story. He gave his employees latitude to make their own decisions in their areas of obligation. Affirmation and compliment were always more important to him than criticism. That spirit turned the store around if not the surrounding neighborhood.
David did in his management what Luke did in his telling of Peter’s story – do everything that can be done to make the other look good. The most oft preached message found in Luke 5: 1-11 is the message of evangelism summed up in the verse about becoming fishers of men. The question is often heard today, “Why doesn’t our church grow?” “Why do we keep coming up with empty nets translated into empty pews?” I think the answer to that question is basically pretty simple. There are many churches that are growing and there are many that aren’t. The one big difference is that churches that grow are churches that know how to grow and churches that don’t grow are churches that know how not to grow. Today’s lesson also offers us some growth pointers besides the simple imperative to be fishers of men. The image of Jesus being present in Peter’s boat is important. The presence of the Lord gave Peter both authority and attractiveness. The other boats gathered around his.
If we want others to find us attractive, the first step for us is to find room for the Lord in our boat. His presence and the difference his presence makes in our lives, our boats, is the reason why we are here and is what we have to offer others. Without that and without a fundamental understanding of and an ability to articulate the meaning of his presence, to share the story, we have nothing to offer and no one from the outside has any particularly good reason to come inside. Church growth is not about learning new, exciting and enticing tricks to tempt and allure people to join us. Church growth is about relationships and growing relationships in the context of a community. The primary relationship for all is the one that each of us has with our Lord, Jesus.
Luke’s treatment of Peter offers us another clue. We live in a world where people get badgered and beaten every time they turn around. All you have to do is drive a car down the street, stand in line at a store, or call a large corporation for assistance and find yourself being helped by a series of recordings. The opportunities to be dehumanized abound. Luke reminds us that the church should be an island of sanity and decency in an insane and indecent world. My friend, David, turned a store if not a neighborhood around with the simple philosophy that it was his job to make his employees look good. We live in a world that doesn’t much care how we look or feel about our selves and usually acts to make us something less than our best. What an invitation it is when the word gets out that a church is a place to go because it is a place where everyone will work hard to make you look good and feel good about your self.
I will finish on this Red Door Pre-School Sunday with a Red Door note. Something that feels worse to me than fingernails on a chalkboard is being in public and near a parent, pulling and jerking on a child’s arm, slapping the child around with the other free hand, yelling at the child and telling the child in front of the whole world what a rotten little creature he or she is. Luke’s business of making others look good is parent business, too. I am so pleased that day after day when I an inside these walls with our Red Door staff, that I am sharing space with a wonderful group of care-givers who make the children look good day in and day out. And you know. When we make others look, we make ourselves look good. The Red Door staff just plain shines. Thanks for mentoring Luke’s philosophy of making others look good. And I might add, Red Door has been growing and continues to grow.