Abundant Life
Let the words of my mouth, and the meditation of my heart, be always acceptable in your sight, O Lord, my strength and my redeemer. Psalm 19:14
When I was a child, I heard or was taught somewhere, “you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit”. The phrase stuck with me and it is something I have repeated to my children at times. In all of life, “you get what you get”. You can throw a fit if you want to, but what good is that going to do? You can’t change anything. What you can change, is your response to a situation.
The Gospel passage today is the familiar story of what we refer to as the calling of Simon Peter and James and John to follow Jesus to become “fishers of men”.
Simon had been fishing all night and had caught nothing. Jesus tells him to go back out and put his nets down in the deep water to catch. Simon does so and they caught so many fish that their nets began to break. They caught so many fish that they filled two boats with their loads of fish and the boats began to sink. It certainly was not what they had been expecting after a night of fishing so long with little to no reward, and Simon we are told fell down on his knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!”.
Simon was aware of his lack of faith and how it affected him — he was going back out to fish because Jesus told him to — but his expectations were kind of low. He was going back out after fishing all day and catching nothing to appease Jesus, but having little faith that his experience would be any different than what it had been all day.
I imagine it can sort of be that way for some of us - we are in process of learning who Jesus is and the affect he can have on our lives — so we are following but sometimes with little faith or expectation that things may be different.
We may have little hope that our lives can be much more than what we can see and are currently experiencing.
Our Collect for this morning begins, “Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins, and give us the liberty of that abundant life.”
The liberty of abundant life.
Jesus’ desire for each of us, is that of abundant life. Of putting down our nets and pulling in so much fish that our boats begin to sink.
I don’t think that most of us live our daily lives in an awareness of, and grasping the understanding of, of what it would be like to embrace the liberty of abundant life.
Most of us live our lives with the attitude, of “you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit” without ever hoping for anything more. Or without realizing the abundance that awaits for us if only we embrace the liberty that is given to us.
“Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins”, the Collect begins — because it is our sins, our lack of faith and belief, our doubt, our own self-flagellation that we are not good enough or worthy enough, that hold us back from embracing that which is freely offered to us in the person of Jesus Christ.
Our Gospel story reveals the miraculous power of Jesus Christ - a power as available to you and to me as we come to the holy table and receive each week, as it was to simple fishermen two thousand years ago.
We fear, like Peter, that we are to sinful and unworthy of God’s love. Jesus replies to Peter’s fear by saying these words, “Do not be afraid.” The same words and comfort are ours here today as they were to Peter two thousand years ago. Do not be afraid.
What is keeping you from embracing the abundant life that is being offered to you? Why are we living on the edges, drawing up our nets, unbelieving of an abundance that may be waiting for us?
In her book, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Annie Dillard writes this:
“Thomas Merton wrote, ‘… There is always an enormous temptation in all of life to diddle around making itsy-bitsy friends and meals and journeys for itsy-bitsy years on end. It is so self-conscious, so apparently moral, simply step aside from the gaps where the creeks and winds pour down, saying, I never merited this grace, quite rightly, and then to sulk along the rest of your days on the edge of rage.
I won’t have it. The world is wilder than that in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant, and bright. We are making hay when we should be making whoopee; we are raising tomatoes when we should be raising Cain or Lazarus.”
Go up into the gaps. If you can find them; they shift and vanish too. Stalk the gaps. Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn, and unlock-more than a maple- a universe. This is how you spend this afternoon, and tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon. Spend the afternoon. You can’t take it with you.”
― Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Go into the gaps if you can find them. Squeak into a gap in the soil and unlock more than a maple - unlock a universe. Abundance awaits for you.
Thursday night I received a message on Facebook messenger from a gentleman who said, “Hey, I see you sail. I see you are Priest, you weren’t hard to find —I am a priest too — you want to sail together?” I said, “Quite possibly” - turns out this priest is the Rector of a church I stumbled into for service on a Sunday last summer in Greenport, NY when I was on another boating trip. I had taken a picture of the stained glass in his sanctuary which was of a sailboat. I fell in love with his window and his little town. He was not there that day — I think he was out sailing. So tomorrow morning I am leaving to join this man sailing in the Bahamas. I thought, “why not?”
So, leaning in to the embracing of abundance, I am leaving tomorrow morning to go meet this stranger and go sailing on his boat for a week or so. I had been contemplating my need for a break and this opportunity came my way and so I am going to take it. God provides for us ways sometimes where we see no ways, out of the blue— and our God of abundance wants us to live our lives fully, extravagantly and abundantly. Don’t spend the rest of your days diddling around. (and I will be back!)
Patty Driskill recently flew to Australia to spend some time with some friends she met on line during Covid. She embraced the life that God has given her.
Embrace your life. Move into it. Live it.
Our passage from 1 Corinthians 15 begins with Paul telling the Corinthians, “I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received”.
Be reminded of the good news. Which is what? That Christ died for your sins…and by the grace of God, I am what I am - declares Paul (1 Corinthians 15: 1-11) And then he says, I worked harder than any of them —(not the point Paul!), though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
It has nothing to do with you - this abundant life that is so readily available. It is dependent on the grace of God that is with you. That was given to you — ready for you to receive it. To embrace it. To live.
And maybe the goal is not just to settle for “getting what we get without throwing a fit” maybe the goal is to accept the abundant grace given to us by our Lord Jesus Christ and having the courage to live into it. Maybe it is time to drop our nets and receive.
Amen.
When I was a child, I heard or was taught somewhere, “you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit”. The phrase stuck with me and it is something I have repeated to my children at times. In all of life, “you get what you get”. You can throw a fit if you want to, but what good is that going to do? You can’t change anything. What you can change, is your response to a situation.
The Gospel passage today is the familiar story of what we refer to as the calling of Simon Peter and James and John to follow Jesus to become “fishers of men”.
Simon had been fishing all night and had caught nothing. Jesus tells him to go back out and put his nets down in the deep water to catch. Simon does so and they caught so many fish that their nets began to break. They caught so many fish that they filled two boats with their loads of fish and the boats began to sink. It certainly was not what they had been expecting after a night of fishing so long with little to no reward, and Simon we are told fell down on his knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!”.
Simon was aware of his lack of faith and how it affected him — he was going back out to fish because Jesus told him to — but his expectations were kind of low. He was going back out after fishing all day and catching nothing to appease Jesus, but having little faith that his experience would be any different than what it had been all day.
I imagine it can sort of be that way for some of us - we are in process of learning who Jesus is and the affect he can have on our lives — so we are following but sometimes with little faith or expectation that things may be different.
We may have little hope that our lives can be much more than what we can see and are currently experiencing.
Our Collect for this morning begins, “Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins, and give us the liberty of that abundant life.”
The liberty of abundant life.
Jesus’ desire for each of us, is that of abundant life. Of putting down our nets and pulling in so much fish that our boats begin to sink.
I don’t think that most of us live our daily lives in an awareness of, and grasping the understanding of, of what it would be like to embrace the liberty of abundant life.
Most of us live our lives with the attitude, of “you get what you get and you don’t throw a fit” without ever hoping for anything more. Or without realizing the abundance that awaits for us if only we embrace the liberty that is given to us.
“Set us free, O God, from the bondage of our sins”, the Collect begins — because it is our sins, our lack of faith and belief, our doubt, our own self-flagellation that we are not good enough or worthy enough, that hold us back from embracing that which is freely offered to us in the person of Jesus Christ.
Our Gospel story reveals the miraculous power of Jesus Christ - a power as available to you and to me as we come to the holy table and receive each week, as it was to simple fishermen two thousand years ago.
We fear, like Peter, that we are to sinful and unworthy of God’s love. Jesus replies to Peter’s fear by saying these words, “Do not be afraid.” The same words and comfort are ours here today as they were to Peter two thousand years ago. Do not be afraid.
What is keeping you from embracing the abundant life that is being offered to you? Why are we living on the edges, drawing up our nets, unbelieving of an abundance that may be waiting for us?
In her book, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek, Annie Dillard writes this:
“Thomas Merton wrote, ‘… There is always an enormous temptation in all of life to diddle around making itsy-bitsy friends and meals and journeys for itsy-bitsy years on end. It is so self-conscious, so apparently moral, simply step aside from the gaps where the creeks and winds pour down, saying, I never merited this grace, quite rightly, and then to sulk along the rest of your days on the edge of rage.
I won’t have it. The world is wilder than that in all directions, more dangerous and bitter, more extravagant, and bright. We are making hay when we should be making whoopee; we are raising tomatoes when we should be raising Cain or Lazarus.”
Go up into the gaps. If you can find them; they shift and vanish too. Stalk the gaps. Squeak into a gap in the soil, turn, and unlock-more than a maple- a universe. This is how you spend this afternoon, and tomorrow morning, and tomorrow afternoon. Spend the afternoon. You can’t take it with you.”
― Annie Dillard, Pilgrim at Tinker Creek
Go into the gaps if you can find them. Squeak into a gap in the soil and unlock more than a maple - unlock a universe. Abundance awaits for you.
Thursday night I received a message on Facebook messenger from a gentleman who said, “Hey, I see you sail. I see you are Priest, you weren’t hard to find —I am a priest too — you want to sail together?” I said, “Quite possibly” - turns out this priest is the Rector of a church I stumbled into for service on a Sunday last summer in Greenport, NY when I was on another boating trip. I had taken a picture of the stained glass in his sanctuary which was of a sailboat. I fell in love with his window and his little town. He was not there that day — I think he was out sailing. So tomorrow morning I am leaving to join this man sailing in the Bahamas. I thought, “why not?”
So, leaning in to the embracing of abundance, I am leaving tomorrow morning to go meet this stranger and go sailing on his boat for a week or so. I had been contemplating my need for a break and this opportunity came my way and so I am going to take it. God provides for us ways sometimes where we see no ways, out of the blue— and our God of abundance wants us to live our lives fully, extravagantly and abundantly. Don’t spend the rest of your days diddling around. (and I will be back!)
Patty Driskill recently flew to Australia to spend some time with some friends she met on line during Covid. She embraced the life that God has given her.
Embrace your life. Move into it. Live it.
Our passage from 1 Corinthians 15 begins with Paul telling the Corinthians, “I would remind you, brothers and sisters, of the good news that I proclaimed to you, which you in turn received”.
Be reminded of the good news. Which is what? That Christ died for your sins…and by the grace of God, I am what I am - declares Paul (1 Corinthians 15: 1-11) And then he says, I worked harder than any of them —(not the point Paul!), though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me.
It has nothing to do with you - this abundant life that is so readily available. It is dependent on the grace of God that is with you. That was given to you — ready for you to receive it. To embrace it. To live.
And maybe the goal is not just to settle for “getting what we get without throwing a fit” maybe the goal is to accept the abundant grace given to us by our Lord Jesus Christ and having the courage to live into it. Maybe it is time to drop our nets and receive.
Amen.