SCRIPTURES  

- John taught that people should repent to make themselves ready and worthy;  Jesus taught that they should repent because the kingdom was already near.  John taught that repentance was the necessary stimulus for  God to act.  Jesus preached that God was already acting; the kingdom was already coming  and one should repent in order to receive what God had to offer.  For Jesus, repentance is a response not a stimulus.  Lindy

-Jesus refused to be a "One man show" 

-The word “evangel” means “good news.”  It is news, something that comes to us, rather than something derived from us. It is good because it is something that God does before it is anything we do. Willimon

-Repentance.  the Greek means, literally, "to have a change of mind." A whole attitude adjustment

-Exegetical Notes by Brian Stoffregen  A wonderful scenario about deciders, doers, controllers, dreamers, and ignored.  Also, the usual great exegetical study. 

-Note that the command, "Repent" is in the present tense -- "Keep on repenting!" "Continually be repentant!"

-Hare in his commentary: "Our task is to share a faith that is exciting enough to be contagious" [p. 31]

-We all need to belong to something, something bigger than ourselves. It gives us a sense of identity, personhood, meaning in an often meaningless world.  But belonging to Jesus will be left to the one or two who look for a kingdom not of this world, and see in Jesus its beginning and end. Only they will leave their nets and boats and follow (belong) to him. Rev. Bryan Findlayson

-Epiphanies are identifying moments: who we are and who God is

-An epiphany is both a revelation and a challenge because it forces us to change. We spend most of our lives fumbling around in the darkness–only rarely we are given the gift to see something old in a new way

QUOTES

-Nothing is more surprising than the rise of the new within ourselves".  Tillich

-The Gospel comes to us, rather than from within us.

-Our problem, in catching a few fish for Jesus is not that we are so respectful of different cultures, so open minded and pluralistic, our problem is that we find it very difficult to imagine any culture more powerful than the one sanctioned by the Pentagon, the White House, AMWAY, and Toys ‘R Us. Willimon

-Called into a new future.  Called to be non-conformists.

-Think of the Bible as a long story of God’s refusal to leave us to ourselves. Willimon

-"Beginnings are hard." To repent means to begin again. When have you made a new beginning? How can you make a new beginning today in some area of your life? Chaim Potok

-If our eyes are not open to see the darkness, how can we see when the light is shined in it?

- The Bible is not so much a record of our search for God and it is a record of how God searched for us.

- You are here, (in church) not because you are searching but because you have been sought, called, summoned.  You are here because God has reached in, grabbed you, put you here, enticed , wooed , allured you here.  So Christianity is not so  much a religion of discovery. It is a religion of revelation.  The long search is over. You have been found.  This is the good news.  Willimon

-Those who think that he is finished is finished.  Those who think that they have arrived have lost their way.  Those who think they have reached their goal, have missed it.  Those who think they are saints are demons.  Henri Nouwen. 

-Not expressing or repressing but confessing. (Repent)

-Repentance is not about the past but about the future.

-The best we can become is redeemed sinners.

-It's hard to get excited about a job.  It's almost impossible not to get excited about a ministry.

-An average church is filled with people doing jobs.  A great church is filled with people involved in ministry. Buechner

-"Make no little plans," said Daniel Burnham, "They have no magic to stir men's blood... Make big plans... a noble logical

  diagram once recorded will never die but... will be a living thing."

-However, almost all agree that repentance requires five elements: recognition of one's sins as sins (hakarát ha-chét'), remorse (charatá), desisting from sin (azivát ha-chét'), restitution where possible (peira'ón), and confession (vidúi).  David R. Blumenthal

-We like to think you are not o.k., I am  o.k.  when we should be thinking,  you are not o.k., I am  not o.k. either.   Gomes
 

BUILD YOUR OWN SERMON   "Seeing change where change is needed"   (Jesus and those new disciples were able to do this.) Here are some quotes, illustrations, humor and analogies on which to build your sermon.  Lindy

-New roads; new ruts.  Gilbert K. Chesterton

- A fish that can change!  A Dream for Dieters: Fish Species Can Alter Its Body Size at Will

-Today's certainty can always become tomorrows antique notion.   B.B. Taylor

-Some defend the status quo even though the quo has lost its status.  G. Mann

-He who never changes never mends.

-Heraclitus said: "You cannot step into the same river twice, for fresh waters are ever flowing in upon you.

-Serenity Prayer

- Someone has said, The Church is a chameleon  It finds colors that fit into various environments.  It continues, yet changes!

-When you put your head in the sand, you know what's up.

-Many churches if given a choice would choose to die rather than change  Spong

-Things do not change,  we do.  Thoreau

-God's frozen people,  fundamentalists,

-All is flux; nothing stays still.  Heracletus

-Change is the law of life. And those who look only to the past or present are certain to miss the future  John F. Kennedy

-All things change; nothing perishes.  Ovid

-Change is inevitable, except from vending machines.

ILLUSTRATIONS

- It is said that rabbis did not "call" disciples.  It was considered bad form for a rabbi to go out and beat the bushes, and ask people to become his disciples.  The greatness of the ones teaching was supposed to naturally attract students. 

-A long time ago, a traveler came upon a site in England where swarms of workers were building a grand church.  The traveler saw several men digging a ditch.  He stopped to ask three of them what exactly they were doing. The first replied, "Hey! I'm just doing what they tell me to do. All I care about it making a living to support my family." The second replied, "Me?  I'm digging a ditch from here to that stake over there." But the third worker stopped, leaned against his shovel, and with a gleam in his eye, said, "I'm helping Christopher Wren build a great cathedral."

-.Scientists say they have discovered a shape-changing fish that can detect the presence of hungry predators and then turn itself from easy pickings into something much more difficult to swallow. (New York Times 1/19/93) Plasticity is the only way for an organism to adapt to a rapidly changing environment within its life span....This opens up the door for more careful examination of plasticity in vertebrates. People are going to have to stop thinking that there's not going to be this kind of change during an individual's lifetime. This fish changes in order to survive. The gospel invites us to change so that we may survive...may become a testament to God through Jesus Christ. Some may even say that we exist so that our natures may glorify God. What a fish story!  Frederick Streets

- An interesting approach to the "fish for people" image is to talk about what kind of bait would work to attract people. I titled a sermon once, "Worms Won't Work."  That's  not the way these fishermen fished. They used nets. They didn't use bait. The fish didn't have a choice of "to bite or not to bite" or "to eat or not to eat." They were dragged ashore or into a boat, they were dragged from life to their deaths.  Maybe we should drag people to church. I'm afraid that if we did drag people into church, etc.  we might miss the gospel message we are trying to share....Stoffregen

HUMOR

-If the Scroll Fits, Live It. Don Friesen

-A young rabbi found a serious problem in his new congregation. During the Friday service, half the congregation stood for the prayers and half remained seated, and each side shouted at the other, insisting that theirs was the true tradition. Nothing the rabbi said or did moved toward solving the impasse.  Finally, in desperation, the young rabbi sought out the synagogue's 99-year-old founder. He met the old rabbi in the nursing home and poured out his troubles. "So tell me," he pleaded, "was it the tradition for the congregation to stand during the prayers?" "No," answered the old rabbi." Ah," responded the younger man, "then it was the tradition to sit during the prayers?"

CHILDREN   

- Compare fishing for fish with fishing for "men".  Need to have right equipment, go where the fish/people are, have patience, You got to love it You have to be dedicated to it. You have to get up at three in the morning.  experience helps, you have to know the fish. You have to know what and where they are biting. You have to know where the good holes are/ be taught by other skilled fisherman.

-Have the children say the phrases and do the corresponding actions with you in this fun finger play based on Matthew-- Hand motions for: 4:18-22.

Jesus walked along the shore (walk two fingers of right hand along left forearm).
He watched (put right hand on brow to shade eyes)
the boats at sea (touch the fingers of both hands together to form a triangle boat and rock them in the air-sea).
He loved (put both hands over heart)
the busy fishermen (pretend to use a fishing pole).
He called (cup hands around mouth),
"Come follow me" (beckon with hands).

PRAYER PHRASES

-...we  have come here this day searching for you, because we believe that you are searching for us.  In countless ways you have reached out to us.  We confess that sometimes we have searched for you in all the wrong places.  We admit that sometimes we have thought that we found you when we only found cheap substitutes for your love.  ....find us new so that we might find you and in finding , love you and in loving you, serve you in all that we do.  Willimon

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