It’s not who you know…
4th Sunday Before Lent, 9 February 2025
Preached by The Very Reverend Nicholas Papadopulos
1 Corinthians 15: 1–11
Luke 5: 1–11
‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man’
What took Simon Peter so long? We might well ask. Saint Luke reports that Jesus has had an association with Simon’s community and Simon’s family which long predates that moment on the boat.
Jesus comes to Capernaum and teaches in the synagogue, to the amazement of all. A demon-possessed man hails him as the Holy One of God. Jesus casts the demon out, leaves the synagogue, and goes to Simon’s house. Simon’s mother-in-law has a fever, and he heals her. She gets up from her sickbed and serves them. The following day Jesus tells the crowds who want him to stay that he must proclaim the good news in other places. He goes off to the other villages of Judea, before returning to the lakeside and climbing into Simon’s boat.
Jesus has been publicly acclaimed in Simon’s village. He has been a guest in Simon’s home. He has performed a miracle for Simon’s family. So again I ask: what took Simon so long?
The critical moment – the moment of change – comes when Simon is shown the inadequacy of his knowledge of the one thing of which he is sure: the waters of the lake of Gennesaret. He has known them since he was a boy. He has worked them all night. They have yielded nothing. Yet when Jesus comes aboard his boat and secures for him a record-breaking, boat-filling, net-busting catch Simon is brought face-to-face with an understanding that is beyond his own. In the second of his Four Quartets TS Eliot writes of the moment when ‘…what you do not know is the only thing you know’. That is what Simon experiences, and it prompts, for him, what his earlier encounters with Jesus – amazement in the synagogue, healing under his own roof, conversation as his mother-in-law serves them – has not. Simon falls to his knees. Here is wisdom such as he will never possess; here is goodness such as he will never emulate. Here is what he does not know, and it is all that matters.
He knows of Jesus – his visit to Capernaum has attracted attention. He knows Jesus – he has been a guest in his home. But only on the boat, knee-deep in the slithering, shimmering stink of writhing fish, only then does Simon know that he is known by Jesus. ‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man’. Knowing that he is known is what makes the difference. Knowing that he is known he has no choice but to follow the one who knows him.
This is the constant pattern of God’s call. It is the pattern of the most famous of all the Biblical stories of God’s call – that of Saul of Tarsus, who becomes Saint Paul. Saul’s experience mirrors that of Simon. Saul does not know Jesus. There is no evidence that they ever met, in Galilee, in Jerusalem, or anywhere else. Saul certainly knows of Jesus, and he does not like what he knows. As he writes to the Corinthians, ‘I persecuted the church of God’. Saul is convinced that the followers of the prophet of Nazareth are a threat to the order in which he belongs. He hunts them down, throws them into prison, and looks on as the first of them to be martyred dies under a hostile barrage of rocks.
This conviction changes only when Saul sets out for Damascus. Jesus has appeared to Cephas – to Simon; he has appeared to the twelve; he has appeared to five hundred brothers and sisters; he has appeared to James. ‘Last of all’ he appears to Saul on the road. But despite the blinding light and heavenly voice this appearance does not have the character of a conjuring trick, something designed to impress and amaze; this appearance is the appearance of one who knows Saul and knows what he is about. ‘Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?’ The papers for the arrest of Christians are in his baggage and the blood of Stephen is on his hands, but Saul is known; he has always been known; and henceforth he will be Paul, the greatest apologist for the prophet of Nazareth that there has ever been.
Many of us had the privilege of hearing our former Archbishop preach at Evensong one week ago; many more have had that privilege since (the recording has been viewed more than 12,000 times). Rowan Williams spoke of the renewal of the Church: not, he said, the renewal of a place offering authoritarian leadership; not the renewal of a place offering ceaseless entertainment; and not the renewal of a place offering interesting opinions. The Church exists, he said, so that there may be a place where human beings grow and where human beings rejoice. The Church exists ‘…so that there may be a space where human beings let themselves be lifted’.
Our growing – our rejoicing – our being lifted – begins, I suggest, when we know that we are known. It’s such a relief. It removes the burden from our shoulders. It’s not all about what I know or what I do. It’s not all about what I understand, or all about the books I’ve read, or all about the courses I’ve been on. Thank God. What it’s all about is that we are known – known intimately, known eternally, known lovingly. Thomas Merton writes ‘Perhaps there is nothing to figure out after all: perhaps we only need to wake up’.
Sisters; brothers: it’s time to wake up. To wake up to this unfathomable reality. We are known. We are loved. We can allow ourselves to be lifted. What Jesus says to Simon he says to us. ‘Put out into the deep water’. The deep water is a place of terror. The world is on fire. The rules-based international order was dismissed last week in a few dangerous sentences uttered about a Riviera of the Middle East. These are frightening times. But we are not alone; we are never alone.
‘It’s not what you know – it’s who you know’ runs the cynical old adage. If I were drafting a mission statement I might adapt it: it’s not who you know – it’s by whom you are known. Come to think of it, it’s not even by whom you are known. It’s by whom you know you are known.
Amen.