The Calling of Simon Peter, St Luke, Fr Daniel York, 09.27.2026

In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and

of the Holy Spirit. Amen. As we shift today from

St. Matthew to St. Luke's Gospel, the Church

invites us to reflect on the calling of Simon

Peter and the first disciples. After finding

Simon on the shore of the lake of Gennesaret,

another name for the Sea of Galilee, cleaning

and washing his fishing nets, the Lord nonchalantly

gets into Simon's boat and uses it as an amvum,

a pulpit, to teach the crowds, tailing him and

pressing in around him. As if he doesn't notice

Simon, putting away the fishing gear, once he

finishes preaching, again, somewhat nonchalantly,

the Lord commands Simon to take the fishing boat

back, back out into the sea to catch something.

Now, if we know the scriptures, the language

here is somewhat freighted. Launch out into the

deep. launch out into the depths, echoing the

depths, the techom, the avisos of creation, where

Christ, as the beginning and the word, enthroned

in the Spirit of God, hovered over the chaotic,

watery depths at the beginning of Genesis, as

he began to shape the earth and fill it with

life, something similar. is about to transpire.

Simon's immediate response is also suggestive.

Master, that is, teacher, not despota here, but

epistata, teacher. We've toiled the entire night,

and we've taken nothing. It's already light out,

and fishermen, if you didn't know, fish at night.

and the sea was void and unpopulated. We weren't

able to catch any fish. But the apostle agrees,

and by doing so, and this is intentional, resembles

the words of Mary at the beginning of Luke's

gospel in the Annunciation. Nevertheless, I will

let down my nets at your word, according to your

word. Further playing on that creational element,

the Lord speaks, let there be and there was.

Here, St. Luke repeats a theme in his gospel.

In fact, it's a theme of what Luke believes the

gospel to be categorically about. A reversal

of human weakness and inability. A lack of human

vitality and potential. can always be overcome

by the reality of divine power and presence.

As the archangel Gabriel announces to Mary as

she's about to become the mother of God, nothing

will be impossible with God. And so Simon sails

the boats into the depths, and Simon casts his

nets into the sea. And what happens? The nets

fill with fish and teem with life. to the point

that the nets start to tear and break. And as

the other -to -be disciples scramble to help

Simon get the nets into the boats, then the boats

fill up, and the boats themselves begin to sink

and capsize. And for the first time in his gospel

narrative, St. Luke addresses Simon as Peter

the rock, as Simon Peter sees. is what the text

tells us. Simon Peter sees. This isn't just any

sort of ordinary physical sight that Luke is

trying to note. No, he sees. That is, he perceives

what's transpiring before his eyes and discerns

that the man in his boat is no ordinary human

or teacher. As the apostle put it to us this

morning in our epistle reading, quoting the Lord's

words from Leviticus, I will walk among them.

As Peter discerns that this man is not master,

epistates, but Lord, Kyrios, which is Luke's

way to cue us to the divine name of the God of

Israel, which was revealed to Moses in that bush.

Tell them, I am the Lord, Adonai or Kirios, or

as the Jews put it, Hashem, sent you, dwelling

and walking among his people. Astonishment, as

the King James puts it, but better, terror, religious

awe, thamvos, to use... or to use the philosophical

term mysterium tremendum from the German tradition,

or what C .S. Lewis called the numinous, quoting

Shakespeare. Under it, my genius is rebuked,

Macbeth. Something mysterious and awe -inspiring,

all captured by this Greek word here, thamvos,

seizes Simon. and the others. And Simon immediately

falls on his face and prostrates himself before

Jesus and cries out and addresses Jesus by the

name of Israel's God, depart from me, for I am

a sinful man, O Kyrios, O Lord. In these words,

we witness repeated what often happens when people

meet God in the scriptures. Take Samson's parents

all the way back in Judges, who are visited by

the angel of the Lord, God. We shall surely die,

for we have seen God. Or perhaps more immediately,

concrete and applicable here, Isaiah the prophet,

in his famous vision of the Lord in the temple,

as the seraphim cry the thrice holy hymn, Holy,

holy, holy. Woe is me, for I am lost, for I am

a man of unclean lips, and I dwell in the midst

of a people with unclean lips. For my eyes have

seen the King, the Lord of Sabaoth, the Lord

of hosts. As Isaiah before him, Simon Peter meets

the King, the King of the universe. the one to

whom creation submits and responds, whether the

sea or the fish or life or even Simon Peter,

who mysteriously listens, that flock toward this

king. Here he is standing in Peter's boat, and

all Peter can do is confess his unworthiness.

I am a sinful man. Or, as we will say it in just

a few minutes, quoting another apostle, I confess

that thou art truly the Christ, the Son of the

living God, who camest into the world to save

sinners, of whom I am first. Depart from me,

O Lord, for I am a sinful man. I'm not worthy

of you. But does Christ depart? No. Rather, he

responds with the words, fear not, don't be afraid.

Father Thomas Hopko of blessed memory used to

say that to hear these words from God, fear not,

we first have to fear him. To hear the words,

don't be afraid, we first have to be, afraid

of him. By making this point, he isn't contradicting

the famous saying of St. Anthony the Great, I

no longer fear God, but I love him. No, there

St. Anthony's getting at a human kind of fear

that disables us from loving God and experiencing

God's love toward us, a human kind of fear that

keeps Christ at arm's length. from our problems,

from our sin, one that I suspect many of us struggle

with. But here we're getting at this religious

sphere, this thamvos, the realization at last

that we are actually standing before the God

of the universe and that he really does exist.

And not just that, but he has not forgotten us.

But he thinks about us, as small and insignificant

as we are, as small and meaningless as our lives

seem most of the time. And he proves it by coming

down to our level, by dwelling. among us, by

walking among us, to use the words again from

St. Paul this morning, from now on you will catch

men. Just like that, the Lord transforms Simon's

life and James and John's and the others who

are called kinonos vis -a -vis Simon, communicants

of Simon. The word we use to describe communion

with the Lord, kinonia, Though he is the chief

apostle, we receive in Peter this morning an

image of the entire church, which is all of us.

The words of the prophet, the words of the mother

of God, communion in one another's life, confessing

sin and our unworthiness, Leaving everything

behind and following Christ. All of this happens

on what seems like a regular, boring, mundane

day at work. After what seems like an unsuccessful

work day. An ordinary fisherman meets the Lord

of all creation. And there's no turning back.

Brothers and sisters, our lives are not meaningless.

The daily grind. Perhaps we're single and we

don't want to be. Perhaps we're married and it's

complicated. Perhaps we're married with young

kids or teenagers and we're exhausted or we don't

know what to do. Perhaps we're divorced and ashamed.

Perhaps we're widowed and lonely. Maybe we're

a child, a teenager, a young adult, a parent,

a grandparent. Perhaps we feel forgotten, like

no one notices us or sees us or thinks about

us or prays for us. Perhaps we hate our job and

we lack purpose, drive, and meaning. toil night

after night, and we haven't caught any fish.

It's often here in these things, in these kinds

of moments that Christ meets us, that Christ

comes to dwell among us and walk with us through

whatever we're going through and reminds us,

as we heard in the epistle, that we are in fact

the temple of the living God, whose life can

be filled with the Spirit's divine energy, with

the Spirit's divine power, with the Spirit's

divine activity, and they can be reconfigured

by the Lord's divine perspective on our lives,

what the Lord sees when he looks at us. what

the Lord sees that we can become through his

life and activity and presence through the Holy

Spirit, if we, like Simon, can just discern Christ's

presence and open ourselves to him. If we were

to keep reading in the letter to the Corinthians

today, if we just enlarged our hearts towards

God. The apostles say, as the Lord says, we are

holding nothing back from you. You open your

hearts towards us. If we, like Simon, can discern

Christ's presence and notice it and see it, light,

divine light, the uncreated light from the transfiguration

refracted everywhere in this creation and refracted

everywhere. in our life, as unworthy as we might

be. Amen.