I can imagine the look on your face reading that title - Jesus Loves Fish???? Whatever could I mean???
There is a friend of mine with whom I share the thoughts before I pen them down as an article and this person also proof reads the articles I write and his reaction when he read the title was - Oh!! Pleasssssse!! Change the title........ Well, I guess I won the argument........
Okay, Here's the story behind the title. This is to justify the title and it does indeed make a lot of sense. Fine, here goes......
Usually weekdays go in a rush and I hardly have proper home cooked food. I eat anything I can grab or sometimes order from one of the nearby restaurants. But very rarely do I cook during weekdays. So to make up for it, I make sure I have really good home made food during the weekends. Weekends are a time of cooking some of my favourite dishes for me and my friends. And its Big Time Home Cooking!! :)
My Dad knows this and so every weekend he calls to find out what's cooking :). Yesterday when he had called I had just finished cooking chicken and I told him that and he was like - Mom made fish today. The place where they stay its hard to get good fish and they hardly have fish there. Dad and I were just playfully arguing trying to prove that each of us had the better. Dad then said - 'Everyday with Fish. Everyday with Jesus' which ofcourse didn't make any sense to me.
Dad went on to say how much Jesus liked fish. He said that Jesus liked fish very much and wanted to eat fish everyday and that was why he chose more than 3 fishermen as disciples so that they would have good fish to eat everyday (Ofcourse he was just trying to win the argument). To prove his point he said that Jesus mostly taught near sea side for the same reason again (Again he was kidding, just trying to push his point across). He went onto say that even when after Jesus' resurrection when the disciples went back to fishing and Jesus was waiting for them at the bank of that river, He didn't simply wait, He started cooking fish.
Point Taken and Dad won the argument hands down.
Later that day I sat thinking about this - Jesus Loves Fish. Probably Dad was right and Jesus, as a man, really loved to eat fish. But there is another context to this too.
When Jesus first called His disciples, He told them - " I will make you fishers of men if you follow me."
One of the basic signs of being a follower of God is 'being a fisher of men'. This was the calling to some of the very first followers of Jesus. Here fish stands for those who don't know the love of Jesus and need to know Him and accept Him as their personal saviour.
Jesus loves them so much. He aches for them. When He sees them in trouble and pain and in tears, looking for someone, He wishes they knew Him. We are His ambassadors to carry this great love to His dear fishes.
Yesterday I was speaking to a friend of mine whose son is kind of sick and might need an operation. She was very upset and said - Why my son??? Why can't it be me?? That is the love of a mother wishing she could suffer it for her son. It is this same love that led Jesus to the cross. He went saying - Why them?? Let it be me. I remember reading or hearing this somewhere - It was not the nails that held Jesus to the cross, it was LOVE that held Him there.
Its great that we know and enjoy His love but lets take a look at the other side of the story. It was a gruesome death He died but yet there are people who don't even know that this death was as much for them as for you and me. It is our responsibility to take this love and message to the fishes He loves. Lets be fishers of men.
Imagine you love someone a real lot, something like crazy, and you've done a lot for this person, to the extent of even nearly dying for this person and you long to be able to talk and help this person but this person does not even know who you are and is giving all the attention and love to someone or something that deserves nothing and cares not a bit for this person. Wouldn't that shatter you? Wouldn't you wish this person knew you and didn't have to waste their life, love and devotion on something that meant death for the person?
This is how God feels whenever He sees every lost fish of His and longs, really longs for them to be saved and to know His truth and His all compassing, unconditional, great love. While you and I are sitting here wondering what people would think about us if we spoke about Jesus, fearing embarrassment, wondering if anyone would even want to listen......... your friend is so much in need of the love of God, so much in need of the peace of God, so much in need of the joy of God, the list of needs that can be met by our God alone goes on.
On one side are our friends with a God shaped vacuum in their hearts. On the other side is God, watching and longing for His child to know His love. We are in between. I could choose to unite the two and make my Father happy or I could just ignore and walk my own way, taking care of just building my life. The choice is completely completely mine. Well, its definitely our choice to either fish for the much loved fishes for our God or just ignore. But getting our God what He loves the most is a way of showing Him we love Him. The only reason one could ignore that would be lack of love.
I remember when I was a kid whenever our vacations got over, two of our family friends had a farewell dinner kind of for my sister and me before we went back to our boarding school. This was a common ritual every year. Every year they would find out what my sister and I liked and they made sure that that was on the menu for the dinner. That was a way of showing their love for us.
Like my Dad said - 'Everyday with Jesus is Everyday with Fish'. Funny though that sounds, isn't it true. We need to be among the fishes everyday to show them God's love and get them for God.
Well now that we know what Jesus loves........ Why don't we start getting 'em.
John 3:16 - For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten ([a]unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life. (AMP)
There is a friend of mine with whom I share the thoughts before I pen them down as an article and this person also proof reads the articles I write and his reaction when he read the title was - Oh!! Pleasssssse!! Change the title........ Well, I guess I won the argument........
Okay, Here's the story behind the title. This is to justify the title and it does indeed make a lot of sense. Fine, here goes......
Usually weekdays go in a rush and I hardly have proper home cooked food. I eat anything I can grab or sometimes order from one of the nearby restaurants. But very rarely do I cook during weekdays. So to make up for it, I make sure I have really good home made food during the weekends. Weekends are a time of cooking some of my favourite dishes for me and my friends. And its Big Time Home Cooking!! :)
My Dad knows this and so every weekend he calls to find out what's cooking :). Yesterday when he had called I had just finished cooking chicken and I told him that and he was like - Mom made fish today. The place where they stay its hard to get good fish and they hardly have fish there. Dad and I were just playfully arguing trying to prove that each of us had the better. Dad then said - 'Everyday with Fish. Everyday with Jesus' which ofcourse didn't make any sense to me.
Dad went on to say how much Jesus liked fish. He said that Jesus liked fish very much and wanted to eat fish everyday and that was why he chose more than 3 fishermen as disciples so that they would have good fish to eat everyday (Ofcourse he was just trying to win the argument). To prove his point he said that Jesus mostly taught near sea side for the same reason again (Again he was kidding, just trying to push his point across). He went onto say that even when after Jesus' resurrection when the disciples went back to fishing and Jesus was waiting for them at the bank of that river, He didn't simply wait, He started cooking fish.
Point Taken and Dad won the argument hands down.
Later that day I sat thinking about this - Jesus Loves Fish. Probably Dad was right and Jesus, as a man, really loved to eat fish. But there is another context to this too.
When Jesus first called His disciples, He told them - " I will make you fishers of men if you follow me."
One of the basic signs of being a follower of God is 'being a fisher of men'. This was the calling to some of the very first followers of Jesus. Here fish stands for those who don't know the love of Jesus and need to know Him and accept Him as their personal saviour.
Jesus loves them so much. He aches for them. When He sees them in trouble and pain and in tears, looking for someone, He wishes they knew Him. We are His ambassadors to carry this great love to His dear fishes.
Yesterday I was speaking to a friend of mine whose son is kind of sick and might need an operation. She was very upset and said - Why my son??? Why can't it be me?? That is the love of a mother wishing she could suffer it for her son. It is this same love that led Jesus to the cross. He went saying - Why them?? Let it be me. I remember reading or hearing this somewhere - It was not the nails that held Jesus to the cross, it was LOVE that held Him there.
Its great that we know and enjoy His love but lets take a look at the other side of the story. It was a gruesome death He died but yet there are people who don't even know that this death was as much for them as for you and me. It is our responsibility to take this love and message to the fishes He loves. Lets be fishers of men.
Imagine you love someone a real lot, something like crazy, and you've done a lot for this person, to the extent of even nearly dying for this person and you long to be able to talk and help this person but this person does not even know who you are and is giving all the attention and love to someone or something that deserves nothing and cares not a bit for this person. Wouldn't that shatter you? Wouldn't you wish this person knew you and didn't have to waste their life, love and devotion on something that meant death for the person?
This is how God feels whenever He sees every lost fish of His and longs, really longs for them to be saved and to know His truth and His all compassing, unconditional, great love. While you and I are sitting here wondering what people would think about us if we spoke about Jesus, fearing embarrassment, wondering if anyone would even want to listen......... your friend is so much in need of the love of God, so much in need of the peace of God, so much in need of the joy of God, the list of needs that can be met by our God alone goes on.
On one side are our friends with a God shaped vacuum in their hearts. On the other side is God, watching and longing for His child to know His love. We are in between. I could choose to unite the two and make my Father happy or I could just ignore and walk my own way, taking care of just building my life. The choice is completely completely mine. Well, its definitely our choice to either fish for the much loved fishes for our God or just ignore. But getting our God what He loves the most is a way of showing Him we love Him. The only reason one could ignore that would be lack of love.
I remember when I was a kid whenever our vacations got over, two of our family friends had a farewell dinner kind of for my sister and me before we went back to our boarding school. This was a common ritual every year. Every year they would find out what my sister and I liked and they made sure that that was on the menu for the dinner. That was a way of showing their love for us.
Like my Dad said - 'Everyday with Jesus is Everyday with Fish'. Funny though that sounds, isn't it true. We need to be among the fishes everyday to show them God's love and get them for God.
Well now that we know what Jesus loves........ Why don't we start getting 'em.
John 3:16 - For God so greatly loved and dearly prized the world that He [even] gave up His only begotten ([a]unique) Son, so that whoever believes in (trusts in, clings to, relies on) Him shall not perish (come to destruction, be lost) but have eternal (everlasting) life. (AMP)
pretty nice thought that touching to think how many fish there are to catch and we ain't gonna catch em if we don't lay out our nets for the lord!!!
ReplyDeleteLets go fishing!!!