{"id":165,"date":"2021-07-15T16:16:38","date_gmt":"2021-07-15T16:16:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/2021\/07\/15\/your-vocation-here-of-people-2\/"},"modified":"2021-07-15T16:16:38","modified_gmt":"2021-07-15T16:16:38","slug":"your-vocation-here-of-people-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/your-vocation-here-of-people-2\/","title":{"rendered":"(Your vocation here) of people"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"is-style-lead wp-block-paragraph\">The first four people that Jesus calls to follow and learn from him were in the business of catching and selling fish. The Gospel according to&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/passage\/?search=Mark+1%3A16-20&amp;version=NRSV\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Mark<\/a>&nbsp;tells us that Jesus saw them working and invited them into a life of discipleship with a play on words that described their new vocation in terms of their old one. \u201cI will make you fish for people\u201d is how he put it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Like many good communicators, Jesus knew how to be funny and profoundly serious at the same time. The fishing metaphor worked for Simon, Andrew, James and John on several levels:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\"><li>It described a change of direction in their own lives, a pivoting away from their old work.<\/li><li>It picked up and built off&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.biblegateway.com\/passage\/?search=Jeremiah+16%3A16-17&amp;version=NRSV\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">an old image<\/a>&nbsp;of God seeking out those who are estranged.<\/li><li>It introduced the idea that those who are called by God die to an old way of life in favor of life with God.<\/li><li>It hinted at the fact that life apart from God is lived in a chaotic abyss.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The four fishermen would have gotten all of this intuitively; they were as deeply engaged in their vocation as fishermen. It\u2019s what they thought about and what they talked about. It\u2019s how they spent their days and why they sought sleep at night. When Jesus calls them fishers of people, he\u2019s building on their deep knowledge born out of years of experience.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">We can find these insights for ourselves, if we take the time to study the Gospels and seek connections into their cultural context, but it won\u2019t be intuitive for us. We\u2019ll have to imagine our way into the things that Simon and his fellows just knew.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">But you know stuff too.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">All of us fill our days with the activities of our various callings. We are students and professors, managers of projects and people, we are tradespeople and technicians, cooks and custodians. We are writers and musicians and artists, scientists and mathematicians. We are fathers and mothers, sisters, brothers and friends. When we spend time doing things, we develop expertise and that knowledge is of great value. In addition to helping us be good at what we do, it provides us with ways of looking at life.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I know that for me, the vocation of fatherhood has deepened my insight into the nature of God\u2019s commitment to creation. I was working as a pastor for several years before our son was born. As a seasoned preacher, I had lots of experience describing the love God has for us. Looking back, I believe I didn\u2019t really understand what I was talking about. Like many new fathers, my definition of love deepened and widened with the birth of our child. I think back on the conversations I had as a younger pastor and realize that I was only scratching the surface in my understanding of God\u2019s abiding promises for us. With deeper insight, I know that I still am.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<blockquote class=\"wp-block-quote is-layout-flow wp-block-quote-is-layout-flow\"><p>How does Jesus call you? How can your vocations \u2013 the things you know from doing \u2013 provide you with a way to describe the rule and reign of God? How does your life\u2019s work give you ways of describing the hope that is yours in Jesus?<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It might have nothing to do with fish and that\u2019s just fine.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Pr. Jim<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Jan 31, 2018<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><em>Rev. James A. Wetzstein serves as one of our\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/chapel\/staff\/\">university pastors<\/a>\u00a0at Valpo and takes turns writing weekly reflections.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The first four people that Jesus calls to follow and learn from him were in the business of catching and selling fish. The Gospel according to&nbsp;Mark&nbsp;tells us that Jesus saw [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":88,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"advgb_blocks_editor_width":"","advgb_blocks_columns_visual_guide":"","_EventAllDay":false,"_EventTimezone":"","_EventStartDate":"","_EventEndDate":"","_EventStartDateUTC":"","_EventEndDateUTC":"","_EventShowMap":false,"_EventShowMapLink":false,"_EventURL":"","_EventCost":"","_EventCostDescription":"","_EventCurrencySymbol":"","_EventCurrencyCode":"","_EventCurrencyPosition":"","_EventDateTimeSeparator":"","_EventTimeRangeSeparator":"","_EventOrganizerID":[],"_EventVenueID":[],"_OrganizerEmail":"","_OrganizerPhone":"","_OrganizerWebsite":"","_VenueAddress":"","_VenueCity":"","_VenueCountry":"","_VenueProvince":"","_VenueState":"","_VenueZip":"","_VenuePhone":"","_VenueURL":"","_VenueStateProvince":"","_VenueLat":"","_VenueLng":"","_VenueShowMap":false,"_VenueShowMapLink":false,"_tribe_blocks_recurrence_rules":"","_tribe_blocks_recurrence_description":"","_tribe_blocks_recurrence_exclusions":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-165","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"acf":[],"author_meta":{"display_name":"","author_link":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/author\/"},"featured_img":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/8\/2025\/06\/20151211-FJA-Christmas-Advent-Vespers-018-300x200.webp","coauthors":[],"tax_additional":[],"comment_count":"0","relative_dates":{"created":"Posted 5 years ago","modified":"Updated 5 years ago"},"absolute_dates":{"created":"Posted on July 15, 2021","modified":"Updated on July 15, 2021"},"absolute_dates_time":{"created":"Posted on July 15, 2021 4:16 pm","modified":"Updated on July 15, 2021 4:16 pm"},"featured_img_caption":"","series_order":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=165"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/165\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=165"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=165"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.valpo.edu\/devotionals\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=165"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}