Fishing Lures

 

So me and my 5 year old son are fishing.  Of course, I am a fishing expert.  Especially in the company of a 5 year old young boy.  I mean, I have caught hundreds of fish, especially fresh water bass, and have a real good knowledge of how to do it, how to catch them, how to bring them onto shore….the whole deal.  And me and my 5  year old little son have been catching these bass from a lake in our neighborhood….on artificial lures….I want him to get this early in life….how to do it without a cork and live bait.

He has caught some fish….had some success…knows what the bite feels like and knows how to set the hook….but he is just learning and under my close tutelage.  I am showing him the ropes, step by step, technique by technique, special tactic by special tactic….lure by lure.  But…well, he likes his own lure selection…and often it is … well, wrong.  I want to make it right with him and basically tell him he can’t use that lure because it is the wrong one….but he likes it….so I let him.  He has some success….some failure.

It is the classic battle I have with God.  I seem to want to do it my way, to use my techniques, my lures, my way of thinking, my battles instead of just listening to God…..instead of just letting God tell me what to do and I do it,…..instead of just seeing that God has all the fish and I need to do it His way.

I want to try to get my son to do it my way….then  I think about me….how often I don’t just do it God’s way.  A classic battle between faith and works, between flesh and spirit, between trust and unbelief…  Just like I am doing now with the sickness of one of my daughters…and so much of my life..  I want to do it my way.

God help me to do it Your way.   Help me to help those around me to do it your way…    louie

 

Processed Meat

I have fished all my life.  When I was just a young boy, I loved to fish.  My dad taught me.  If I finished my homework, I was allowed to go out to ponds near my house, in a small boat with an electric trolling motor and fish.  I got really good at it.  It took time for me to learn but I got  very proficient at it with rubber worms, top water baits and flys on a fly rod.  I loved it.   I got good at knocking out my homework too so I could fish.  It was a process.

Jesus was in Galilee near the Sea of Galilee.  He met some fishermen.  Some guys that, unlike me that fished for fun, these guys were real fishermen.  Simon (later known as Peter) and Andrew his brother were casting their nets.  Jesus told them that he would make them become fishers of men. 

Not he had made them ….but that he would make them become.  God is a process sort of guy.  He gets us started on the way and He develops us.  It is like we are processed meat.  We don’t just arrive one day….we go through a process.  I mean, once we give our lives to Christ,….our spirit is secured.  It is our soul,….our mind, will and emotion….that God works on as we yield this area to him. 

I listened to my dad about fishing and hunting…….and life.  He had been processed……he had become….by God.   So am I and so are you…processed meat.  As we yield to God…we become.  If we do not yield to God,…we do not become what He has for us.

louie