Living Like the Sea of Galilee

Sermon for Nov. 26, 2023, Feast of St. Andrew (transferred)
Matthew 4:18-22

Over the past five weeks, we’ve heard in sermons and interviews how, indeed, it can be well with our souls.  We’ve looked at the world around us, and looked into our hearts, and we’ve wondered:  Do I have worth?  Where is my community?  Am I on my own?  Will the kids be all right?  And do I have purpose?  I’m so grateful to the parishioners who’ve shared their stories of finding God’s peace through the life of this church and to Christina Santiago Turner for her great interviewing.

If you’ve found some peace – whether through those sermons and interviews or just through a Thanksgiving weekend with people you love – well, now what?  How do you hang onto God’s peace?  Well, the truth is, you don’t.  In fact, you can’t.

It’s a counterintuitive truth we can see if we stand alongside our patron saint, good old Andrew the fisherman.  Having made a pilgrimage to the Holy Land in May, I can see today’s story of the call of Andrew with fresh eyes. 

I don’t know what comes to mind when you hear about the disciples fishing on the Sea of Galilee, but it’s not a sea at all.  It’s just a lake.  And not one you might actually mistake for a sea but a lake whose opposite side you can see from the shoreline.  This whole “sea” is only 13 miles long and eight miles across at its widest.  But it was an economic engine for the people of Galilee – people like Andrew and Peter and their father, Zebedee, commercial fishermen who spent much of their life out there on that lake.

When we picture Andrew, Peter, and Zebedee, we may miss the amazing geographical variety they would have seen in their tiny land.  Take a look at the images in the bulletin, or just enjoy the photos as they come up on your screen at home. Within the space of about 120 miles, the distance from Kansas City to Columbia – or Kansas City to just past Manhattan, if you prefer – within that short distance, the waters of this land change drastically.

At the very northeast corner of Israel is a spring that starts the Banias River, one of three sources of the Jordan River. This headwater of the Jordan really is chilly and cold, as the old spiritual says, flowing fast and freely through a nature preserve.  It’s the opposite of what you might expect to see in Israel – the deep green of the trees and undergrowth, rather than dust and rocks.

The Jordan runs about 25 miles from there until it creates the Sea of Galilee, where Jesus and his friends spent so much time.  Even now, you see fishing boats out on the lake, along with the pilgrims and tourists.  We stayed at Magdala, on the lakeshore.  I got up early a couple of mornings just to watch the sun rise over the Golan Heights.  Birds glide over the water looking for breakfast, and the water laps at the lake’s edge as it has for thousands of years, inviting you to do a little time-traveling of your own.  The Sea of Galilee has supported all manner of life here since the waters started flowing from those springs up north.  Fishermen like Andrew, Peter, and Zebedee had a challenging time, certainly; but even if they didn’t catch much on one day, they could trust the fish would be there tomorrow.

From our hotel at the north end of the Sea of Galilee, we drove south.  Before long, the east and west lakeshores come together as the lake changes back into the Jordan River that began it.  The river creates the boundary between the West Bank and the nation of Jordan, irrigating thirsty dust into an agricultural gem like California’s central valley.  Because of the irrigation, the river is much smaller today than Jesus and Andrew would have experienced, but there’s still plenty of water for pilgrims to wade in at the site of Jesus’ baptism.  It may be muddy, but it’s life-giving, both now and eternally.

And then, about nine miles from the place where John the Baptist brought the crowds through the water of life, that water changes drastically.  You’ve come to the Dead Sea, the lowest point on earth and a site that certainly deserves its name.  The only living creatures in this water are the folks who’ve come to float in its super-buoyancy and smear mineral-laden mud all over themselves.  Across the road are the ruins of the community of Qumran and the caves where ancient scribes left the Dead Sea Scrolls.  But the folks at Qumran certainly didn’t drink the water in the Dead Sea.  Captured in the pit of the lowest point on earth, the Jordan River mixes with ancient minerals to lie flat, still, and poisonous,¹ evaporating in the blazing sun to create one of earth’s most desolate landscapes.

Why am I telling you all this?  Because it’s one of God’s very best metaphors, a geographic parable about the life into which Jesus invited Andrew – and invites us still.

Now, I need to acknowledge that I’ve stolen this from countless other writers and preachers, including our Presiding Bishop Michael Curry.  But in the spirit of imitation being the sincerest form of flattery, here’s God’s own truth about the Christian life and our search for peace in a world gone mad.

Perhaps you’ve known moments when you’ve dwelt in peace and joy.  Life feels abundant, like the headwaters of the Jordan at Banias.  You drink in blessing as you watch God’s abundance flow to you.  It gathers like a lake, like the Sea of Galilee.  You fish from it, and swim through it, and stand by the water’s edge letting life’s soft waves lap at your toes.  This lake of blessing could feed you forever, body and soul.  These are the times of heaven on earth.

And there’s a surprising reason why it works that way:  The Sea of Galilee is a desert oasis because the water of life flows through it.  Every day, millions of gallons flow into the lake from the cool springs up north; and every day, millions of gallons flow out of the lake as the Jordan River runs south, watering the fertile valley as well as welcoming pilgrims looking to die and rise with Christ in baptism.  The Sea of Galilee is a source of life because God’s lifegiving water flows through it.  It’s constantly renewed and refreshed with water from above because it constantly gives its life away downstream.

There’s your model, God says.  Let my abundance of blessing flow to you and through you, God says.  That abundance will keep coming, renewing your life always – if you pass it along.  If we’ve heard nothing else from the sermons and interviews over the past five weeks, we’ve heard this:  Your friends here at St. Andrew’s are finding God’s peace precisely by letting God’s love flow through them to bless the people around them.

The other model, of course, lies at the river’s end.  The Dead Sea is dead because it has no outlet.  The water of life flows in, and the lowest spot on earth grabs hold of it, clinging to divine blessing with a zero-sum mindset.  It acts the way we act when faced with our fear of scarcity: “If I share what God gives me, there won’t be enough left for me.”  But God says, “No, no; my love turns your fears upside down.”  Christianity is a religion of paradox, and one of our greatest paradoxes is this:  The more you give love, the more you get love.  The more God’s peace flows through you, the more peace you know yourself.  God’s love only lives when it’s shared.

Maybe this counterintuitive truth is what flowed through Andrew’s heart when he took that crazy step to leave his boat and his father and his livelihood, and trust that even more abundant love was on its way.  Andrew had learned the lesson of the Sea of Galilee, and now he knew he had to share himself with a world that taught him to be afraid and clench God’s blessings before someone else could take them away.  As Andrew found later, at the feeding of the 5,000, there’s plenty when we take what God gives us, and ask God to bless it, and break it faithfully, and share it with all who come to the banquet table.

So, today, we’re gathering our pledges of estimated giving to our church family for 2024; and in just a few minutes, we’ll stand at the altar and bless the pledges we’ve received so far.  If you haven’t yet made your pledge for God’s work here next year, you’ll find pledge booklets at the ends of  the pew racks near the center aisle.  Or you can pledge through the church website. But let me say this directly:  Your giving doesn’t just bless the church.  Even more, it blesses you.  Your soul needs for you to give.  You sleep better when you give.  You cope with loss better when you give.  You deal with annoying people better when you give.  You have more patience with your kids, and your parents, when you give.  And here’s why:  It’s by giving that God’s love flows through you, and it’s only when God’s love flows through you that you know God’s peace.  It doesn’t make sense, according to the rules of the world – which is why the apostle Paul called it “the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding” (Phil 4:7). 

As you consider what you’ll give back next year from the abundance God gives you, remember Andrew looking across the Sea of Galilee.  Remember the clear, cool water flowing into the lake from the northern Jordan River.  Remember the lake teeming with life and supporting thousands living nearby.  Remember the Jordan flowing freely again to the south, watering dry ground to make it a regional breadbasket.  Just as life-giving water flows through an arid land, so does God’s love flow to us, and through us, to water the dry places of our world.  

And if we don’t?  If we grasp and cling to the love God gives so freely; if we dole out God’s blessings in drips and drabs, thinking we can keep that living water for ourselves?  That’s when we find ourselves living on the shores of the Dead Sea.

Andrew would ask us to choose differently – in fact, to see our lives as God’s life in microcosm.  Given the chance to stay put, move forward.  Given the chance to hang onto what we think is ours, let go.  Given the chance to store up resources in fear, give them away.  Let God’s waters of blessing flow through you.  Your Lord, and your world, and your soul will thank you for it.

1.     https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2916785/