Reflection for the 5th Sunday in Ordinary Time - February 9, 2025
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February 4, 2025The Gospel passage tells of the disciples in the boat fishing. They caught nothing. Jesus challenged them to "go into the deep." They followed Jesus' request and caught more fish than they could handle without help.
Today's scriptures remind us that our experience of God must be real and personal. Jesus is real and walks with us each and every day of our lives. We must look for him even in our small experiences and tell the world what he has done for us and what he will do for our world. God is my all and all, meaning that God is everything to me, the source of my strength, the guide of my life, and the love that sustains me.
Jesus calls us into the ordinary experiences of our lives. He called his early disciples during their experience of going to fishing. As Jesus spoke with them, he wanted to know if they had caught anything. They told him that they caught nothing. He told them to go further into the deep. They did as he said and were left in awe, astonished that they saw more fish than they could handle without help.
Jesus enters our human history, and we are never the same. His transformative power reminds us that we need each other. Community is at the heart of our Christian discipleship. Following Jesus is a journey of going “into the deep." We go deeper into our relationship with God and others. We go deeper into listening to the Lord and acting on it.
The power of Jesus' presence and invitation to his disciples was so great that they dropped everything. I wonder how many of us would be willing to respond to Jesus in this way.
