They Followed Him: Luke 5:1-11 | The Call to Obedience and Discipleship

What does it truly mean to follow Jesus? Is it just admiration from a distance, or does it require something deeper? In Luke 5:1-11, we see Simon Peter, James, and John leave everything behind to follow Christ. Their encounter with Jesus changed their lives forever—how does His call shape yours? In this sermon, we explore how Jesus' teaching, miraculous power, and divine authority lead to a radical response from the disciples. They don’t just listen to Jesus; they obey, surrender, and commit their lives to Him. The same call extends to us today. Are we willing to trust Him completely?

Sermon Points:

📖 Jesus Teaches with Authority – The crowds press in to hear the Word of God, revealing His growing influence (Luke 5:1-3).

🐟 Jesus Displays His Power – A miraculous catch of fish demonstrates His divine authority over creation (Luke 5:4-7).

🙏 Jesus Calls His Disciples – Recognizing His holiness, Simon Peter falls in repentance, and the fishermen leave everything to follow Him (Luke 5:8-11).

Transcript:

There are many different ways that we can interpret the idea of being a follower of someone. There is the obvious idea that we like what they have to say and so we follow their teaching and try to apply it to our life. That is usually viewed as a positive thing. You have found someone whose view of the world is something you want to emulate and so you look at trying to be like them and pattern your life around what they teach. But let’s not miss that there is often a negative connotation to being a follower. When a young person often gets in trouble we quickly go to the idea that they are following the crowd and what is the first lecture that passes through a parents lips? You need to be a leader and not a follower. While we like the idea of someone following a good example but when the example isn’t so good we quickly abandon the idea of being a follower. And in our day I think the idea of being a follow has become rather innocuous. We the follow button on Twitter or Instagram rather easily and say that we follow someone. This might be a friend or classmate. Someone we agree with or someone our views don’t line up with at all. It might be a famous actor or a music group we enjoy. It could even be a parody account or someone posting as if they are one of our favorite fictional characters. We can say that we follow them but in the grand scheme of things it doesn’t really affect our lives all that much, does it?

But when we talk about following Jesus, it is to mean something. It is to impact our life and shape us. It means more than being interested in what he has to say. It means that we follow after him and desire to conform our lives to his commands. As we continue through the book of Luke this morning we find ourselves seeing Jesus calling his disciples and when they followed him it didn’t mean they were to like or re-tweet what he had to say. It meant that they left everything and followed him.

As we cross over from Luke chapter four today into chapter five we are going to break the eleven verses we are looking at today into three points to help us stay on track this morning.

First, we find that Jesus is doing more than just teaching in the synagogues. We’ve only read about him teaching there so far but now the popularity is spilling out into the communities.

The second thing that we are going to see is that Jesus continues to show that he has power over nature. In interacting with some fisherman he shows a power that is beyond comprehension.

Finally, we see that this power causes some fisherman to follow him. But it isn’t because his power can bring them a financial windfall. It is because they see the miracles of Jesus for what they are. Signs that he is more than just skilled and wise teacher. He possesses the power of God himself.

And so we dive right into Luke 5 today as we start out with our first point in verses one through three with Jesus teaching by the lake of Gennesaret.

Luke 5:1–3

ESV

On one occasion, while the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, he was standing by the lake of Gennesaret, and he saw two boats by the lake, but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. Getting into one of the boats, which was Simon’s, he asked him to put out a little from the land. And he sat down and taught the people from the boat.

As I mentioned while lining out the points we really haven’t seen Luke tell us about Jesus teaching in this way before. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t already a part of the ministry of Jesus, it just means it hasn’t been a part of the story that Luke has been telling so far but here we see Luke ready to tell us more about the popularity of Jesus.

And he does this by letting us know that on one occasion the crowd was pressing in on him. I think we can all sort of relate to this because we’ve all likely been at some event where people are pressing around us. I particularly think of shows I used to go to in tiny little venues when I was in high school and college. There weren’t thousands of people in these places. Maybe a few hundred but we were all pressed in there and everyone was trying to get to the front and when the crowd went one way, you went one way. The best part about these events was that they just smelled fantastic with all those people pressing in and as I imagine the people pressing against Jesus who didn’t have the benefit of our modern system of hygiene probably smelled even worse than a bunch of punk kids from South Dakota. As I said, I think we can all pretty easily imagine ourselves into this story and what we feel as we read this is that there are a lot of people all wanting to move towards Jesus because they want to be near him and they want to hear what he had to say. The reason I have to say the word “what” a lot at the age of 47 is because of those shows in tiny venues that made sure I could hear the band but in the first century without amplification the people were not only pressing in to be near Jesus to be healed but to be able to hear what he had to say.

And that’s the image described for us by Luke here. Jesus wants more people to be able to hear him and see him and so when he sees two boats by the lake he has an idea. The fishermen aren’t in the boats and we are told that they are washing their nets. This is an indication that they are done for the day. When they would finish up they would clean the muck out of their nets and mend them so that they were ready for the next day of fishing.

So Jesus gets into one of the boats and he has them put him out from the land a little ways. Just imagining this you can see why it is a good idea. The people can’t press into him on the boat. It lets there be a little space between him and the crowd allowing the sound to go out a little better instead of being absorbed by the mass of bodies that are pressing into him. And it’s kind of a cool little scenario to imagine. They push against him up to the lake and instead of getting upset with the people he makes it possible for them to hear him. And seriously, how amazing would it have been to be there in that moment. Imagine that you were far enough away from him that you couldn’t really hear and, in fact, maybe you didn’t even know who you were pressing into. You may have just heard Jesus was there and you wanted to be a part of it and so you just find yourself flowing with the direction of the crowd and you assume that they are pushing you toward Jesus and then suddenly a boat floats a little ways out into the lake and the people tell you that this is Jesus and then he begins to speak. Just an amazing thing to imagine.

And we see once again Luke drawing out something that he has already mentioned earlier. Jesus sits down. Now those of you big on boat safety were glad when I read this. We don’t need Jesus standing up in a boat and I bet he didn’t have a life jacket on either. But joking aside this was the posture for teaching and Luke lets us know that Jesus is again taking the time to formally teach the people who have come to hear him speak.

And before we move on to the meatier part of the story, I want to again draw out the big point being driven home to us in these first few verses. Jesus is a big deal. The people are flocking to him. They can’t get enough of him. In fact, Jesus needs to take measures to ensure that more people will hear what he has to say and as the story continue and we move on to our second point we are going to find that Luke wants us to understand that he is not just some guy who has done well to entertain the masses with his teaching. He is more than just a fan favorite. His teaching has authority. And we see this with a fantastic miracle that is on display for us in the next few verses.

Luke 5:4–7

ESV

And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” And when they had done this, they enclosed a large number of fish, and their nets were breaking. They signaled to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both the boats, so that they began to sink.

Jesus finishes teaching and he turns to Simon Peter to tell him to go out deeper into the lake and put down their nets. Now, remember what we read about the situation before Jesus began to teach. They were cleaning up their nets. They were finishing up for the day. You know how you feel when you have just finished doing something and you have to get everything all dirty again. I’ve never had to clean and mend first century fishing nets but I’m guessing throwing them back in was a big deal.

And the initial response of Peter kind of lets us know that my assumption is correct here. They have been fishing all night and didn’t catch anything. The idea is that they are tired and it is a worthless endeavor because the fish aren’t ending up in the nets. But we see that Peter means it when he calls Jesus Master here. He is going to be obedient to him and do what he says.

And while I would have loved to have been able to put eyes on the scene where Jesus was teaching from the boat I would have just loved to have seen this miraculous catch of fish. We read that the nets are breaking. Imagine them struggling trying to pull the bulging nets into the boat. They are struggling with holding on and with being pulled into the lake themselves. I would imagine that they likely didn’t even really have time to think about the miracle that had happened because of the crisis that was in front of them. And Luke lets us know just how full the nets are by informing us that they had to have the other boat come and give them a hand and we see that it is a good thing that the other boat came because there are so many fish that they fill both boats and they can barely handle the load. The nets and the boats were not even designed to hold this many fish. The point is that this isn’t that Peter and his friends have caught quite a few fish when they couldn’t catch any before. What we see is that Jesus has caused a ridiculous amount of fish to be caught. This is not a happenstance. It is a miracle. It is of divine origin.

And what is being signaled to us very clearly is that Jesus is more than a man. From the angel to telling of his conception and up until now Luke has been letting us know that Jesus is divine. And here we see it connected to his teaching. These are not simply the words of a guy who studied the scriptures and has figured out how to teach them to the masses. And this is not just a man who has studied the rhetoric styles of the people around him and he can get the people fired up better than anyone who has come before him. The miracle shows he is divine and it shows that he is more amazing than anyone who has come before him. His miracle confirms that he is a teacher with authority from God.

And we see that Peter understands this deeply in his reaction as we finish up the passage with our third point as the fisherman come to be followers of Jesus.

Luke 5:8–11

ESV

But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. And Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching men.” And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.

And we see in the reaction of Peter that he truly gets it. He doesn’t say “That was cool but can you fill three boats”. Instead he realizes who Jesus is and he falls down and the knees of Jesus. We don’t bow before people in our culture so we can’t fully grasp what is going on here but we know enough to understand that this is putting himself in subjection to Jesus and what we see here is that Peter understands that Jesus is no mere man. A human cannot do what Jesus has done. This isn’t a parlor trick meant to entertain a few guests. This is an absolute miracle. And notice what Peter says to Jesus to verify how he views Jesus. He tells him to depart from him. Now, that’s an interesting statement. You would think that Jesus probably just more than doubled the income of these fishermen for the month with this catch of fish. The natural reaction would be “stick by me Jesus because I bet you can do this in another part of the lake. We haven’t caught much over in that little corner for weeks. Why don’t we go prove how amazing you are over in that spot?

But Peter realizes that this is about more than his financial gain and success. He says this because he realizes he is in the presence of someone who is divine and he is a sinful man. He knows that in the presence of God he doesn’t have a leg to stand on. He is unholy but here he stands in the presence of someone who has power over nature itself. He knows that he is undone in the presence of holiness and that he cannot stay there on his own.

And we see that it isn’t just Peter who is amazed by all this. We have seen the familiar name of Simon and now we see two new familiar names. James and John, the sons of Zebedee also have been witnesses to the power of Jesus.

And look at the loving way in which Jesus addresses Simon Peter. Don’t be afraid, you’re going to be catching men from now on. They are going to go from casting out the nets in the lake to bring fish into the boat to casting out the word of God to bring people into the kingdom of God.

And we know how they respond. They bring the boats in and they leave everything to follow Jesus. They are all in. Why is that? Because they have been in his presence and they understand who he is. What else could they do? Are you going to see that miracle and say, you know, I think I’m just going to wash out the nets again, sell the fish, and go to bed and come back and plop my nets in the water again tomorrow? Of course not, they understood who he was and so they knew that he was the one that they had to follow. He was the one and so they left everything and followed him. After coming into contact with Jesus their lives couldn’t stay the same. He had called them, they would follow.

And so we see the scope of this story and the application for us is clear because we can see this in our own lives. As we head out into the world this week I believe there are two very clear challenges for us as points of application.

The first is to obey Jesus. Simon Peter gives us a clear example of what this looks like. To him it didn’t seem to make sense to put the nets into the water, did it? Not only had they just cleaned up and were ready to be done for the day but they also had zero success during the night. In his mind there would be no chance for success during the day. But the command of Jesus was clear and he heard and obeyed.

We hear the commands of God and they are clear. We know that he has called us to obedience to his law but it is very easy for us to come up with reasons those commands aren’t really what’s best for us. The law of God is old and it doesn’t really work in our age. We are more enlightened or more compassionate or something. The clear statements of God can’t be clear in our every day lives. And the other temptation we have is that we mean well and God gets it. He knows that I really, truly love him and so that little sin I enjoy isn’t that big a deal. These are the things that we tell ourselves but we know that instead of these justifications we should respond as Peter did and that is to follow in faith trusting that what God has commanded in his word is actually what is best for us. So, may the Spirit empower us to take God at his word and that leads us to our second application to follow Jesus.

As I opened I talked about how innocuous we’ve made the idea of following someone in our age. But we see in the story that was in front of us today that following Jesus for the disciples was serious business. They left everything and followed him. In our day we view following as mixing a little of this and a little of that. We have certain things that someone will tell us and we’ll maybe take that to heart but the next things we’ll pass on. We might even introduce some ideas that are contrary to what some of the other people we follow have to say.

Jesus shows up and lets us know that doesn’t really work. He is Lord and savior. Think back to the reaction of Peter. What did he do when he realized who Jesus was. He knew he wasn’t worthy to be in his presence because he was a sinner.

The Holy Spirit has come to us and in our hearing of the word of God and of his law we know that we are sinners. We don’t have any hope because we understand that we were born dead in trespasses and sins and enemies of God. We can’t stay in his presence on our own but then we heard the sweet news of the gospel. That when we have faith in Christ the wrath of God that we deserve for our sin was poured out on him and the perfect righteousness that he had in keeping the law is ours.

When the Spirit convicts us of that truth we understand that Jesus is the one worth following. His way is the one that offers us hope. His way is the one that brings us peace with God.

And so may we depart from here today following Jesus and casting wide the net of the gospel that the Spirit might be at work in those around us to bring others to faith that we might follow Jesus in obedience and faith all to the glory of the one who has saved us. Amen.