This is a guest post by my best bud Travis Young, with whom my life has been changed countless times as we’ve traveled the world and learned about the goodness of God.  Some of the things I like about him best is his simplicity, boldness and passion, and I believe these will come through in this piece he recently wrote.  These are his revelations on Matthew 4:19, where Jesus said to Simon and Andrew, “Come, follow me, and I will make you fishers of men.”

Fishing is an interesting sport.

You never know what you’re going to get, but the thrill of getting your line pulled beneath the waters into the unknown makes the fight of pulling in the prize exciting.

I wonder if Jesus was implying that fishing for people is kind of the same way.

You just have to throw your line out into the unknown. You’re not necessarily going to catch what you might be fishing for.

It’s a Jesus paradigm – maybe sometimes when you are out ministering and just living your life, you might get a tug on your line by a fish you never expected to catch!

Sometimes you might pull in an old boot, while other times maybe you’ll hook onto that treasure chest at the bottom of the ocean.

I don’t think it’s all about the catch, it’s the thrill of the unknown.  And you won’t always catch something either – but that shouldn’t leave you disappointed, it should just get you pumped for the next chance to cast out your line to the waves.

You don’t have to be a pro, and you don’t have to have all the perfect tools, you just have to be available to go and wait.  Patience is key.  It’s called fishing – not catching – and sometimes it takes time. If you try to rush things or if you pull too fast, you will lose your fish.

Just remember, you may not always catch what you expected or even wanted, but any fish that you catch is still a good catch.