Luke 5:3 “And he entered into one of the ships, which was Simon’s, and prayed him that he would thrust out a little from the land. And he sat down, and taught the people out of the ship.”

Luke 5:4 “Now when he had left speaking, he said unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your nets for a draught.”

Luke 5:5 “And Simon answering said unto him, Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net.”

Luke 5:6 “And when they had this done, they inclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake.”

Hello readers, I haven’t done a more personalized style blog for ages! Probably since the start of the year! I try to do more concise articles these days, as I usually share what I write on FB also, so need to keep the word count down as much as possible.

Nevertheless it is nice to read when someone is typing from experience and the most I’ve ever been helped and encouraged from God’s word is when from experience someone shares how God has lead them through his word and made what he said, and the stories therein, personal to them in a special unique way to their life.

A lot has happened in my life in the last year and a half, and I’ve got so much to share, but I want to share a story from the Bible which you may have never looked at this way. I also want to share in a way that helps, we are blessed to be a blessing, and we get to give… and I believe this could be a word in season for where you are at in life, if you will just take it as from God, as I will be sharing from God’s word.

You may have heard the saying “there’s more fish in the sea”… and we use that saying generally after disappointment in romance. Some people seem to get a pretty easy run in life, but a lot don’t… and this sentiment can ring very hollow when you’ve gotten to know someone or set your sights on someone, but it hasn’t gone the way you wanted to. When someone tells you “there’s more fish in the sea” trying to comfort you, but you only want a future with the person who there is no future with… it doesn’t help at all does it.

I don’t know if your personal world has ever ended, but most people will experience this in their life. This blog isn’t a light hearted “there’s more fish in the sea”, but a Biblical take on this saying in a way that could really comfort and encourage your heart in life, if you will let God just do it. And so this blog is primarily aimed at Christian singles, and I’ve been in that department for many years.

Maybe you’re cynical or hopeless. Maybe you’re like Sarah, you’ve laughed in your heart at the impossibility yet tantalizing teasing taste of God’s promises. Maybe you just think “that’s not my life”. Yeah well, the Bible is going to meet you right here, right now today!
Have you found the waters of life you are in empty… they don’t have a catch for you, you’ve caught nothing? You can catch a cold but that’s about it, you couldn’t catch one of these “more fish in the sea” if you tried.

Maybe you’ve trolled the waters where God has put you for years, and you’ve thrown out your net once or twice and you just keep coming up empty. And then you think there’s a problem with your net, so you wash your net out, you try different ways of finding the right person for your life… but whether there’s a hole in your net, or the fish just don’t like your net… either way, you haven’t caught a thing. It’s good to wash the net out, you may be going about catching your spouse the totally wrong way… and we all need a good cleansing and cleaning… but it’s all ultimately going to take Christ stepping into your situation one day… and today could be that day!

I believe inlaid into this wonderful story of Peter netting the catch of his life, and which transformed his life, are the most wonderful principles to finding your future spouse. Yes, this story can apply in different ways, but the way in which it applied to me personally during this season of my life was in the way I am sharing with you today.

Disclaimer: I believe the Bible is fully sufficient for every part of our life “That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.” And all the stories and books of the Bible are at our disposal to the end that we know who God is, what God has said, how God works… and so that we might believe more and more in him for everything we think, say and do “In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”

And so this story definitely!! applies to the single scenario of life, this is not a stretch. It’s absolutely amazing how the Holy Spirit takes and ministers the word of God to where we are at in life, he truly does break the bread for us… and nobody did this for me, God produced this perspective in my life last year.

So welcome to the deep waters! Peter was in deep in this chapter… and you’re going to have to go deep, unless you really want a shallow profession that’s never been challenged by the absurdities of life. God will put things out there in the deep, good things, but you’ll need to be in the deep to get them, and he’s going to stretch us a bit not because he loves making things hard for us, but because he wants to change us as he changes our lives forever.

Apart from salvation, finding the right spouse may well be the biggest thing you ever face in life. … the Bible tells you how to catch her, and if you net who God brings to you, you truly have “she’s a great catch”. Who catches who? Hopefully you don’t get caught by Satan and the strange woman in this part of life, but hopefully you net who Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit brings along at the appointed time in your life. When the right one come along, God will bring all the right things into alignment as only he could. Don’t jump ship early, and don’t get ahead of God, we should NOT want to go about this part of life outside of God.

I want to say in all this, as a Christian, you will know it was all God and not you… what hast thou that thou didst not receive?” … In this most recent year of my life, I finally met the girl I was going to marry, and recently I got engaged to her. It’s been quite an amazing journey, I can only describe it as a divine journey. .. may sound cliched, but that truly is the testimony God has given me in this “For he established a testimony in Jacob…”

But this story I’m talking about today was one of many scriptures which God ministered to me in a special way during this time, before I knew this girl even existed, and then this happened in my life. So I’m not just writing words, I’m going to be 35 in a few months, and I was single for a very long time with no prospect, and really no clue in this area of life.

I felt as Peter did “Master, we have toiled all the night, and have taken nothing: nevertheless at thy word I will let down the net.” No, I hadn’t been doing everything I could have been doing, but nonetheless, I felt the waters were empty. Maybe you feel like that… maybe you can’t even think of someone you’d like to be with, much less approach that person.

I’ve come to learn that impossibility is the place God wants us all to be as his children. It’s where he gets the greatest glory, and it’s in impossibility that God will give you a testimony and an experience with him that will be with you forever. And I bless his name for that, and so don’t run from impossibility, but rather know that impossibility is opportunity, opportunity to the glory of God, and living for his glory is the right place to be.

Gideon was facing a monumental calling in life, and he got together some troops to fight millions of Midianites, but then God did something unusual… he trimmed his army’s numbers down to 300! The real 300. Why did God do this? … so they’d know God had delivered them and fought and won the battle. And in this area of life, when God is in it, you’ll realize he was like those ark bearers crossing the Jordan river… he went on well ahead of you and he also was behind you, he had your back too.

I’m not taking away for a second from the disappointment, struggle, and woes of life… I’ve had a few, but I’ve also not had what many others go through either. I can only plead the grace of God. Maybe he spared me even tougher situations because I’m very far from the best Christian to ever live. There are others living life who I just can’t believe the grace of God they have to deal with their hand “The lot is cast into the lap; but the whole disposing thereof is of the Lord.” I don’t know the hand you’ve been dealt, but I know that the Lord can deal with it… and he can give you an experience of him that nobody will ever know “The secret of the Lord is with them that fear him; and he will shew them his covenant.”

My hope is that you read this story, maybe seeing it in a new light, and then dip it into the waters of your life just as Peter let his net down in simple obedience to Christ… regardless of what he thought and the impossibility and futility and “reality’… God can do a lot with a simple act of faith… believe it or not, most people don’t have simple faith.

Are you single right now and struggling? You would know if you’re called to be single, and that would be a special calling, but for the vast majority, marriage is a gift from God and a blessing and help to your life. And it’s a great thing to desire, and should be encouraged. Jesus has a wife, the church… and he has had to wait for her… you may have to had a wait as well… use this wait as a chance to really press into his promises and claim his promises of answered prayer for you. We need to stop with this Christianity that’s dead inside, Christianity is the religion of the heart. And yeah you might have had a rough hand, but that’ll make it even sweeter believe me “when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.”

So let’s get to this story… Jesus had been teaching a lot of people out of Peter’s boat, and they all stood by the shoreline listening. But now Jesus was going to get personal to Peter. And I believe in the area of finding a spouse… God has to be personal to you. Remember, the Bible is written for you and to you if for no one else. It’s generally and objectively true, but it has to be personally true. So this is a story anyone can read and a lot probably know, but let God take this story and speak to you personally with it.

Only you know where you are at with God, and truly only God knows that because we don’t even know where we are, if Solomon didn’t know how to go out and come in… highly doubt we are in any better shape! But if God has given you a godly desire, which the Bible instructs and encourages, for a spouse… then you can claim his word for your own. So do it. God loves when people take him at his word, and dare to trust his word. The reason why David could be successful against Goliath was because he hadn’t been so infected by fear and unbelief of all the soldiers in the trenches together… instead after being out in the wilderness alone as a boy facing bears and lions, he was just “stupid” enough to trust God.

… but it’s deep water! No doubt! Let’s not pretend it’s not deep, but God wants to go deep in your heart and life, you can’t be shallow forever! And finding a spouse requires “launching out”. By faith in God’s word. Relying on him to bring the draught while you step into what he has put on your heart from his word to do. This story is the most amazing parallel to finding the person God has for you in life… every detail is so instructive. How has God lead you? Do you know God’s leading in this?

But you are going to have to launch out. God’s not just going to parachute someone in on someone who is not willing to launch out with him by faith. Sometimes we disguise our lack of faith and unbelief well, really well! It’s actually a lack of faith to not launch out. And when all is said and done when we see who God is and what God did, it’ll make us just crumble before him, and see how sinful and pathetic and unbelieving we really are. Nevertheless, there is a role we have to play in this, and pathetic as it may be, God rewards a step of faith, there is still something we can do. I don’t know what it is for you specifically, but you’re going to have to get God’s personal direction in this, and launch out by faith… without necessarily seeing the catch yet. If God’s made some promises to you, you gotta run with it. Please do.

And so Peter protests, he obviously knows better than Jesus what is out there, but he does obey and push out from shore. And out there in the deep water he throws out his net again… and it sinks into the depths. Peter isn’t expecting much to happen “Lord, I believe; help thou mine unbelief.” Throw the net in reader.

The keyword in this story is “draught”… shut the door to stop the draught! It’s a keyword because it’s a Holy Spirit word… remember that big rushing wind that came through on the day of Pentecost? Well, finding the “more fish in the sea” is going to take the Holy Spirit’s timing and provision. Just as well it’s up to God isn’t it, because if it was truly up to me, I’d be sunk.

I think one of the toughest things as a Christian is figuring out what is ours to do, and what is God’s to do. None of us can make the right person for us, or orchestrate all the events that need to happen in life and in each other’s hearts to bring it all to pass… so we can only trust God for that… while we obey him how he is leading us today. God can do a lot with little, he fed a multitude with a few loaves and fishes… “but what are they among so many?” Well those little steps faith might just add up to a whole lot more.

You are going to be truly surprised what he can and will do. God goes above and beyond as Ephesians 3:20 says. Peter was sure those waters were empty! And so was I. But the girl I met lives a few minutes away from me, that I thought I’d have to travel the world to find. The answer can be a lot closer than you think. You can trust God. You can claim his promises before you’ve even seen them come to pass. The Bible isn’t for “someone else”… it’s for you. The Bible is utterly useless if it’s not God’s word speaking to you personally today… you must have your own experiences of God’s provision. Abraham had his. You need and can and will have yours.

I was encouraged in John 1 where some guys have just started following Jesus, who will be his disciples and apostles… they then go and tell Nathanael that they’ve found the Christ! And they say he’s Jesus of Nazareth. And Nathanael goes… what? Nazareth? Can any good thing come out of Nazareth? The Bible says finding a wife is finding a “good thing” … maybe trace that phrase “good thing” through the word of God, and let the Holy Spirit write them on your heart… you’ll realize God is telling you he can and will provide for you, in a way that blows your mind.

Our Lord and Saviour came out of low end of town. Stop limiting God with your unbelief. God says in the Bible “… prove me now herewith, saith the Lord of hosts, if I will not open you the windows of heaven, and pour you out a blessing, that there shall not be room enough to receive it.” You think Peter experienced that as his net filled up so full that it’s sinking his ship? When God gets in something he’ll give you more than you can handle. So how about take this opportunity of finding your spouse as an opportunity to prove God. Let him make it a blessed divine journey, something that you will forever look on as “When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, Depart from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.”

If you’ve got a Biblical desire and you want to follow Christ in your life, he has promised to answer your prayers and give you what you asked for. He doesn’t need an out. He doesn’t need your limitations. He’s not bound by your “reality”. The empty waters are nothing to him. Maybe he’s kept them empty on purpose for you, maybe he’s been keeping just the right one for you, and he knew you’d settle for less. Maybe he’s had one or two more things he’s wanted to operate on in your heart and life so you were capable of loving your spouse just right. Maybe before your change comes, he’s had to change you. Maybe the wait is just going to make it just that much more beautiful “He hath made every thing beautiful in his time”. Let God turn this torture, despair, hopeless, inevitability, impossibility, desperation, disappointment, cynicism, sarcasm, pain, hurt, tears… let him give you beauty for those ashes “For with God nothing shall be impossible.”

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