Together they pushed their boat into the Sea of Galilee. When they got several miles out in the open sea they met up with James and John.

“Where have you boys been? Most of the fishing day is gone,” Zebedee said as Andrew’s boat came up beside theirs.

Simon patted Andrew on the shoulder. “Big brother here was listening to that teacher, John again.”

Pulling up his nets John said, “I’ve listened to him a few times. He does have some interesting things to say, but there have been so many of those preachers I can’t be sure who to believe.”

The five men spent many hours fishing and didn’t return home until morning, disgruntled and frustrated. For only a few fish had been caught during the night.

As they approached the beach, they noticed a man standing on the beach teaching. Andrew jumped out of the boat and ran to the shore shouting, “Simon, it’s the man I was telling you about, the man John the Baptizer baptized a month ago, Jesus.”

Simon shook his head and continued to pull the boat ashore.

Jesus stepped into Simon’s boat and asked him to put out a little from the shore.

Then he sat down and taught the crowd gathered on the shore. When he finished speaking, He said to Simon, “Put out into deep water and let down your nets for a catch.”

“Master,” Simon replied, “we’ve worked hard all night long and caught nothing! But at Your word, I’ll let down the nets.”

Simon reluctantly rowed out and dropped his nets, while Andrew and the others stood on the shore. Andrew watched the boat start to tip over as Simon tried to pull in the nets. John, James and Andrew rowed back to help. There were so many fish that it took the two boats to pull them in.

When they finally returned to shore, and Jesus stepped out of the boat Simon followed and dropped to his knees.

“Go away from me, because I’m a sinful man, Lord!”

“Don’t be afraid,” Jesus told Simon. “From now on you will be catching people.”