Shocking Fish
Written by Heather Block
My husband and I have enjoyed vacationing in Florida and on one of our trips, we attended a church where the Pastor told us a story about a time he went to help a new friend that he had met that worked in the mining industry. This friend was someone that he wanted to share the love of God with but wasn’t sure how he would go about it.
A mining company in the USA needed additional capacity for their settling pond for silt. There was a suitable pond; however, it did had fish in it that would need to be moved otherwise they would all perish from the silt that would enter the pond.
A common procedure to move fish is to use a form of shock treatment that temporarily stuns the fish for anywhere from a few seconds to a couple of minutes where they float to the surface giving opportunity to net them and then move them to the new pond.
This is where this Pastor came in as it was his job, as the assistant, to net as many fish as possible before they “came to” and swam away again as they are only in this shocked state for such a short period of time.
As he continued to net as many fish as possible, he wondered to himself, “What does the fish think that escapes my net?” No doubt the fish thinks he was clever in escaping the net; that he was free to enjoy life as he knew it. He did not realize that in his desire to escape to what he thought was freedom, he was actually escaping to his own demise; as no fish could continue to live once the silt from the mine began to fill the pond. We can see how foolish it is that the fish sought to get away from the very person that was seeking to save them.
What a picture of God’s grace and love for us!
God has reached down to mankind to save him and yet we wrestle to get away from God’s loving reach thinking He is “out to get us”, or, “I don’t think I will like what God is wanting to do with my life”. We struggle against yielding our life to Him thinking we may not like His plan and then, going our own way, we bring upon ourselves our own demise.
Scripture tells us in John 3:16 that “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him will not perish but have everlasting life.” God sent us a rescuer because we cannot save ourselves any more than those fish in the pond could. We can do nothing about our sin nature but God in His great love for us sent His Son Jesus to die on the cross for our sins so that we could receive His forgiveness and be given everlasting life in Him.
This Pastor wished the fish actually understood and trusted him. That he wanted to save their lives not destroy them.
How much more, God wants us to understand His great love for us and that He came “to seek and to save the lost” Luke 19:10. That He offers us a new life with Him.
This was a powerful object lesson that this Pastor was given to share with his new friend, that we can trust God fully, that out of God’s great love for the world, He set a plan in motion to rescue us from our sin and give us everlasting life! I want to be rescued by God by acknowledging that I too need to be saved from my sin and receive His plan for my life! How about you?