Daily Bible Reading 13th May 2026 // Luke 5:1-11
1 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, 2 and he saw two boats by the lake, but the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. 3 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. 4 And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” 5 And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” 6 And when they had done this, they enclosed a large number of fish, and their nets were breaking. 7 They signalled 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. 8 But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” 9 For he and all who were with him were astonished at the catch of fish that they had taken, 10 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.” 11 And when they had brought their boats to land, they left everything and followed him.
One commentator points out that a clear and definite section of Luke's record begins at this point, reaching to 6:11, in which a possibly intentional symmetry is indicated, as follows: the call of a leading disciple (Peter), 1-11, followed by two healings (12-16 and 17-26), which provoke controversy; then, the call of another disciple (Levi), 27-39, followed by two Sabbath incidents (6:1-5, 6-11), which again provoke controversy. This is an interesting structure and helpful in showing us the 'build-up' of opposition to our Lord's ministry which finally led to the dark and ugly plotting to destroy Him. As to the call of Peter, Calvin regards this passage as being the first, initial call of Peter and the others to discipleship. But this raises real problems; it is certainly the first mention of Peter in Luke's gospel up to this point; but we must remember John's gospel with its emphasis on a Judaean ministry of Jesus a year before that is recorded by the Synoptic writers, Matthew, Mark and Luke, and in which Peter was already called by Jesus (John 1:42). There, also, a promise was made - 'Thou shalt be called Cephas... a stone' - as here, '...from henceforth thou shalt catch men'. And this episode was one of the ways in which the other was helped towards its fulfilment. We shall think further of the disciples' call in tomorrow's Note.