Fishing in a Fishbowl

©1999 by James A. Fowler. All rights reserved.

You are free to download this article provided it remains intact without alteration. You are also free to transmit this article electronically provided that you do so in its entirety with proper citation of authorship included.

The illustrator of these parodies is Aaron Eskridge.
For contact and information about Aaron: Illustrator's Page

Text of article below graphic

   Have you ever seen anything so foolish as someone fishing in a fishbowl?

   May I suggest an even more absurd situation wherein the owners of the fishbowl put fish in the fishbowl and hire a commercial fisherman to catch the fish in the bowl so as to make them legitimate members of the fishbowl?

   This appears to be what many churches do on a semi-annual basis as they schedule their "revivals" or "evangelistic meetings."

   The fish in the big ocean of the world are not jumping at the opportunity to be placed in an ecclesiastical fishbowl. They are not desirous of being put behind glass, even if it is stained-glass. They are wise to the lures of the average Sunday fisherman.

 
     But the caretakers of the fishbowl feel obligated to make a special effort to bring the fish of the world into their fishbowl, at least semi-annually in the Spring and in the Fall. They carefully research the availability of the most successful big-name commercial fisherman whose services they feel they can afford and whose schedule coincides. This evangelistic fisherman, known for his success in "fishing for men," brings his tried and true lures to fish in this little fishbowl.

   A few unsuspecting fish in the sea that surrounds that particular fishbowl are entrapped, netted or otherwise snared to join the local members of the fishbowl, in order to be fished for by the commercial fisherman. If they are "caught" by the cunning lures of this foreign fisherman, they will be expected to become contented and faithful members of the school of fish that inhabit that particular fishbowl. There they will be fished for again and again, Sunday after Sunday, even though "caught."

   I told you this was a silly story!

   How else will the fishbowl be replenished? Perhaps we should do away with the entire fishbowl mentality, and recognize that Christianity has to do with the restoration of functional humanity.

   Jesus did not say, "I came that you might join a fishbowl and swim eternally contented in circles." Rather, He said, "I came that you might have life, and have it more abundantly." (John 10:10)