Jesus said to them, “Children, have you caught anything to eat?” They answered him, “No.”

John 21:5

It’s curious that Jesus calls full-grown men children. I actually chuckled when reading the gospel this morning. I imagined Jesus watching the disciples in the boat once again catching nothing, thinking, “these children", while shaking his head in laughter. We think we know what we are doing, but we have no idea.

Children need help and cannot do things on their own. Children are vulnerable and brutally honest. Jesus even tells us himself, “unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven” (Matthew 18:3 NABRE).

How often, like the disciples, do we think we know what we are doing without God? We make poor choices, we return to bad situations and we seek help from others rather than turning to our Lord. Sometimes, it is only when we are backed into a corner that we look up to heaven and implore His help.

Many times I wish I could be like my children, so certain that God is with them, so sure. Their faith is pure and wise with no complications, just simple. I can hear my youngest say, “Why are you worried? God is with you!”

Wherever you are today, place yourself in the hands of Christ as a little child. Change your prayers from worried to carefree, and invite Him into all of your places and spaces. Then you will see that when you cast your net of prayer in the way that He is asking you, you too will pull in a large number of fish in an abundance of your needs. Then you will say with the disciples, It is the Lord!