One of the early battles in General Vespasian’s efforts to clean up Galilee was fought on the Sea of Galilee in 70CE. Ship to ship and hand-to-hand combat ensued, and when the Romans marched off victorious, the local fishermen were tasked to take their boats out into the sea and to cast their nets to draw up the enormous quantity of human corpses left in the Sea. They became fishers of men.
και ποιησω υμας γενεσθαι αλιεις ανθρωπων
follow me, and you shall become fishers of men
This is not a generous offer. This is not a metaphor for building the church. It’s not really a question. It’s a statement of fact that their doom lies directly ahead. This, the second prophetic statement of Jesus, sounds really poetic, but it was meant to be literal. It was intended to highlight the grisly results of rebellion against Rome.
Here we begin a theme that will continue through this chapter focused on the authority of Jesus, specifically, that he’s got a lot of it. It becomes a brag: he’s got so much authority that one wacky thing after another keeps happening. So he’s not asking or cajoling or convincing. This is not a trade or interchange being suggested. It’s an order; it’s a demand. And he has the authority to make those demands.
What’s more, he promises misery to those he preaches. The Romans are coming, and they will witness their own doom.