FROM THE ARCHIVES: “Breakfast at Jesus’” (St. Luke’s: Friday, April 21, 2017 [April 6, 2018]; Ac. 4.1-12; Ps. 118; Jn. 21.1-14)

ENCOUNTERING the risen Jesus.  Have you ever seen a celebrity?  Have you ever been walking down the street and happen to have seen someone whom you had only previously seen on TV?  John tells us that this was the third time that the risen Jesus had appeared to the disciples, the other two times having been in the house in Jerusalem where the apostles had been lodging (and hiding).  At the beginning of the book of the Acts (1.3), St. Luke tells us that the risen Jesus appeared to the disciples during the 40-day period before his ascension.  Think about it – the disciples went about their daily lives for 40 days, never knowing when or where Jesus was going to pop up.  It must have been a very mysterious time.  Just like the answer to Herod’s question as to Jesus’ whereabouts in Oscar Wilde’s play Salome: “He is in every place my Lord, but it is hard to find him”.  The risen Jesus is at much at home in God’s space (“heaven”) as in our space (“earth”).  For those of us who are familiar with the Chronicles of Narnia, the risen Jesus is constantly going back and forth through the wardrobe that is the portal between our everyday world and the world of Narnia.  During these 40 days, Jesus is both present and absent.  We can imagine different disciples running into each other on the street, one of them looking excited and bursting with news: “I saw Jesus!” and the response, “Where? When? How? Tell us all about it!”

Back to the scene of the crime.  In today’s gospel, we’re back where it all began – Peter, James and John (and a few others) are in a boat on the Sea of Galilee with their nets, and a mysterious character shows up on shore and calls to them… it’s as if the DVD has jumped back to the first scene of the film.  Those who had been called to become fishers of men have gone back to fishing for fish.  In fact, everything about today’s gospel is orchestrated for Peter’s benefit.

No fish.  The details of the story sound familiar – once again, we have Peter – exhausted after having spent the night on the lake with nothing to show for it – and Jesus, who, with a simple command, enables a great catch of fish.  If I had been in Peter’s shoes, I might have thought, “Not again!  Here is Jesus showing up when I have just experienced failure.”  Why couldn’t he appear just when I had managed, on my own, “to bring home the fillets”?  Then I could show Jesus just how capable I am and he could be impressed and give me a pat on the back.  Peter was a career fisherman; this was the one thing that he was good at.  And yet, there he is, as the rising sun reveals that his boat is empty.

A charcoal fire.  And the fact remains: Peter had indeed failed, gloriously.  Full of zeal at the Last Supper and full of swashbuckling bravado in the garden, Peter lost his nerve when a servant girl recognized him in the light of a charcoal fire (cp. Jn. 21.9 & 18.18) and he had denied 3 times even knowing who Jesus was.  Judas had betrayed Jesus for 30 pieces of silver, but then again, maybe that wasn’t such a surprise – after all, Judas had always hung onto the money bag a little too tightly (cf. Jn. 12.4-6; 13.2).  But Peter!  Peter had always been the natural leader of the 12 apostles, always the first to speak, or rather, as was often the case, to put his foot in his mouth.  Even in today’s Gospel, Peter leads his friends out onto the Lake with his confident assertion: I’m going fishing!  But Jesus appears now, as if to let Peter know – everything that you will do from this moment on, you will do – not out of your own wealth of experience, your own abilities or confidence – no, from now on, you will act with my power, with the wisdom of my Spirit.

Bread and fish.  The disciples had searched for food all night, only to discover that breakfast was already waiting for them on the shore – bread and fish cooked over a charcoal fire, two more echoes from earlier in the story.  This takes us back to chapter 6 of John’s Gospel, where Jesus multiplied bread and fish to feed 5,000 people and then gave a lengthy discourse, as the Johannine Jesus has a habit of doing, identifying himself as the Bread of Life which came down from heaven.  Jesus then goes on to say that whoever does not eat his flesh and drink his blood does not have eternal life.  Upon hearing this, many of those who had been following Jesus started walking away.  (the real presence of Jesus in the Eucharist has always been a controversial thing).  So Jesus turns to the 12 apostles and asks them: Are you going to leave me too?  And that’s when Peter makes his confession: “Lord, to whom can we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and know that you are the Holy One of God” (6.68-69).

Follow me.  As chapter 21 of John’s Gospel continues, Jesus and Peter take a walk down the beach.  Jesus has 1 question for Peter, and he puts it to him 3 times.  As Jesus had told the apostles during the Last Supper, “Without me you can do nothing” (Jn. 15.5).  You can’t even catch fish without me.  So trust me.  I love you.  I died for you.  I forgive you.  And you’re not off the hook.  What I said to you all those months ago (perhaps on that same beach), I say to you now: “Follow me” (Jn. 21.19, 22).  Jesus’ last words to Peter had also been his first: Follow me.  Follow me into the darkness of the world, follow me into the streets full of broken people, follow me into the courtrooms of the powerful, follow me to the cross, follow me to the Father.  Oh, and one more thing.  As I have fed you, feed my sheep (Jn. 21.15-17; cf. v. 12).  This is good news for all of us who have ever failed, or ever felt like failures, or both.  Failure does not need to be the end.  There is hope.  If we can let go of our pride, humble ourselves under the mighty hand of the Father, trust Jesus’ love and forgiveness, and open ourselves to the wind of the Spirit, we can be amazing agents of the love of God in this world.

PROCLAIMING the risen Lord.  So the risen Jesus appeared to the disciples during a 40-day period.  As often happens in the Bible, this period of 40 days was a time of preparation.  Preparation for what? We might ask.  The answer is to be found in our first reading.  In the book of the Acts of the Apostles, we see the consequences of having encountered the risen Jesus – after the disciples receive the power of the Holy Spirit, they begin to proclaim boldly – in public – that Jesus had been raised from the dead – and they suffer for it.  I find it amusing that the members of the Supreme Court of the day take the apostles’ message a lot more seriously than many Bible scholars do.  Many scholars dismiss the miraculous claims of the NT, saying that it’s only to be expected that primitive, pre-scientific folk would believe things like the bodily resurrection or the virgin birth.  Well, let me just say this: the reason that Joseph considered divorcing his pregnant fiancée is because he knew exactly where babies came from, not because he didn’t know.  It is obvious that however the apostles understood what had happened to the crucified Jesus, they thought that it was something that had happened in the real world.  They advanced two claims about the resurrection: the tomb was empty and they had seen the risen Jesus, had touched him, and had shared meals with him.  And it’s obvious that the Sanhedrin – though they didn’t believe that Jesus had been raised from the dead – thought that the apostles’ message was dangerous enough to warrant them imprisoning, beating and even considering killing the apostles.  That’s worth thinking about – why did the members of the Court consider the message of Jesus’ resurrection to be dangerous…?  Well, if it’s true that Jesus was raised from the dead, what does that say about the power of those who killed him?  If the Jesus who was crucified did not stay in the tomb, then the world has been changed, and those who use death as a weapon know that their time is up.  Back to Herod in Oscar Wilde’s play: “He raises the dead?” “Yea, sire, He raiseth the dead.” “I do not wish Him to do that. I forbid Him to do that. I allow no man to raise the dead. This Man must be found and told that I forbid Him to raise the dead.”  The risen Jesus forgives, heals, empowers and sends his messengers into the world.  God raised Jesus of Nazareth from the dead – this is the revolutionary news that our world needs to hear.  Amen.