Introduction
John 21 is a significant passage for me. Let me take you back to 1985. It’s Low
Sunday, the Sunday after Easter. I am a church steward in my home church. A Local
Preacher from another
church in the circuit was preaching on this passage. All I know is that on
that morning something clicked with me. It began a journey of discovery that
led me to theological college and eventually into ordained ministry. Chris West
has a lot to answer for!
It’s also a passage that has been important for me since I
began reading the books of the late David Seamands,
who taught much about how the Gospel relates to our emotional brokenness. His
interpretation of this story and others had a beneficial effect on my life and
on others.
So I bring a lot of gratitude to John 21, along with a large
number of existing assumptions. In my preparation this week, I have tried to
start with a blank sheet of paper. That hasn’t been entirely possible, but I
hope I can be like the wise and faithful homeowner of whom Jesus spoke, who
brings out from the storehouse things both old and new (Matthew
13:52). I want to approach this account of Jesus at the water’s edge by
showing that he’s not at the edge of our lives, but at the centre. The risen
Christ is at the centre of every part of our lives.
1. Fish
The seven disciples are back on their home territory, the Sea of Galilee – or
as ‘home’ as the Roman Empire will allow them to think of it, since Rome has
renamed Galilee as the Sea of Tiberius in honour of the emperor Tiberius. It’s
as home as you can get but it also has unwelcome influences.
‘I’m going fishing,’ says Simon Peter, ‘Anyone care to join
me?’ And his six friends go off with him in the boat.
Despite what some Christians might think there is nothing
implied in the story that is critical of Simon Peter returning to his old
profession of fishing. This isn’t despair or unbelief. He has met the risen
Christ and hope has been restored in his life. Going back in the fishing boat
isn’t an act of bad faith. He’s back at his old job and it’s OK.
Except it’s not OK. It’s disastrous. They go out to fish at
night – it was the best time – and it’s a complete failure. The most fruitful
time and they catch no fish. Then a mysterious stranger appears on the shore.
In the muzzy tones of daybreak, they can’t recognise him – quite a theme of the
Resurrection stories. Almost certainly they also don’t recognise Jesus because
they’re not expecting him.
And maybe this strange figure can make out a school of fish
in the great lake as the first sunrays creep over the horizon. Or perhaps he’s
not a fisherman at all. What does he know? Whatever, let’s do as he says and
let down the nets on the other side of the boat.
And you know what happens. They go from nought to a hundred
and fifty-three in a matter of seconds. (It sounds more like a Ferrari than a
fishing boat.) As they sail towards the beach ‘the disciple whom Jesus loved’
(whom I take to be John) recognises the man who has called out to them. ‘It is
the Lord!’ And good old impetuous Peter dives into the water and rushes to him,
or as quickly as he can through the water, hampered by newly wet garments.
What has happened? Jesus has shown up at the workplace, and
he has blessed and transformed it.
How many of us find our place of work is rather like the
experience of the fishermen overnight – a lot of slog and no sense of
accomplishment? I spent seven years in the Civil Service and when I left for
theological college, even the atheists were jealous. I have one or two funny
stories from those times – not least from when I dealt with National Insurance
contributions and a self-employed woman returned her papers, saying she was
jacking in her career due to ‘unforeseen circumstances’. She was a clairvoyant.
However, largely it was a dreary, discouraging job, even if I was helping
people who needed Social Security. I don’t think I had any sense that Jesus in
his risen presence could be with me at work in the way he was with me in church
activities.
But in John 21 Jesus doesn’t limit himself to the religious
stuff. Some people have tried to find all sorts of significance in the number
of fish, the one hundred and fifty three. But to me there is no convincing
symbolism there, however laden with symbolism John’s Gospel is. I think the
simple fact is, the risen Christ transformed the working environment and made
it fruitful.
I am not suggesting that being open to the risen Christ at
work automatically makes everything fine. This is a broken, fallen world. There
will still be suffering, toil and meaninglessness at work. It is the curse of
Adam, who in the biblical story of the Fall was told that in the light of sin
the ground he tilled would be cursed and he would toil all the days of his life
(Genesis 3:17). But the
Cross of Christ redeems the effects of sin’s curse, and his Resurrection gives
new power to live. So if we by faith believe that he is present with us and
ahead of us at work, the workplace may become fruitful for us. But if it
doesn’t and it remains an oppressive place to be, then he is still present,
sharing the pain with us.
Yet in saying all this I am aware that I am addressing a
congregation containing many for whom paid employment is in the past. This
probably sounds irrelevant to you. So I invite you to see what is underlying
this. It is the conviction that we meet the risen Christ in the ordinary
routines of life as much as we meet him in the singing of hymns, the saying of
prayers, the sharing of the sacrament and the ministry of the word. Here in
this story when the disciples get to shore, Jesus somehow already has some fish
and he’s cooking it. (Where did he get his
fish?)
On Good Friday we as a family had fish and chips for our
dinner, not out of the Catholic tradition of ‘fish on Friday’ but because our local chippie had a special offer.
And I suggest to you that next time you eat fish, remember the risen Jesus on
the beach with seven of his disciples. It’s like the Salvation Army tradition
of expecting to meet with Christ at every meal, not simply at Holy Communion.
The miraculous catch of fish and the breakfast that followed
call us, in the words of Michael Frost, to the
holy task of ‘Seeing
God In The Ordinary’. He is present in everyday life and he uses the raw
material of mundane living to make his presence known and speak to us. God has
always been doing this. He spoke to Amos through a plumb line (Amos 7:7-9) and a basket of
fruit (Amos 8:1-3). Jesus
drew lessons from a fig tree (Mark
11:12-14). Let us, as Michael Frost says in his book, learn again to be
attentive to this truth, to ‘shudder properly’ at God’s speech through
creation, to hear him in stories, see him in others and embrace the spiritual
discipline of astonishment. All this is raw material for our discipleship
because we believe that Christ is alive and with us.
2. Forgiveness
It’s 1985. It’s that service I mentioned at the beginning, where this passage
spoke powerfully to me and eventually led to theological college and the ordained
ministry. When Chris the Local Preacher expounded this passage, he likened
Jesus to those craftsmen who are master restorers of damaged paintings. The damaged
painting in the story is, of course, Simon Peter. And Jesus restores him.
Peter’s damage is the three times he denied Jesus (John 18:15-18, 25-27). Here, as
we well know, Jesus gives Peter three opportunities to affirm his love for him,
in place of the denials.
Moreover, this work of restoration by the risen Jesus is
good news for us. How many times have we let Christ down or even denied him?
Have we wondered whether he still loves us, or whether he is still willing to
use us in the work of his kingdom? As a Christian and as a minister I have seen
a wide variety of versions of this. Some have over-sensitive consciences – what
psychiatrists would label ‘scruples’. I think of one person who felt God would
not accept her, because she had misread the words of the Holy Communion service.
That may be an extreme example, but it is a true one and more common than you
might think, given a combination of a severe interpretation of the Gospel and a
person with low self-esteem.
For others, though, it is something more serious. It may be
a failure to speak up on Christ’s behalf at a critical point, as Peter did. It may
be a moral failure, such as unfaithfulness to a spouse. It may be a criminal
act that may or may not have been detected. Some think they have committed the ‘unforgivable
sin’ of ‘blasphemy against the Holy Spirit’ (although ‘blasphemy against the
Spirit’ is specifically calling the Holy Spirit’s work the work of the Devil – Matthew 12:22-32 – and
therefore those who are worried they have committed this sin are those least
likely to have done so).
But if Christ can restore a coward like Peter, and in the
Old Testament can use another coward like Abraham, a murderer like Moses and an
adulterer like David, then it seems that God indeed is the master restorer of
human beings. What he has done once, he can do again. If he can make a
slave-trader like John Newton into a Christian and later a campaigner for the
abolition of the industry in which he made his money, he can restore broken
people like you and me.
Failure may feel like a death, and it is. However, our faith
does not stop with death: it goes through to resurrection. Therefore, Christ
raises up failures. He forgives them and gives them a new start. Failure is
never the final word with Christ. He restores. He has restoring grace for those
of us who know we have let him down – and some of us have let him down badly.
To be sure, his restoring work is not the parody of
forgiveness that we sometimes hear, where someone says, ‘Yes, I forgive you, it
was nothing.’ If forgiveness is needed, then it wasn’t nothing, it was
something, and it hurt. And neither is it as trivial or flippant as to say, ‘God
forgives – it’s his business.’ Failure hurts both parties and to walk through
it to healing may well be painful. The three times Jesus asks Peter, ‘Do you
love me?’ make him face up to his failure. But Peter faces those denials in the
loving presence of Jesus. The story says ‘Peter felt hurt because [Jesus] said
to him the third time’ (verse 17). Yet he goes through with it, because he is
with Christ, and he finds healing.
I have two friends with deep hurts in their lives that have
damaged relationships, especially with their spouses. Both have received
Christian counselling. What is common to both is that whenever the counsellor
has put a finger on the root issue they have run away and stopped receiving the
counselling. They have been unwilling to walk through the pain. As a result,
they have never dealt with their problems. They remain unhealed, broken people,
and their closest relationships remain very disordered. If only they truly knew
that the risen Lord would be walking with them as they faced their pain.
But Peter does come out the other side. Jesus restores him. And
with restoration comes a renewed calling. ‘Feed my lambs’ (verse 15); ‘Tend my
sheep’ (verse 16); ‘Feed my sheep’ (verse 17). He is more than forgiven; he is
re-commissioned. For those here who know they have failed Christ today, the
good news is that our risen Saviour will walk with us as we face the failure
and come through to forgiveness. Then there is this bonus: Jesus still has a
calling for us. We may think he is crazy, but he isn’t. He didn’t simply
forgive us so that we could wait placidly on the platform for the glory train; he
forgave us so that we may have a new lease of life in the service of his
kingdom.
Conclusion
So let us be open to the risen Christ taking us by surprise. We may find
his presence in the ordinary life of work and the world, and respond to him
there. Alternatively, it may be more like Peter and Jesus’ private conversation
– and for us, that would be something like prayer. Either way – or both –
Christ is risen to let us know that God has not finished with us. He has
unfinished business with each of us. As Paul puts it:
I am confident of this, that the one who began a good work
among you will bring it to completion by the day of Jesus Christ.
(Philippians 1:6)
Alternatively, as the t-shirt slogan has it, ‘Please be
patient with me: God hasn’t finished with me yet.’
Technorati Tags: DavidSeamands, Galilee, Tiberius, SimonPeter, CivilService, NationalInsurance, clairvoyant, work, resurrection, Jesus, Christ, fishandchips, MichaelFrost, SeeingGodInTheOrdinary, Amos, Matthew, Mark, John, forgiveness, restoration, scruples, HolyCommunion, blasphemy, HolySpirit, JohnNewton, slavery, denial, counselling, Philippians
Big Circumstance 
What Do You Think?