April 17th, 2020: Easter Friday. John 21:1-14.
“Have you caught anything?” Jesus
calls out from the shore at dawn to his friends in their boat. What he really
said was: “You haven’t caught anything, have you?” Jesus was poking fun at
their lack of success in the one thing they were supposed to be good at:
catching fish. Not once in the gospels is there any record of Peter and his
friends catching a single fish without Jesus’ help. Here that help is the command
to try again. They do so – and at once they feel the net heavy with fish. One
of those in the boat tells Peter: “It is the Lord.” It is the unnamed “disciple
whom Jesus loved.” Peter and the others hurry ashore and find a charcoal fire
with fish on it, and bread. Knowing that they would be hungry after their long
night’s labor, Jesus has made breakfast for them.
Did Peter recall another charcoal
fire, at night, in the courtyard of the High Priest’s house at Jerusalem, where
Peter stood warming himself? “Peter was distressed,” we heard in the gospel,
because Jesus asked his question a third time. Of course he was distressed! The
memory of his three-fold denial at that other fire was painful. Peter’s thrice
repeated assurance of love is his rehabilitation. In response to each pledge of
love, Jesus assigns Peter responsibility: to feed Jesus= sheep.
Why did Jesus give this
responsibility to Peter, of all people? Jesus gave the office of leader to the
friend whose love was imperfect; whose impetuosity and weakness made the
name Jesus gave him - Peter, the rock - as ironic as calling a 350-pound
heavyweight “Slim.”
Is there someone here today who feels
weak? You have made so many good resolutions. Some you have kept, others not. You
have high ideals. Yet time and again you have compromised. You had so many dreams,
hopes, plans. How many have you achieved? You wanted so much. You have settled
for so little. If that is your story, you have a friend in heaven. His
name is Simon Peter.
If, like Peter, you have discovered that you are weak, that
command is reassuring. Jesus doesn’t ask you to be strong, for he knows your
weakness. He doesn’t ask you to be a pioneer or a leader. He knows that is too
hard: that you would soon lose your way - or at least your nerve. He asks one
thing alone. He asks you to follow him.
Following Jesus Christ is not always
easy. If you know your weakness, however, you have an advantage over those who
still think they are strong. Then you will trust, as you try to follow your
Master and Lord, not in any strength of your own, but only and always in the
strength of Jesus Christ. His strength is always reliable; and it is always
available. We have only to ask, and Jesus is there.
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