A man in
The man thanked the pastor and continued on his way. As he continued to visit churches in
I love that joke, but I fear that it won’t be long before I am not going
to be able to make a call to anyone, anywhere if I have to use a cell
phone. They keep getting more and more
bells and whistles, and more and more apps…whatever apps are! Now you can send email with them, watch
television and movies on them, and text until your
thumbs are in danger of falling off. No
longer do we need watches or cameras…cell phones tell us the time and
take our picture. I won’t be
surprised if you won’t be able to fry an egg with one in the near
future.
Technology has surpassed my grasp and my skill set…but I have to wonder: in this age of instant accessibility are we
more or less present to those around us?
You probably remember that ad not long ago. A guy with a cell
phone … walking across the country … asking the person on
the other end "Can you hear me now?" I guess it was supposed to prove
that there was no place you could go where you wouldn’t be
heard…but if you can’t think of anything more interesting to say
than that, maybe you shouldn’t be saying anything at all. Maybe instead of indulging in our endless
chatter we should spend more time listening … waiting for God to call.
God does call, you know. Today we are hearing the stories of God’s call
to the two greatest leaders of the early church. We know them so well. They are
the consensus all-kingdom heavy hitters. They are remembered in two marvelous
statues immediately in front of St. Peter’s basilica in
Simon Peter is the first among the apostles in all the gospels. But in
the gospels he is the chief in a confederacy of dunces. Title this chapter of
his biography "Clueless in
We meet him today in a story every scholar agrees was a later postscript, an
addition to the Gospel of John, which already has a perfectly good ending in
chapter 20. But this was an extra story they just had to include when they
heard it, so it got added in, thank God.
Just a few weeks after Jesus has risen from the dead, Peter says,
"Let’s go fishing." Think about this for a minute! Peter has
seen all the miracles, he has seen the empty tomb, he
has seen Jesus alive in the upper room, first when Thomas isn’t there,
then again when Jesus intentionally includes the Doubting Thomas. But now,
after all of that, Peter’s going back to fishing?
Why would he do that when he’s been commissioned to establish the church
on earth? Does he think he can go through Easter and then just go back to
normal? Doesn’t he realize Easter means it can never be normal again? I
agree with Richard Donovan: "People often fail because that which is
comfortable seduces them away from that which would save them." They
abandon the adventure of their dreams out of fear or cowardice or just plain
laziness.
It’s easy enough to wander off the path if you aren’t mindful and
alert.
But are we to think Peter has forgotten so soon, just a few weeks after the
resurrection? It seems so faithless. I think maybe though that Peter goes back
to fishing because it’s what he knows best. It’s where he’s
known some success. It’s not because he no longer believes in Jesus, you
see, but because he no longer believes in himself. He’s swallowed a big
piece of humble pie, with a large glass of sour milk, and the taste of failure
lingers in his throat. He denied Jesus, not once but three times. Now here
stands the one he denied and abandoned to the cross. Peter knows…he
isn’t worthy. He isn’t able. And he can’t bear to face his
failure.
As John’s gospel postscript tells it, the story is loaded with beautiful
symbolism. At one level it’s a simple story about reconciliation between
friends and the reclamation of a broken man…such beautiful grace. At
another level it’s about the church, and how Jesus loves us all even when
we fail.
The scene is seaside back in
Jesus is always with us, though often we are not with him … not
aware that we are being cared for…watched over…loved.
He calls them to fish on the other side of the boat … like that small
distance will make a difference. Yet there is a lesson for us here, when we
work so hard and see so little result, it’s time to pause and reflect:
perhaps we are trying too hard to do it all on our own. Perhaps we are focusing
in the wrong direction. Maybe we are proclaiming the gospel to people who
don’t care to hear it and ignoring those who need it most. When the
disciples do follow Jesus’ instructions, they catch so many fish that
they can’t haul the net into the boat. Meaning again, we won’t have
any success in our fishing if we aren’t guided by Jesus as we cast our
nets.
Peter is the first to realize: "It is the Lord!" He throws on
his cloak and dives into the water … he knows better than try to walk on
it! But he can’t wait for the boat to glide to shore. Is that
because he loves Jesus so much or because he hopes Jesus will curse him for his
failure before the others are close enough to hear? But Jesus is cooking
breakfast, always one step ahead of us, already providing what we need. After
breakfast, Jesus puts his full attention on Peter. He has been calling Peter
day after day for three years, from the first day he walked up to him near this
very spot and said "follow me." But Peter hasn’t really been
paying attention. He has been listening through the filter of his own
self-focus. He has been watching through the glasses of his expectations. He
has been following in the path of his own goals. And he always gets things
distorted. But now all his self-protective defenses and self-serving strategies
have been stripped away. I imagine Jesus saying, "Can you hear me now? Are
you ready to listen?"
Three times Jesus asks Peter, "Do you love me more than these?" More than these what? These friends?
These lovely surroundings on the
There it is! If you love Jesus, you show it, you live it, you answer his call.
And what does he want you to do? If you love Jesus … feed his sheep. I
think we can take that literally to apply to hunger ministries, but it’s
about feeding souls, too, of course. What would it look like for you to take
that call seriously, to love Jesus by feeding his sheep?
Anyway, it’s the third resurrection story we’ve heard in a row. On
Easter we heard about Jesus rising from the tomb of his crucifixion. Last week
we heard about Thomas rising from the tomb of his doubts. Today we hear about
Peter rising from the tomb of his failure. Jesus’ resurrection means we
rise, too, from whatever soul-killing tombs hold us down. And this is the power
of Jesus’ love for us, not only that we rise, but that we rise to serve,
we rise to love, we rise to follow his call.
The other great Apostle of the church was the biggest bigot of his day. He was
a scholar, but he was no gentleman. Educated in Greek classics, trained in the
religion of his ancestors, Saul of Tarsus was a cosmopolitan man. But his
education didn’t broaden him…it narrowed him. He hated Gentiles. He
even hated Jews who were different from his beliefs. He especially opposed the
strange new teaching about the Messiah, and as if it wasn’t enough to do
violence to the “Jesus movement” in
What does it take for God to get our attention, where we’ll listen for a
change instead of telling God how God should be doing things? Now Saul is ready
to listen. "Who are you?" he stammers. "You know who,"
Jesus answers. "I’m the one you’ve been persecuting."
Actually, Saul has been persecuting Jesus’ sheep, but as we’ve
already seen and ought to get it by now, that whatever you do to the people
around you, to your brothers and sisters, to the least of these in our world,
you do also to Jesus. Jesus is not here in a way we can embrace, but we can
embrace “them” and by so doing we can embrace “him” in
them. That’s what he wants us to do.
Ironically in our readings today, the model of “loving Jesus by loving
others” is shown not by the big “kahunas”
Peter and Paul, but by this fellow named Ananias. I never saw any statues of
Ananias. It’s the only time we hear anything about him in the Bible. The
Lord appears to him in a vision and calls him by name: "Ananias!"
Ananias replies with the same words Abraham uses when God calls him to go to a
strange land … the same words Moses uses when God calls him to go back to
Egypt to confront Pharoah, the same words Samuel uses
when God calls him to become a prophet to the King, the same words Isaiah uses
when God calls him to challenge the people’s unfaithfulness, the same
words Mary uses when God calls her to bring the Messiah to birth. Just like
them, when God calls, Ananias’ first response is "Here I am!"
It means: "I am present. I am listening. I am ready to do what you ask."
Oh, I think this might be a better world if more of us responded that way to
God more often. Instead of filling
God’s ears with all our prayers and pleas and demands, if we would simply
put ourselves in God’s presence, give God our full attention, and say,
"Here I am, Lord," and be ready to do what he calls us to do.
Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do when we come here? Stand in
God’s presence, present for duty, and wait for God’s orders?
What the Lord wants Ananias to do is not easy. "Go into town and talk to
this man named Saul and open his eyes to my truth." This is the other
thing Ananias has in common with Abraham and Moses and Samuel and Isaiah and
Mary. He says, "Who, me?" And he says, "Are you kidding?"
And he says, “Do you realize what you are asking of me?" As if the
Lord didn’t know. Well, a lot of the things most worth doing are also the
hardest things for us to do. Face down our fears. Stretch beyond our comfort
zone. Put ourselves out there on the edge. Overcome our own prejudices. Ananias
has to go to the very man every Christian has come to fear, and help him, and
love him in Jesus’ name. Who would that be in your life? Who would you have a hard time loving and
helping in the name of Christ as your way of loving the Lord?
Ananias goes. He lays his hands on Saul and Saul’s eyes are opened. Saul
stops using his old Jewish name and takes up a new
Greek name, Paul, because he will go to the people he hated most as the good
news bearer for the faith he hated most. But none of it would have happened if
it hadn’t been for this man named Ananias.
All of these stories about God’s call today remind us of three beautiful,
though somewhat unsettling truths. First, in Christ’s resurrection we also
rise to serve. Second, there’s not a person here Christ can’t use
to spread his love around. Third, Jesus has to get our attention first.
My friend, Christ is risen. He was here before you
even arrived today preparing food for your soul. What
would it take for you to hear him now?
He is here calling you by name. Can you hear him now?
May we pray?
Here we are, Lord. And with a little attention to your word and to our life
stories, a little focused listening, we will hear your call for each of us, for
all of us together. Give us the grace and good sense to hear and to do, to love
and to follow in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Rev. Mary Anne Biggs, Pastor
Nekoosa United
Nekoosa