SECOND CHANCES BY THE SEA

John 21: 15-17

Read the Scripture carefully as we do each week, and you will find out that Jesus and his disciples have returned to Galilee. He went to Jerusalem to fulfill Scripture and to face the cross. But today, Jesus is risen from the dead and back in the area where he spent most of his ministry. Galilee was not a place of wealth and the seat of power like Jerusalem was, but was a working man’s community, with tradesmen, fisherman, and farmers. Jesus, we know, was a tekton according the Greek word in the Bible. Traditionally we have translated that word as “carpenter.” But those who have been to Galilee, even over to the city of Nazareth and the cosmopolitan city of Sepphoris where most of the contracted work must have been done, know that the land had so few sizeable trees that one man said even in Jerusalem that the cross the Romans used for crucifixion would have been an expensive execution device. (Bargil Pixner) Wood was scarce. Tekton, then, didn’t just mean carpenter as we are used to hearing it. It also meant stone mason, certainly part of the trade in which Jesus was schooled. Did you know that? As a boy schooled in Torah; as a young man who knew how to build and how to fish, our Lord could relate to men. Our Lord also had the support of many loyal women. And he loved children. This is the image of God that pours from Jesus’ eyes, words, and actions: the Love of God; the kind of love described by John in his first letter (I John 4: 7-12).

As Jesus made what are called his post-resurrection appearances, we know from Matthew’s Gospel that he said: “Go tell my brothers and sisters to go to Galilee, and there they will see me.” (Matt. 28:10) We know from John’s Gospel that the disciples were in Jerusalem at least 8 days for Passover. At the end of that time they returned to their homes and trades. Peter’s home was in Capernaum, at the northern edge of the Sea of Galilee. Today they are back in Galilee according to John 21, fishing on that sea, also called the Sea of Tiberias. That night they caught nothing according to the verses just before today’s reading. By day they were on the Sea of Galilee fishing again when Jesus appeared on the shore. From his vantage point, he could tell where the fish were. Although I am no fisherman, it has been fun for me to go out fishing with people in boats a few times in my life. In one boat I recall being able to scan the waters from a short distance and see the water disturbed by schools of fish. Could Jesus have seen them appear from his vantage point while the discouraged fishermen were busy trying the other side? Who knows how our Lord amazed his followers? It’s likely that the disciples were using a cast net when they were fishing, which is “a circular net about 20 feet in diameter with weights attached to the bottom edge. The cast net could be thrown either from a boat or from the shoreline. With great skill, the fisherman folded the net over one arm in a manner that would allow it to open completely when it landed in the water and then descend like a parachute trapping fish beneath it. To retrieve the cast net, the fisherman would dive into the water and pull the bottom of the net together carefully.” According to verses 7-8, “when Peter heard that Jesus was standing on the shore, … he jumped into the water and swam the distance.” [Vamosh, DAILY LIFE AT THE TIME OF JESUS, Palphot, Israel, p.63.]

As Jesus invites them to bring some of the fish to the shore to cook for breakfast, John’s Gospel clearly points out “this was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.”

With the stage set at the place where Jesus and Peter had shared many successes and failures, Jesus turned to a guilt-ridden Peter, the one disciple who had denied knowing him three times, and began his question this way: he used his given name which was “Simon, son of John.” “Peter” was the name Jesus gave him (Peter in Greek, Cephas in Aramaic, which meant rock.) Here Jesus reverts to his given name either as a blessing like we use full names at baptisms, or in earnestness the way a mother calls to her child when he has done something wrong. “Jeffrey Alan, did you make this mess in the kitchen?!” I knew that wasn’t a blessing voice, but I still came running! Jesus used the full name for blessing AND to make a point: “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Love was what Jesus embodied and it’s the very essence of God. Peter says that he certainly does love him. Then Jesus commissions him to be the Good Shepherd of the flock while he is gone: “feed my lambs.” Remember how precious lambs were to the Jews. Then he asked him again: “Do you love me?” And Peter answered a second time, “yes, Lord, you know that I do.” Jesus commissions him again: “Tend my sheep.” By the third time that Jesus asks him, perhaps Peter was getting exasperated. Wouldn’t you? He had already clearly answered the question twice. Yet he answered him again: “You know everything; you know that I love you.” To which Peter gets commissioned for the third time, undoing the time in Jerusalem when he denied his Lord three times. The text doesn’t indicate that Peter got the meaning at that moment: but Jesus had undone the curse of his denial. He did it because he loved his disciples, and he loves us. When we sing a Kyrie, “Lord have mercy, Christ have mercy, Lord, have mercy,” it pleads for Jesus to give us the same second chance once offered to Peter by the sea.

Many of you will remember the wonderful song in “Fiddler on the Roof,” called “Do you love me?” Tevye and Golde had met on their wedding day through the traditional Jewish arranged marriage. Tevye’s parents had told him they would learn to love each other. Marriage was based on a covenant between one another before there was any love between each another. You might have seen such an arranged marriage portrayed in the studio film “The Nativity” as Mary became betrothed to Joseph through arrangements by her father. Covenant is still at the heart of Christian marriage: its not just about love, it’s about promises. So in “Fiddler,” after 25 years of marriage, Tevye asks Golda the simple question that we heard in the passage today: “Do you love me?” Seven times he asks his wife, and only after the seventh time of explaining all she has done for him for a quarter of a century does she finally give the straightest answer she can give: “I suppose I do.” Twenty-five years and it had never been asked or said; sometimes we need to hear that we are loved.

Friends, there are many who are hungry for the words and thoughtful actions of love—husbands to wives; wives to husbands; girlfriends, boyfriends, children, parents. Do you say “I love you” to anyone? If your actions don’t show it, or if abuse, neglect, or indifference are in place of love, then the words are hollow. If you show love, let the one you love hear it once in awhile. One who longs to hear and know your love is the one from whom we have come and to whom we will one day go. If you think your parents, spouse, or children do loving things for you, how many behind-the-scene things has God done for you? What blessings or guidance have come along because God loves you? As Max Lucado has said, “If God had a refrigerator; your picture would be on it.” But like Tevye, perhaps God, once I a while, just needs to hear the answer to the question: “Do you love me?” Let your actions support your words when one day soon, even today, you join Peter in saying: “Yes Lord, you know that I love you.” And just for good measure, you could say it … three times.” J

Let us pray:

Dear Lord: perhaps it has been awhile since some of us have talked with you in prayer. To simply say, “Dear Jesus, I love you,” seems too rushed for such a heartfelt sentiment. We remember that in saying you love your church, you meant: “I give you my life and my promise to lay down my life for you. Today those who are committed to you say: “I accept your life and promise; in return I give you my heart and devotion. Thank you, dear Lord, for keeping your promises and offering us forgiveness. Amen.

Jeffrey A. Sumner April 22, 2007