Easter 3C
In the name of God: who was, and who is, and who is to
come. Amen.
Last week felt like something of a return to the “back to
normal” life for the church, after all of the excitement around Easter Day.
This week, in this epilogue to John’s gospel, we hear of the
sort of “back to normal” life for the disciples.
The 21st chapter of John always makes me think of my friend,
Megan, and the story she tells about her uncle.
Whenever he’s a part of a social engagement and is ready for it to be finished,
he’ll simply slap his hands on his legs, say, “Well, okay…”, and stand up and
walk out of the room.
No good byes. Never
seeing his guests out the door. It’s
just “Well, okay…” and he’s gone.
Over the years, this has become a kind of inside joke
between Megan and me. We talk on the
phone almost every day, and if there’s a lull in the conversation, one of us
will just say, “Well, okay…”, we’ll laugh, and the conversation ends.
In the 21st chapter of John, I can almost hear Peter saying,
“Well, okay…”
The followers of Jesus had been through so much. He had called them. They had followed. He had taught them. They had grasped some of it. He had done signs and wonders in their
sight. They had marveled at his power
and come to worship him as the Son of God.
In the more recent days, things had changed. They had been a part of the Last Supper. They had prayed with him in the garden. They had seen him arrested. They had betrayed him and they had denied
him. They had run for fear of their own
safety. They had hidden together from
the crowds. They had witnessed his
crucifixion and even his resurrection.
After all of this - the unusual years that climaxed into
those final, dramatic days: the jumbled emotions of heart wrenching pain, and
earth-shattering joy - after everything, they must have been sitting in that
room together in a kind of stunned silence.
Where could they go from here?
As the stun began to wane and the silence grew into pregnant
anticipation, Peter must have slapped his hands on his legs, stood up and said,
“Well, okay… I’m going fishing.”
At some point, life had to go on - even if now it couldn’t
be recognizable as compared to the life they had before.
When your world is turned upside down, there comes a
juncture wherein you simply have to go on.
And if you don’t know how to go on, you go back to the basics.
He might not have known what anything in the world meant
now, but he knew how to fish. No matter
what had changed, that simple act was a constant he (and they) could still cling to.
My first serious exposure to the Episcopal Church was at
Trinity Episcopal Church in Clarksville, Tennessee. I was in school there at the time, and
studying vocal music, and my voice teacher had offered me a paid position
singing in the parish choir.
When I found this community, they were in the midst of
recovering from a terrible trauma. Their
church and parish hall buildings had recently been destroyed by a devastating
tornado. Within weeks after the storm,
while the community was just beginning to wrap their minds around the work of
rebuilding, their rector suffered a heart attack and died.
The people of the parish were, understandably,
devastated. Everything that they thought
was holding them together had been crushed in one swift blow after
another. By the time I found them, they
were basically wandering in a stupefied daze.
Though they had no idea where to begin, the one thing they
did know was that they needed to worship.
Their building was gone. Their
priest was gone. And if they didn’t
worship, their community would soon be gone, too.
So they worshiped.
They borrowed space from the local Roman Catholic church. The choir practiced in the organist’s
home. Soon they had an interim
rector. And though things would be
different, and maybe even a little uncomfortable for a while, they stumbled
through by simply doing what they knew how to do. They went back to the basics.
That’s where we find Peter and the other disciples
today. It may not even be that the shock
was even gone yet, but it had somehow lost its grip on them. Maybe they had simply grown bored with
it. But after the shock, somehow, life
had to keep going.
They may not have known how to do anything else in their
lives now, but they still knew how to fish.
Back to the basics.
The funny thing is - the amazing thing, really - is that,
even in that: even in the most hum drum, ordinary of tasks - even in just
fishing - even there, they would find Christ in their midst.
The people of Trinity Church did, too.
After the church buildings were rebuilt, and after they had
moved back in, and after they had called their next rector, they reflected on
their time in the wilderness, and realized that it had made them stronger. It had brought them together in ways that
they had never been truly “together” before.
And through their unity in worship and prayer in some of the darkest
days of their community’s history - through getting back to the basics of what
made them a Christian community - they realized that they had seen Christ in
their midst.
Easter Day here was fun. It
was grand, and big, and beautiful. It
was dazzling. I hope you felt that there
was something holy happening here that day.
I know I did.
Now things are getting back to normal.
But that doesn’t mean that they have to be any less
holy. It certainly doesn’t mean that
we’re any less likely to see Christ.
Things are getting
back to normal, but it’s a new normal now.
A new normal, with a renewed appreciation for the truth of Christ among
us.
We’ve been through our own little wilderness, and now we’re on
the Resurrection side of reality. When
the bigger wildernesses come, we can traverse them with the sure and certain
hope that new life will be their product.
That’s the way it works.
Just when we start to settle in, we see Christ, and we remember that
normal will never be normal again.
Thanks be to God.
Amen.
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