THIRD SUNDAY OF EASTER, YEAR C

May 4, 2025

Saints Matthew and Mark, Barrington, R. I.

 

Acts 9:1-6

John 21:1-19

 

In the New Testament, the risen Christ never appears to his followers merely to comfort, edify, or inspire. No, the Lord’s Resurrection appearances always entail a commission: a command to go and do something.

 

In the forty days between his Resurrection and Ascension, Christ instructs and organizes the disciples for the tasks ahead. The period of his earthly ministry is ending; the age of the Church’s mission to the world is about to begin.

 

In the Gospels of Matthew and Mark, Jesus promises his disciples that after he’s raised from the dead, he’ll go before them to Galilee, where they’ll see him. So, in today’s Gospel from John, we have one of the Risen Lord’s appearances to his disciples back up north, where they all came from.

 

It’s almost as though they’ve returned to the old life they once left behind to follow Jesus: fishing on the Sea of Galilee (also known as Lake Tiberias). After they catch nothing all night, the risen Jesus appears on the shore. At his instruction, they cast the net on the right side of the boat and miraculously haul in a catch of 153 large fish. This catch symbolically points to their future success in preaching the Gospel and gathering men and women into the Church. Jesus then cooks them breakfast over a charcoal fire on the beach. (When I was in the Holy Land three years ago, I stood on the same beach where this episode is believed to have taken place. It is a wonderful spot.)

 

What follows might be called the rehabilitation of Peter. Remember, on the night before Jesus dies, at the Last Supper, Peter promises Jesus that he will lay down his life for him—to which Jesus responds, “Will you lay down your life for me? Truly, truly, I say to you, the cock will not crow until you have denied me three times.” Sure enough, after Jesus is arrested and taken to the high priest’s house, Peter three times denies being one of his disciples.

 

In the Judaism of the time, to declare something three times is to make it legally irrevocable and binding. So, even after the Lord’s Resurrection, Peter is living with the guilt and shame of having betrayed Jesus after saying he’d lay down his life for him.

The point, then, of Christ’s asking Peter three times, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” is to give Peter the opportunity to cancel his threefold denial with a threefold declaration of love: “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” In response, Jesus three times commissions Peter to shepherd his flock: “Feed my lambs … tend my sheep … feed my sheep.” Not only that, but he foretells that eventually Peter will indeed fulfill his promise to lay down his life for his Lord: “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young you girded yourself and walked where you would, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish to go.”

 

In our reading from Acts, we see an even more dramatic instance of rehabilitation. Up until this moment, Saul has persecuted the fledgling Christian Church. He’s looked on with approval at the stoning to death of Saint Stephen, one of the first seven deacons. Then, according to Acts 8:3, “Saul laid waste the church, and entering house after house, he dragged off men and women and committed them to prison.”

 

As today’s reading opens, we find Saul on the road to Damascus, carrying letters from the high priest authorizing him to arrest any Christians he finds there, to bring them back to Jerusalem bound in ropes and chains. Saul is a hard case; and hard cases require extreme measures. To turn him around, it takes nothing less than a blinding light from heaven knocking him to the ground and a voice asking, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”

 

But instead of striking Saul dead on the spot for his crimes, the Lord does something totally unexpected. He chooses Saul to become the figure known to history as the Apostle Paul. “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But rise and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do.”

 

In both these stories, the person being commissioned must first be forgiven. Peter needs to be forgiven for denying Jesus three times, Paul needs to be forgiven for his murderous persecution of the Church. In both cases, forgiveness is indeed forthcoming. Peter is commissioned to be the Chief Shepherd of the Church, and the forgiven Paul is commissioned to be the Apostle to the Gentiles.

 

The point is that Christ’s Resurrection engenders a whole new raft of opportunities for second chances and fresh starts. Forgiveness becomes a real possibility for all who repent of their sins and return to the Lord. And that’s good news for all of us.

 

However, today’s Church often falls short of that ideal. In an age of zero tolerance, lawsuits, and legal liability, we’ve become a largely unforgiving Church. It’s not clear that either Saint Peter or Saint Paul would make even the first cut in the search and nomination processes in most of our episcopal elections today. They probably wouldn’t get past the initial background checks! (And I say this without the slightest intention of disrespect to any of our bishops!)

 

I don’t pretend to have any easy solutions to this problem. Clearly for some crimes, such as child abuse, we should have zero tolerance, and after such crimes there can be no second chances. Protecting the flock requires nothing less.

 

What I can suggest, however, is that we allow today’s readings to challenge us with an alternative vision of the Church and the world from the perspective of God’s Kingdom. If Jesus could not only forgive Peter but also make him chief shepherd among the apostles—and if Jesus could not only forgive Saul but also entrust him with the mission of preaching the Gospel throughout the world—then how far should we be willing to go in extending to repentant wrongdoers forgiveness, second chances, and fresh starts? Again, I have no easy answers to that question. But in light of today’s readings, it’s the question that we need always to be asking.