Be like Peter: make a splash

In today’s gospel reading, the disciples are out fishing, no doubt trying to find their feet again in the turbulent time that had followed Jesus’s crucifixion and the couple of miraculous sightings some of them had experienced since. There are many things to love about this reading, but I have to admit the imagery that lingers with me is that of Peter jumping out of the boat and heading to shore.

Call me a deep thinker, but the first question that springs to my mind is why the heck would anyone be fishing naked? And the natural follow-on question is why would you put your clothes on, only to jump into the lake and get them soaking wet? It wouldn’t have made swimming any easier. I mean, I can understand that Peter would be excited to see Jesus - so sure, jump up, leap overboard, and swim. Alternately, I can well imagine that he would want to be dressed - so yes, scramble back into your clothes. It’s the combination of the two actions that makes me chuckle. And remember, according to the story this is all taking place just 100 yards from shore - roughly the same distance from here to the other side of the tennis courts. I expect Peter would have got to the beach much quicker if he’d just stayed put and paddled fast.

I got to wondering if Peter’s slightly madcap reaction to seeing Jesus alive again might prompt us to question our own response to the gospel narratives of the empty tomb and the resurrected Christ. What are we to do with this story that has been passed down from generation to generation to generation and was again entrusted to us on April 20?

Great lines of poetry have been written about the days that follow Christmas. At the end of his long poem "For the Time Being: A Christmas Oratorio"  W.H. Auden talks about packing away the Christmas decorations into the attic and writes: "As in previous years we have seen the actual Vision and failed To do more than entertain it as an agreeable Possibility, once again we have sent Him away …. The Christmas Feast is already a fading memory."

More helpfully, perhaps, African-American theologian and civil rights leader Howard Thurman wrote "The Work of Christmas," the words of which were later used for the popular gospel song, "I am the Light of the World." Thurman wrote that after the songs of the angels have stilled, the star in the sky is gone, and the shepherds are back with their flock - that is when the real work of Christmas is begun: to find the lost and lonely, to heal the broken, to rebuild the nations.

Strangely enough, though, our western culture has not offered up much of a guide for what we should be doing with ourselves in the days following Easter. Easter poetry, as I have discovered with a google search, is very long on lambs and daffodils, and very short on moral instruction. Even the church, I think, comes up short. We Christians have Lenten studies and programs coming out our ears, but hardly anything at all for the season of Eastertide, being the 50 days that stretch from Easter Sunday to Pentecost. A web search for Easter studies yielded me nothing; an online trip to the Church Times Bookshop in England offered up only one book, titled The Risen Existence. This is a seven-week Eastertide study written by Paula Gooder, who states in the introduction that she wrote the book because she couldn’t find anything else like it. It seems that our collective focus and engagement come to a screeching halt once the events of Holy Week have been duly acknowledged. A week or two later, to echo Auden above, the Easter feast becomes already a fading memory.

So no wonder, like poor Peter in the boat, we don’t know quite what to do with ourselves in this post-Resurrection period. And that’s a problem. Because if we take to heart the gospel accounts and the message of the Resurrection, this truly is for us the most wonderful time of the year. The most hopeful time. The most joyful time. The time we remember those disciples and followers who may have walked closely with Jesus in his earthly life, but who only adopted a radical change in belief and action following his resurrection appearances. Those who had hidden in fear behind locked doors went on to openly proclaim Christ as divine and to risk their personal safety again and again and again.

C.S. Lewis famously said: "Christianity is a statement which, if false, is of no importance, and if true, of infinite importance. The one thing it cannot be is moderately important.” But it is so easy for most of us to fall into that middle ground, isn’t it? To stay comfortable in our faith, and to forget that it calls us to rise up, take stock, and take risks.

I think God understands that we need help in this post-Easter period. To take a moment to process and regroup. After the disciples had met the risen Christ, he didn’t tell them to go out then and there and start proclaiming the good news - he told them to go and wait in Jerusalem, where, as it turned out, the holy spirit would descend on them at Pentecost and equip them for far greater ministry. In the reading today, Jesus sits with Peter on the beach and puts him through a repetitive mini-catechism ("Peter, do you love me - yes? Feed my sheep")  to bring Peter down from the euphoria of the moment and connect him to an inner structure of meaning that will give him clarity and strength for his ministry to come.

Even Saul’s dramatic experience on the road to Damascus was followed by an enforced period of stillness, while he sat, fasting and blind, at a home in the city. It’s not just Paul who is being challenged - so is Ananias, who at the same time is being instructed by God to visit Paul and lay hands on him so that he may regain his sight. Understandably, Ananias isn’t keen to visit the person who was violently persecuting people who belonged to the Way, as the early Jesus movement was called. God doesn’t explicitly guarantee Ananais’s safety, but Ananais decides to trust God and in doing so plays a key role in unleashing Paul’s ministry and the incredible growth of the Christian church.

So perhaps these weeks of Eastertide, as exciting as they are, are initially about fully processing for ourselves the magnitude of what happened that first Easter, and what it means for us. We may have celebrated Easter Sunday, participated in an egg hunt, and enjoyed a hearty lunch or dinner. But where are we on our walk with God? Is there somewhere inside us where the stone has yet to be rolled away?

Last week Helen encouraged us to experiment with using the words "I trust" instead of "I believe" when saying the creed. There are a few other words of a similar nature that we often use interchangeably, when in fact they each carry different shades of meaning. Not long ago at work I was offering some writing tips and had occasion to look up the meanings of the words feel, think, and believe.

When we feel something, we are calling on our emotions and our subjective experience to form our opinion, as in "It’s so grey outside, I feel like staying home."  When we think something, we are offering an opinion shaped by more objective measures, such as reasoning and logic, as in "It’s pretty grey outside, and the weather report calls for rain, so I think you should take an umbrella." When we believe something, we are are offering our opinion in an area that is generally accepted to be a matter of some speculation or conjecture, as in "I’m taking an umbrella to Lynn Valley Day, because I believe that no matter when they schedule it, it’s going to rain at least part of the day."

All of these ways of seeing the world - through feeling, thinking, and believing - ultimately add up to where we place our trust. And where we place our trust makes all the difference, for us and for others.

Our recent federal election was a case in point. Two people could look at the same data, the same election ad, or the same interview, and come away from it with entirely different impressions and opinions of what they had just seen. This is usually because they had already decided, consciously or unconsciously,  which party had their trust, and so everything was interpreted through that lens. Our vote goes to the party or candidate who has won our trust, but who we trust is a complex result of our feelings, thoughts and beliefs that are in turn affected by a million other factors.

So let’s take the time we need in these post-Easter weeks to feel. To think. To ponder our beliefs. Because all these together will determine where we place our trust, and our trust determines how we act. Critically, we want the dog to be wagging the tail, and not the other way around - whether in our faith life or anywhere else, we don’t want a misplaced or outdated trust, to colour our ability to feel authentically, to think objectively, or to believe with integrity.

Trusting is a dynamic process - or at least it should be. It’s not easy to do, but revisiting our thoughts, feelings and beliefs helps ensure our trust continues to be well placed. And a better-informed trust helps us live out more deeply and effectively all we are called to do and be in this world.

Another thing I like about the beach scene in today’s reading is that it is a potluck. Jesus already has bread and fish on the go, but he asks the disciples to bring some more. God doesn’t like to work alone. And if God doesn’t work alone, then we shouldn’t either. We can actively help each other grow in our understanding.

I was pleasantly taken aback when I was driving the other day and flicked on CBC radio to hear a man’s voice booming:"I believe in God." It was Alan Ritchson, the actor who plays Jack Reacher, being interviewed by Tom Power on Q, and making reference to the faith that got him through some tough times. What a powerful witness for those people listening across the country and beyond, and what powerful good we can do in our own spheres of influence when we let our faith shine through our words and our deeds. The world is hungry for hope and for meaning.

For those who might enjoy a good think in the weeks to come, I’ve brought from my home library a selection of books on Christian basics, from a range of decades and of schools of thought within the Christian spectrum. You’re welcome to borrow one if you see a title that appeals to you.

Last week Helen referenced the famous 19th century painting The Light of the World by Holman Hunt, which you can see on the back of today’s bulletin. It’s a painting of Christ knocking at a door that has no handle on the outside, and therefore controlled by the person on the inside. While it has always been understood as a beautifully rendered metaphor of Christ seeking entry into our lives, Helen recounted Pope Francis’s interpretation of it as Christ knocking and asking us to come out and follow him into the world.

But there is, of course, a time and place for both. "Think before you act," our parents always told us, and they were usually right. By opening the door and letting Christ in to our hearts and minds, we are given the clarity and courage to answer his knock and step forth firmly grounded in wisdom, humility, commitment, and love.

I still don’t know whether it’s the right move to jump out of a boat naked or whether to put your clothes on first. But I do know that Peter was swimming in the right direction. I encourage all of us to use these glorious weeks of Eastertide to dive deeper into our feelings, into our thoughts and our beliefs so we can emerge from the water feeling revitalized in our faith in the resurrected Christ and in the God who loves us all.

***

- Photo by Noelle Otto: https://www.pexels.com/photo/splash-of-water-906023/