Third Sunday of Easter

Acts 9: 1-20
Psalm 30
Revelation 5: 11-14
John 21: 1-19

What a gift the Great Fifty Days are for the church! Time to celebrate. Time to ponder. Celebrate and ponder the stupefying wonder that is the Resurrection of Jesus, the Christ. Here we are on the third Sunday of Easter and the disciples still aren’t getting it. Their continued bafflement speaks volumes to the shock of what has taken place. Thousands of years later the ripples of that decisive Act of God can continue to confound us; the church is still in need of this gift of time to yearly reorient ourselves to what God is up to.

Unexpected, startling, the Resurrection of Jesus has left the disciples at loose ends, unsure of what the implications are and of what they are to do with themselves. “I am going fishing.” says Simon Peter in this Sunday’s text from John. This is the first hint in John’s gospel that some of the disciples are former fishermen. When confronted with something surprisingly new, it seems to be human nature to fall back on old ways. The others, lacking for any better ideas of what to do, decide to join him. They hang out the “Gone Fishing” sign and head for the boat, though their efforts prove fruitless. It all seems a bit anticlimactic and even a little lame after everything that’s happened. Perhaps the real miracle is that the church was birthed at all! Read more