Saturday 4 May 2019

Sermon Opoho Church Sunday 5 May 2019 Easter 3 Holy Communion


Readings  Acts 9:1-20    John 21:1-17

We pray: may the words of my mouth and the meditations of our hearts be acceptable in your sight, O God, our rock and our sustainer.  Amen.

Today on this third Sunday of the Easter season, the lectionary presents us with two readings that remind us of the grace of God made known in the risen Christ challenge our response to that grace.  One set some days after the astonishing event of the empty tomb and the other- well, later. There is some debate whether Paul’s Damascus Rd experience was, like the disciples, a meeting with the resurrected Jesus before the ascension or rather vision on the road after that.  
But that is not the issue here - what was important was the fact that this was a very big conversion, a huge change of understanding in one who was to become a pivotal disciple of Jesus– huge in the story of the Christian faith and the Christian church. 

It was a sensational turnaround for a zealot who remorselessly persecuted those who followed this man Jesus. 
He had demonstrated a ferocious commitment to stamp out these miscreants, these Christ followers – which might indicate perhaps that he was quite familiar with Jesus’ teachings and very aware of the danger to the Jewish faith that this new ‘teaching’ brought – that it threatened the sacredness of scripture and its law and therefore the unique status of Israel.  Yet, as if often the case, the very act of suppression was counterproductive – scattering the disciples far and wide, where they preached in synagogues they might not have gone to, had listeners that they might not have engaged with.

And was Paul really as convinced of the complete awfulness of this new teaching – Bill Loader suggests that perhaps, by the time he was heading off to Damascus, chasing down some of these refugee Christians, his very zeal was that of someone who feared that what he was trying to stamp out actually had some validity.  It’s not an unknown thing that those who fear the truth of something are the most opposed to it.

So perhaps what happened on that road that day, the voice from heaven, the blindness, the conversion from prosecutor to believer was into a soul that was troubled and disturbed already.  We can only wonder.
What we do know is that the overwhelming sense of love, embodied in Christ he encountered on the road and now flowing in those who had become the body of Christ, such as Ananias – this love broke through his barriers of fear and reached into his very soul.  Paul, instead of being an example of the wrath of God, became the recipient of the grace of God. 

Paul’s encounter with the risen Christ on the road to Damascus was extraordinary, a ‘big’ change, a very new and unexpected commissioning.  Is it any wonder that Ananias was reluctant to go to him? It showed great courage to on his part to go minister to this man that by all accounts was out to destroy the fragile Jesus movement in first century Israel. Yet his words were also full of grace "Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit."  And so Paul was and his journey with Christ and with us had begun….

And we know that Paul went on to use that same zeal he had used against the Christians to instead follow Christ’s teaching, often going far beyond where other disciples and apostles were prepared to go.  He refused to withhold regular table fellowship with Gentiles, resisting those who insisted on circumcising the same people, asserting that, in the love of God in Christ, legitimate biblical law became an outcome rather than a driver of righteousness.  He was just as determined, focused, powerfully intense in his ministry for Christ to the world as he had been in his previous denial of Jesus as the Messiah.

And so we come to the Gospel for today – John’s account of the appearance of the risen Jesus down by the lake to the fishermen.  You can almost hear their thinking:  ‘What were we to do?  We knew Jesus was alive – we had seen him – but then he went away again and there were no instructions.  So I suggested we go back to fishing – and the others agreed – we had to feed ourselves at the very least – we couldn’t exist on memories and fresh air.  But that wasn’t much use – not a splash of a fish in sight – maybe it was some kind of punishment for us leaving him when he most needed us – for our doubting, and our denials and our blindness of faith all those times.’ 

There is that sense that, like Paul, they were troubled and disturbed and not sure what direction they should be going in. They also seemed to be reluctant to approach Jesus – not sure of their reception perhaps.  And yet they came to the shore, Peter first among them, drawn to the hope that was this stranger beckoning them in. Drawn to the meal that was so much part of their experience of being in the presence of the living Christ.
And we can say that this also was a time when the grace of God overwhelmed the doubt and denial and uncertainty of the disciples as Jesus welcomed them and loved them.  But it was for Peter that this encounter was most life changing.

Again imagine it from Peter’s point of view – sitting there, breakfast finished, a private moment with Jesus when he was asked: ‘Do you love me Peter?’ Three times!   The first time was embarrassing, the second he started to get annoyed, the third time he understood, he knew that this was the recycling of denial into affirmation of his commission to go out and feed Christ’s sheep no matter where it would take him.

It’s is remarkable how, in the commissioning for ministry of both Paul and Simon Peter, the risen Christ overwhelms them with grace, empowering them to walk the way of discipleship, unashamedly and unconditionally.

And I guess the question for us is where are we holding guilts and fears and understandings which prevent us from striding with conviction into the paths that we know we should be walking. 
Where are we denying a truth because deep down we are afraid it might have a validity?  I think immediately of those who prosecute others in the name of Christ because to do otherwise might shift some of their established and containable brick walls they build around their faith.  Quoting bible verses in hate, seeking to drive out those who are different, refusing to eat with those who also come in the name of Jesus.

Where are we refusing God’s grace in our lives? I think of those who allow guilt of past failure to determine their worthiness (or not) before Jesus – whose denials feel stronger than their affirmations. And those who block out God’s merciful voice to them because they are too busy shouting at themselves.

Where are we adrift, directionless, stuck in a limbo of nothingness?  I think of those who are looking in the wrong place, fishing out of the wrong side of the boat, unable to trust that by the grace of God, new and unexpected paths are where we are to go. I think of people unable to hear the love of God in Scripture, drowned out as it is by judgement and hatred and personal agendas.  I think of those who allow fear to rule their lives and their choices.

There is much that we can ponder from these readings today – and, as we gather round the table together, may we be reminded of the grace of God made known in Jesus Christ, may we be reminded of the purpose that we live in as Christians – to love God and one another in all we say, do and be, may we forever remember that we are Christ’s body here in this community, this city, this world and that we have promised, with Peter, to feed those whom Jesus loves wherever it might take us.  God’s grace be with us all.  Amen.

Margaret Garland


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