Year C Easter 3 2022 Clueless

 Year C Easter 3, 1 May 2022

St. James the Less Episcopal, Ashland, VA

“Clueless”

Collect: O God, whose blessed Son made himself known to his disciples in the breaking of bread: Open the eyes of our faith, that we may behold him in all his redeeming work; who lives and reigns with you, in the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for ever. Amen.

Acts 9:1-6

Saul, still breathing threats and murder against the disciples of the Lord, went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues at Damascus, so that if he found any who belonged to the Way, men or women, he might bring them bound to Jerusalem. Now as he was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" He asked, "Who are you, Lord?" The reply came, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do." 

John 21:1-19

Jesus showed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias; and he showed himself in this way. Gathered there together were Simon Peter, Thomas called the Twin, Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples. Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing." They said to him, "We will go with you." They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to them, "Children, you have no fish, have you?" They answered him, "No." He said to them, "Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some." So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, "It is the Lord!" When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the sea. But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off.

When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. Jesus said to them, "Bring some of the fish that you have just caught." So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, "Come and have breakfast." Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, "Who are you?" because they knew it was the Lord. Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love you." Jesus said to him, "Feed my lambs." A second time he said to him, "Simon son of John, do you love me?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love you." Jesus said to him, "Tend my sheep." He said to him the third time, "Simon son of John, do you love me?" Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, "Do you love me?" And he said to him, "Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you." Jesus said to him, "Feed my sheep. Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go." (He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, "Follow me."

Today is a joyous day. Today we celebrate and baptize little Evie, merging her story with The Story. Often growing up I had heard that history came from the words “His Story,” being God’s story, but it is actually from the Greek “histor” or wise man. 

But when we have the view, the long view, what we celebrate today is the cycle of life, bringing in and celebrating with 4 generations today. What a rarity, what a joy!

But I want to talk about the baby for a bit. Evie is clueless. No offense. She may be in the moment, but it is not imaginable that she will have any conscious memory of this day. It may live in family stories, and when the pictures get pulled out she may remember the reminiscences, but she will not remember the day.

And in this day, we tie her to Jesus’s baptism, and to the Hebrew children walking through the Red Sea, and to our baptisms that we have had, and to all the baptisms that are yet to be. We re-member our baptisms, both reconnecting (re-membering) and thinking of them as well. We remember the baptisms we have seen, and the Baptismal Covenant vows we made or had made on our behalf. But we were not always in this state of being in the know. We had to start somewhere.

We were Clueless, and then we moved into a place of Revelation. Our eyes were opened, and all was revealed. That is revelation, that is unveiling of what truly is.

Saul thought he was defending the faith of the one true God. But lo and behold, what he was doing was the exact opposite. And really, if God is who we say God is, does God need defending? Come on!

Now as [Saul] was going along and approaching Damascus, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice saying to him, "Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?" He asked, "Who are you, Lord?" The reply came, "I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting. But get up and enter the city, and you will be told what you are to do." 

And he was struck blind, “blinded by the light!” if you ever wonder where that phrase came from. He was taken to the city, Damascus, and after three days his eyes were opened, metaphorically, literally, or both, the scales fell off, and he could see again.

He was clueless, like little Evie. And that is okay! There is no fault in ignorance when you are a baby.

Ignorance is the lack of information. Stupidity is not being able or willing to learn and change. The baby is ignorant because she is clueless. No one faults her for that.

But Saul ignored the scriptures, he ignored the miracles at hand. He felt he needed to take matters in his own hand, and persecuted the church on behalf of the Jewish religious leaders (thinking he was doing it for God, the audacity!) encouraging the killing and imprisonment of the followers of “The Way,” as early Christians called themselves.

Saul chose to be clueless, thinking he was doing the will of God. How often do we act in such a way to tell God what to do? God is still at work. God is still drawing the Kingdom more and more into reality. God goes to lengths we cannot fathom or imagine to love us and to bring us home.

Every so often God breaks through the noise and clutter we fill our lives with and gets a word in edgewise. “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?” “Your-name-here, your-name-here, why do you do fill-in-the-blank to hinder my kingdom?” When we get those nudges, those whispers, or even those blinding lights, how do we respond? 

Ignore them?

Rationalize them away?

Or do we stop in our tracks and listen?

Saul, who transformed into St. Paul, through the work and grace of God, spent three days blind, and then three years in Arabia and Damascus [if curious see Galatians 1:17], changing and growing and understanding what everything he learned as a youth really pointed to. It was not killing people in God’s defense. It was humbly becoming the first missionary to evangelize the known world.

He moved from a perspective of needing to prove he was worthy of God’s love to a place where God’s love sought him out and brought him home through Grace. He was Clueless, and then the Love of God was revealed in all its Glory. Thanks be to God.

In our Gospel reading we see the disciples, those closest to Jesus. They were clueless, too. They had seen the Risen Lord, but when there was uncertainty as to what to do, they went back to what they knew, the lives they led before they even met Jesus. Now some of you might argue that when in doubt one should go fishing, but in this instance, I do not think what Jesus had in mind for his closest friends and followers.

Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing." They said to him, "We will go with you." They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

Going back to what we know, going back to the status quo, going back to the safety of what came before is no longer a choice for those of us who are no longer clueless. Choosing to stay clueless makes us stupid. Not ignorant, intentionally clueless.

What I said last week remains true. Ignorance may be bliss, but it is no longer a choice.

Jesus does not want any of us to choose to remain in the dark. Jesus wants us to grow into the fulness and stature God intended for us.

Sometimes we do things to uphold tradition. Sometimes we do things from familial expectations. Sometimes we are running, running from shame, running from guilt.

The encounter of Jesus and Peter on that Galilean shore is one of the most loving portraits of Grace in scripture for me. Jesus does not force himself on Peter, demanding him to change his ways. But there are so many ways that Jesus sets it up for Peter to step up, to grow up, and to come into the fulness of relationship  and love Jesus is offering.

He sees his disciples going back to their old lives, their old way of doing things, losing sight of the vision of God’s Kingdom he gave to them. But even then, after a night of toil, they had caught nothing. So Jesus gives them what they thought they wanted, fish. 153 of them, all big. That type of detail in the story fascinates me.

And here Jesus set the stage for Peter to see two things, Jesus still loved him and accepted him just as he was, and that Peter could love and forgive himself for what he had done. 

And you may be saying, but Rock, Jesus asks Peter if he loves him, and he has to do so three times! Yep. You are right. But do think Jesus ever doubts that Peter loves him? Don’t you think Jesus knows Peter’s heart? Your heart? My heart?

And not to mention, Jesus just witnessed Peter jump out of a boat and swim to him. Peter’s love was not in doubt, TO JESUS.

But Peter needed to hear Peter swear his love to Jesus. And he needed to do it THREE TIMES for his own sake. Not Jesus’s!

Only twice is the word charcoal used in the New Testament. Both are in the Gospel of John. Chapters 18 and 21. Most of us, when I mention the smell of charcoal, we can all pull it out of our store of sense memories. Our sense of smell is one of the strongest memory triggers that there is. Think of Thanksgiving. I bet you can smell it first, before any visual triggers. For me the smell of Christmas is Gluehwein, the warm mulled wine of the Christmas markets in Germany. I smell that and I feel the cool on my cheeks, the wool of my scarf wrapped tight, the tinkle of the Glockenspiel playing Christmas carols. All from a smell.

Did Jesus think that Peter remembered warming himself on the charcoal fire in the court of the High Priest Caiaphas? And that smell would trigger consciously or not the denials Peter made? Saying emphatically that he did not know Jesus not once, not twice, but three times?!? 

And here we are, smelling the charcoal again. And being asked who this Jesus was to him again, not once, not twice, but three times.

I do not think that any of this is accidental. So much of our spiritual lives is not about convincing ourselves that God loves us, that Jesus wants what is best for us. The older I get the biggest spiritual battles I wage are whether I can do what God wants me to do, whether I am worthy to do what God seems to be calling me to do. Too often my spiritual warfare is with who I belittle myself to be. And all the while Jesus finds a way to confront that “less than” image we hold, and goes to lengths, great ones at times, to tell us that we are not only loved, but lovable, not only able, but capable of great things. 

Saul on the road to Damascus is confronted with the truth of what he was truly doing and then becomes St. Paul.

Peter on the shore of the Sea of Galilee has to decide if he will put down his nets once and for all and take up the mantle of his calling in God. It was not God preventing him but that nagging voice in his ear, “You are not good enough. God could never forgive you for what you did.” But Jesus says, “Feed my sheep.” Jesus does not even recognize the excuses or the blame. He gets to the work at hand. 

Jesus combats that lying voice for Paul. Jesus combats that lying voice for Peter. Jesus combats that lying voice for all of us with the final two words of today’s reading.

Hear these words, and obey. Staying Clueless is not a choice. My prayer for Evie, for the parents, and godparents, for all of us is Jesus’ words of invitation and hope. “Follow me!” Amen