They Will Know We Are Christians

I’ll never forget walking up to the statue in Tabgha, Israel. There was Peter, looking up at the Risen Lord. It was located on the banks by the Sea of Galilee. According to the Gospel of John, it was just after daybreak, Jesus called out to his disciples who were fishing. Yes, this is a post-resurrection story. The disciples at first did not know it was Jesus calling from the shore.

The idea of not recognizing Jesus perhaps reveals something of our human nature which after the resurrection may have been difficult to identify. Yet the voice caught the disciples’ attention. “Children, you have no fish, have you?” They answered “No.”

May I suggest what was going on between the disciples in the boat and Jesus on the shore was not simply an instruction in fishing. Nor was Jesus touching a sore spot to those disciples who had spent all night fishing only to come up empty-handed. What catches my attention in this vignette is Jesus calls to them to cast their nets on the other side. It is not a story about Jesus performing yet, another miracle. For me, the miracle appears within the simple words “they did.”

They did what Jesus said to do. They trusted Jesus. Better yet, they believed in Jesus. The miracle is when Christ appears—even from a distant shore—we discover a new way of being. It is time to let the old ways die. Jesus taught us at least that much. Sin does not work. A life of doing it “my way” as our friend Frank Sinatra bellows, really does get old.  Old ways, habits, routines, drag us down as familiar as they might be. Casting our nets in a new direction brings up not only a load of fish but don’t you know Jesus is recognized.

Remember it is just after daybreak. The disciples are no longer in the dark—if you know what I mean. Aware, attentive, and wide-awake, the disciples have breakfast with Jesus. Some scholars will say this breakfast took place where a boy gave Jesus a few barley loaves and some fish to feed 5,000. Although that is a miracle how about having breakfast with the Risen Lord.

Don’t you know that is what we do every time we gather and encounter the Risen Lord when we break bread, where Jesus appears in our midst. And what he says to Peter, he says to us all. “Do you love me?”

Of course, we love Jesus. Then, Jesus says to Peter and again, and to all Christians who love him, “feed my sheep.”  Feed them with food that will last forever. Feed them with the bread of life. Yes, feed them with love which is formed by our will, our choices, our decisions to extend ourselves for the good of another. It is not about fixing another.

It is about providing and opening, a way for Jesus to touch the life of another, by allowing our faith and our love to hold hands and go to work. They will know we are Christians.