Word from the Pastor

Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” [The disciples] 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 . . . [Jesus] said to [Peter] 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 Jesus, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.” John 21:3-6; 17

We have journeyed through the 40 days of Lent, the mountaintops and valleys of Holy Week, and Easter morning and the empty tomb. Now what? What comes after Easter in our understanding of the faith journey that we have chosen to take?

 In John 20, we read of the fear and lack of hope that consumed the thinking of the disciples after the crucifixion and the experience at the empty tomb. Then Jesus came. He came and stood among them saying, “I’m here just like I said I would be. Put aside your fear. Replace it with my peace.” And then Jesus breathed his divine breath upon them and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit and get ready to be sent out into the world, just as I have been sent, I send you.”

However, in the next chapter in the Gospel of John, we find the disciples going back to work, doing what they knew how to do best, and doing what they did before meeting Jesus. They went fishing. They went back to the familiar routine of everyday living as if the previous three years with Jesus were just a fading memory.

Sometimes we are advised, after experiencing a traumatic event as the disciples had, “to get busy, go back to work, you’ll get over it.” Maybe the disciples began to think, “This Jesus movement was a good thing while it lasted, but all good things must come to an end. So, let us just go back to work and forget all this Kingdom talk and especially this resurrection idea. The story is ended.”

Then early one morning the risen Christ finds these disciples-turned-back to-fishermen and says to them, “It’s not over. It is just getting started. Do you love me? Then get out of those boats and feed my sheep. Go find my people and teach them the things I have taught you. Go and be my church.”

It’s not easy to start over. Maybe we would never start over without the pushing, pulling, and prodding of the risen Christ. Peter and the others were quite content to go back to the routine and familiar; to a life that was safer than following Jesus.

However, for the disciples, and for us, the story is not finished, so Jesus comes to us and says once again, “Feed my sheep.” Hopefully, we will not be like the disciples who decided the story was over and went sorrowfully back to their fishing, to the way they were before Jesus.

It is a temptation to let down spiritually after Easter when the events and the excitement are over. We are drawn back into the routine and commonplace repetition of our jobs and responsibilities. Sometimes, even unintentionally, we tend to put Easter carefully back on the shelf as a holiday until next year.

So what is next for those who believer in Easter? I believe that Easter is present tense. It is about following Jesus now. It is about living as if God is victorious, unstoppable, triumphant, now. As “Easter people”, we must believe that God will get God’s way in the end, no matter what. If Jesus’ death on the cross has been defeated by the empty tomb at Easter, what other victories is God working on?

How is God working in your life? Where does God show up in your daily walk?

If we allow it, Easter can move us quickly from the affirmation, “He is risen,” to an assignment, “Go into your family, community, and the world and do something about it.” By carrying out that assignment, Easter continues within the lives of each one of us for the rest of our life and beyond.

God is not finished with the story or us. The story is alive. So what is next? The rest of the story.