A Sermon Preached By

Rev. Peter W. Shidemantle

Third Sunday of Easter, April 22, 2007

PEBBLE HILL PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH

5299 Jamesville Rd., DeWitt, NY  13214

Phone:  315-446-0960     FAX:  446-0672

phillchu@twcny.rr.com     http://pebblehill.presbychurch.org

            This has been another of those weeks when our nation has been overcome by tragedy and pain.  For the most part people who have not been directly affected by the mass killings at Virginia Tech have managed to carry on - go to school, go to work, walk through our normal routines, maintain our schedules and meet our obligations.  But I think all of us have been walking around with this extra burden of sadness and sorrow for the pain one young man has brought to so many - the victims and their university community, their families, their friends, their home towns.  Those of us who are further removed, at some distance from the most searing pain and grief, have felt at least its ripples - that, and the memory of other pain, known in this university community when the airliner with some 35 Syracuse university students and others was ripped from the sky over Lockerbie, Scotland. 

            We often hear it said, and maybe say ourselves, when others experience tragic and  devastating loss, that we “cannot imagine” what it would be like to go through it ourselves, but that’s not really true.  We can imagine it, which is part of the heaviness and the grief that everyone shares.

            We think of all the people for whom now everything has changed, and they will never be able to go back to the way things were.  And in the early stages of grief, they won’t be able to go forward either.  In time, hopefully everyone will, and the university will feel like a safe place again.  The future will open as possibility again.  But it can’t be rushed.  People will need to hold on to one another for a while yet.

            I am reminded of the phrase from Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, after he recalled the thousands who lay dead on the battlefield, and how no mere words could do justice to their sacrifice, he began to speak of the future, and he started that section with the phrase, “It is rather for us, the living. . .”

            It comes to that, of course.  How to move forward - not to make sense of senseless tragedy, but somehow to honor its memory, to honor the lives lost, to create meaning out of meaninglessness – not to ensure that nothing like this ever happens again, for that is not within a free society’s capacity to ultimately ensure, not within anyone’s power to ensure for our own lives or those we love. 

I would like to reflect with you on our gospel text this morning from the perspective of the loss of this past week - and of moving forward.  It is a resurrection text.  “Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberius; and he revealed himself in this way...”  John writes at the end of his gospel that the world could not contain all the books it would take to tell everything that Jesus did - which is hyperbole, I guess - but the point, as I take it, is that Jesus is still doing these things.  He revealed himself to the disciples “in this way” here at the Sea of Tiberius – but there are countless other ways, in countless other places and situations, and in countless other lives in which the living Christ is revealed as well.  The books are still being written. 

            But “this way” - this text - is instructive for us, because it contains one of the most touching scenes of scripture, where the resurrected Jesus asks Simon Peter, three times, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?”  It parallels the three times that Simon Peter denied him at the end.  Each question, “Do you love me?” piercing more deeply into the guilt and the shame, so that it can be rooted out.  Jesus used his old name, Simon, when asking the question, which was surely part of the painful reminder of his betrayal.  Jesus had given him a new name, Peter - Rock - but before he could truly be the rock on which Christ would build the church, he had to be reminded what else he had given him besides a new name.  He had to come to terms with what he had done, with what he had forgotten and whom he had betrayed.  Jesus met Peter’s denial with his love, which cuts deeper than accusation or anger.  These can only lead to separation.  Only love, forgiving love, can lead to reunion, and only love could open the future so Simon Peter could move forward.

            What part might forgiveness play in moving forward from the tragedy of Virginia Tech?  That’s a tough question.  It is almost absurd to speak of forgiving the young man who took all those lives and then his own.  It was obviously not on his deranged mind - as far as we know.  It may become an issue for the loved ones of those who perished at some point down the line, with some distance between them and the events of last Monday.  But then again, that may be something other than forgiveness, more a letting go of anger or hatred for the one who did this, just in order to move on.  But for the living, who have the capacity to ask for forgiveness and to accept it, it is really accepting forgiveness that is the harder part. 

            The Simon Peter in the courtyard of the high priest’s residence that night of Jesus’ arrest  was someone who thought he controlled his own destiny.  He thought he had the power to remove himself from the danger and the pain, the fear of those hours.  “I don’t know him.”  I don’t know what you’re talking about.”  Denial:  “no, not me.  I’m stepping away.  This doesn’t touch me, doesn’t affect me.”  The Peter on the lakeshore after a night of fishing as the morning light dawned is a realist, as Jesus helps him to see things as they really are.  He comes to realize that he is a person who controls nothing.  “Simon,” Jesus says to him, “When you were young you could walk around wherever you wanted.  (Stretching it...) You out-fished everyone, you out-wrestled them, you out-drank them.” When Jesus speaks of being “old, stretching out your hands,” and being “led to where you do not want to go,” he is describing Peter’s death.  But it also describes his life if he is to move forward in this ministry of feeding sheep, of servant leadership.

            To accept forgiveness means allowing yourself to become totally vulnerable, to release whatever illusions you might have of control and bravado, as anyone who has been forgiven by a loved one whom you have hurt, knows.  “Lord I will never betray you.”  “Lord, I will go wherever you go,” Peter and the others boasted when Jesus was with them.  To accept forgiveness requires, as Henri Nouwen has written, going on the “downwardly mobile” path - requires a recognition of our brokenness, our powerlessness, and real humility.                     

We have learned in these past several years that even the most powerful military machine on the face of the earth has virtually no power to prevent a determined person or group with no concern for their own lives to inflict horrific injury and death on others.  Certainly we must provide the best security that we can, take all precautions to protect innocent people - but ultimately we cannot ensure it.  But in reality, this is the condition in which we have always lived.  None of us invulnerable.  To accept Christ’s forgiving love is to say that we know this is so, and to follow the One who gives true life, who names us as his own, is to acknowledge that it is only God who gives ultimate security.  To arrive at this place is to arrive at spiritual awakening, awakening the desire to live in that relationship between myself and my God - the God who is my strength and my shield, and Jesus who is the way.

            “Children, have you any fish?” Jesus called to them from the lakeshore.  Once again, they didn’t know it was him.  Resurrection had happened, but they didn’t yet know how to move forward without having him in the way he was with them before.  Christ being raised from the dead is at the core of Christian belief - but it doesn’t mean much if it isn’t at the core of Christian practice.  All too often we try to fish where there are no fish.  We try to find peace and contentment where they can’t be found, or we give heart and soul to pursuits that offer momentary “highs” or temporary gain, that build our self-esteem or give us small samples of pleasure or meet a need that is only our own.  In the extreme, with no mooring, completely adrift, some lose all sense of connection with others and lash out in delusional ways as if they are the total center of the universe and others are of no consequence to them.

            On the beach that morning for Simon Peter there was no judgment, no reminder of his denials, no focusing on the old, but only on the new.  Loving Jesus, wanting to be near him, wanting to be fed by him - this was the most important thing for Simon.  That’s why he shot from the boat when he realized it was Jesus on shore.  But now that he’s raised, Simon Peter can’t be with him in the way he was with him before.  He can only be with him by being with others in the way that Jesus was with others - feeding, tending, teaching, helping, healing.

            Out of resurrection comes church -  “ecclesia” - which means those “called out” from the world and sent back into the world as disciples of the living one.  Out of resurrection comes life that is new by our giving ourselves to it, by walking through the door he holds open into a future we cannot see.  None of us can be assured that we will remain safe, only that we will remain loved - loved to the end, and loved eternally.

            Amen

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