Sunday, April 22, 2007
John 21:9-19
“Quintessential Moments”

Do you have those times in your life when it feels like all of your living is summed up in one brief moment? I’m talking about those unplanned but God-sent experiences when time seems to stand still and everything past, present, and future seem to meld into each breath. Some people say you only have such moments when you die, or are faced with certain death. I disagree, but I do think they are rare.

I haven’t had many such moments, but I have had one or two. I like to call them “quintessential moments” or “consummate experiences.” Quintessential, meaning, “the essence of a thing in its purest and most concentrated form.” “Consummate,” meaning “complete in every detail, of the highest degree.”

In thinking about all of the post-Easter appearances of Jesus, I imagine each one was just such a consummate experience, a quintessential moment for the disciples. By the tomb with Mary Magdalene, in the closed room with Thomas, on the road to Emmaus, and here, on the seashore with Peter and the other disciples. What kind of a magical time that must have been?

It’s really hard for us to imagine how it felt, if not impossible. This incredible teacher who they had come to believe was their Lord and Savior had been taken from them by the powers that be and executed in a horrific act of shame and domination. Then, after a few days of mourning and deep reevaluation, they came face to face with him in resurrected form. In John’s account, this is the first time Peter is named as one to whom Jesus appears in resurrected form. Whether or not Peter had seen the resurrected Jesus before or if this was his very first time, it doesn’t matter: This was a quintessential moment: the essence of Jesus in his purest form. This was a consummate moment for Peter, Christ was complete in every detail.

In trying to get the feel for how the disciples may have felt in the presence of Jesus post-tomb, I’ve thought a lot about my mother’s death, now nearly 12 years ago. My brother-in-law called me in New York to fly home to New Mexico because my mother had had a heart attack. By the time I arrived, my mother was already unable to speak or respond in any way. She died quietly later that night. I never had the chance to interact with her knowing that she was dying. It all happened so fast.

But reading John 21, I picture myself doing something very routine, perhaps vacuuming the house, reading a book, or writing a sermon, and then noticing that my mother was in the kitchen cooking breakfast. It wouldn’t have been fish, but pancakes, with bacon, and milk. And then I imagine sitting with my mother at the kitchen table. I would listen more closely to her than I every had listened before. I would have soaked up every word my mother spoke, and every nuance of every gesture and look. Each second would have been imprinted upon my brain like a cellophane cell of an animated cartoon. THAT’s a “quintessential moment” and THAT’s a “consummate experience.”

So what happens in this intimate and focused moment between Jesus and Peter, just days after his resurrection, on that shore way? Jesus asks Peter a question, the same one three times, and with each, more frustrated answer Peter offers, Jesus presents the same challenge, three times over. “Peter, do you love me?” “Yes, Lord, you know I love you!” “Then feed my sheep.”

The quintessential Jesus, in this consummate moment, repeats himself. Three times asked, three times answered, three times challenged. Perhaps symbolically we are reminded of Peter’s thrice denial of Jesus on that fateful night. No matter, for this challenge echoes in our minds regardless, slightly different each time, but nonetheless the same: “Feed my lambs.” “Tend my sheep.” “Feed my sheep.”

Because I find this moment so powerful and significant, I’d like to try my hand at coming up with what Jesus may have meant by this phrase, in large part because neither Jesus nor Peter were shepherds, and because this is such a powerful defining moment! I want to soak up every nuance and remember every detail, just like Peter did.

Feed my lambs. What if the first time Jesus said this, he meant it on a purely literal level. What if Jesus meant to feed sheep. What if Jesus meant to take care of the other creatures of this planet. What if Jesus’ final words to his chief disciple were about caring for the creation, the very request God made in the beginning of all time, when the first humans were charged with dominion, or stewardship, of the earth?

Today is EarthFest in Cleveland, in honor of Earth Day, the annual event to celebrate our planet and remind us of our responsibility to care for the earth. I could imagine that the consummate words of Jesus would be to echo the desire of God for humanity from the dawn of time: take care of this big, marvelous, complex creation... for God’s sake and ours.

There are so many examples today of learning to better care for our environment, and I would encourage you to discover one or two new ways to help the environment, and live them out as often as you can. “Feed my lambs” may mean walking to the corner store next time instead of driving. “Feed my lambs” may mean turning off lights in the room when you leave, or buying Energy Star appliances next time you need one. “Feed my lambs,” may just mean reporting the street lamp which stays on all day to the city, or writing to Congress to push for stronger environmental laws. “Feed my lambs.”

“Tend my sheep” is the second time Jesus challenges Peter. Perhaps this, the more familiar and traditional interpretation of this plea, to nurture each other in spiritually significant ways, was Christ’s greatest desire. To nurture and to be nurtured fulfills Jesus’ challenge, as we care for one another, teach one another the ways of Christ and the meaning of God’s Holy Word, as we meditate and think anew about God’s call to us to love and serve God, ourselves, and our neighbors.

But I want to take this challenge to a deeper level. I don’t think Jesus’ call to “tend my sheep” was simply to sit in Sunday School or Bible Study or even our personal devotions and take what we read in a book, or even the Bible, and swallow it whole. As I’ve said here dozens of times, to nurture and be nurture involves marinating the Word, chewing on it, and digesting it... which means we need to discuss it, bring our own perspectives to it, argue a bit over it, and meditate upon it... in order to get all of what God has put in the Word for us for this time and this place.

And then we have to live it, or it means nothing. “Tend my sheep” is a call to both nurture, and action. “Tend my sheep.”

“Feed my sheep,” Jesus’ third and most vexing challenge to Peter. Perhaps Jesus needed to make sure Peter knew there was a deeper level to this care for creation and this nurturing of others. Jesus wanted us to create a just and fair world for all God’s children. He didn’t want us to simply rearrange deck chairs on the Titanic, but wanted us to effect profound change in the systems of human selfishness and sinfulness in order to solve the problem and not simply put a band-aid on them.

Charity, benevolence, and kindness are all necessary, for there is much suffering in the world. Wounds need to be bandaged, bellies need good food, and tears need a shoulder upon which to fall. But if we only stop there, then we have done Jesus wrong, for we should always be asking the questions: “What caused the hurt?” “Why is there not enough food?” “Who made you cry?”

Here’s an example: In 1994 Pierre Tami established the Hagar Shelter in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, as a haven for women who had fallen victim to violence and sexual exploitation. Hagar has assisted more than 100,000 women and children through its social programs and economic projects.

Now, Pierre could have simply stopped with simply offering charity when he created a shelter for women, many who had been kicked out of their homes when their husbands found a younger woman to replace their wives. Pierre saw the deeper issues of justice behind the charity. He wanted to feed God’s sheep. Thus, the Hagar Shelter does more than just provide the necessary roof over their heads, it provides post-traumatic counseling, and expansive education program, and work. In 1998 they began Hagar’s Soya Company, Cambodia’s first and only large scale producer of soya milk, now producing 12,000 liters per day with 83 employees. (1) “Feed my sheep.”

Here’s why this is so important to me. There are many voices around us these days who present a much different conclusion about Jesus and what Jesus challenges us. There are many in our world who, first and foremost, put the questions of Jesus into the sweet by and by, in heaven, after we die. We have the image of St. Peter at heaven’s gate with his clipboard in hand, or the angry finger God wagging at us, “naughty, naughty person!” But the picture the gospel of John presents is a Jesus – yes, headed to heaven – but passionately concerned about how we behave in the here-and-now. Jesus calls us to live life well NOW. “I have come so that you might have life, and have it abundantly” John quotes him earlier.

Secondly, and even more urgently, I see people, in the name of the Christian faith, drawing lines in the sand all around us. “You’re either in, or you’re out.” “You’re either with us, or against us.” “You’re either on our side, or on the wrong side.” On that beach with the disciples Jesus did no drawing of lines in the sand. Rather, he encouraged them to do what they were doing, fishing, only better. He fixed for them breakfast. Hard to do the Lord’s work on an empty stomach! And he challenged them to care for the earth, care for their neighbors and each other, and to bring about God’s reign of justice.

I think on that beach with Peter God was calling him – and us – to be our best selves. No lines in the sand, just a gentle, persistent, persuasion. Feed my lambs, tend my sheep, feed my sheep.

I certainly know that there are other representations of God and of Jesus in the Bible, and some of them give us the idea that there is a great dividing line between heaven and hell, those who are in and those who are out. But I stand here today to say there are also these images of God-in-Christ where the call is more of an invitation, and the consequences of not accepting the challenge is to bring sadness to Christ and risk breaking God’s heart, which is worse than any brimstone hell could offer.

My mother, sitting at that kitchen table with coffee in one hand and a cigarette in the other, would not have needed any heavy-handed hellfire and brimstone to keep me on the straight-and-narrow. All I would have to know, in that quintessential moment, that consummate experience, would be that to do anything else than what my mother hoped for me, longed for me, yearned for me would be to break her heart. That would be enough.

Beloved in Christ, let us not postpone till later doing the good work of caring for creation, nurturing ourselves and one another, and bringing about justice. Christ is on the beach challenging each of us this day, born out of his love for us and our love for him. It is not an angry threat, but a powerful invitation: “Feed my sheep.” I’m up for the challenge. Are you?

(1) “In You I Take Refuge” by David Batstone, Sojourners, March 2007, pp. 20ff. Check them out at www.sojo.net

Rev. Allen V. Harris
Franklin Circle Christian Church
www.FranklinCircleChurch.org


 

Copyright 2007 -- The Rev. Allen V. Harris

Franklin Circle Christian Church (Disciples of Christ)

1688 Fulton Rd., Cleveland, OH 44113-3096