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| Today's Gospel lesson comes after the original ending of John, so what do we do with this bonus good news? |
©2025 The Rev. Seth Olson
This sermon was preached at the Episcopal Church of the Holy Apostles in Hoover, AL on the Third Sunday of Easter. A video of the message may be found here.
Holy God, may my words be your words and when my words are not your words, may your people be wise enough to know the same. Amen.
At the end of last week’s Gospel lesson — right before today’s story — we heard the following: “But these [things] are written so that you may come to believe that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and that through believing you may have life in his name.” Boom! Resurrection, belief, and new life. End of story. Roll the credits.
Except… not quite. It’s like in an infomercial: But wait! There’s more!
Today we hear a bonus, post-Resurrection encounter — it almost feels like a surprise scene after the credits of a movie or a hidden track at the end of an album. In this Gospel lesson, John sneaks in one last story about the Risen Christ, it’s a secret epilogue of grace. As though, God is saying: You thought I was finished? I'm just getting started.
And what is in this bonus good news? What is it that God is just getting started?
It’s a beach breakfast, a miraculous catch of fish, a conversation about love and forgiveness, and—surprisingly—a challenge… to not just “believe,” but to live differently because you believe.
Now y’all, I know that change is challenging. Even when that change comes from experiencing the Resurrection. For in the new light of Easter, we experience newfound freedom—knowing that death doesn’t have the last word—but, this new way of being is impossible. At least it is on our own.
So, friends if you hold on to nothing more from these lessons, remember that if you are going to live “life in Christ,” you will need the risen Christ feeding you and transforming you. But, what does this sustaining presence look like? Well, let’s start by looking at a failed fishing expedition.
After everything—the empty tomb, the Easter appearances, and the imparting of the Holy Spirit (according to John)—what do the disciples do? Go on a mission to share the Good News? No! Serve the needy of Jerusalem? Nope! Pray unceasingly worshipping God? Nah! Instead, the disciples go fishing.
It's an odd thing. After everything that happened, they just went back to what they were doing before. And, who could blame them? There is not empirical data measuring the stress levels of these 1st Century disciples, but imagine the mental and emotional load that was upon them. The leader of their movement had been viciously killed and mysteriously raised. It would make sense to blow off some steam by doing something fulfilling and familiar. It’s what we do too, right?
Perhaps we do this by going fishing, but it could also be when we’re golfing, hiking, running, cooking, traveling, or any other number of other productive ways to cope with stress. So, the disciples head to some well-known surroundings to recenter and recognize what had taken place, but…
They were terrible at it—at least the fishing. You would have thought none of them had fished before. How did they survive by doing this? Because they fished all night long and caught nothing. Not a single fish!
Then, at dawn, just as the sun rose (or was it the S-o-n that rose?), a stranger on the shore shouted: “Children, you have no fish, have you?” (Ouch! Who is this mean heckler on the shore?)
“No,” they sighed in reply.
“Cast the net on the right side,” he offered. It is not in any translation, I’ve ever read, but I imagine the disciples rolling their lives and retorting: “Don’t you think we tried that!” But, eventually, they did cast their nets on the other side. And, bam! They hauled in 153 fish. More than they could haul into the boat.
It’s in this moment of abundance that the proverbial scales fell from their eyes. John recognized: “It is the Lord!” Simon Peter, never one for half-measures, went all-in, throwing on his clothes and diving into the sea. (Only Peter would get dressed before swimming… I mean, was he worried about Jesus seeing him shirt-less?)
When the disciples reached shore, what did they find? Jesus. Already there. Already preparing a meal for them. Already sustaining them! Before he sent them out to feed others, he fed them first. But, we do not live by bread (or fish) alone. For then, came the deeper work of spiritual sustenance.
After breakfast, Jesus turned to Peter—remember he was the one who had denied Jesus three times—and in a series of questions that were as tender as they were cutting, Jesus asked Peter three times: “Do you love me?”
Each time Peter said yes, and each time Jesus responded not with “That's nice” or “I love you, too,” but with a commission: “Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep.”
In this moment, we see more clearly that love to Jesus is not just a warm feeling. Instead, it is a choice, an action. And, in the three-fold affirmation of Peter’s love for Christ, we also discover that God’s love is about restoration. The denials of Good Friday morning are undone here at this brunch on the beach. And though we know that Peter still didn’t get it all right, his later mission and martyrdom exemplify a life turned toward the service of others. And here’s where this bonus scene of Good News challenges us. Jesus’ unbinding Peter and his denials is inextricably linked with a transformation—a difference in being and behavior.
The priest and author Barbara Brown Taylor once told a story about a seminary classmate from Lebanon who was curious why his classmates did not want this for themselves. He grew frustrated with the other students, saying: “All you Americans care about is justification! You love sinning and being forgiven, sinning and being forgiven. Has anyone ever heard of sanctification? Is anyone interested in learning to sin a little less?” These are hard questions, but appropriate ones. Don’t we want to be transformed? Don’t we want to live in integrity when it comes to the relationships of our lives?
The truth is the Risen Christ forgives us endlessly, like we saw in Christ Jesus’ repeated forgiveness of Peter. However, Christ also calls us beyond the hamster wheel of sinning and being forgiven. Christ calls us to be transformed. How do we know this? Well, look no further than our lesson from the Acts of the Apostles this morning.
Saul, the bloodthirsty persecutor, became Paul the Apostle. The adamant victimizer who held the cloaks of those who martyred Saint Stephen, became the evangelist who helped spread the Christian message to the Gentiles. Or, look again at Peter, the denier, who became the rock on which Christ built the Church.
Both were fed by the grace of God, but neither stayed the same. Their lives became acts of penance in the best sense — not as punishment, but as repair. They did not change because they feared God’s wrath (although I think Saul’s blindness certainly put the awe of God in him), instead they changed knowing the freedom of serving in Christ’s ministry. Their faith was not just a listless “I’m sorry.” It was a moving, new way of living: loving, feeding, tending, and serving.
This is what sanctification looks like. This is Life in Christ. This is Resurrection! So, what about us? Do we want this?
You may feel tired. Maybe your nets have been empty. Perhaps even returning to old sources of sustenance isn’t as fruitful. Maybe you’ve been stuck on that hamster wheel or out in lifeless waters. Perhaps you cannot break the old sinful ways. If any of this sounds like you, look to the shore. See the Risen Christ. He’s already readying a meal for you and for all. Let him feed you. Let him love you first. Yes, here at Christ’s Table, but also in prayer, in the study of scripture, in giving to others, in being loved on by this community, or countless other ways that God is yearning to meet you.
And then—because you are loved beyond measure, because no matter what you have done you have been forgiven—get up. Feed his lambs. Tend his sheep. And, love his flock (all his flock). Because the bonus good news isn’t just that Christ is risen. The bonus good news is that you are rising too. Amen.
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