"With Christ Anything is Possible!"

John 21:1-19

 Preached by Rev. Robert Matlack
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It was a confusing time for the disciples. They had been there when Jesus was arrested. They had fled in fear of their lives. Then Jesus had been crucified - something which to their way of thinking was just not supposed to happen to the Messiah. And then, amazingly, Jesus had risen from the dead. Already He had appeared to some of the disciples in a couple of different settings. It was all so confusing. It was difficult to understand what it all meant, and how they fit into these incredible happenings. What was their role? What were they supposed to do next?

Peter responded to the confusion by deciding to go fishing. That was his old occupation. It was something that he knew, something that made sense. It was familiar. It was comfortable, and it would give him time to think about all that had been happening, about what God wanted him to be doing next.

When we don't stop to do that once in a while, we can fall into the trap of just keeping on doing what we've been doing. We lose track of what we're about or at least supposed to be about. We lose track of who we really are. One man described it this way:

"I've been an engineer for forty years and now I am retired. I made a good living for my wife and children. But I am not sure that I ever made a life for me. My father was an engineer and I just sort of drifted into it, as I look back on it. For the first time in my life, I am beginning to wrestle with God's will for my life. I am not sure that I ever found it, or really tried to find it. I find myself very busy in these retired years, but I am not sure that all this busyness has much to do with God's will for me."

How many of us could say similar things - whether we're retired or not? Have there been times when the emptiness of your life and a sense of unfulfillment have haunted you? How can one know God's will for his/her life?

Those are exactly the kinds of questions that Peter must have been struggling with. What was next? What did God want or expect from him. Peter wasn't alone with those struggles, in fact very quickly the other six disciples who were with him decided to go fishing as well. They spent the entire night working at their old occupation. They fished and they fished. They tried everything - and they didn't catch anything - not one single fish.

They're not very far off shore and they see in the morning light someone walking; He yells to them, "Young men, haven't you caught anything?" They reply "Not a thing". Then He says, "Throw your net out on the right side of the boat, and you will catch some." Now I'm not much of a fisherman, but I suspect that by the time you've been out there all night, you've already tried everything that you can think of. Remember that many of these disciples were professional fishermen. They knew what they were doing, and they were serious about it. Fishing wasn't just a form of recreation, where it doesn't really matter whether or not you catch anything. Fishing was their livelihood, and they were good at it! Now some stranger on the shore yells to them to try the other side of the boat - when they've already tried it many times.

The amazing thing is that it works. It doesn't just work, it works incredibly well! The net is filled to the overflowing with fish. In fact, they're amazed that the net doesn't break. It's that full.

Now after they come ashore and have some fish to eat, Jesus has a conversation with Peter. Remember that before His arrest, Jesus had predicted that Peter would deny him three times before the cock crowed. Peter had responded by declaring his devotion and saying that he would never deny Jesus. Peter was sure that denying Jesus was something that he never would or could do, but it happened, just as Jesus had predicted.

Now Jesus asks him, not once, but three times, "Do you love me?" This really is the test by which any disciple stands or falls. "Do you really love me?" Faced by this questioning, Peter doesn't argue or protest, though by the third time he is sad that Jesus feels He has to keep asking him this question. Peter realizes that there has been very little evidence of his love in his recent actions. He has failed Christ, denied Him, deserted Him, yet through it all he does love Jesus, even though his recent actions don't do much to prove it. Three times he declares that love. Jesus responds by telling him each time to "Take care of his sheep", and then concludes by saying to him "Follow me".

What does this all mean? There are a couple of things that are clear. The first is that when we only rely upon ourselves, upon the resources that we have, we are limited in what we can do. There will be times when we spend the whole night fishing, and still don't catch a darned thing. Yet with God anything is possible, in fact, everything is possible. When we've been casting our net and it keeps coming back empty, God can see that it is filled to the overflowing.

If we go through life thinking that we can rely only upon ourselves, then what we will accomplish will be very limited. When we go through life relying upon God and allowing God to work through our efforts, accomplishing God's will rather than our own, then anything can happen. There are no limits anymore.

The question we often struggle with is the one Peter and the other disciples were struggling with at the beginning of this passage - namely, what's next? What does God have in mind? What are we supposed to be doing next?

The specific answers aren't always clear, and they certainly require a great deal of time spent in prayer and discernment of God's will, but at the same time, Jesus has given us the general direction. When He told Peter "Follow me", those words were spoken to us as well. God wants us to follow Christ, to follow that example of love, of faith, of commitment to God's will.

One of the ways that will be expressed is in our efforts to "feed Christ's sheep", to nurture and care for each other.

Remember back in the gospel of Matthew when Jesus is approached by a man who asks Him what he must do to inherit eternal life? After talking about following the law, Jesus tells him to love God with all his heart and mind and spirit, and to love his neighbor as he loves himself. That sounds remarkably like the message that Christ is offering to Peter, to the other disciples, and to us.

So let us live as people who are called to follow Christ, to be people who love and who always remember that with God anything is possible!

Amen.

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