I’m preaching on Sunday and I’m on a deadline because we are heading back to Keswick on Saturday so I need to be all done by tomorrow. The thing is I’m having a bout of procrastination. So what’s new I hear you cry!
The thing is I’m starting to wonder if that’s what is going on in this week’s story in John 21: 1-19. The disciples, even though they have seen Jesus twice since the resurrection, have scarpered back to Galilee and are back fishing! Jesus appears on the shore and the seven disciples there sit and eat bread and fish with Him.
Then Jesus gives Peter a bit of a spiritual kicking! ‘Do you love me more than this lot?’ he asks Peter three times, mirroring Peter’s three denials of Jesus. By the third time Peter is hurt. Why do you keep asking? You know I do! But following each answer Peter gives Jesus gives him an instruction. Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep. It seems that Peter is being charged with the growth of the church. He is then invited once more, on the shore of the Sea of Galilee where this crazy adventure all began, to give up fishing and follow the shepherd.
It seems to me that we, like Peter, are given that same invitation each and every day: staywhere we are comfortable doing what we know best or step out onto the road on the great adventure of faith…
Maybe I should go write that sermon…