The center of gravity, the fecund source, the estuary bringing forth life in the involved story of Jesus appearing to his disciples after their long night of fruitless fishing is the meal on the shore that follows the fishing, and that precedes the poignant conversation between Jesus the Christ and Simon Peter.
As with so much that is important in this world, the crucial moment is quiet, and goes by almost unnoticed. It is that as Simon swims ardently towards Jesus, and the other disciples row the boat in more slowly, bringing the miraculous draught of fish with them in the net, there is already a charcoal fire glowing on the beach, and food is already cooked on it. What is this food, and where did it come from?
This moment, coming at the end of the John’s Gospel, after the Crucifixion, brings our minds back to the beginning of his ministry, as we were just starting to know this One who is both like us and yet who manifests the creative powers of God so clearly. We remember his mysterious and funny conversation with a Samaritan woman beside Jacob’s Well. The disciples are not there for the conversation, and when they return they are surprised to see Jesus talking with a woman.
The Samaritan woman leaves the well to go and tell her village about what she has experienced. Then this conversation ensues between Jesus and the disciples:
31 Meanwhile his disciples urged him, “Rabbi, eat something.”
32 But he said to them, “I have food to eat that you know nothing about.”
33 Then his disciples said to each other, “Could someone have brought him food?”
34 “My food,” said Jesus, “is to do the will of him who sent me and to finish his work.
Again, here at the beach, as the disciples come to meet Jesus the Christ, he has food to eat whose origin is spiritual. This moment of the meal at the beach, with food that has to with being in alignment with the purposes of God, which are the creative purposes of the universe God made, casts light backwards into the story and forwards into the conversation with Peter.
Backwards, in that we begin to understand that Jesus the Christ’s direction, that is the disciples own alignment with the will of God expressed in the Christ is what connects them to the pure generativity of God: when they cast their nets as Christ directed the abundance of life they met was so great it almost overwhelmed their capacity to comprehend it (it didn’t quite tear the nets, but almost).
And we also understand the conversation with Peter better after the meal with Jesus the Christ: Peter is to feed those with whom he lives and ministers as Jesus the Christ has fed him and the other disciples: by being aligned with the will of God, which is the rhythm and coursing powers of the creative universe.
Recent Comments