Easter Is Today, Tomorrow, and for all Time
A Sermon by the Reverend Elizabeth Rees on the Third Sunday of Easter (C), May 1, 2022.
John 21:1-19
Good morning! It is so good to be with you here at St. George’s! Thanks for being the faithful remnant while the others are together at Shrine Mont! I’m Elizabeth Rees, and I’m the chaplain and religion teacher at St. Stephen’s St. Agnes Upper School.
I’m really new to this Chaplain gig, and it has been a big switch. I’m preaching less and teaching more, and to a very different audience – my average age demographic has gone down about 40 years. But the biggest change has been to my summer and weekends. Summer used to mainly be a time when I felt guilty for leaving my kids to their own devices (and when I say “devices,” I unfortunately mean that literally). Now, like all the students in the room, probably, I am counting down the days until summer vacation (26!) when I get to play and relax and travel and hang out with my family. And weekends are a brand new world too. While Sundays used to be my busiest day, now my family roams around a little aimlessly, trying to figure out where to worship next and how to amuse ourselves.
Which is what allowed us a few weekends ago to do something that has been unthinkable for the last 15 years. We went away for Easter weekend. We spent a long weekend at the beach in Duck, NC. It was strange, but beautiful, to walk on the beach on Good Friday, the roar of the waves standing in for the roar of the crowd yelling “Crucify him!” But Easter itself didn’t go according to plan.
We decided to go to the local (non-Episcopal) church in town. I thought it would be fine – a chance to try something different, maybe get some new ideas. But I was wrong. It was almost unspeakably terrible.
First, we were outside and it was a cold and windy morning. We hadn’t brought the right clothes and so we were all freezing.
Second, the music was horrendous. No “Jesus Christ is Risen Today!” I didn’t recognize any of the music; the tunes just felt random and unsingable.
Third, the service was completely non-liturgical – totally at the whim of the pastor’s run-on and non-poetic prayers without an alleluia to be found.
And worst of all was the preaching. All dogma – if you don’t believe x, y, and z, you can’t call yourself a Christian – with uncomfortable whiffs of antisemitism.
I left depressed and super-grumpy. We’d wasted our Easter morning and there was no getting it back. No chance for a proper Easter service. I wanted a do-over.
But, honestly, my wanting a do-over wasn’t just about the Easter morning service. It was about all the other disappointments and failures and uncertainties too. My Lenten practices didn’t go as well as I’d planned. I am still feeling like I’m at the front end of a long learning curve at work. My parent guilt still rears its head more often than I’d like. I’m awfully close to turning 50 and not sure what that means for me. And of course, we’ve got this lingering Covid with all the suffering and life interruptions and political separation it has entailed. Somehow I expected Easter to wipe the slate clean.
And I’m not the first one to want a do-over on Easter. Imagine Jesus’ mother – heartbroken at her loss and now just confused by the empty grave. And the disciples who had fled the scene of the crucifixion in fear and now were left stranded without the leader they had left home and livelihood to follow and so they aren’t sure what to do but return to their old life of fishing.
But maybe there is no one that wanted – needed – a do-over more than Peter.
Peter. The one who left his fishing net immediately when Jesus invited him to follow, and opened his home and heart to Jesus.
Simon Peter. The kid in the front of the class, quick to raise his hand to answer a question: “Who do I say that you are? You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God!” But maybe sometimes too quick to respond or to react. Like when he jumped out of the boat to walk on water with Jesus only to succumb to fear and sink.
Peter, the Rock, hard-headed and blustery, quick to challenge Jesus about his parables and his theology, but always there when Jesus needed him.
But also Peter, the stumbling block that resisted Jesus’ predictions of suffering and death, to whom Jesus so memorably chided, “Get thee behind me, Satan!”
This complex disciple swore he would never desert Jesus, even unto death. And yet that last night – the one that began so well, with footwashing and supper together, had ended with Peter denying three times that he even knew Jesus, all while Jesus was being tried and condemned to death.
One: “You also were with Jesus the Galilean,” said the servant girl. “I do not know what you are talking about!” (ring bell)
Two: “This man was with Jesus of Nazareth,” asserted another servant girl. “I do not know the man.” (ring bell)
Three: “Certainly you are also one of them, for your accent betrays you,” accused a bystander. Then Peter began to curse, and swore, “I do not know the man!” (ring bell)
And then, of course, we know what happened next. The cock crowed. And Peter remembered what Jesus had said: “Before the cock crows, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly.
And you can almost feel the desperation in Peter to undo those three denials in the stories that come after. As he runs to the tomb after hearing the women’s report about it being empty, racing against another disciple to try to get there first, hoping against hope that maybe all of it was a bad dream or a terrible misunderstanding. And as he (almost comically) puts on his clothes to jump into the sea to reach Jesus on the shore in our story for today. And then as he rushes back to the boat to do Jesus’ bidding, hauling out the fish to cook for breakfast.
Poor Peter is full of regret and shame; craving the chance to show Jesus how he feels – to wipe the slate clean.
And then comes exactly what Simon Peter has been longing for. The opportunity he never imagined possible as he denied knowing Jesus in the courtyard while Jesus was being tried, or as he wept outside after hearing that cock crow, or as he cowered in fear while Jesus was being crucified, or as he crouched confused inside the empty tomb.
The chance for redemption and forgiveness and new life:
One: “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” (ring bell)
Two: “Simon son of John, do you love me?” “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” (ring bell)
Three: “Simon son of John, do you love me?” “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” (ring bell)
And then Jesus’ last words to Peter, an echo of his first words that felt like an eternity ago: “Follow me.” In other words, “Peter, this isn’t about your failure or your fears. Do you love me? Then stop dwelling on what you did or didn’t do in the past, or even what you can or cannot do in the future. Stop focusing on your limits, and focus on your love. I know you. I believe in you.”
The story doesn’t say it, but I imagine Peter weeping again. But this time in relief and consolation and joy.
Peter didn’t need a redo of Easter.
Not because Good Friday didn’t happen. Not because he hadn’t made plenty of mistakes. Not because everything was back to normal. And not because the future was going to be easy.
He didn’t need a redo of Easter because Easter wasn’t a one-time thing that Peter missed because of his fear and his denials. Easter was a continual, repeated invitation to love and to follow that Peter would spend the rest of his life living into. Easter was another chance, and another, and another – as many chances as Peter needed – to let go of the burden he’d been carrying.
And the same is true for me, of course. I don’t need a redo of Easter either. Easter wasn’t one day in April that was ruined because my church experience was rotten. Easter isn’t even just the 50 days that we assign to this liturgical season. Easter is here – today, tomorrow, and for all time. We swim in the promise and possibility of the Risen Lord, whether we know it at any given moment or not. We breathe in the possibility of hope and new life and forgiveness with every inhale. Every day we are invited to let go of the burdens we’ve been carrying, whether they are memories of past actions, or words said or left unsaid, or shame or regret. Not because Easter promises some magical fix or some easy future, but because Easter assures us that every day is an opportunity to better live our lives as an Alleluia. Another chance to live out in our lives the answer to Jesus’ continual question for us: “Do you love me?”
So let’s start right now!
Alleluia! Christ is risen!
The Lord is risen indeed. Alleluia!