The Rev. Virginia W. Nagel
Ephphatha Parish of the Deaf
Episcopal Diocese of Central NY
The long preparation for Easter, which we call Lent, is over. The big celebration of the feast of the Resurrection has come and gone...and it is still Easter! Eastertide, of course, lasts until Pentecost, but more than that, every Sunday is a "little Easter"...another celebration of the Resurrection of the Lord, although usually in a lower key with less pomp and excitement. In fact, most of us tend to forget that every Sunday is a little Easter. We have come to think of Easter as an occasion, but it is really a process. It is, in fact, the process of conversion, which is an ongoing process, too, not a one-time-only event as some people seem to think.
Let's see what Scripture can tell us about this.
Today's first reading is about the conversion of Saul, who later used his Greek name, Paul, to mark his new life. Saul had been trained as a rabbi, and a rabbi of the most strict of Pharisees at that. He saw the teaching of Jesus, and Jesus' increasing number of followers, as a threat to the Law of God as he understood it. So he made it his business to try to wipe out this group of people who were following Jesus. He got all the necessary licenses and documents, and set out for Damascus to rid that city of Christians, as he had already been doing in Jerusalem.
But his plans abruptly changed. On the road to Damascus, a totally unexpected thing happened. We just read about it. In an instant, Saul saw Jesus, was blinded, and was confronted with the fact that Jesus is Lord, God the Son. He was led by his companions to the city, fasted and prayed for three days, and then asked to be baptized when he had been healed by the laying-on of hands of a Christian. Now, some would say that Saul's conversion happened in that split second. But if you stop and think about it, while he was emotionally converted in that moment, he still needed three days to get his mind and his heart in step with what had happened on the road. At the end of the three days, he asked for baptism. But what we learn only from later writings is that he did not immediately start his apostolate of preaching and church planting. We are told that he spent some fifteen years studying, praying and fasting before he heard the call to go and preach, and had that call confirmed by the apostles in Jerusalem. Clearly his conversion was a process, not an event, although the meeting with Jesus on the road was the event that started the process.
Let's look now at the gospel reading. Jesus had risen from the dead, and appeared to the disciples and to some other folks. And then what? None of them seem to have seen him after the first appearances, on Easter Day and the following week. Perhaps some of the disciples felt that the story was all over; it was time, maybe, to get back to a normal life, earning money to support themselves and their families. So, Peter said to them, I go a-fishing; anyone want to come with me? And they got their nets and set out in their boats in the evening, and fished all night.
When dawn was breaking, they were tired and cold and wet, and headed back to shore. They hadn't caught much of
anything, certainly not enough to bother to take to market. As they neared the shore, they noticed a man tending a fire on the beach. It was Jesus, of course, but they didn't recognize him at first. Then the man called out to them and asked if they'd caught anything. When they replied that they had not, he told them to put down the nets on the other side of the boat. They must have looked at each other and maybe twirled a finger alongside their head; that was the wrong side of the boat to cast nets from. You have to work with the tides, not against them. Anyway, it was too shallow to get much if anything of a catch so near to shore. But they tried, anyway, probably thinking that it wouldn't hurt, at least it would rinse the nets.....and were they ever amazed at the size of the catch!
Then Peter thought he recognized Jesus and hopped overboard and waded the last few yards. Yes, it was indeed Jesus. Jesus told them to bring some of the catch over to the fire and cook it. He had flat bread baking, and a few small fish he'd caught himself, cooking. They all sat down to eat, and, guess what? After all this....the miraculous catch, the recognition that it was really Jesus, the conversation over the meal...still, Scripture tells us that some of them wanted to ask, Is it really YOU, Jesus? but that they didn't, because they were afraid to ask. Again, emotional recognition came before mental and "gut" recognition. Some of them were, perhaps, still struggling to believe that Jesus really had risen from the dead. Others were likely trying to convince themselves that this man was really the Lord they had they known so well and had followed for so long and come to love and believe. For them, as for Saul, later, conversion was a process, not an event; even at the time of the Ascension, we are told that some were not quite sure they believed. Yet, they were converted enough to put their lives on the line, to preach the gospel, and to die martyrs' deaths to support their belief.
For you and me, conversion is also a process. We learn about God and Jesus in Sunday School and church, from reading, perhaps from Bible study or Cursillo or other similar groups. Eventually, we are confirmed. But we still have to struggle. Every now and then, we may find ourselves going over what we believe and trying to figure out if this is "real" for us, and if it is, how to make it fit into our lives. Most of us have periods when we are not quite sure we really believe. Most people will find their faith has its ups and downs, sometimes related to the events of their lives, sometimes "just because." We need to keep remembering that conversion is an ongoing process, and will end only when we go through the pearly gates into heaven! Here on earth, struggle seems to be part of faith. Nearly every saint has told us of periods of dryness when they were not sure if they still believed, and simply said their prayers and went on living according to their rule of life with no feeling or great excitement or attraction to the faith. That is natural and normal. We humans simply do not have the capacity for sustained intense, deep faith. We will have periods of faith when we feel sure we can do anything in the name of Christ, and we will have periods when we wonder why we are still saying prayers and going to church, and what good it is doing. The ebb and flow of our faith is like the ebb and flow of the tides that the apostles knew so well. It is a natural part of our lives, and it applies to other things than faith too....New Year's resolutions, hobbies, fads, friendships. All of them have ups and downs, because that's the way we humans are.
Scripture gives us the perfect prayer for those times of dryness and "blah-ness". It is one we should all memorize and use as we need to: Lord, I believe. Help me in my unbelief!
Amen.
