Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord’s disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him. He fell to the ground and heard a voice say to him, “Saul, Saul, why do you persecute me?”
“Who are you?” Saul asked. “I am Jesus, whom you are persecuting,” he replied. “Now get up and go into the city, and you will be told what you must do.”
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Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Tiberias. Peter, Thomas, Nathanael from Cana, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. “I’m going out to fish,” Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not recognise him.He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?” “No,” they answered. He said, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.
Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” As soon as Peter heard him say, “It is the Lord,” he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water. The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from shore, about a hundred yards.When they landed, they saw a fire burning there with fish on it, and some bread.
Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish you have just caught.” So Simon Peter climbed back into the boat and dragged the net ashore. It was full of large fish, 153, but even with so many the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” None of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. Jesus came, took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. This was now the third time Jesus appeared to his disciples after he was raised from the dead.
When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.”
Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.”
The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.”
Jesus said, “Feed my sheep. Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to Peter “Follow me!”
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For most of his life the late Malcolm Muggeridge professed to be agnostic. In 1969 he became a Christian, publishing “Jesus Rediscovered”, then “Jesus: The Man Who Lives” in 1976, a more substantial work describing the gospel in his own words. He also produced several important BBC documentaries with a religious theme, including In the Footsteps of St. Paul. In 1982, Muggeridge converted to Roman Catholicism. He was 79. His last book “Conversion”, published in 1988 and recently republished, describes his life as a 20th century pilgrimage - a spiritual journey.
In today’s reading from Acts, there is a word which never shows up, and yet its presence almost screams out of the story. Rev. Tom Hall calls it “a disruptive word--a word that intrudes into our life, a word that rocks our boat, threatens us with priority shifts.”
We need to be clear that the story of Saul on the road to Damascus is not a story about a conversion to the Christian faith. Saul was a Jewish rabbi and a citizen of Rome, and he remained a Jew even after his experience. It is not a story about a change in religious belief, but rather a story about a conversion of nature or character. Unfortunately, the Damascus Road incident has become kind of the yardstick by which everyone measures “conversion”. I suggest that this story is one of a huge epiphany for Saul in his own life as a Jewish rabbi, and the true meaning of the Scriptures he has lived with and the God about whom he taught.
A little background. Saul seemed to arrive just when he was needed most. The religious leaders and the sanhedrin thought new the movement could not be stopped even after the death of Jesus. Saul volunteered to take on the job of getting rid of the Jesus movement. He was young, intelligent, well educated as a rabbi and absolutely committed to the traditions of the faith. He was a real zealot in his rooting out and removal of those followers of “The Way”. There were reports of followers in Damascus, and he took off, determined to stomp them out. Instead he finds himself flat on his keester in the road, blinded by an incredible light. He has to be led into Damascus, and wait in the city for instructions. He sits for three days in an inn - hungry and unable to function. A human comes into the room, he feels hands on him and then hears "Brother Saul; Jesus, who appeared to you on the road has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit." The lights come back on, and suddenly he sees more clearly than ever. He really sees, for the first time in his entire life. His perspective changes. His commitment changes. His relationships change. Even his name changes.
Saul, now Paul, was still the same man as before in the sense that he was still a practicing Jew. He hadn’t changed his faith, but he had changed his perceptions and understandings of how that faith was to be lived out. His understanding of God changed. Paul had a conversion experience - no question of that - but his experience was one of conversion to a new life in ministry within the faith he had professed all his life. He understood his scriptures and his faith differently, and the new insight propelled him into ministry with precisely the small group he had tried to eliminate. Sometimes epiphanies - conversions - are dramatic affairs, much like Paul's. Often they are not.
One of the most well-known conversion experiences is that of Kagawa Toyohiko. He had been an orphan from an early age, and became a Christian while learning English from western missionaries. His extended family disowned him. He studied at the Tokyo Presbyterian College, in the United States. The real conversion, I believe, came when he attended Kobe Theological Seminary, and found himself distressed by the pickiness of the seminarians around technicalities of doctrine. He believed that Christianity in action was the real truth of those doctrines.
In 1909 he moved into a Kobe slum as a social worker, and sociologist. He recorded many aspects of slum society previously unknown to middle-class Japanese - illicit prostitution (i.e. outside of Japan's legal prostitution regime), informal marriages (which often overlapped with the previous), and the practice of accepting money to care for children and then killing them.
Kagawa was arrested in Japan in 1921 and again in 1922 for his part in labour activism during strikes. After his release, he helped organize relief work in Tokyo following the 1923 Great Kanto earthquake, and assisted in bringing about universal voting rights for men in 1925. He organized the Japanese Federation of Labour, as well as the National Anti-War League in 1928, and continued to speak on behalf of Japan's poor; he pushed for the vote for women, and a peaceful foreign policy.
His conversion began through a simple prayer: "O God, make me like Christ." That was it. That was the blinding light and heavenly voices that accompanied his conversion. He was an orphan, half blind, always sick, yet he walked into the slums of Tokyo and became the greatest slum
reformer.
As we read the story in John, it seems to me this is another kind of a conversation experience. The disciples had been used to having Jesus around as their teacher, and had relied on him to tell them what to do. They forget that the characteristics of a good teacher are to teach for a time, and then pass responsibility to the group. Jesus was with them for three years, and when he was taken from them, they weren’t sure what to do - and instead of picking up where Jesus left off, they went back to their old occupation - fishing.
Peter had come to believe in the resurrection; and yet here he is, returning to what had been familiar. Had Jesus made no impact on him? Did the resurrection mean nothing? Peter seems to return to 'life as usual.' Three years with Jesus had made no apparent difference in his life. He goes back to fishing, the very thing he had been doing when Jesus called him to follow him the first time (Mt. 4:18-19).
Then Jesus is among them again, and pointing out that there are things for them to do, even if he is not physically there. He feeds them - bread and fish - and then he says “If you love me, feed my lambs.” Where Saul got thrown on his keester to get the message, the disciples are basically told by Jesus to get moving and get back to work. Bread and fish - food for a hungry world. A message of peace of life, spiritual food for a hungry and oppressed world. Essentially Jesus demonstrated to them that being followers of The Way meant participating in the creation of the New Realm.
The event of Easter, the resurrection, is a changing point in history. It is a shift of paradigms, a change in the way we understand the world. It changes the way we see everything. It is the beginning of the Kingdom of God, the ultimate revelation of God, the start of an entirely new framework for life. Peter sees the truth of this new paradigm when Jesus calls him to 'feed his sheep.' Peter is no longer a fisherman; he is a shepherd. He has a new task in life, a new purpose in life, a new reason for living. The whole focus of his life has changed. He has to leave the past behind and follow Jesus in a whole new way.
Conversion is not a word we associate very often with our own lives. We rarely have those wild surprises where we see with absolute clarity, even for just an instant, and are blinded by the insight. Sometimes it’s something very small, which we might easily overlook - like some bread and fish on a fire. Yet other times the mighty persistent God breaks in to disrupt our lives completely. Saul’s experience on the Damascus road challenges us to be open to conversion. The Good News of Easter, and for us, is that God brings a profound change in nature or character. As Christians, we have to be open to conversion of ourselves in the practice of our faith. That means seeing our selves, our lives, our congregation, our church - differently - and making a commitment to being a part of The Way, however we can.
Sources:
1: “Conversion”, a sermon by Rev. Tom Hall
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malcolm_Muggeridge
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toyohiko_Kagawa
4. “Sheep Don’t Eat Fish” a sermon by Rev. Randy Quinn
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