Gone fishing

a story for the Easter season

Just after daybreak, Jesus stood on the beach; but the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. Jesus said to them, ‘You have no fish, have you?’ They answered him, ‘No.’ He said to them, ‘Cast the net to the right side of the boat, and you will find some.’ So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because there were so many fish. That disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, ‘It is the Lord!’ When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on some clothes, for he was naked, and jumped into the lake. But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, only about a hundred yards off.

When they had gone ashore, they saw a charcoal fire there, with fish on it, and bread. Jesus said to them, ‘Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.’ So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, ‘Come and have breakfast.’ John 21:1–14

The story of Easter morning took place in a garden, not on a beach. But this story is a great reminder that Easter is a season, not just a day. Lent may have seemed long – 46 days from Ash Wednesday to Easter Day. But Easter, as a season, is even longer: 50 days of resurrection appearances, followed by the ascension, and then nine more days waiting for Pentecost.

In this story from John’s gospel, he relates how seven of the disciples, all of them fishermen, went back to Galilee where the whole story had begun some three years earlier. Even though Jesus’ death had been followed by the joy of his resurrection, there was some elapse of time before the disciples had any clarity about what to do next. Jesus was risen, which was astonishing and joyful, but in practical terms the itinerant life they had led for the past few years, as they followed Jesus around, seemed to be over. Somehow, they had to pick up where they had left off. So, perhaps with a strange mixture of joy, regret, and uncertainty, Peter – ever the practical one – announced, ‘I’m going fishing.’ And the rest of them went with him to the beach and, as the sun began to set, climbed into a boat, and pushed out on the water.

This, though, turned out to be a fishing trip like no other. For a start, Peter could not catch any fish. Now, of course, they must have known good nights and bad over the years, but no fish at all? What was going on? Had they all forgotten how to do this? But then, with a curious touch of déjà vu, he heard a familiar voice across the water: ‘Try fishing on the other side of the boat.’ Peter must have remembered that time when Jesus had said those words before, and there had been such a great haul of fish that the nets couldn’t hold them. ‘Those were the days,’ I imagine Peter thinking, laughing at himself at the nostalgia, and missing the way Jesus always knew what to do, always surprised them, always made everything so much more alive than it was before. ‘Still,’ he thinks, ‘we may as well try the other side once more before we give up for the night.’ So he throws the nets overboard one more time – feeling the pangs of memory, wondering if he will ever stop missing his friend – and all of a sudden it’s happening all over again. Not only do they find fish on the other side of the boat, but a ridiculous number of fish, hundreds of them, like a gift from God.

I imagine Peter turning around, squinting through the light of dawn to see the figure on the shore. It couldn’t be, could it? And then there’s a voice at his side – the disciple Jesus loved, who always seemed to be the first to know, like an intuition. ‘It’s the Lord,’ said John, and Peter leaps out of the boat, not walking on the water this time, but swimming to the shallows and then wading back to the shore.

And it is him! There he is, with a fire, waiting for Peter to bring in some fish to cook. ‘Come and have breakfast,’ he says, like it’s just a regular day.

Even going fishing was never going to be the same again. No matter what Peter did from then on, it would never be a matter of going back to what he’d done before. From now on everything would look different, smell different, taste different. Jesus had walked through Peter’s life, just as God had walked past Moses on the mountain top, and Peter had seen the glory of the Lord just as surely as Moses had. Peter could go fishing any time he liked – he would always be a fisherman. What he could not do was go back to where he was before.

It’s a good thing – especially if you woke up on Easter morning not feeling overjoyed and hopeful – to remember that the church season of Easter is 50 days long, and that even for the first disciples, while Easter morning brought a certain amount of hope and promise, it was also quite bewildering, and it took them some time to work out the detail of what to do next. The same is true for us. We can never just go back to where we were before – back to the world, back to the church, back to life as if nothing has happened. Every place we have ever been will now look different because we have met Jesus. Easter isn’t a single day of celebration, but a hinge moment in a life that is being transformed.

Come and have breakfast. Lent is over, and Easter has only just begun.