'gain, 'gain

'gain, 'gain

A sermon delivered by Rev. Peter T. Atkinson

April 15, 2018

at Bethany Presbyterian Church, Zuni, Virginia

Joshua 3: 9-17

John 21: 4-14

Let us pray,

Help us to see despite our eyes

Help us to think outside of our minds

Help us to be more than our lives

For your eyes show the way

Your mind knows the truth

Your being is the life.

Amen.

⁴ Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus.

⁵ He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?”

“No,” they answered.

⁶ 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.

⁷ Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” As soon as Simon 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.⁸ The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from shore, about a hundred yards.^[a] 9 When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread.

¹⁰ Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish you have just caught.” ¹¹ 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. ¹² Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” None of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. ¹³ Jesus came, took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish. ¹⁴ This was now the third time Jesus appeared to his disciples after he was raised from the dead.

Another Risen Jesus encounter. . .

There are many in the gospels, Road to Emmaus, last week

Feed my Lambs,

 Doubting Thomas,

The Great Commission

I am with you till the end of the age

This is a great one because it’s happened before

I know John’s Gospel is different

Clearing the temple at the beginning

Wedding at Cana – Water to Wine

Has all the poetry, all the I am statements, I am the bread of life, I am the way, the truth the life,

I am the Resurrection and the life, I am the Good Shepherd, and others

Has the raising of Lazarus

It is just different, and maybe we can chalk this up to being different, this is just John being John

Because Luke has this too, but at the beginning of it all not at the end

The calling of the disciples, right

Here is Luke’s version

One day as Jesus was standing by the Lake of Gennesaret,^[a] the people were crowding around him and listening to the word of God. ² He saw at the water’s edge two boats, left there by the fishermen, who were washing their nets. ³ He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little from shore. Then he sat down and taught the people from the boat.

⁴ When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into deep water, and let down the nets for a catch.”

⁵ Simon answered, “Master, we’ve worked hard all night and haven’t caught anything. But because you say so, I will let down the nets.”

⁶ When they had done so, they caught such a large number of fish that their nets began to break. ⁷ So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them, and they came and filled both boats so full that they began to sink.

But what is going on here, is this just John showing the same story, just out of order, or is this Jesus doing the same thing again

Is this a relive story, a second run of the same miracle?

I like to think so, because there is another time in the Bible when a miracle is rerun

Though I like to say, don’t stand at the Red Sea waiting for it to part again,

God does part water a second time

Joshua 3: 9-17

⁹ Joshua said to the Israelites, “Come here and listen to the words of the Lord your God. ¹⁰ This is how you will know that the living God is among youand that he will certainly drive out before you the Canaanites, Hittites,Hivites, Perizzites, Girgashites, Amorites and Jebusites. ¹¹ See, the ark of the covenant of the Lord of all the earth will go into the Jordan ahead of you.¹² Now then, choose twelve men from the tribes of Israel, one from each tribe. ¹³ And as soon as the priests who carry the ark of the Lord—the Lord of all the earth—set foot in the Jordan, its waters flowing downstream will be cut off and stand up in a heap.”

¹⁴ So when the people broke camp to cross the Jordan, the priests carrying the ark of the covenant went ahead of them. ¹⁵ Now the Jordan is at flood stage all during harvest. Yet as soon as the priests who carried the ark reached the Jordan and their feet touched the water’s edge, ¹⁶ the water from upstream stopped flowing. It piled up in a heap a great distance away, at a town called Adam in the vicinity of Zarethan, while the water flowing down to the Sea of the Arabah (that is, the Dead Sea) was completely cut off. So the people crossed over opposite Jericho. ¹⁷ The priests who carried the ark of the covenant of the Lord stopped in the middle of the Jordan and stood on dry ground, while all Israel passed by until the whole nation had completed the crossing on dry ground.

What’s going on here?

Joshua is the new leader, Moses has just passed on, and now they are finally crossing the Jordan

What does this miracle do?

It gives Joshua the bona fides to get the job done

It shows that God was not just attached to Moses to end when Moses ended, but lives on

This story is not over

It is only beginning

Now look at the Gospel again. . . there are parallels

Jesus died

Could you imagine if you were one of the disciples

Going back to your old life

How do you do that?

Have you ever done that?

Had everything you thought fall apart, but then you have to go back to life again

And life is dead, and you aren’t catching anything

You don’t believe any more

How could this happen?

What does it mean?

But God relives a miracle. . .

Unmistakeable

Recognizable – they are like, hey its Jesus! Very much like the Road to Emmaus with the breaking of bread

Here they are reliving the miracle a second time, and it is solidifying of faith

It is mission sending, starting, renewing

Just like Joshua

I don’t know if I’ve told you my call story, but I see parallels, because it took twice for me to get it

Jamie

Jake

The bottom of the bottom, second miracle brings it back together

Old proverb nothing that happens once is going to happen twice, but anything that happens twice will surely happen a third time. . . and miracles happen like that all in our lives.

Again and again. . .

When I was a kid dad would thrown us around, or play with us and we would say ‘gain, gain

Because you wanted to do it again to go through with it again

You would take the pain of it again, the cost of taking that next step, the risk, the cross, you’d do it all again, just to lve the miracle. . . life abounds through such things. . .