Jesus gives us the gift of being givers – John 21:1-14, Rev 5:11-14

Easter, Week 3 (Year C); Notre Dame (Keenan / Howard)

When I was in my first semester of the MDiv degree here at Notre Dame, I was rather surprised to get an email from one of our professors asking, “Can I keep a copy of this paper?”  It was a class in which we had to write a bunch of short papers over the semester, and after turning in about half of them, she would contact me to ask if she could keep a copy.  At first I thought it was a little strange, mainly because I didn’t really see why she felt the need to ask, but also because these weren’t papers that had really contained a lot of original research on my part, I’m sure I hadn’t told her something she didn’t already know in them, they were really just processing and reflecting on the readings that she had already given us.  But, then I remembered she was a scholar and a teacher.  She had chosen to dedicate her life to theological scholarship because she loved to read good theological writing, and apparently, I was producing something at least approaching that.  And, as a teacher, she needed to teach me that I was doing that, and asking permission to keep a copy of something she had a right to anyway, something that I could only have produced with her help and at her command; that was how she went about that.  In her deigning to receive my work as a gift, she nourished my scholarly zeal.  In deigning to receive my work as a gift, she gave me a gift in addition to the teaching she had already given; she gave me the gift of being a giver.

Jesus gave that gift to the disciples, that day after his resurrection, when they had breakfast by the sea.  They had shown that they could do nothing, not even catch fish, without him, but at his word they receive an amazing gift: a bountiful catch of fish.  And it doesn’t just fall into their laps, they still have to work for it, to cast their nets and drag their trawl, but that doesn’t stop it being gift: it’s a gift they are given an active part in receiving (just like the education we receive).  And then the beloved disciple realizes who has given them this gift and Peter shows his joyful eager exuberance in swimming towards him – not far, less than two lengths of a swimming pool; Jesus is not distant from them, not even death could make Jesus distant, but think what Peter might have learnt about himself, about his love for Jesus, about Love incarnate, by discovering his eagerness in his instinctive swim.  And Jesus asks them for some of that fish, some of the gift that he has given them.  Jesus takes some of the fish they’ve caught, probably cooks it over that charcoal fire, and gives it back to them that they might be fed.  Jesus gives them the gift of being givers.

And Jesus gives us that same gift.  At Jesus’ word, so much bounty has been made available for us.  And yes, we’ve had to work hard to receive some of those gifts, like the disciples in the boat.  Certainly our material and intellectual gifts, the friendships and relationships we’ve cultivated, the virtues we’re honing, including our compassion, our gratitude, and even our sorrow, at injustice in the world, and even at our own sin.  But, like the disciples in the boat, we could never have built those on our own.  Like Peter, we’ve sometimes expended huge amounts of energy of our journey to God, our journey to greater holiness, and like him we’ve learnt so much and developed so much through walking (or swimming!) that path, even though Jesus was never distant.  And now, Jesus asks us to offer our gifts.  He gives us the gift of being givers.  He asks us that whenever we see injustice that can be railed against, whenever we see need, whenever a friend reaches out to us, or we must seek pardon, or we must accept suffering.

And he does that in a summative way in this place, at this altar.  In the liturgy, we both truly receive the gift of being givers, and train ourselves, to continue exercising that gift throughout the rest of our lives.  For it’s not just bread and wine that we offer here.  In the Eucharistic Prayer, we pray that God would accept that God would accept the “oblation of your Church” and we don’t just mean the bread and wine; that’s everything that we have offered.  All of our gifts, all of our thanksgivings, our pleas and our laments; we go one to ask God to “make of us an offering to you”… it’s our whole selves that is gift; gift we’ve given that we might receive the greater gift of being givers.  And just as the fish is transformed by fire, and the bread and wine are transformed by the Spirit, so we are transformed in the offering, and we are fed.

We are transformed that one day we may join the chorus we heard of our reading from Revelation, join with every creature of God’s creation, in a time when there is no more sadness and sorrow, and continue to offer the only gift there will be left to give: a joyful offering of praise.