My favorite story of the risen Christ meeting the disciples is during the encounter when he calls from the beach to the disciples out on the boat. There are a couple of scenes from this story as we know it from John 21:1-9 that most of us remember.
The first scene is of the disciples, tired and disappointed from a failed fishing outing, still in their boat out on the lake. They didn’t catch a thing. When from the beach, a man, the resurrected Jesus, instructs them to put their nets into the water on the other side of the boat—which they had already tried! But they do and there are so many fish they can’t bring them all on board.
Peter Realizes It’s Jesus
Peter was in the boat. When he realizes, thanks to John--the disciple who loved Jesus--that the man on the beach is Jesus, Peter puts on his clothes and jumps out of the boat to go greet him. Jesus then prepares and serves them breakfast once they are all back on shore.
The next scene is the beach breakfast. In the midst of the conversation Jesus asks Peter three times, “do you love me more than these”? And Peter’s response is “Yes, Lord. You know that I love you!”. Jesus repeats the question and Peter answers, “Yes, Lord, you know.” And the third time, “Yes, Lord. I love you!” After each of Peter’s answers of love, Jesus gives three different responses: Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep. I think it is easy to resonate with Peter’s irritation of being asked the same question three times in a row.
The Most Fascinating Part
But what comes next is the most fascinating part of the story for me. Jesus then goes on to tell Peter about what is to come in his life: “But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will fasten a belt around you and take you where you do not wish to go.”
When we hear this story, given that it begins with the declaration about when Peter grows old, I think that most of us assume the sentence is a statement about aging. This image of Peter standing there with his arms outstretched and someone else fastening a belt around his waist connects with images of physical therapists buckling a three-inch strap around a client’s waist in order to be able to support them as they take shaky steps down the corridor of a medical facility. That image is one of frailty and vulnerability. And with that belt around Peter’s waist, we are placing our own images and stereotypes about what it is like to grow older. I don’t know about you, but that is not something to which I have any aspirations! And that is not where I wish for my life to go—as the final verses suggest.
We hear these verses and assume that it is about growing older, fragility and vulnerability with no choice about where our life will go. But this is not what the original readers of the Gospel of John would have thought.
What Original Hearers Would Have Thought
There is one piece of information that the hearers of this passage would have known that we perhaps may never have known or we mqy forget. And that is the manner by which Peter’s life comes to an end. Although there is no biblical account of his death, tradition holds that he was put to death under Emperor Nero in Rome years after this beach breakfast. When Peter’s life was in the hands of the empire and Nero, he asked to be crucified upside down because he did not feel worthy to die in the same manner as Jesus.
This passage was seen as a prophecy of Peter’s death. If we imagine him standing with his arms out to the side in order for the belt to be placed around his waist, he was forming the shape of a cross. And perhaps when an individual is hung upside down on a cross, there was a need for such a belt. No one wants to be crucified. This is the place where “you do not wish to go.”
Our Cultures Aging Messages
In our contemporary culture when we are surrounded by a broad range of messages that aging is horrible and something that we should deny, hide or avoid, it is easy to hear this text and assume that it is another message that Peter, like us, doesl not want to grow old.
We should remember that in the first century, the average age was somewhere in the 30’s. Sure, there were people who lived into their sixth, seventh and eighth decades, but they were few, far fewer than our current demographics. I can imagine that when Peter first heard Jesus’ words, “But when you grow old….” Peter did not assume a negative attitude. In fact, he probably thought of this as a cause for celebration. He was being prepared to live a long life. He was given the opportunity to imagine and prioritize his life to make the best use of the years ahead.
And he probably was not spooked by thinking about his own death. Death was most likely seen as a natural course and the conclusion of life. But crucifixion as the cause of death was the place that no one, including Peter, would have wanted to go.
May you now, when you hear these verses in John which are traditionally read the third week following Easter, remember not only the fishing advice of Jesus from the beach and the conversation over breakfast with Jesus asking the same question over and over.
May you also remember that in this exchange with the risen Christ, Peter learns that he will live a long life and grow old.
We are the inheritors of a century of advancements that have resulted in the possibility that more of us will also grow old. May we embrace this good news and look forward to the ways we can continue to grow in our own journeys of faith.
For Reflection (either individually or with a group)
Read the blog. Read it a second time, maybe reading it aloud or asking someone else to read it aloud so you can hear it with different intonation and emphases. Invite the Divine to open your heart to allow the light of new understanding to pierce the shadows of embedded assumptions, stereotypes, and ways of thinking so that you may live more abundantly. Then spend some time with the following questions together with anything or anyone who helps you reflect more deeply.
- What has been your previous take-away from these Bible verses/
- Put yourself in Peter’s place in the first century. How would you hear Jesus’ words to you/
- How are your ideas about aging affected by all the anti-aging messages in our culture—ads, TV and film fictional characters, public policies, other?
- Do you hear any hope in Jesus’ words to Peter?
Download a pdf including the Reflection Questions to share and discuss with friends, family, or members of your faith community small group.
