Jennifer Mills-Knutsen Sermons

The Old South Church in Boston

On Love and Grilled Fish

Sermon by Jennifer Mills-Knutsen
John 2: 9-19*

April 29, 2001

As you may or may not know, I was raised in the South. In the South, and perhaps in some other places that you know well, there is an age-old method we use to show care and concern for someone. It’s called the casserole. When someone is ill, when a family member passes away, when a new baby is born, when a new family arrives in the community, ovens begin to preheat and refrigerator doors swing wide. In kitchens across the neighborhood, soup cans fly open, rice and noodles rise to a boil, knives chop vegetables galore, and all varieties of meat begin to sizzle. Chicken tetrazzini, tuna, turkey with wild rice, chicken with broccoli, lasagna, hamburger, vegetable, you name it. They are simple dishes, but prepared with tender care.

And after the cheese has melted or the top turned crispy, when the timers have all sounded, then the procession begins. Each foil-covered, still-warm casserole quickly makes its way through the neighborhood to the home of the bereaved or infirm, the new mother or new family. And atop the foil is likely a hand-written note that goes something like this, “Just preheat oven to 350 and heat for 20 minutes. I know this is a difficult time, and our thoughts are with you. Mrs. Jones.” I used to shake my head in bewilderment at the sense of urgency that hovered over the whole process—as if grief or recovery or even life itself depended upon a big helping of chicken and rice with mushrooms.

That same sense of bewilderment at the importance of food greets me at the opening of today’s Gospel story. It’s a simple story of a shared breakfast. The setting is the shore of the sea of Galilee, sometime after the crucifixion and after Christ’s early appearances to the women at the tomb and the disciples. The disciples have been out fishing through the night, and upon their return to the shore they catch the smell of grilled fish and fresh bread wafting through the air—a typical fisherman’s breakfast to be sure, maybe even the “tuna casserole” of fishing life. They turn to follow the smell of the food, and who do they see tending the fire but Jesus! The disciples are curious, ecstatic, weeping, overcome to experience the presence of the resurrected Christ once more. They await more of Jesus’ mesmerizing speeches, words of challenge and comfort. They anticipate power, glory, transformation. What miraculous deed might unfold before them today? What new and wondrous thing will Jesus do? The risen Christ returns to us, and what does Christ do? Barbecues, and offers them each a plate of grilled fish. Christ’s words of wisdom? “Come and have breakfast.” Can you imagine? As if the answer to all of their questions and needs depended upon a big helping of grilled fish.

Women bearing casseroles and Jesus bearing grilled fish. What is it about food? Despite my initial bewilderment, I slowly began to recognize a connection—both Jesus and those women from my neighborhood knew something about the link between food and love. These offerings of grilled fish and casserole, simple though they were, were signs of a deeper love and concern. Food is about sustenance, so the gift of food is a sign of care for a person’s health. By bringing a casserole, the women evidenced an abiding concern for the ongoing health and wellness of the recipient. Jesus, in sharing breakfast with his disciples, was showing an intimate level of care for their overall well-being, a concern for their wholeness. In short, casseroles and grilled fish become a sign of love, a gesture of caretaking.

Of course there is a danger, not only to our waistlines, when food and love become too closely connected—when a parent’s only way of showing affection is with fresh-baked cookies, or when a person’s only means of self-comfort is a pint of ice cream. But there is still something to be said for the connection between food and love, as an intertwining of affection and care-taking. Love is both of those things—feelings of affection and the desire to care for the other. What does it mean to love someone, if not to care about their well-being, to have concern for their needs? What does it mean to love someone, if not to bring offerings of grilled fish and casseroles when they are hungry?

So this gospel story opens with a tender moment, an intimate meal Jesus cooks for his friends. A lesson, by example, of what it means to love. But the story continues, and the disciples receive their next lesson in the meaning of love. Jesus turns to Simon Peter and asks, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” (I’m not sure what “these” refers to. Does Peter love him more than the disciples? More than all the things of the earth? Or just more than grilled fish for breakfast? Perhaps Peter did not know either, because he simply answers, “Yes, you know I love you.” Jesus responds, “Feed my lambs.” Again with the food! Loving is connected to feeding, almost “If you love, you will feed.” Then a second time Jesus says to Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter responds, “Yes, you know that I love you.” and Jesus answers again, “Tend my sheep.”

This time the instruction is broader than just food—Jesus uses the word “tending,” making sure Peter and the others “get it”—that loving means feeding means tending means caring. Through that word “tending,” Jesus moves us beyond food and sustenance, incorporating body, mind and spirit into the realm of our care. And that means caring broadly about the environment and situation of those we love, from their safety to their family to their happiness. We begin adding to the circle of loving care all the elements surrounding our beloved one, the many things that come together to make each person unique. Therein we find the story’s next lesson in love—to love someone is to care about the things that they value, to extend your love to those people, places and things that they love.

Anyone who has been in a romantic relationship knows that as you get to know a lover you learn about their likes and dislikes. And you participate in the activities your partner loves to do—even if they are not the activities you love to do. And you might even develop a certain affection for those activities, as an outgrowth of your love for your partner. A non-baseball fan suddenly finds himself with a liking for the Red Sox after witnessing his partner’s passionate love for the team. A devotee of classical music develops a certain fondness for the Beatles as her partner sings along to the CD’s every morning. A big part of loving someone is appreciating the things that they love, valuing the things that they hold dear. It even makes it into the level of bumper stickers—you might have seen the one I’m thinking of—“love me, love my cat.”

There was a country song out a few years back that expressed that same sentiment. The song is addressed to a lover, and chronicles the singer’s lifelong struggle to find love and happiness, the struggle to be true to himself and to reach out for faith. During the chorus, however, he sings out the prayer he has prayed since childhood, “Now I lay me down to sleep, pray the Lord my soul to keep. And if I die before I wake, feed Jake. He’s been a good dog, my best friend, right through it all. If I die before I wake, feed Jake.” The singer trusts that the one that he loves will care for his best friend. Out of love, he expects that, despite the rocky nature of their relationship, his lover will look after the thing he loves most deeply, his best friend and dog, Jake. To love someone is to care for that person and to care for the things that matter to them. And there’s that food thing again—now we’re not just feeding the one we care about, but we’re feeding the ones that they hold most dear, including their dogs. After all, what does it mean to love someone, if not to find yourself entangled in their passions, wrapped up in their most pressing concerns? What does it mean to love someone, if not to tend to the things in life that they find most important?

So we’ve garnered two lessons of love from this Gospel story: to love a person is to care for their well-being, and to love a person is to care for those things that she or he loves. But the story isn’t done with us yet. It goes on. A third time Jesus asks, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” As you can imagine, this third time around Peter was getting a bit exasperated, and even hurt that his first two answers had not been enough. He says, even more emphatically, “You know everything, you know that I love you.” And Jesus says again, “Feed my sheep.”

And the next layer unfolds. This is Jesus speaking to Peter. “Do you love me?” “Feed my sheep.” Peter has confessed his love for Jesus, which means not only to care for the body, mind and spirit of Jesus, but to care for those whom Jesus loves. “Feed MY sheep.” Just as affection and care for a lover demands attention to those things he or she loves, love for Jesus demands attention and care for those things Jesus loves.

Who were the ones Jesus’ loved, whom he called on Peter to tend and to feed? Tax collectors, abhorred by all for their conniving ways and all-consuming greed. The lepers and the blind and the sick, those whose bodies were broken and battered by disease, cast out because their illness made them unclean, with unsightly sores and irritating coughs, foul-smelling breath and glassy eyes. Those afflicted by demons, whose mad and manic behavior was threatening and strange and uncontrollable. Criminals, robbers and thieves who hung beside him on the cross, convicted adulterers ready to be stoned. Prostitutes, women who were streetwise, selling their bodies for money, operating outside the realm of morals and marriage. Samaritans, mortal enemies of Judea. The poor, the meek, the oppressed, the lowly, the immoral, the messy, the deceitful, the abandoned, the foreign, the insane, the outcast. These were Jesus’ friends and companions. Yes, Jesus’ love extends to all, but these were the ones Jesus spent his time with, the ones he felt most in need of care. His flock of sheep was the most motley of crews, a raggedy band of beggars and thieves.

“Do you love me?” he asked of Peter. And the bold answer, “Yes, of course, you know that I love you.” And the response, “Then feed my sheep. Tend this ragtag flock that I have assembled. Ensure the well-being of those I hold most dear. Come to love them the way I do, share in my affection. Care for them as I would have, care for them as I have cared for you. And please, when they are hungry, make them up a big helping of grilled fish.”

My friends, we who gather here today in this house, we who bear Christ’s name, we who are willing to profess our love for God through Jesus Christ, this call to Peter also rests upon us. To love Jesus is to love the people Jesus loved, to care for their well-being and come to care for them as personally and intimately as Jesus did. To love Jesus is to tend to the needs of God’s people in our world.

So what does our love for Jesus look like? It might look like participation in next week’s Walk for Hunger, either by walking or sponsoring one of our youth who are walking. It might look like an afternoon spent at Sunday’s Bread, cooking up a meal and serving it to those on the streets. It might look like a telephone call or letter to a state representative, speaking up in support of those working to build affordable housing. It might look like an armload of clothes, cleaned and pressed, to be delivered to Training, Inc. for those taking their first steps into new careers. It might look like an evening spent talking to a newly released prisoner, listening to concerns and navigating together the path toward new life. It might look like an embrace, offered to a homeless person whose mental illness or alcoholism instinctively turn us away. It looks like you and me, reaching out in love, however we can, to the homeless, the hungry, the oppressed, the convict, the villianized, the outcast. By these acts, we love the people whom Christ loves. By these acts, we love Christ.

“Do you love me?” Jesus asks each of us. And what does that mean, if not to care for the needs of those whom Christ loves? What does it mean to love Christ, if not to tend to the well-being of Christ’s most beloved ones, those whom Jesus chose as companions and friends? What does it mean to love Christ, if not to prepare a meal, maybe to grill up some fish, and invite all who are hungry to come have breakfast?

Let us pray:

Loving God, who loves each of us intimately, help us to love Christ more deeply each day. Guide us in your paths, that we may live out that love in your world. Help us to love those whom Christ loved, to extend care and compassion to all. In the name of your most loving son Jesus we pray.

Amen.

SCRIPTURE READING

John 21: 9-19

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 fifty-three of them; and though there were so many, the net was not torn.Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” because they knew it was the Lord.Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and did the same with the fish.This was now the third time that Jesus appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” A second time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” He said to him the third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.Very truly, I tell you, when you were younger, you used to fasten your own belt and to go wherever you wished. 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.”(He said this to indicate the kind of death by which he would glorify God.) After this he said to him, “Follow me.”