effervescing elephant

in john 21, Jesus returns to find a rather tormented leader out on the water with his crew once again. it’s as if everything and nothing has changed. peter’s elephant is in the boat with them.

elephant?

yes, the one that followed him home on the night Jesus was taken away. now it goes with him everywhere. he knows it's with him and so does everyone else. he takes good care of the elephant- he takes care of it the way all good pet owners do. he feeds it, takes it out for exercise and, most importantly, he pays a lot of attention to it. peter takes better care of his elephant than he does of himself.

don't we all.

so there they all are, out in the boat. peter's been a bit preoccupied of late- more so since resurrection day when he ran to the tomb and saw with his own eyes that Jesus was not where they had left him. truly a holy moment, especially since this was probably the only time since it began following him around that peter's elephant wasn't there with him, somehow informing everything by its presence. the thing just couldn't keep up with the hope that had driven peter to the empty tomb.

sadly, once the endorphins abated, the elephant was right there... imposing, demanding, controlling. the picture of codependence.

so now, peter's perspective has become so dark and tormented that, upon announcing to everyone that he is going out on the water, he finds his closest friends deciding to join him. see, they just don't trust peter these days, out on the water, alone with his elephant. who knows what might happen?

and into this scene comes Jesus with his almost taunting greeting from the beach: "have you caught anything?"

no doubt there are those in the boat thinking
perhaps if we didn't have to try to work around this elephant here in the boat we'd have more of a catch- but thanks for asking!

but no one says anything... not even peter, who is known for having no difficulty in this area. quite the contrary, in fact. he is, of course, tending to his elephant again and hasn't really been listening.

so Jesus tries again.
‘you're throwing your nets on the wrong side... throw them on the right side of the boat and you might actually catch something!'

this one pokes peter. it pokes his elephant too. way back in their shared memory, there was a time when somebody claimed to know more about fishing than peter did. that somebody seemed to not only know about fishing, but about pretty much everything else, including the time and place that peter would go about procuring for himself one rather large and obtrusive pachyderm that is now becoming a bit cumbersome to have around.

he looks up at about the same time one of the others shouts out in triumphant recognition: the master! peter jumps into the water and enthusiastically swims to shore. the elephant remains in the boat with the others who paddle in.

as they eat breakfast, there’s a certain indescribable tension in the air. Jesus allows the elephant to remain there with them on the beach. he does not feed it. he does not tend it. he does not, however, chase it away either.

see, God seems to be okay with a little dramatic irony. apparently it is we who are in this big hurry to resolve every conflict and explain every mystery in a timely fashion.

There is nothing miraculous or mysterious about the things we can explain. We control what we are able to explain. Consequently it is only natural to seek an explanation for everything. (Oswald Chambers)

when the teachable moment is ripe, Jesus strikes up some casual conversation, flatly reinstating peter. after all, enough is enough. three times Jesus challenges peter to confess with his lips in greater measure than the original denial and in these moments of restoration, Jesus calls peter beyond the basic undoing of a wrong and into a new day, a new identity.

with Jesus’ resurrection and peter’s confession of love, the elephant in the room is finally put down.

The work that Jesus called Peter to do was the work of shepherding the flock of God... There could only be one motivation. Love. Not a love for the open fields. Not a love for shepherding. Not even a love for the sheep. It had to be more than that. It had to be a love for the Shepherd Himself. Everything had to come from there. Every sermon. Every prayer for the sick. Every search for someone who was lost... All of the work, even the lowliest part of it, had to come from there. (Ken Gire)