Let's Try Again

For young children, when they just can’t quite learn a new skill or grasp a difficult concept, it’s likely that sooner or later they’ll hear: “If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.” That famous proverb also works the other way, though, as you know if you’ve ever had to teach young children. The first attempt to teach or explain something often doesn’t go over great, but if you keep working at it – if you keep trying – then usually children begin to catch on.

And not just children, but grown-ups too, as we hear in our Gospel today. For the third time now following his Resurrection, the disciples encounter the Risen Jesus. For so long, in his earthly life, he had been their Teacher and Master, and now, in his Resurrected life, it seems they are slow to catch on to what he wishes to impart to them. He came to them first on Easter Sunday evening, as we heard in last week’s Gospel, wishing them peace and offering them reconciliation. And then he appeared again a week later in the same place, as Thomas, who was present this time, was moved from unbelief to belief. And yet, as we hear today, it seems the disciples still are not quite sure what to make of this new reality of the Resurrection. They have gone back to what is familiar to them – back to their home region of Galilee, back to their prior occupation of fishing.

Isn’t that the way with us sometimes? When we encounter difficulty, when we struggle with some new reality in life, often we tend to revert back to what is safe and familiar. Even worse, sadness, confusion, and loss can often leave us spiritually yearning, and in our desire to be filled, we can turn to those things which occupy us but which don’t really satisfy – like spiritual junk food, if you will. Simon Peter and the other disciples turned to fishing, but maybe we turn to gossip, occupying our attention with the affairs of everyone else; or perhaps to dwelling on our resentments and grudges, brooding about who has slighted us or in what areas we feel wronged; or maybe to overindulging in sensible pleasures, like food or drink; or maybe it’s the internet, social media, hours spent watching nothing good on TV or online. Whether it’s in these things, or even others that are worse, when we seek to fill ourselves up, we will find what Simon Peter and the disciples found trying to fish – that there is nothing there good to eat, and we come away with even greater yearning than we had before.

James Tissot, Christ Appears on the Shore of Lake Tiberias (c. 1890)

Often, however, it is in just these moments that the Lord comes to us anew. Just as he was for the disciples, he is an ever-patient Teacher for us, not giving up on us, but always trying again to help us to see the newness of life that comes only through him. When we have understood again that what is tired and old does not satisfy us, he makes his presence known, often not directly but standing on the shore of our lives, close enough to be perceived but not so near as to be obtrusive. He wants us to seek him, with boldness and urgency, as Simon Peter does, but he also won’t force us to do so. He offers us newness of life, the brightness of the morning that dawns beyond the reach of sin and death, but it must be we who make the choice for him. And we must make that choice again and again, especially when we fall and fail, never losing heart at where we don’t succeed but trying again and again through the love and mercy Jesus continually offers us.

“Do you love me?” That’s the question the Lord asks Simon Peter in the Gospel, and he asks it of us too. He keeps asking it, each day, because each day the love that he gives must be accepted anew, and in the light of his Resurrection it is only in our friendship with him that our lives find their fullness of meaning. May we be attuned to where the Risen Lord is present on the horizon of our lives, standing on the shore – calling to us, patiently teaching us, inviting not to turn back to what is old and tired, but to turn more fully to him, to come and share more deeply in the abundance of his life.