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The Very Reverend Harry Pritchett
The Cathedral of St. Philip
Atlanta, Georgia
April 18, 2010
The Third Sunday of Easter- Year C
As far back as I can
remember I always loved music. Even as a young boy. But we lived in a
relatively small town and never really had much of an opportunity to
hear really great symphonic music. And the radios were full of static,
the 78 records weren't that great, and in my house there just was not a
lot of classical music played except in forced practice for forced
piano lessons. One time when I was in grammar school our class went out
to Foster Auditorium at the University of Alabama to attend a concert.
And there I heard for the first time Beethoven's Fifth Symphony. I
don't have any idea who played it or whether it was well played or not,
but I want you to know that it is still for me the image of the
symphony. It was the concrete expression of this abstract thing called
a symphony. Now I know that there is a great deal more to understand
about symphonic music - and I hope to a degree I have moved beyond it,
but I began with that vivid picture, that dynamic image that was
concrete and specific and true. And I will never forget it as long as I
live.
Now it may seem unfortunate for our 21st century minds,
which are conditioned by technological precision and mathematical
exactitude, that the only way we can talk about the abstraction of God
is with images - with mental pictures, with metaphors, -- with poetry.
Of course we know we can't figure out how to get to the moon and back
that way. We can't figure out how to do open-heart surgery and
transplants and genetic engineering that way. We can't actually build a
skyscraper that way. And yet for people of faith, and maybe all human
beings, to deal with the most central issues in our lives, all we have
for building blocks toward our theological understanding are concrete
images, metaphors and stories.
Now of course that's really true
about any abstraction, like God, which we cannot see but can only
imagine"”and of course to imagine means "to image", to use your
imagination. I think to some degree, that we all have some images of
God and we might need others. Everybody has one or more, whether we are
aware of it or not. We have never seen God, but we still have a picture
of God.
I'll also bet your picture of God is not always the
same, not even during your own life time. It changes. When you were a
child, God may have been very near to you when you knelt down by your
bed with your mama or daddy and prayed, "God bless Mama and Daddy and
make me a good boy or girl." Then when you became a young person and
faced all the complexities of life and saw before you perhaps for the
first time the riddles of existence that were beyond our comprehension,
maybe God disappeared completely. And so your picture of God was an
empty absence. And maybe when you grew a little older and became a
little more mature, God may have come back , so to speak, but not
exactly the way God was when you knelt by your childhood bed.
So
don't be surprised if your own image of God changes as you grow. In
fact, perhaps it ought to change. Be alarmed if it remains exactly the
same. The picture changes because we change and the world changes and
the stuff by which we make images become wider and more extensive. And
yet for Christians there is one very important thing to remember: In
the New Testament we definitely get an image of God. The human, Jesus,
is the concrete and specific image of the unseen God. That's what the
incarnation doctrine is really about. Therefore as Christians we begin
with Jesus. We begin with the concrete and move out to the abstract.
For most people I think that is the way we go. You begin with the
picture, the image, and then move out to the abstract in the same way
that the specific work of Beethoven points toward the abstraction of
symphony.
So here in the Gospel for today, we get an image,
another picture in the Jesus story; one that has not been used much in
theological discussion or for reflection in Christian pictures and art.
Much more popular ones are the good shepherd, the loving father, the
faithful teacher, the crucified savior or even the liberating reformer,
driving folks out of the Temple. The story in today's gospel goes like
this:
One evening Peter and few of the others took the boat out
fishing. They didn't get a nibble between them but stuck it our all
night. It was something to do anyway. It passed the time. Just at dawn,
in the weird yellow half light, somebody showed up on the beach and
cupped his mouth with his hand, ANY LUCK? The answer was NO in more
ways than one, and they said it. Then give it another try, the man
said. Reel in the nets and cast them off the port beam this time. There
was nothing to lose they hadn't lost already so they did it, and the
catch had to be seen to be believed, had to be felt, the heft of it
almost swamping them as they pulled it aboard. Peter saw who the man
was first, and heaved himself overboard like a side of beef. The water
was chest-high as he plowed though it, tripping over his feet in the
shallows so he ended up scrambling ashore on all fours. Jesus was
standing there waiting for him by a little charcoal fire he had going.
The others came ashore, slowly, like men in a dream, not daring to
speak for fear they would wake up. Jesus got them to bring him some of
their fish and then they stood around at a little distance while he did
the cooking. When it was done, he gave them the word. "Come and have
breakfast," he said, and they all came over and sat down beside him in
the sand. They sat there around the fire eating their fish with the sun
coming up over the water behind them and they were all so hushed and
glad and peaceful that anybody passing by would never have guessed that
not long before, their host, their cook, had been nailed up on a hill
outside the city and left there to die with out a friend to his name.
So
what are the images of God implied by this story, what does this story
of the Resurrected Jesus point to about God, the very core of all that
is, the heart of the whole universe. We have to use our imaginations:
As
in Symphony is Beethoven's fifth, God is the good shepherd, the loving
father, the faithful teacher, the crucified savior, the liberating
reformer. God is, Jesus of Nazareth.
In this powerful, but lovely resurrection story, behold these images of God:
God
is, a gracious cook, who chooses the fatted calf and makes not just
wine, but the very best wine out of water for the feast.
And God is, a hospitable chef, who prepares a table before me in the wilderness in the presences of my enemies.
And
God is,a welcoming host who invites with gusto, COME ON AND HAVE
BREAKFAST. who sits down to eat with everybody, who doesn't take the
head of the table, nor just stay over the fire, but picnics on the sand
with his friends, as the sun rises on the Easter dawn.
So the
questions of these images are at least twofold: What does God as cook,
as chef and as host mean for you, to be continued. And perhaps more
than that, will you have breakfast with him on the beach? Think about
it. Amen
Comments? Contact The Very Rev. Harry Pritchett at: hpritchett@stphilipscathedral.org
