Mystagogy: On the Shore of Lake Tiberias
As a part of our mystagogy is a reexamination of our relationship with God during our suffering.
To help us in this reexamination is the post-resurrection story from John’s Gospel in which Jesus, on the shoreline of Lake Tiberias (Sea of Galilee) calls out to his disciples who fishing through the night proved to be furtive endeavor. Jesus asks them how the fishing went. They replied that it was miserable. He then instructs them to throw their nets on the other side of their boats. Immediately, the nets fill with fish. They knew it was Jesus who had called out to them and headed back to the shore. There, they found Jesus had prepared a fire on the shore, and they cooked and ate some of the fish they had just caught. Then, this beautiful story unfolds between Jesus and Simon Peter.
“¹⁵ 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.” ¹⁶ 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.” ¹⁷ 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.” (John 21:15-17, NRSV)
In this discourse between Jesus and Peter, Peter is confronted with the denials he made about Jesus in the throes of Jesus’ Passion. Jesus does not reprove Peter for his weakness in the face of great danger. Instead of berating and browbeating Peter for his unfaithfulness, Jesus gently asks Peter, “Do you love me?” Jesus does this three times. Peter, overwhelmed by his guilt, replies, “Yes!”. Jesus then impresses upon Peter the mission he would be receiving, namely, “Feed my lambs. Tend my sheep. Feed my sheep.” Jesus was passing on his ministry of love and compassion to Peter.
In our own feeling of being overwhelmed in the midst of our own Crucible, we will express verbally, interiorly, or in some other form, our own denial of God’s presence. As our suffering twists and contorts us, our perception of the real presence of God can be equally twisted and contorted so much so, that we are unable to detect God’s presence. To use the Gospel story of the storm at sea, we cling to the boat as the storm of suffering buffets our boat in such a way we feel we will perish and, like the disciples in the bottom of the boat, weakly implore God to save us. In our desperation, we begin to doubt the presence of God in our suffering, especially so when our suffering does not abate, and the storm of suffering only increases.
As we begin to recover from our suffering, and begin to think more clearly, we find revealed to us that God did not abandon us, but was steadfastly holding our hand during the worse of our suffering. It is then, we feel the guilt of doubting in the God who loves us so much. It is at this point that we slip inside the person of Peter and feel the guilt he felt on the shore of Lake Tiberias.
It is here that we can learn something about God’s mercy and love from the experience of those who have had Near Death experiences. For those who have had positive experiences (not all Near Death experiences are those who go into the light), they speak of encountering a “being of love”. At one point, those who have died re-experience the harm and suffering that they have caused others, from the point of view of those they have harmed. As they relive the agony their behavior has caused others, this “Being of Love” reassures them that they are loved by God and that nothing can change the love of God for them. When their souls are returned to their bodies, they live lives that are completely changed from who they were before the near death experience. It is the experience the agony their behavior had caused others that elicits this change. They have learned to live the Great Commandment of Jesus who said, “Love one another as I have loved you.” As one near death experiencer said, “I never want to go through that rerun of my life ever again.”
We are reminded by the story of Peter and Jesus on the shore of Lake Tiberias, and the stories of many near death experiencers, that in spite of our doubts and denials of God in the midst of our suffering, God’s love and mercy are constantly present to us. We are enveloped in God’s love and mercy every moment of our lives.
As you meditate on the music, reexamine those times in which you doubted the presence of God, or felt that God utterly abandoned you. In what ways have you, like Peter, experience God’s love and mercy for you? When Jesus asks you, “Do you love me?” how do you answer?
