Matthew 17:22-27
O Lord, today may you catch us. May you pull us out of the sea of our worries and our distractions.
I don’t know what to make of the gospel today. I almost wonder if Jesus isn’t joking, or putting Peter off.
If I owed you money, and you asked for it, and I said, well, go to the lake, and throw out a line, and the first fish you catch will have a coin in it, and that’s your payment, how would you react?
It’s as if he’s saying, don’t bother me with stuff like this.
We don’t have to be perfect, we don’t have to weep and fast and pray.
Or maybe the fish with the coin in its mouth is a symbol of the little gifts our lives are always giving us. We don’t have to be perfect, we don’t have to weep and fast and pray. Every day there are pennies from heaven, they just come, they just appear.
Spontaneity is implied here. It’s the first fish. You just drop your hook in. Whatever happens happens.
I remember being at the Sea of Galilee, near Capernaum, and having lunch at a restaurant that looked from the outside like some kind of gas station, and what we had was tilapia from the lake, St. Peter’s Fish, lightly fried, and the people at the restaurant put a coin inside of one of them, according to tradition, so that the one of the pilgrims in our group, I forget which one, took away a little prize.
There’s something playful about this. It’s a game. Is that the way faith is sometimes? It’s just fun? Just easy?
Or if faith is like the coin in the mouth of the first fish, if revelation is like this, then revelation is subtle. It’s hidden in the water. It’s not obvious. And we do have to make an effort. We have to go to the water, and we have to put out our line, and we have to be patient, waiting for the first bite.
Or there’s the image in the monastic tradition of prayer as fishing. We get up every morning and go to a quiet place and we watch for the first thoughts that arise, our first memories or images or desires. We fish for them.
Barb and I went up to Hillsboro on the weekend to the parents of our soon-to-be son-in-law and in a glass case in their house there was a Chinese wood-carving of a wise old man, a traditional figure symbolizing wisdom and insight. Mervin’s parents are Indonesian, of Chinese ancestry, and this carving has been in their family for a long time.
And what is the wise man doing? He is fishing. The wise man is always fishing.
O Lord, today may we go to the sea and put out our lines and may we bring up the fish with the coin in its mouth.
O Lord, today may you catch us. May you pull us out of the sea of our worries and our distractions.
O Lord, today may we love you and see you as you love and see us.