A Reconciliation Meal

Gospel: John 21: 1-14

The disciples have returned to their former way of life in Galilee.  They have taken up again the fishing trade, and they do not find any success in that endeavor.  But then, unawares to them, Jesus appears on shore and suggests to them casting their net on the opposite side of the boat where, to their amazement, they find a great deal of success.  It must indeed be Jesus on shore, and so it is.  

There on shore Jesus has prepared a meal for them at a charcoal fire, a meal of bread and fish.  The charcoal fire was the place of Peter's denials of Jesus not that long ago, and the Eucharistic meal of bread and fish hearkening back to the multiplication miracle - all of this becomes the setting for a great reconciliation between Jesus and his disciples.  These men who had betrayed him, denied him, abandoned him, disbelieved him and others and who now have returned to their former way of life - they now must be transformed by this meal.

Is this not the same with us?  We too have betrayed, denied, abandoned, and disbelieved the Lord, rejecting him in the person of others.  We who claim discipleship in him return again and again to our former ways of living.  But the Lord is ever there, ever preparing and providing a reconciliation meal for us as well, hoping that perhaps this time it will transform us and our former way of life from fruitless toil to great success.  That is the difference the presence of the risen Lord makes in our lives.