The Fisherman

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by Larry Huntsperger


  And so, at last, the world came to an end.

  My recollection of the next several days is little more than a dark blur of mingled pain and fear. I stayed close to my fellow disciples. The report of my public denials and desertion was now well known to all of them. To their credit, though, their attitudes toward me seemed to reflect compassion and sorrow rather than condemnation. Perhaps their own sense of defeat and shame at doing nothing themselves to prevent the Master’s death kept them from passing too harsh a judgment on me. We all saw the wisdom of staying out of sight as much as possible. Though no further arrests were being made, the possibility was enough to keep us all cowering in the shadows.

  The day following the crucifixion, filled with remorse and faced with the consequences of his greed, Judas found a desolate piece of ground outside the city, secured a rope to the branch of an old tree overhanging a thirty-foot embankment, slipped a noose around his neck, and jumped to his death. The rope snapped his neck, the weight of his body then broke the branch on which his rope was tied, and his body, branch, and rope crashed onto the jagged rocks below. His chest and stomach were ripped open in the fall, and those who found his remains gave testimony to the hideous end of the one whose name has now become synonymous with betrayal among the people of God.

  The sun was not yet fully risen the first day of the week when I felt John’s firm grip on my shoulder, shaking me into consciousness. Morning has never been a good time of day for me, but since the Master’s death it was abhorrent beyond measure, bringing with it the obligation to face another sixteen hours of emptiness, fear, shame, and regret. The urgency with which he spoke brought me to a sitting position.

  “Simon? Simon! Wake up! Mary’s here. She just came back from the tomb, and the stone is rolled away from the door. The guards are gone, and she’s afraid somebody has taken his body.”

  I got dressed as quickly as I could, and the two of us set off at a brisk pace, heading toward the sepulcher. The first rays of the morning sun were just touching the tallest buildings in the city, promising a glorious day ahead. I will not say I yet had hope. Perhaps it would be more accurate to say I felt within me the hope of a hope. For the first time since the crucifixion, the Spirit of God brought back to my mind the Master’s promised resurrection on the third day. We walked on in silence for several minutes, my mind now recalling more and more of Jesus’ prophetic words: “The Son of Man is going to be delivered into the hands of men; and they will kill him, and he will be raised on the third day.” “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem; and the Son of Man will be delivered to the chief priests and scribes, and they will condemn him to death, and will hand him over to the Gentiles to mock and scourge and crucify him, and on the third day he will be raised up.” “For just as Jonah was three days and three nights in the belly of the sea monster, so will the Son of Man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.”

  The more I thought, the faster I walked. John’s mind must have been moving in the same direction, for after several minutes of silence, I glanced over at him and saw a tiny smile creeping across his lips. He saw me looking at him, and for a few seconds we both stopped and stared at each other in silence. Then John’s face broke into a broad grin, and he spoke the two words that signaled the start of the best footrace of my life.

  “Three days!”

  That was all he said. It was all he needed to say. We both took off at a dead run, heading for the tomb. It wasn’t a fair race, of course, with me being built more for strength than for speed. John arrived at the door to the open grave a full minute ahead of me. When I finally came puffing and blowing up to his side, though, I could see the pain once again filling his eyes. A single glance into the dimly lit cavern told me why. From where he stood, looking through the door, the linen cocoon in the shape of the Master’s feet could be clearly seen still resting on the cold stone bench.

  I left John standing at the door and entered the cave. Having come this far, I wanted to make certain Jesus’ body was still undisturbed. What I found when I entered that tomb altered the course of my life and the history of the human race forever.

  The first thing I noticed was the absence of Jesus’ head. The linen cocoon surrounding his body was still stretched out on the stone, but the cloth binding for his head was now folded neatly, sitting by itself at the end of the bench. And where his head should have been there was nothing . . . nothing at all. Then I looked more closely at the cocoon. There was something wrong with it as well. The chest and stomach were sunken in several inches as if some heavy weight had been pressed down, crushing the chest cavity. When the truth of what I was seeing finally surged into my conscious mind, I let out a sort of gasping bellow that drew John to my side. There was no body inside the wrappings! It wasn’t just that the head was missing. The entire body was missing, having passed through the layers of binding, leaving the linen wrappings untouched, undisturbed in the form of a hollow shell. With the body removed, the stillmoist linen and paste cocoon had sunken in slightly under its own weight.

  What we were seeing could of course not be true. And yet it was. I knelt down and slipped my arm through the neck hole, feeling the emptiness within, to confirm what I now already knew—Jesus was alive! I had no idea where he was. But I knew he was alive.

  I sprang to my feet, grabbed John around the chest, and then bounced him around the tomb in a mighty bear hug, screaming, “He’s alive! He’s alive! He’s alive!”

  Following my exuberant outburst, we both headed back to the city to report our discovery to the others. We walked together, talking over the deluge of still unanswered questions that now flooded our minds. The question that troubled me most deeply, though, and the one that now mattered more than all the rest combined, was a question I dared not put into words, a question for which I knew John could never give me an answer. If, indeed, the Master was alive, and if we were ever to see him again, how would he relate to me, the one who failed him utterly, the one who publicly, repeatedly denied him, the one who deserted him in his greatest hour of need?

  26

  Less than four hours later I had the answer to the question I feared most of all.

  John and I literally exploded into the silent, dimly lit room in which our fellow disciples still lay sleeping. We were both blasting forth our accounts of the empty tomb and the linen wrappings before the door closed behind us. Our entrance caused several of our comrades to sit suddenly bolt upright out of a deep sleep, terror in their eyes, assuming the early morning chaos meant their own arrest and execution was now upon them. By the time everyone was awake and alert enough to hear what we were saying, they were all so irritated with us that no one was taking us seriously. Someone flung back a less than flattering proverb about the offensiveness of loud greetings early in the morning, and several others mumbled comments about the dangers of drowning our pain in too much wine. Within a matter of minutes the only thing we had successfully accomplished was to reduce the room to a collection of grumpy, muttering, half-awake men tossing insults back and forth at one another.

  John and I continued our urgent efforts to convince the others, but trying to tell them about the resurrection of Christ introduced us to a principle we would see reconfirmed countless times throughout the rest of our lives. Facts alone can never successfully communicate the truth about the resurrection of our Lord. Only when those facts are combined with the work of the Spirit of God can the hearer ever make the transition from facts to truth.

  In the end John and I decided it would be best for us to keep any additional comments to ourselves until our fellow disciples were better equipped to relate to our discoveries in a logical, rational manner. Having successfully roused the entire room with our entrance, we then fell silent and joined the others in the morning routines of life.

  We were just finishing our morning meal together when the women arrived. Mary, Jesus’ mother, was there, as was the mother of James the Less, along with several other loyal followers of the Master. The group w
as lead by Joanna, the wife of King Herod’s steward. Throughout most of the past four years her social prominence in the Jerusalem community had not prevented her from boldly proclaiming her support of Jesus. The first words out of Joanna’s mouth sent a jolt throughout every man in that room.

  “We just saw Jesus! He’s alive! He’s whole! And he’s coming to see you!”

  A few seconds of stunned silence were followed by everyone in the room bursting into speech at once. All the women launched into vivid accounts of their encounter with the Master, and all the men pelted them with questions. The room quickly broke into four or five little clusters of shrieking men and women, all trying to hear and be heard above the noise. Gradually the account took shape.

  The women had gathered at sunrise, planning to go to the Lord’s grave as a group to mourn his death and, if they could find someone to help them move the stone at the entrance of the cave, to anoint his body with spices. When they arrived at the tomb, however, they found the stone already removed. They entered, expecting to find Jesus’ body, but found instead two young men sitting at either end of the empty linen wrappings. The men were dressed in glistening white clothing, giving off a radiance that immediately convinced the women they were in the presence of supernatural beings. The two men stood as the women entered, and one of them spoke. “Don’t be afraid; for I know that you are looking for Jesus who has been crucified. Why do you seek the living one among the dead? He is not here, for he has risen, just as he said. Come, see the place where he was lying.”

  At this point he encouraged the women to gather around the empty linen cocoon, and, to my immense satisfaction, the women gave a description of the empty shell identical to the one John and I had been trying to present to the others a half hour earlier.

  Then the angel spoke again. “And go quickly and tell his disciples that he has risen from the dead; and behold, he is going before you into Galilee, there you will see him; behold, I have told you.”

  But the best was yet to come. The women took off out of the sepulcher, heading back to town as fast as they could go. But before they’d gone a hundred paces down the trail, suddenly there he was! He wasn’t a ghost. He wasn’t a product of their imaginations. He was real and he was alive! They dropped to the ground in his presence, but he opened his arms wide and embraced them in what was certainly the most wonderful group hug of their lives. Everything about him proclaimed victory. The first word he spoke to them was the single word “Rejoice!”—not that they needed any encouragement. Jesus did not stay with them long, but he did not depart from them before he personally confirmed the same message given to them by the angels a few minutes earlier.

  “Don’t be afraid; go and take word to my brothers to leave for Galilee, and they will see me there.”

  I will not say the others believed the women’s report. Grief and loss can do strange things to people. It can cause some to see and hear what they want to see and hear. It can cause others to fear the reentrance of hope, believing it will lead in the end only to greater pain. I will say, however, that I have never seen a group of men pack more quickly for the journey home than we did that morning.

  For me, however, there was one more tiny piece of information given to me by Jesus’ mother, information that overshadowed all the rest. The room was still buzzing with a dozen different conversations when she approached me. No words had passed between us since before the crucifixion. When I saw her coming my way, I found myself unable to make eye contact with her. My sense of shame and failure was still so raw, so intense. What defense could I offer for my actions? What explanation could justify my failure? If I could have met her gaze as she approached, however, I would have known she was seeking me out not to bring me condemnation but rather to bring me hope.

  “Simon, there is something else I think you need to know. Joanna did not quote the angel’s words exactly as they were spoken. The exact words spoken by the angel were these: ‘But go, tell his disciples and Peter, “He is going before you into Galilee; there you will see him, just as he said to you.”’ He mentioned your name specifically, Simon. He wants you there.”

  “‘And Peter’? You’re sure he said, ‘and Peter’? He really said my name?”

  “Yes, Simon, I’m sure. I heard him speak. The message the angels gave us mentioned you by name. And Simon, if you could have seen him, if you could have seen the way he is, you would know . . . everything is all right. In fact, it’s not just all right, it’s wonderful as it has never been wonderful before. Go to him, Simon. He wants to see you, and you very much need to see him.”

  And so I went, not because Mary told me to go, but because I knew I had no choice. Until I saw him, until I knew where we stood, he and I, nothing else mattered. The deafening babble of the dozen bellowing voices around me continued, but I no longer heard them. I walked in silence out the door and into the early morning Jerusalem street. I didn’t know where to go, of course, but I also knew it didn’t matter. I didn’t have to find him; he would find me. I would return to the tomb and wait.

  As I walked along the quiet lanes winding through the city, the angel’s words kept running through my mind. “But go, tell his disciples and Peter . . . and Peter . . . and Peter . . . and Peter.” Could it really be? I would have expected the angel to say, “But go, tell his disciples, except Peter,” but that was not what Mary said. And why did the angel use that name—Peter? Why didn’t he call me Simon? Surely that other name, that other wonderful name given to me by the Lord so long ago, the name that meant “The Rock,” surely I lost any right to that name forever when I proclaimed to all the world, “I do not know him!”

  My mind was so full of lies back then. It still is in many ways, of course. But at that point in my pilgrimage, even the basics of the faith eluded me. After four years with the Master, I still believed the serpent’s lie that my past determined my future, my sins defined my true identity, and the limitations of my flesh designated the boundaries of the life of Christ through me. I was yet to discover that his declaration of me as “The Rock” was not and never had been based on anything I could do for him. It was, rather, his prophetic affirmation of what he would one day accomplish in and through me.

  If I was permitted to retain just one memory of the risen Lord, it would be the memory of that first encounter. The garden surrounding the entrance to the tomb was deserted when I arrived. I had some vague notion of waiting for his arrival on the bench inside the cave, but I never made it that far. As I approached the doorway, without warning he was there, standing just a few feet in front of me. Until that instant I had not known how much pain, how much shame, how much fear and unresolved agony still remained within me. At the sight of him, I dropped to my knees and then to my face at his feet. Through uncontrolled sobs I spoke the words I most wanted him to hear. “Oh, my Lord, forgive me . . . forgive me . . . forgive me.”

  There was no question about it being him or about his being real. The thought never crossed my mind. I could feel his feet in my hands. Even through my blurred vision, I could see where the nails had been driven through his flesh.

  Then, as I lay there on the grass at his feet, he knelt down, and I once again felt his strong grip on my shoulders, and I heard his voice speak my new name. “Peter!”

  When I finally looked up into his face, I saw what until that instant I believed I would never see again. I saw him smile. And I saw in his eyes not just forgiveness, though certainly that was there in abundance, but something else as well. I saw victory—both his victory and mine.

  He did not remain with me long, but it was long enough. Everything I needed to know he communicated with absolute clarity. He was alive. I was forgiven. He still loved me. He still wanted me by his side. And I did not have to be afraid anymore.

  And so the longest night of my life at last came to an end as the risen rays of his love once again flooded my soul.

  27

  Those weeks between the resurrection and the day of Pentecost were exciting days for me, b
ut they were difficult ones as well. Relating to the truth of the resurrection without the indwelling presence of the Holy Spirit drove me to all sorts of strange behaviors. I was flooded with truth about my Lord, but I did not understand what to do with it. That Jesus was alive was obvious. He threaded himself through our lives, appearing to one person here, to two or three there, to a small group in Jerusalem, and then to another gathering in Galilee. He touched us, ate with us, talked with us, and responded to our questions, making certain every individual within his tiny band of faithful followers knew beyond any doubt that he was alive.

  That he lived was now the central truth of my existence. But I didn’t know how this truth was to impact my life. My heart was healed, but my mind was still immersed in blindness, ignorance, and confusion. It was a strange time in my life, a brief time between two worlds, a time when I possessed huge quantities of truth about the Master yet continued to relate to that truth through the mind of the flesh.

  We spent most of those days back in Galilee. I kept waiting for Jesus to reorganize his people for a second assault on Jerusalem. At the time it seemed to me to be the only logical plan. In my mind I could see it all so clearly—the excitement among the masses at Jesus’ miraculous reappearance, the terror in the eyes of the high priest and his cohorts as he stood before them in his resurrected majesty, the immediate submission or panic-driven desertion of all those who once opposed him.

 

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