A sermon for the Third Sunday of Easter
May 1, 2022
Have you ever been to an old fashioned testimony service? You know the ones, where folks stand up and tell the story of how they came to Jesus. I have to tell you, I hated them growing up. Sometimes they can turn into a sort of game, a competition to see who among us was the worst before they found Jesus. Who had fallen the lowest? Who had sunk deepest into the mire of sin? Who was the hardest, in our human eyes, to redeem? Perhaps I didn’t like those testimony services because I could never win at that game. I’m pretty vanilla. My sins are pretty normal, boring even.
Churches that have testimony services focus a lot on conversion–change–how someone came to know Jesus. Testimony services ask us to tell our conversion stories. When was the moment that God grabbed you out of the mire and set you on a new path, they ask? Churches like ours don’t tend to ask that question. I think we’re missing out. Not because I think we should engage in this game of who-was-the-worst, but because I think it’s important to tell our stories, to tell how God has come into our lives and picked us up. Elaine Murphy likes to ask that question. One afternoon, sitting on her back deck, she asked it this way. “Mark, tell me what you know about Jesus.”
Conversions don’t all look the same. Some are dramatic. Some are boring. But they are all conversions. Nor is there only one conversion. No, we all have many conversions, many changes that happen to us over our lifetimes. And as long as we’re on this planet, our conversion stories don’t end. God is always converting us, changing us, all the time in all sorts of ways, if we allow the Spirit to move in our lives.
Sometimes we’re converted from. Converted from a life of sin, taken off a path of destruction. That happens to all of us, whether it’s dramatic or not. It was certainly dramatic for St. Paul. In our reading from Acts, he is still known as Saul, and he is hunting down the early church. He is merciless; he is mad. He’s on his way to Damascus to do his worst when God shows up. A light shines, a voice speaks, Saul is knocked from his horse and struck blind. “Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me?” St. Paul would win that testimony service game of who-was-the-worst. But he wasn’t too far to be reached by God. No one is ever too far gone, too far out of bounds to be reached by God’s loving hand. Nor is anyone ever too good not to need God’s hand reaching out for them. We all need God. We all need Jesus to show up in our lives, to set us free from the power of sin and death.
Peter learns something about that today. Hi conversion here in John 21 is far less dramatic than Saul’s. It happens while they’re on a fishing trip, over breakfast. While they’re out, the resurrected Christ shows up. Peter, who denied Christ three times, swims to Jesus. Jesus makes breakfast for them. While they’re eating, Jesus picks Peter up and restores him, forgiving him for his past denials. “Peter, do you love me?” He asks this question three times, one for each time Peter denied him. It’s Jesus’s way of calling him back.
Sometimes we’re converted from, and sometimes we’re converted to. Converted to new life, to a new path, to a new way of living, to a new way of seeing, to a new way of thinking, to a closer walk with Jesus. Ananias could tell us something about that. He shows up in today’s reading from Acts, too. He is already a devoted Christian, a faithful man, and he has heard about Saul. He knows Saul is coming, and he knows he wants to stay away from him. But then Jesus calls. Jesus needs Ananias to go to the very man he feared, this persecutor of the church, to lay his hands on him and pray for him. Ananias pushes back a little: In case you haven’t heard, Lord, this man is not good. Jesus tells him again: go. So he goes. When Ananias shows up, he calls Saul something unexpected: “Brother Saul,” he says. “Brother Saul, the Lord Jesus, who appeared to you on your way here, has sent me so that you may regain your sight and be filled with the Holy Spirit.” A conversion has happened again, this time to Ananias. It wasn’t dramatic, like Saul’s; Ananias wouldn’t win that testimony service contest; but this is still a conversion, a change. Ananias has been given a new way of seeing, of seeing this persecutor of the church, not as an enemy, but as a brother in the Christian fellowship. He has been converted to newness, brought closer to God.
Peter, too. In our gospel lesson, Peter is first converted from, taken from that path of denial he had been on. Then he is converted to–to newness of life, to following Jesus again. Jesus tells him, “follow me.” “Feed my lambs.” “Feed my sheep.” Be a disciple and walk a new path with Jesus.
God is calling us to the same kind of conversion to that Ananais and Peter experience today. It may not be dramatic, but it’s still a conversion to new life, to a new way of living, of seeing, of thinking, of being in this world. But we have to be open to it.
Sometimes we’re converted from; sometimes we’re converted to; every time, we are converted by. In other words, conversion is not something we do to ourselves, but it is something done to us. We are converted by God, who is reaching out to us, calling us, and whose power is able to bring us closer no matter what. It is Jesus who knocks Saul from his horse. It is Jesus who tells Ananias to go. It is Jesus who shows up on the lakeshore, makes breakfast, forgives Peter, and tells him to follow. It is all Jesus. Conversion, change, isn’t something we can do for ourselves. It must be done to us and for us by Jesus himself–but we must allow him to work and let his grace in.
Tell me what you know about Jesus, Elaine asked me. I’ll tell you what I know: Jesus shows up in our lives; he loves us as we are; but he doesn’t leave us the way he found us. He changes us. He converts us. He makes us more like him–if we will allow him to.
So tell me what you know about Jesus. What’s your story? Believe me, you have one, even if you don’t think you do. If you really examine it, you will find it’s a story of one conversion after another: conversion from our own way; conversion to the way of Christ; conversion by Christ himself, grace. Maybe it’s dramatic, and maybe it’s boring. Maybe it’s a little bit of both at different times. But it’s your conversion story nonetheless. It is a story that will not end, as long as we allow God to keep working on us. For God will never stop drawing us in, bringing us closer in relationship and in love.
Storied Grace 