Return to Mission!

Friday, April 5, 2024

Acts 4:1-12; Jn 21:1-14

Today’s Gospel highlights Jesus’ call back to mission. 

After the death of Jesus, the hopes of the disciples were shattered. They were highly disillusioned about the fact that the life they shared with Jesus came to nothing. Nothing made sense anymore. 

It is against this backdrop that we have to read the disciples’ return to their former profession, fishing, under the leadership of Peter. 

In despair, they can only imagine themselves as ‘fishermen’ and forget their mission to be ‘fishers of men.’ 

It is at this point that Jesus intervenes. Something interesting unfolds here. 

If the disciples recreated a return to their former profession, Jesus recreates the miracle to remind them of the need to return to God’s mission. 

Now they are not fishermen but fishers of men. They will always be. 

Before returning to our ‘old’ ways, let us think of God’s interventions in our lives to return to Him. 

Fr. Dhinakaran Savariyar