St Peter - Whom We All Know - Or Do We?

 

Feast of St Peter. St Peter’s Church, Merton

 

St Peter was rough and ready. He was a worker, a man of the streets. He was brusque, like his namesake from centuries later – Rocky. He was impulsive and impetuous. He spoke from the hip. He let his emotions – the whole range of them – rule him. And because Peter, Saint and Apostle, was all of these things, there is hope for us.

 

I imagine you have heard one or two sermons making that point, over the years, if you’ve been going to church for years. So today I want to say that, well, I think all of that is either dubious, or wrong. Let’s start with what is wrong. It is not the case that Peter was a worker, a man of the streets. As a fisherman, it would be truer to say he was a small businessman. Remember his fellow fishermen, James and John, when called by Jesus, left their father and their servants. It’s likely Peter had servants or at least hired staff.

 

As for whether Peter was impulsive and impetuous, that is a harder matter to settle. I am sure that some of you – and a large part of me – would like a systematic study, where I list all the times Peter was impulsive, all the times he was neutral in this regard, and all the times he was serene. Unfortunately there are well over 200 references to Peter, by one of his names or the other, in the New Testament So, forgive me, I have allowed myself not to do that.

 

Instead, I want to say this: the Gospels are not novels. I don’t just mean they are not fiction. I mean they don’t take the form of a novel. In a novel, the writer can comment at length on the thoughts, and motivations, and demeanour of the characters. Pages can be spent describing one look. Chapters can build up the picture of a person for decades before the main story begins. Not so the gospels. What we tend to have in the gospels are a string of fast-moving stories, told very straightforwardly. This happened, then this happened, then this happened. It's been said that, until you get to the Last Supper, all of the action of the Gospels could fill a mere three weeks. At least, that is Matthew, Mark and Luke. It’s not quite true in John. But in John it is still extremely rare for us to be told what anyone was thinking.

 

You can see what I am saying. We don’t really have enough information to build up a strong sense of Peter’s character, or anyone’s character.

 

Actually we do tend to understand the point, at least when we think not of Peter but of Jesus. If I ask (say): was Jesus an extravert or an introvert, you are, I think, likely to say that we just don’t know. If that is true of Jesus, shouldn’t we be as slow to define the disciples (or anybody else) by a couple of adjectives relating to their behaviour, as if they really defined them. And our readings today do not show an impetuous Peter, but Peter who is surprised and surprising, yes, but the text is clear that this is the result of miracle or revelation, not any aspect of his character.

 

Let me be very clear. I do know the other stories. Say, the story of the Transfiguration, where Peter does not know what to say, and babbles on about setting up booths for Jesus, Moses, and Elijah. So I can certainly agree that Peter was capable of being impetuous. My point is more limited, and, strictly speaking, a negative one: that we don’t know enough to describe Peter’s character in global or absolute terms.

 

And, if I am right about this (or frankly even if I am wrong), there are wider lessons for us. We can all have a tendency to describe those around us in simple, simplistic terms. And indeed in groups persons do tend to take on different roles. Someone is the silent one; someone is the argumentative one, and so on. And there are dangers here. I know I don’t really have to spell it out. We should do all we can to avoid prejudice. We may have to make provisional judgements about people. For example: that person tends to be late, and so I’ll invite them a quarter or an hour before the others. I am not suggesting there is anything sinful about that. We might call it prudence. What I am saying is that we should be supple, supple in all our thoughts about those around us.

 

And there is another way in which prejudice can work. We can be prejudiced… against ourselves. We can think: I am just not the kind of person who does such-and-such, and we can believe it, and so we might deprive ourselves of some real act of service, or some great enjoyment. In short, we have to be ready to surprise ourselves.

 

If we think we could never pray out loud in church, mightn’t it be good to give it a go? If we think we could never pray silently, just by sitting still for twenty minutes, again, mightn’t it be good to give it a go? These are just examples. But I think you will have examples of your own.

 

If we as a benefice are to grow together (my fervent hope), we will surprise each other, as personal disciples, but also as communities. We need to welcome that. I realise it is perhaps dangerous for me to say that, here. Dangerous, because you might be thinking I am now speaking in code, and I might be about to try to persuade you about a range of radical changes. I am not. I am not speaking in code here. I mean only what I say: we must be ready to welcome surprises. To welcome surprises, because God is, as has been well said, God of surprises. Think again of today’s readings. Peter knew God to be God of surprises. And so can we. 

Amen.