3 Easter
April 18, 2010

When I was a young boy, about the age of ten, I was taken to the old Boston Garden to an event I have never forgotten. There on the stage, way down below me was an animated preacher named Billy Graham, passionately seeking souls for Christ. You may have seen one or two those rallies on t.v. back then, maybe you even attended one of them yourself. But you probably remember at the end of the service, there would always be an altar call, for those who wanted to give their life to Jesus. I remember that night, people slowly rose from their seats, tears streaming down their faces, and walking those long dark, corridors that smelled of beer and sweat, down to the stage to be converted.

I am not sure why, but something moved me to join them, and so, I made that long walk too, to experience my own conversion among the throng. And as I think about it now, it was just one touchstone in a countless array of turning points that have brought me to this place in time.

I would like to say a few words this morning about conversion. Your conversion. My conversion.

And by conversion, I don't mean it in the way that it has often been portrayed. For as much as that seminal experience in the old Boston Garden affected me, conversion is not a sudden event, where somehow, you wake up one morning completely transformed, where in an instant you change religions, or lifestyles, or political persuasions.

By conversion, I mean it as a turning around, an intentional choice to move in a different direction. In this way, conversion can be seen as a process, something that can take up to a lifetime to accomplish.

Our scripture lessons this morning help us help us zero in on just what conversion is and how it may apply to our lives. The stories of Saul become Paul, and Simon become Peter, have something in them for each of us, I believe.

Now the conversion of Saul is very familiar. Saul was a religious zealot, a pious man who truly believed what he was doing was right. In his loyalty to his religion, he sought to stamp out what he considered to be a threat. In his time, the followers of Jesus, Saul considered to be infidels and so he rounded them up and had them tried and sentenced to prison.

On the road to Damascus one day, he is struck down by a blinding light, and a voice asks him "Why are you persecuting me?" When he asks who is speaking, the voice says: "It is Jesus who you are persecuting."

Very often in our lives, there comes a moment when everything we believed to be right and true comes crashing down. There comes a time when we have to admit, in the language of the 12 steps, that we are powerless, and we have to set our feet on a new path, in a new direction. We have to submit to a higher power.

In Saul's case, and ours, the source of our conversion rises out of that dark, unknown part of ourselves, the place in us yearning for light and love. For Saul become Paul, out of the vindictive, hateful darkness within him came an abiding devotion and commitment to the one he had persecuted. And in this, he became the greatest champion for Jesus the world has ever known.

For Simon Peter, the conversion was no less dramatic and enduring. In John's Gospel, we are told the story of those disciples who had left their fishing nets to follow Jesus. In the wake of his death, it seems they had gone back to their trade on the Sea of Galilee.

It is only natural. When any of us experience trauma, we seek refuge in what is familiar and predictable. In Simon Peter's case, there was the added weight, that not only had he lost his friend, but in Jesus' dying moments, he had denied him three times. In the shame and ignominy of that experience, going fishing again was the perfect escape.

And so we see him and his mates toiling in a boat on Galilee all night, but catching nothing. As day breaks, a solitary figure appears on the beach in the distance, and instructs them to cast their nets to the other side of the boat.

Sometimes conversion begins in making the smallest of changes. And when these Galilean fishermen as this stranger invites them, they draw in an enormous catch. Just as suddenly they recognize it is their Lord who awaits them on the beach. Ever impulsive, Peter throws on his clothes, and dashes into the water to get to Jesus.

As they are eating breakfast on the beach, Jesus pulls Simon aside and queries him. "Simon, son of John, do you love me?" What is interesting in this exchange is the word that is used for love. In Greek, there are four words. Jesus uses the word agape, which is the word for the love of God, divine love. In essence, there, Jesus, is asking Simon Peter, do you agape me? Simon, in response, uses a different word for love, philio, which is the love of friends. So, in response to Jesus question "Do you love me?" Simon responds, "Yes, Lord, you know I like you. (You know, I bet there isn't a woman in the house today that hasn't had that kind of experience with her man.) Nevertheless, Jesus persists, "Then, Simon, feed my lambs." And he asks again, "Simon, do you love me?" Again, Simon Peter demurs, saying, "Yes, Lord, you know that I like you." "Then tend my sheep," Jesus replies. When Jesus asks Simon Peter the question a third time, he changes the word agape to philio, saying "Simon, do you like me?" In other words, "Simon, are you even my friend?" At this, Simon is deeply grieved, the shame and ignominy speaking loudly in his response: "Yes, Lord, you know everything, you know that I love/agape you."

In this simple exchange, there is so much about the nature of conversion, and what we have to give up, in order to really turn our lives around. In all the ways we deny others and ourselves, in all the ways we fall short of the kind of love God endows us with, conversion is a process of letting go of all the impediments that prevent us from living life abundantly, that stand in the way of our being in complete possession of our souls.

There is only one thing we are meant to do in this life. There is only one requirement, and that is to love, to love ourselves, to love our neighbor, to love our God. And when we submit to love, when we like Saul become Paul, and Simon become Peter, give our hearts over to love, we are converted, over and over and over again.

When I was in India, I heard an old Brahmin proverb that says when we love, the very angels desert heaven and come and sit in our house and sing for joy. What a wonderful image for us, as we are sent forth from this place to be converted by love. And what better words to close with than where I started this morning, from Billy Graham himself, who wrote: "Being a Christian is more than an instantaneous conversion. It is a daily process where you grow to be more and more like Christ."