Homily For Third Sunday of Easter Year C, 4th May, 2025. HAPPY FATHER’S DAY

 

Readings: Acts.5:27-32.40-41; Ps. 30; Rev. 5:11-14; John 21:1-19

Fr. Emmanuel Emenike Onyia.

THE LORD WANTS TO RESTORE THE HIDDEN WOUNDS OF SINS IN US

Today being the third Sunday of the Holy season of Easter, we are presented with the theme of restoration. This is important because we have often fallen and separated ourselves from God as a result of the ups and downs of life. Every day, we are faced with new struggles.

Yes, we struggle for life, we struggle for survival, we struggle against the manipulation of the evil ones. More challenging is the struggles we face within our own self, especially our weakness and sinfulness.

 The effects of this fall and restoration are evident among the disciples of Jesus. All the time they were with Jesus, they struggled to be like him, to follow his ways and to understand him, and it wasn’t easy. In the cause of these struggles, they failed several times; they denied him, suffered, and sinned against the Lord Jesus despite their love for him. But this was well predicted by Jesus who warned them to remain steadfast even in the midst of these struggles.

However, after all the struggles and falls during his passion and death, Jesus decided to strengthen and restore his disciples once again as regards the great task ahead before departing from them. So in the occasion of the Gospel passage today, Jesus said to Peter, the leader of his Apostles: ‘Simon son of John, do you love me more than these others do?’ He answered, ‘Yes Lord, you know I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my lambs.’

A second time, he said to him, ‘Simon, son of John, do you love me?’ He replied, ‘Yes, Lord, you know I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Look after my sheep.’ Then he said to him a third time, ‘Simon son of John, do you love me?’ Peter was upset that he asked him the third time, ‘Do you love me?’ and said, ‘Lord, you know everything; you know I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my sheep.

Here, we can imagine the disposition of the disciples when seeing the Lord as they sat together around the fire, eating silently the meal which Jesus had prepared and no doubt gazing silently at the Lord’s silence. It must really be a great moment of tension as to how the oppressive silence was to be broken.

Also, how Peter’s heart must have been troubled when the great silence was broken with the words: Simon, son of John, do you love me? These three times questions have a special force in the restoration of him who had three times denied his Master, and now three times declares his love for Him, and he is three times restored and entrusted with a great task of feeding his master’s sheep.

From this gracious act, we see how God, through Jesus, treats a soul conscious of its sinfulness and fault, and in Peter’s disposition, we see an illustration of how a soul, conscious of its sinfulness and fault, should behave before God.

This gracious event is very symbolic not just that the Lord had forgiven Peter for his threefold denial at the moment of his arrest and suffering, but also that, the Lord restored him again as the leader of his flocks and the entire Universal Church.

We can see the effect of this restoration in the response of Peter and the other apostles in our first reading today when they said to the council of Pharisees: ‘Obedience to God comes before obedience to men; it was the God of our ancestors who raised up Jesus, but it was you who had him executed by hanging on a tree.

By his own right hand, God has now raised him up to be a leader and saviour, to give repentance and forgiveness of sins through him to Israel. We are witnesses to all this, we and the Holy Spirit. And John, in his vision, as we heard in our second reading, said: the Lamb that was sacrificed is worthy to be given power, riches, wisdom, strength, honour, glory and blessing.

Dear friends, this is a moment of restoration, for in our struggles in this life, we have done ugly and sinful things that we really regret and don’t want to remember or talk about, just like St Peter and the other disciples.

These things We wish we could have changed or avoided, but there is nothing we can do about them anymore except seek restoration. And this restoration is what Jesus is offering us today as he says: my child do you still love me? Do you really love me? Do you love me more than all the things of this passing world?

All we have to say in the consciousness of our faults and sinfulness is: Lord, you know everything; yes, I truly love you. And just like St Peter, the Lord Jesus will not only forgive us, he will restore us to a greater glory.

So why struggle in silence? It’s time to break open the hidden wounds of sin in our hearts, for the Lord wants to heal and restore us once again so that we can be open and free to receive the Holy Spirit, the promised Paraclete, who will restore us afresh to God’s greater glory.

LET US PRAY: Lord God, as we anticipate the coming of the Holy Spirit, we come to you today conscious of our faults and sinfulness. Grant us, we pray for your healing and restoration, especially to all Fathers. We ask this through Christ our Lord. Amen. Happy Father’s Day.