Two big stories, and one tiny baby boy.
One, two, three.
And where do we go from here.

Story one:

Saul, soon to be known of as Paul falls off his horse

and finds God burning in his eyes,

and,

in the words of Fredrich Buechner is rendered:

‘blind as a bat, never to be the same again’

and spends the rest of his life

‘attempting to bowl over the human race just as he had been bowled over with dust in his mouth and road apples down his shirt’

hoping to tell the world with every word he writes and every sound he utters that

‘God wants You. You of all people, and You like me have been saved

and sent spinning by amazing grace.’

So that’s one story.

Story two:

The disciples go fishing and Jesus waits on the shore and Simon Peter flails about

in the ocean naked as the day he was born. Simon Peter the one whom Christ called

‘The Rock’. The rock that catches in your shoe and trips you up,

the rock which refuses to move, stubborn, solid, maybe a little rigid

or stuck in old ideas

or maybe something to rely on, something to be trusted as safe.

‘You are my rock Peter’ said Christ. It could mean many things.

So that’s story two.

Lets look at them side by side.

The allegory of the fish filled with nets is simple and clear, the message plain.

Without Jesu the disciples catch nothing, they have no community,

there is no hope for God’s story to be told on earth.

But with Jesus presence and by following his instructions

the disciples will gather community aplenty and the church will overflow into the future all shiny and a-sparkle with fresh wholesome life.

The story of Saul, falling from his horse is not quite so simple,

but the outcome is once again powerfully clear. Christ makes his own disciples, sometimes through the channel of others

sometimes through cosmic mystery.

So what’s story three?

Where did we begin?

With Saul and Peter and who else?

That’s right with our baby, our wee baby boy.

So lets look at him.

Story three.

Toby’s parents are not in the habit (I don’t imagine, although I could be wrong)

of falling off horses or witnessing the living Christ alone on the beach

and yet this hasn’t stopped them from coming here today to wet Toby down,

like a shiny silver fish

and catch him up in the community of Christianity-

a community which has travelled forward from the stories which we heard today

for over 2000 years.

And who, we might ask, are Trish and David,

to enter into such a momentous moment,

and who for that matter are we,

that we might imagine ourselves to be the boat in which small Toby is scooped.

How can we possibly be equipped: theologically, emotionally, spiritually

to guide wee Toby on his path with God?

Well at one level we are not,

we cant possibly be,

its such a big task,

surely we will fall down and fail,

surely we will not be as kind as we could be

or as holy as we hoped

or as justice seeking as we proclaim,

maybe its all too hard

and we should give up on this dream of being part of the body of the God

who stands on the shores beckoning us close.

Maybe we should just say no to the fishing trip and the horse riding

and the whole holy thing.

And yet, when we look at today’s examples, today’s examples of leadership in the community of faith, today’s examples of Saul and Peter, what have we got?

We have Saul, a zealot, a persecutor, a religious fundamentalist,

wanting to destroy all that do not follow the rules as he sees them.

And we have Peter, the one who never really got it, the one who pushed his way forward, the one who wanted to be first, the one who ran away, the one who denied Christ,

his friend,

three times,

one two, three.

We have them.

And today we are told that Christ chooses these two to stand up and be counted

as pastoral carers and prophets for a new vision of God’s kin-dom here on earth.

So what does this tell us about who God wants as part of God’s family?

Well? What do you think?

It’s kind of obvious isn’t it? But no matter how obvious, we still find it hard to believe, deep, deep down in the frightened part of ourselves.

What does it tell us?

It tells us that God wants Saul no matter how zealous and arrogant.

It tells us that God wants Peter, no matter how frightened and confused.

It tells us that God wants Toby, no matter how vulnerable and small.

It tells us that God wants us all, no matter how doubting and lost.

It tells us that God wants you and you and you.

So what do you think?

Can you fall into the arms of the living God?

Just like Peter falls down into the sea and Saul falls down onto the road and

Toby falls down with his little bald head into the baptismal font.

Can you fall down today

into the fishing boat of Christian community,

into the challenge of feeding sheep and shouting the word?

Can you?

Can you fall way down, down into Grace my love,

can you fall way down.

Down to the sea?

Spirit carry me your child I will always be, Spirit carry me down to the sea.