The Last Supper and the First Breakfast

A Reflection on the First Reading for Sunday, April 20th, 2025:
The Solemnity of Easter Sunday

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Acts
​10.34a, 37-43

​Peter began to speak: “You know the message that spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced: how God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Spirit and with power; how he went about doing good and healing all who were oppressed by the devil, for God was with him.

“We are witnesses to all that he did both in Judea and in Jerusalem. They put him to death by hanging him on a tree; but God raised him on the third day and allowed him to appear, not to all the people but to us who were chosen by God as witnesses, and who ate and drank with him after he rose from the dead

“He commanded us to preach to the people and to testify that he is the one ordained by God as judge of the living and the dead. All the Prophets testify about him that everyone who believes in him receives forgiveness of sins through his name.”

Pause. Pray. Reflect.

There’s something grounding about eating and drinking together. 

Peter had a trio of visions inviting him to feast on all foods, and that led to this moment of him declaring the Gospel in 167 words. Peter always comes across to me as a man of action, and here he’s managed to give the short version of the life, death and resurrection of Jesus in a brief 167 words. My dad’s always abjuring my mom to tell the short version; I think he’s been trying that for almost 70 years to no avail. The long version is where she (and I) love to dwell.

I’m sure Peter could have said so much more than 167 words. He had three years with Jesus. Just think of all the times they sat down and shared a meal, of all the conversations over food passed from one person to another: 

• A wedding feast in Cana
• Peter’s mother-in-law and the sandwiches she made after her healing
• Sharing bread and fish with thousands on a hillside
• Being with Jesus as He brought so many people into the circle of shared food and drink — even people whom the leaders of the time called out as moral pariahs

From one of these tables, a story shared as well, of the love of the Father being given to His lost son, welcomed home to feast on the fatted calf. 

Peter was even there for the Last Supper and the First Breakfast. 

At the Last Supper Peter had felt so sure of himself and his place in sharing the food and drink of the Passover. So sure of his own steadfastness as he took the broken bread, and drank from the cup passed from Jesus’ hands. And so equally sure of his own failure as across the flames of a courtyard campfire he voiced his denial of knowing Jesus. So sure of the end as the earth shook, the sky darkened and rocks split as Jesus died. I’m sure the last thing Peter expected was a chance to eat and drink with Jesus again. 

And then, in the light of the third day, he heard the women tell rumours of His rising. And later, in the astonishment of seeing His Lord, was there the shadow of a partial eclipse dimming the glory, caused by carrying his failure with him? (I know I have felt it myself, carrying my failure.)

And so we come to the grounding of another meal shared —the First Breakfast.  Peter was looking across the flames of a campfire built in the sand, by the waterside where he had been overwhelmed again by an abundant catch. Smelling the fish Jesus had cooked at dawn, and seeing the bread in His hand, what happened to his heavy heart as His Saviour said, ’Come and have breakfast.’ A meal together prepared the way for a call and answer we still hear today. 

‘Do you love me?’ 
‘Yes’
‘Feed my sheep.’

I’ll join you at the table with Him. 




Noreen Smith

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