This was now the third time Jesus was revealed to his disciples after being raised from the dead. It appears this third appearance takes place several days or even weeks after the resurrection. The dust that was raised by the events preceding the resurrection seems to have been finally settling. Normalcy was slowly coming back. The people seems to have put everything behind them and were moving on with their lives. Even Peter and company had come out of “hiding” and had receded back to their home in Galilee (Peter, his brother Andrew, and the sons of Zebedee must have been Galileans-they were called by Jesus while fishing in the Lake of Galilee). Maybe for lack of ideas on how to kick-start their movement, and perhaps to kill boredom and put some food on the table, Peter suggested to the others that they go fishing. Unfortunately, their labor all night long yielded nothing. We can excuse the group and attribute their failure to catch anything to their couple of years away from this profession. Or maybe, just as had happened in some of the appearances, their failure to catch any fish was divinely orchestrated. Something was brewing somewhere!
I don’t think Peter and company had abandoned the “way.” Their going back to fishing must have been a means of cooling their heads off and retracing their steps. As it sometimes happens to us when we feel the hand of a loved one who is dead “leading” us into a discovery or something, Jesus’ hand must have been all over the decision of this group to go back fishing. It is no mere coincidence that the appearance takes place on the very lake where Jesus met and called the pair of brothers. It is no coincidence that on both occasions, the pair of brothers catches nothing after laboring all night. Jesus was making a statement, and it is a statement that Peter and company read only too well. It was a second calling of these disciples. Unlike in the other appearances, we are not told if Jesus “expounded” on the Scriptures for them. However, he did something that was meant to put a spark in the memory of the group: he broke bread with them! Without saying a word, Jesus was reminding them that he had already given them assignment (do this in memory of me). He was once again calling them to be fishers of men and women.