NOTE:
This is a manuscript, and not a transcript of this message. The actual presentation of the message differed from the manuscript through the leading of the Holy Spirit. Therefore, it is possible, and even likely that there is material in this manuscript that was not included in the live presentation and that there was additional material in the live presentation that is not included in this manuscript.
ENGAGE
Last Saturday, Maximum Security crossed the finish line in first place at the Kentucky Derby. However, after an objection was filed by two jockeys, Maximum Security was disqualified and a 65-1 longshot, Country House, was declared the winner.
So this week on Monday, the owner of Maximum Security, Gary West, declared that his horse would not run in the Preakness Stakes, saying there was no sense in rushing his horse into another race since it no longer had an opportunity win the Triple Crown.
TENSION
Unfortunately, I think we can often respond to adversity or failure in a similar way when it comes to our relationship with Jesus Christ. Because of some failure, or shortcoming, or weakness in our life as a disciple of Jesus, we are prone to just throw in the towel because we feel like that flaw disqualifies us from continuing to serve Jesus.
That can take many different forms.
• There are some of you here this morning, who feel like you can’t serve God because you’re too old. And at the other end of the spectrum, there are some of you young people here today who think you are too young.
• There are some of you here today who feel like you can’t serve God because you just don’t know enough. You feel like you need to know the Bible better before you are ready to serve God.
• There are some of you who feel like you’ve failed God so greatly in the past that there is no way He could ever use you now.
• There are some of you here who have been hurt so deeply by someone else, maybe even another disciple of Jesus, that you don’t think God could possibly use you.
If that even comes close to describing how you feel this morning, then I’ve got some great news for you. The passage that we’re going to look at this morning reveals that…
Jesus’ call is greater than my fall
TRUTH
Today’s message is the 4th in our current series – 40 Days with Jesus. We’ve been studying the various encounters Jesus had with His disciples in the 40 days between His resurrection and His ascension to His Heavenly Father. So far, we’ve looked at His meeting with Mary Magdalene just outside His open tomb, His conversation with two disciples on the road to Emmaus, and His two appearances to His disciples as they hid in fear in Jerusalem.
This morning we’ll look at an encounter that takes place some time after that. The disciples have finally made it to Galilee, where Jesus had commanded them to go both before and after His resurrection. Let’s pick up the account at the beginning of John chapter 21.
[Read John 21:1-14]
We don’t really know how long these seven disciples have been back in Galilee waiting for Jesus. But late one afternoon, Peter decides to go fishing and the other six agree to go with them. We just don’t have enough information in the text to know if Peter planned to go back to fishing on a permanent basis or if this was intended to just be a one time thing. Maybe his wife was ready to get him out of the house for a while or maybe they were running low on food and Peter figured he could make a few bucks selling some fish at the local market.
In any case they headed out to fish at night, which was the best time to fish there. They fished all night, but caught nothing, which had to be a bit embarrassing for these professional fishermen. Early the next morning, some guy on the shore is basically taunting them. This is one of those places in the Bible where we see that Jesus had a good sense of humor. It’s hard to see in our English translations, but Jesus basically says to the disciples, “You haven’t caught any fish, have you?”
The disciples don’t recognize Jesus yet and dejectedly answer “No.” Jesus tells them to cast their nets on the right side of the boat, something they have probably already tried multiple times that night. But they are so desperate at this point, they figure “why not?” The net was immediately filled with 153 large fish. As you might imagine, Bible scholars have come up with all kinds of explanations for that 153 number – most of them pretty farfetched. The most likely explanation is that John, as an eyewitness, includes this detail to give evidence that this was a real event and to document the magnitude of the catch.
When that happens, John recognizes Jesus, and of course Peter immediately leaves the rest of the men to handle the nets and jumps into the water and swims to the shore to see Jesus. Jesus has breakfast ready for them and invites them to bring a few of the fish they had just caught to add to the meal.
There is so much we could learn and apply just from this first part of the account, but the main idea I want us to focus on this morning is found in the next part of the chapter. But before we go there, I want to call your attention to one important detail here. Notice in verse 9, we read that Jesus was preparing the meal on a “charcoal fire”. There is only one other place in the Bible that word is used.
Now the servants and officers had made a charcoal fire, because it was cold, and they were standing and warming themselves. Peter also was with them, standing and warming himself.
(John 18:18 ESV)
You might recognize this from the account where Peter denied that he knew Jesus three times after Peter had claimed that even if all the other disciples deserted Jesus, he never would. So already we see a connection between what is happening here and Peter’s big failure earlier. We’ll see even more connections to that event in the next section of this chapter. So let’s pick up the account in verse 15.
[Read John 21:15-17]
This is probably a familiar passage to many of you and it’s likely that you’ve heard a message or two on it or studied it on your own at some point. I know I’ve preached on it a couple times before since I’ve been at TFC. If so, you are probably familiar with the fact that there are two different Greek words for love that are used in this dialogue between Jesus and Peter.
The first two times Jesus asks Peter if he loves Him, Jesus uses the word “agape”, which usually describes sacrificial love that is an act of the will more than a feeling. And both times Peter responds that he loves Jesus, but he uses the word “phileo”, which we usually think of in terms of brotherly love. Philadelphia, the city of brotherly love, gets its name from that Greek word. The third time Jesus asks if Peter loves Him, He also uses the word “phileo” and Peter uses it again when he answers.
In classical Greek, those two verbs do have those different meanings, so it is not surprising that some pastors and commentators have concluded that the change back and forth between the two verbs is significant. And I’m sure I’ve done that myself at some point.
However, after some further research, I’m just not convinced that the change in verbs is all that significant. Let me briefly explain why.
First of all, this conversation likely took place in Aramaic, not Greek. And John, who is not a Greek expert by any means, has to translate it into Greek when He writes his gospel account.
Although the verbs agape and phileo do describe two different levels or types of love in classical Greek, those distinctions are not nearly as clear in the way those verbs are used in the New Testament, and in John’s writings in particular. In fact, John tends to use the words interchangeably, as we can see in these two verses:
The Father loves [agape] the Son and has given all things into his hand.
(John 3:35 ESV)
For the Father loves [phileo] the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing…
(John 5:20 ESV)
Finally, This is very similar to the way that Jesus uses the terms “lamb” and “sheep” and the verbs “feed” and “tend” interchangeably in this conversation as well.
The danger here is that by placing too much emphasis on the differing Greek words for love here, it can actually distract us from the main point of this encounter, the one I mentioned earlier:
Jesus’ call is greater than my fall
Although we have no detailed record of the encounter, we know that Jesus had previously appeared to Peter individually some time on the day of His resurrection – presumably some time between when He appeared to Mary Magdalene at the tomb and the time He met the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. Those two disciples referred to that meeting when they went back to Jerusalem to tell the disciples about their encounter with the risen Jesus. And Paul also refers to that meeting in 1 Corinthians 15.
I think it is reasonable to assume that at that time Jesus personally expressed His forgiveness for the fact that Peter had denied Him three times and restored His relationship with Peter. Otherwise I can’t imagine that Peter would have been so anxious to see Jesus here.
If that is true, then what is Jesus’ purpose here? I think it is to restore Peter publicly in the eyes of his fellow disciples. Peter’s failure was a very public one that all the disciples would have been aware of and so Jesus wants to publicly demonstrate the fact that Peter had been fully restored from his previous fall. The fact that John, who was present here, records the conversation in his gospel account is good evidence that all the disciples observed this exchange between Jesus and Peter.
Personally, I’m grateful for that because it means that we are also privy to this encounter. And that is something all of us need because, like Peter, we fall and fail Jesus on a regular basis, and we need to know that failure isn’t final because…
Jesus’ call is greater than my fall
APPLICATION
So let’s see what we can learn from this passage about…
HOW TO LET JESUS OVERCOME MY FAILURES
1. Take my sin seriously, but don’t dwell on it
There are two mistakes that we typically make when it comes to our sin that can hinder Jesus’ ability to overcome our failures:
• At one end of the spectrum, we can ignore, excuse, explain, or rationalize our sin. The problem with that is that we never deal with that sin and it sits there and festers. It is similar to what happens when a splinter gets under our skin and we don’t do something to remove it. It eventually causes some major problems.
• At the other end of the spectrum, we can dwell on our sin, even after we have taken the appropriate steps to confess and repent. When we do that, we often allow some sin from the past keep us from serving Jesus in the present, believing that our past sin has somehow disqualified us permanently, kind of like the owner of Maximum Security decided not to enter the Preakness Stakes.
But Peter does a great job here of avoiding those two extremes. He certainly doesn’t try to ignore the fact that he denied Jesus three times. In fact, in verse 17, we read that when Jesus asked Peter for the third time if he loved Him, Peter was grieved.
We already saw that Jesus had prepared a charcoal fire that would have reminded Peter of the setting where his denial of Jesus had taken place. And the three times that Jesus asks Peter if he loves Jesus and gives him an opportunity to publicly declare his love for Jesus correspond to the three time that Peter had publicly denied Jesus. So, I have to imagine that when Jesus asked that question for the third time, it brought back some painful memories for Peter as he was reminded of how he had failed Jesus.
But we also see here that Peter doesn’t dwell on that sin to the extent that it paralyzes him and keeps him from carrying out Jesus’ call on his life. I think this is a good reminder that while we shouldn’t continually dwell on our past sins once we have confessed them and been forgiven, there is value in grieving over those past failures in a healthy way that keeps us from repeating them again.
And that process is going to look different depending on the nature and severity of the sin. Unfortunately we sometimes see where a pastor is unfaithful to his wife, and that will almost always be a situation where the pastor needs to step down and devote his time to dealing with that sin and reconciling with his wife. And it may very well be that would preclude him from serving as a pastor again. At a minimum it will probably be a long time before that would be appropriate. But that doesn’t mean he can’t serve Jesus in some other way during that process.
On the other hand, let’s suppose that I promised my grandkids that I would take them out for ice cream one afternoon and then I didn’t show up. That would certainly be a sin that required me to ask them and God to forgive me and for me to repent, probably by taking them out for ice cream twice the following week. But fortunately, that sin wouldn’t have a big impact on my ministry. If it did, I’d be in big trouble because I certainly sin at least that badly every day.
2. Love Jesus more for who He is than what He does
Jesus first asks Peter, “Do you love me more than these?” The underlying Greek text doesn’t give us a clear idea of what Jesus meant by “these”. There are three main possibilities, although we certainly can’t rule out that the ambiguity here means that perhaps Jesus had more than one of them in mind and there is some overlap:
• He could mean, “Do you love me more than these other disciples love me?” That would certainly correspond to Peter’s claim before the crucifixion that he wouldn’t abandon Jesus even if all the other disciples did. But that just doesn’t seem consistent with Jesus’ consistent teaching that the disciples were not to compare themselves to each other.
• He could mean, “Do you love me more than you love these other disciples?” That would certainly be consistent with Jesus’ teaching that to be His disciple one must love Him even more than family. So I think that’s at least a possibility.
• The third possibility, and the one I think is most likely, is that Jesus looked around at the boats and the nets and the large haul of fish and essentially asked Peter, “Do you love me more than what I just provided for you and the other disciples?” That haul of 153 fish would have been a financial windfall for Peter and the other disciples. And the fact that such a large catch hadn’t even torn their nets was certainly a miracle and a blessing as well. So given the context here, this seems to be the most likely meaning.
Becca and Sam Mizell wrote a song titled “More Than Anything” several years ago that was recently recorded by Natalie Grant. I think the chorus of that song captures this idea much more eloquently than I ever could hope to do:
Help me want the Healer
More than the healing
Help me want the Savior
More than the saving
Help me want the Giver
More than the giving
Oh help me want You Jesus
More than anything
This is one of the reasons the prosperity gospel is so dangerous. With its emphasis on what Jesus can do for me, it tends to draw people away from a genuine love for Jesus Himself.
I’m not saying that we shouldn’t be grateful to Jesus for healing and saving and giving. When He does those things we should praise Him and give thanks. But we need to love Jesus regardless of whether we receive anything at all from Him or not.
I think it’s actually pretty easy to evaluate whether we love Jesus for who He is or we love Him for what He does. Just ask this question:
If Jesus were to take away my _________________, would it cause me to love Him less?
If Jesus were to take away my job would it cause me to love Him less?
If Jesus were to take away my house would it cause me to love Him less?
If Jesus were to take away my health would it cause me to love Him less?
If Jesus were to take away my IRA would it cause me to love Him less?
If Jesus were to take away my family would it cause me to love Him less?
3. Get to work
Once we’ve dealt with out sin appropriately and we’ve made sure that we love Jesus for who He is and not just for what He does for us, then it’s time to get to work.
Each time that Peter answered that He loved Jesus, Jesus repeated essentially the same command, with the slight change in wording that we talked about earlier:
Feed (or tend) my lambs (or sheep)
Although Jesus had not used those particular words, He had essentially spent the last three years telling Peter and the other disciples that this was His call on their lives and preparing them to carry out that call. And for Peter, the other disciples and for us, the command that Jesus gives three times here is proof that my past failures don’t disqualify me from serving Jesus in the present. It is the evidence that…
Jesus’ call is greater than my fall
And just look at the results! A few weeks later, Peter, empowered by the Holy Spirit, gets up and preaches with boldness about the crucified, risen Savior, Jesus, and 3,000 people put their faith in Jesus as a result.
One of the dangers this morning, is that some of you probably view the call of Jesus as something that only applies to pastors or missionaries or others in vocational ministry. The Bible certainly does use the word “calling” in that way to refer to a specific ministry to which an individual is called. And if you only view the idea of a “call” like that, you’ll conclude that this message doesn’t apply to you.
But even more frequently in the New Testament, the term “called” applies to all who are disciples of Jesus. Here is just one example:
God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of his Son, Jesus Christ our Lord.
(1 Corinthians 1:9 ESV)
Paul is clearly writing here to the entire church in Corinth and not just to selected individual. In fact the Greek word for “church” – ekklesia – literally means “called out ones”. So if you are a disciple of Jesus, you have been called and the call of Jesus on your life is greater than any of your failures. And that means that if you’ve dealt with your past failures appropriately by confessing your sin and repenting and if you genuinely love Jesus for who He is, then it’s time to get to work.
INSPIRATION
There are probably some of you here this morning that feel a lot like Gary West, the owner of Maximum Security. Things haven’t gone exactly as you’ve planned in your life and you’re ready to just throw in the towel. You may be sitting there feeling sorry for yourself or beating yourself up because you feel like you’ve failed Jesus so greatly that He could never use you. And frankly if you’re living like that, you know what a miserable life that is.
But I’m pretty sure that whatever has you thinking like that can’t possibly be as bad as denying Jesus publicly 3 times right after you promised that you would never forsake Him. If Jesus could forgive and restore Peter and use him to bring 3,000 people to faith in one day, then certainly failure isn’t final for you either, because…
Jesus’ call is greater than my fall
