A Salvage Operation on the Sea of Life
Tom Shrader examines Jesus' breakfast with the disciples by the Sea of Galilee after His resurrection, focusing on Christ's three questions to Peter about love. He challenges believers to honestly evaluate their hearts and consider what might be competing with their devotion to God, emphasizing that anything - even good things like family or career - that supersedes our relationship with the Lord is wrong.
“Anything, even good things, that supersede that relationship with the Lord and what He's called you to do - anything that supersedes that is wrong.”
— Tom Shrader
Series: John: The Essence of Life (2003)
Recorded: 2003
Duration: 42 min
Themes: love, devotion, priorities, heart, restoration, commitment, surrender, evaluation, struggling with priorities, questioning commitment, pastor, church leader, feeling distant from god, new believer, parent, career focused
Scripture: John 21, John 20:30-31, John 3, Matthew 6:24, 1 John 2:15, John 3:16, Acts 2
Theological Themes: agape love, discipleship, spiritual restoration, lordship of christ, heart examination, christian devotion, biblical priorities, pastoral restoration
Full Transcript
This is it. This is it for this series, the 12th week of a 12-week series, looking at the Gospel of John. I hope it's been not just enjoyable for you, but I hope it's been a beneficial series for you. Even if you are someone who is a Christian, and you have been for quite some time, this should be a source of great encouragement for you.
We started every week with the same passage, so there would be no point in breaking that pattern now. It's in John chapter 20, so if you have Bibles, you can open it to there, and then we'll spend our entire time in the 21st chapter. John chapter 20, verses 30 and 31, John writes this: "Many other signs, therefore, Jesus also performed in the presence of the disciples that are not written in this book. But these have been written, that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name."
The Purpose of John's Gospel
So we get the idea very quickly of what this book is about. It's about belief. In fact, in the noun or verb form, that word belief appears over 80 times in this Gospel. John writes this Gospel with specific purpose in mind, and that is that He has selected this material so that as we read this, as we look at this, we would understand who Jesus is.
He's very deliberate in the material that He chooses. He's deliberate in the miracles and in His presentation. Because His hope is that the Holy Spirit will use this to open eyes and ears and hearts, and people will come to Christ in repentance and faith. That's why so often, when you're talking to somebody, perhaps they're a new believer, and they say, well, I want to read through the Bible, I don't know where to start, where should I start? Often you'll say, read the Gospel of John.
It's a Gospel that, in the writer's mind, is designed for that type of person. Somebody who's looking, somebody who's searching, somebody who wants to understand truth, and somebody who can look at this, and if they'll do it in a logical, fair way, they will see that indisputably Jesus is who He said He was. He rose from the dead, and He's alive today, and He is the Creator and the Savior of the world.
The Structure and Timing of John's Gospel
Now, in this 20th chapter, we look at the resurrection. We spent two weeks on that. It seems to me that if you look at what we just did, chapter 20, verses 30 and 31, that seems like a great place to stop. It's almost as though John were stopping there, and then chapter 21 comes along, and it's like a postscript, and we'll look at it.
Let me give you just a little background and make sure that you've got this in your mind. Three Gospels: Matthew, Mark, and Luke. Let me give you the time frame on that. We believe Mark was the first one written somewhere in the 50s. We can't put an exact date on that. We're pretty confident that we can date Luke's Gospel at 60 A.D., and then we put Matthew somewhere in the 60s. So in that period of 12 years, plus or minus, we see the authorship of those three Gospels: Matthew, Mark, and Luke.
Along comes John almost 25 years later, and he writes this Gospel. And he writes as an eyewitness. The most powerful testimony we can get is that of an eyewitness, somebody who's been there, somebody who's seen this. John writes not only this Gospel, he writes four other books that we find in the New Testament. Three are pretty easy to spot because they have His name in them: 1 John, 2 John, 3 John, and then the book of Revelation. So John's an important person in the early church, an important author to us.
Lessons from Summer Camp
I just was at summer camp, and so I'm probably going to refer to it because it's so fresh in my mind. We just spent four or five days with 525 junior high and high schoolers, and I had the privilege to teach them seven times. It's the low point of camp for them, I'm sure, but not for me. I started each summer camp with essentially the same message. I try to make it look different, but it's the same point. And it's this: Will you honestly look at your life? Take this time and honestly look at your life.
Because some of these kids are little church kids. They've been in church since they were born. I mean, they were in there a week or two after they were born, and they've been there for now 12, 13, 14, 17 years. They've learned pretty successfully how to play the game. They know exactly what to say. They know exactly the phrases to use to get mom and dad off their back. They know exactly when to come in and when not to. They know exactly how to play the game. And they do.
I don't know if you've ever been through the statistics, but the statistics are that 90% of church kids, when they graduate from high school, will not attend church in college. That's an extraordinary number. And the reason is, in all likelihood, they were never saved. They may be nice kids. We would use the term good kids, compliant kids. Yes sir, no sir, three bag full kids. But their heart was never changed. So I try to spend a lot of time early on telling these kids, you've got to be honest with yourself. And every year it just seems that God is gracious, saves some of these kids and they'll talk about it.
The Reality of Teenage Pain
I think there's a tendency on the part of, and I'll just talk to you because I know some of you have teenagers, I think there's a tendency on our part to do a couple of things. Number one, it's to underestimate the hurt and the pain in their life. We had a little 13-year-old kid that got up and he talked about His dad leaving right after he was born and His mom not really wanting anything to do with him. In fact, what they told me is one of the buses left late because His mom was supposed to pick him up over there and she forgot about it. So we're really good with him and say, hey listen, there's a little change of plans and we want to take you back and blah, blah, blah. What do you think that kid's going through? There's a lot of that. There's a tendency to underestimate the pain.
There's another, I think, tendency to say, oh they have this life change, it's just
An emotional thing. And it may be, frankly, just like many of you. Many of you have been through that. You go through some crisis and a spouse walks away or a business folds and you have this revelation from God that lasts until another spouse comes along or another business begins.
But one of the kids, and I try to tell them the story. We've been doing the camp now for six years. The first year there was a kid there who today is full time on our staff and has grown up and matured and is part of our training center at church. Great kid. So lots of things happen.
An Honest Look at Your Life
My point there is to ask you to take an honest look at your life right now, today, as we look at this gospel, this final chapter. And maybe it's to decide whether you're a Christian or not. But most likely it's to say, am I truly living like a Christian? That's for you to decide and for you to look at. I don't need to play God. I can't do that.
I can't look in your heart. I can't begin to evaluate what's going on in there. I don't know. That's the only peek we have into your heart, your actions. So if your actions don't line up with what God's word says, we could conclude that you are either not a Christian or you're a practicing practical atheist, one of the two. But that's something you're going to have to decide. So you take a look at it.
Understanding the Symbolism
The other thing as we get to chapter 21, is to understand that this book is filled with symbolism. Symbolism in the sense that throughout it, Jesus is speaking on a spiritual plane, but using physical truths and they're oftentimes misunderstood.
You don't need to turn there, but in John chapter 3, Nicodemus comes to Him and Jesus says, "Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you're born again, you can't see the kingdom of God." And Nicodemus said, "How can a man be born when he's old? He can't enter his mother's womb a second time and be born, can he?" And Nicodemus misses the point that Jesus was trying to make, again, using this physical picture of the spiritual truth.
And there was the woman at the well and Jesus said to her, "If you knew the gift of God, who it was who said to you, give me a drink and you would have asked Him and He would have given you living water." And she said, "Sir, you have nothing to draw with, and the well is deep, where will you get the living water?" Remember that? He said, "You don't even have a bucket. How are you going to give me water?" And then Jesus comes back and deals with that. So there's some of that here as we look at verse 21.
Reading the Full Chapter
I want to do today what we did last week, and that is read the whole chapter, and then come back and just make some random comments on what we see here. Again, we could spend weeks and weeks and weeks on just this chapter and on just certain principles in it, but let's give you enough to kind of whet your appetite and hopefully you will spend time digging and mining the truth and the jewels that are here. Here we go.
John chapter 21: "After these things, Jesus manifested Himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias and He manifested Himself in this way. There were together Simon Peter and Thomas and Nathanael and the sons of Zebedee and two other disciples." So there are seven guys here. Got that? Seven guys. Five of them we know who they are.
"Simon said to them, 'I'm going fishing.' And they said to him, 'We'll also come with you.' And they went out and they got into the boat and that night they caught nothing. But when the day was now breaking, Jesus stood at the beach, yet the disciples did not know it was Jesus. Jesus therefore said to them, 'Children, do you not have any fish, do you?' And they answered, 'No.' And He said, 'Cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will find a catch.' They cast therefore, and then they were not able to haul it in because of the great number of fish."
"That disciple therefore whom Jesus loved said to Peter, 'It's the Lord.' So when Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he was stripped for work, and threw himself into the sea. But the other disciples came in a little boat, for they were not far from land, about a hundred yards, dragging the nets full of fish."
"And so when they got upon the land, they saw a charcoal fire already laid and the fish placed on it and bred. And Jesus said to them, 'Bring some of the fish which you have now caught.' Simon Peter went up and drew the net to land full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three. And although there were so many, the net did not break. Jesus said to them, 'Come and have breakfast.' None of the disciples ventured to question, 'Who are you,' knowing that it was the Lord. Jesus came and took bread and gave it to them, and the fish likewise. This was the third time Jesus had manifested Himself to the disciples after He was raised from the dead."
The Restoration of Peter
"So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon son of John, Do you love me more than these?' And he said to him, 'Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.' He said to him, 'Tend my sheep.' He said to him a second time, 'Simon son of John, Do you love me more than these?' And he said to him, 'Yes, Lord, you know that I do.' And he said to him, 'Shepherd my sheep.' Then he said to him a third time, 'Simon son of John, Do you love me?' And Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, 'Do you love me?' And he said to him, 'Lord, you know all things, you know that I love you.' And Jesus said, 'Tend my sheep.'"
"'Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were younger you used to gird yourself and walk wherever you wished, but now that you are old you will stretch out your hands and someone else will gird you and bring you where you do not wish to go.' Verse 19, 'Now this was said signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God,' and when he spoke this he said to him, 'Follow me.' Peter turning around saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them, the one who also leaned back on his breast at the supper and said, 'Lord, who is the one who betrays you?' Peter therefore seeing him said to Jesus,"
Lord, what about this man? And Jesus said, "If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me." This saying therefore went along among the brethren that the disciple would not die, yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but only that "if I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you?" This is the disciple who bears witness of these things and wrote these things, and we know that His witness is true. And then He closes the book and He says this: "And there are also many other things which Jesus did, which if they were written in detail, I suppose even the world itself would not contain the books which were written." And that's the close of this Gospel.
Understanding the Main Character
A couple of things—let's work our way through it. Make sure we understand here the setting. If I say to you, who's the main character of this chapter 21, what would be your answer? Who's the main character here? Jesus. See, that's always the real spiritual people who are always going to say Jesus.
How about the rest of you? Who's the main character here? Peter. Peter seems to be the main focus of this, and I'm sure you could build a case for Peter or for Jesus or for John, but Peter seems to be a main focus. And you see this dialogue, this discussion that happens between Peter and Jesus.
Refurbishing Peter's Reputation
I think I've given it up, but I was on somewhat of a single one-man campaign to try to refurbish Peter's reputation only because I run into so many people who when they talk about Peter, talk about the big dumb fisherman, and talk about him denying Christ three times. And obviously, that took place. But that's not the end of Peter's life.
We see Peter here in an encounter with the Lord Jesus Christ, and then we meet Peter in the book of Acts, and we see Peter deliver this powerful sermon in Acts 2 that literally starts to energize the early church and becomes really the standard for messages that are preached in the sense that Peter goes back to and focuses on the risen Christ. Peter becomes a major player in the church. We know the pillars of the church. Peter, James, and John.
There's no question I would not think of Him as a first pope. I don't think you could build a case out of that. I don't think that he has that kind of power in this church. He's one of those big three. And in fact, what you see is that when he and Paul differ, it is Paul's teaching that dominates Peter. Peter's not the final word. But he's a major player. And you make a mistake if you take Peter and isolate him to that time of denying Christ.
Back to the Boats
So we pick up the story in chapter 21, and these things have passed. Time's passed. As I said, there's seven guys gathered here. Of the seven, five of them are named. Of the five that are named, three of them by profession are fishermen.
So Peter says, "I'm going fishing." Why would he say that? We don't know. It may be that Peter has arrived at the conclusion that we've had a good three-year run, but now it's time to get back to business.
Peter in his discussions has been very clear. Lord, when You called, we went immediately. When You said, "Follow me," we came. We've left everything. Peter even makes that point to Jesus. "We've left everything to follow You." It may be that Peter said, "You know what? It's been incredible. We've seen extraordinary miracles. Lame walk, blind see, deaf hear. We've even seen a guy that was dead be risen from the dead. We've seen all sorts of extraordinary things. We've even seen the risen Christ. But you know what? It's time to get back to work. We had this extraordinary time. We had this point of exhilaration, but now it's back to things, back to normal."
So Peter goes fishing. And so the guys say, "Well, listen, we'll go with you. We're up for that." Like I said, three of the five anyway are fishermen.
A Night of Futility
They go. They're out all night, and we're told in verse 3, they caught nothing. It's not that the catch was slim. It's that the catch was none. It's not that they caught little fish and not big fish. They didn't catch any fish. They're shut out. Got the picture?
And it's daybreak. And they look to the shore, and they see this guy. They don't know that it's Jesus. And the guy says to them, "You're fishing out the wrong side of the boat. All the fish are on the right side."
An Act of Desperation
Now, stop and think about this just a second. This makes no sense. The fish aren't here. The fish are there. Now, I've heard lots of guys, and I've talked about it in teaching this Gospel. Man, you can make this baby dance, and there's a lot of ways to make it say whatever you want to say. I've heard a lot of guys preach it and say, "Look at what they did. They listened to Jesus. They obeyed Jesus. Now, their nets are full. That's what you need to do. Obey Jesus."
Whoa, whoa, whoa. They didn't know it was Jesus. That's what the story said. See, I think this is a picture of desperation. Again, I can read a lot into it. But I'm saying these guys are saying, basically, "For three years we haven't done much fishing. We've lost our touch." They see a guy on the beach. They don't know who he is. Don't say they're obeying Jesus, because they don't know it's Jesus.
And he says, "You're on the wrong side of the boat," which these guys, in their heyday, would have said, "Are you nuts?" But they go through the process. It's not like just reeling it in. They pull all the nets in, flip them over here, drop them in here. This makes no sense at all. This is just me. And this is reading into it too. I think you see here an act of desperation.
When Desperation Makes Us Vulnerable
I'll make just a point to you. Oftentimes, you'll see somebody who's taken by a con guy. And you'll say, "How could that happen?" Right like this. Because they're desperate. When you're hurting, and things aren't going exactly the way you want them to go, and maybe it's physical, maybe it's emotional, maybe it's relational, when things are tough, you're really vulnerable.
Now, it just so happens that they were fortunate enough that the guy standing on the beach was the Lord Jesus. Be careful.
When you hit these road bumps and things are tough, be careful who you listen to. Be careful what you read. Be careful what you do. The story says they take these nets and move them from one side of the boat to the other side of the boat. All of a sudden, they've got this huge catch. It's so big, they're not even sure if they can haul this net in.
Verse 7 says, "the disciple whom Jesus loved." By now we know that's John. John refers to himself that way. He's the guy writing the book, so we get an eyewitness firsthand account. At this point, John says to Peter—and John seems to always be around for Peter to kind of interpret things for him, because Peter seems to kind of miss it somehow—and John says, "That's the Lord."
Peter's Strange Response
Now, as odd as it was to say the fish are on one side of the boat so go over there, this to me is equally odd. This defies all sorts of logic. I've never seen this before. Peter realizes it's Jesus, so he puts on clothes to go swimming. He's dressed for work. It would be easy, logical, just to jump in the water, and there he goes. Why would he do that?
We don't know, but there was a Jewish law that said if you were going to offer a greeting, it was a religious act. To carry out a religious act, you need to be clothed. So Peter puts on the clothes. Does that cut something a little bit? Don't know. Away they go.
The Miraculous Catch
They get toward land, and they realize that the catch is big. Jesus is preparing this breakfast for them, and He says, "Bring Me some fish." Look at verse 11. They bring in this catch, and again, we have to assume there's some significance to this, because John tells us there were 153 fish.
Now, why does he say that? Well, as I studied, I found a couple of options. One got into the numbers. A hundred meant full. I don't remember what 50 meant. Three meant trinity. So it was something like that. Augustine had a theory that I couldn't possibly give to you, but it was something like add one and three and five and divide it by your zip code and multiply it by your birthday. I don't know what it was.
There was another one that said this: In the Sea of Galilee at that time, there were 153 known species of fish. What happened was that God had ordained that they would catch one of each species, perhaps thinking that the disciples at this moment, familiar with this science, would see this and understand that when He said, "I'm going to make you a fisher of men," you will be a fisher of all men, Jew and Gentile, in all places at all times.
In fact, when the Holy Spirit comes on them at Pentecost, part of what we see there is the movement of the church beyond just the Jew. That's what Jesus said: "In the power of the Holy Spirit will come upon you. You'll be My witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and the remotest parts of the earth." So it could be that.
It could be—and you can pick the one that works for you, by the way—it could be as simple as this. These guys made their living this way and there were seven of them, and what they would typically do is count the number of fish and divide them so they could take them in and sell them and cash them in. John remembers, "Man, there was 153." Don't know. You pick the one that works for you. But the point is this: they got all these fish and they come and they dine with Jesus.
The Three Questions
Then beginning in verse 15, this dialogue begins. They finish breakfast and Jesus says to Peter, "Simon Peter, do you love Me more than these?" Then in verse 16, a second time, He said, "Simon, son of John, do you love Me?" And then a third time in verse 17, He said, "Simon, son of John, do you love Me?"
There's a difference, a slight difference in those three greetings. Greeting two and three are exactly the same. Greeting one is a little bit different. Jesus says to Peter, "Do you love Me more than these?" Now all we have are the words. We don't have a visual. "Do you love Me more than what?" becomes the point here. And this is where we'll try to apply it to our life.
As He's saying to them, "Do you love Me more than these guys? Do you love Me more than you love these guys?" Or as He's saying to them, to Peter, "Do you love Me more than these guys love Me?" There's another possibility, and it's the one that I think is what He's saying. I think Jesus is saying, "Do you love Me more than you love these fish?"
The Real Call vs. the Comfortable Path
Here you go, Peter. I told you I'm going to make you fisher of men. I told you I've got a plan for your life. He seems to reinforce it here when He says, "Feed My sheep, tend My sheep, shepherd My sheep." And Peter, all you're doing is running right back to what you knew before.
Now, I don't want to get hung up on trying to apply this to your life and saying that exactly what He's saying to Peter here is exactly what He's saying to you. That's not true. He's got a very specific call on Peter's life. But I do think there's application to understand that He also has a call on your life.
Here's what Jesus says in Matthew 6, verse 24: "No one can serve two masters. You'll love one and hate the other. You'll hold to one, despise the other. You cannot serve God and mammon." Do you hear what that verse says? It's speaking to you. It says you can't serve two masters. You can't serve God, and you can't serve this world.
The Question of Slavery
This verse says you will always be a slave. You get that? It doesn't say you're going to be a master of one of these. You're always going to be a slave. The question is, who will you be indentured to? The world or God?
John, same writer, in 1 John 2, verse 15 says this: "Do not love the world nor the things of the world, because if you love the world and the things of the world, then the love of the Father is not in you." I think that's what's going on at this moment in Peter's life. And I think that's that point where you have to come to in your life over and over and over again. Who are you enslaved to? God or the world? And if you love this world, I'm just quoting John now, then
The love of the Father is not in you. I want to make a couple of points here because it's coming up in more and more of the studies we're in. You've got to do a little bit of work here.
What's John 3, verse 16? What does that say? "For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life." So God so loved the world, yet 1 John 2, verse 15 says don't love the world. Is it alright for God to love the world but you don't love the world?
Understanding the Different Uses of "World"
That word "world" is used in a variety of ways in Scripture. And we need to understand how it's being used in each instance or it's not going to make much sense to us. It could speak of the globe. It could speak of the people of the world. It could speak of the world's values and the world's system.
God so loves the people of the world that He gave His only begotten Son. He says to you and me do not love the world. Is He talking about don't love the people of the world? Is He saying to us don't love the planet? He's saying to us don't love this world's system. And this world's system is always going to put you in competition with God. Always. Always. Always. Always. Because the core baseline value systems are opposite.
The World's Message vs. God's Message
So what does the world say is important? All you've got to do is turn on TV. I mentioned it. I saw it last week. I was at the bookstore last week and I know it was after this study so I'll be fresh in here. I saw a book that was titled "How to Be Your Own Soulmate." And I mentioned this and somebody said, "Did you see the article out of the paper?" I said no. And they emailed it to me. There's a gal in the Netherlands—you're going to think this is goofy because I thought it was a little weird myself—who just married herself. She was the bride and the groom.
See that's what the world says. Jesus comes along and says love your neighbors as you love yourself. And Jesus is saying listen, the most natural thing in the world is to love yourself. He's not saying fall more in love with yourself. But we're so perverted that we take that verse and say well we can't even love others if we don't have a good healthy self esteem. See the world system says go for it. Get it. Grab it. Whatever it is.
Nothing More Important Than Your Relationship with Christ
Here's what I told those kids over there and I know that I'm going to have a few parents who are going to get a hold of me and say I don't believe that and I know that some of them aren't going to like it. But I told these kids there's nothing in your life more important than your relationship with Christ and there's nothing in your life—because the main avenue for the majority of you is going to be through the church—there's nothing in your life more important than this relationship with the church. Not sports. Not work. Not school.
Now parents are going to come back and say well this is important, this is important, this is important. I'm going to say no it isn't. If they're in a vibrant relationship with Christ in a vibrant relationship and fellowship, all those other things are going to be in their proper place and important. You would not allow me to go to a business guy and say well you know what, your work is more important than church and your relationship with the Lord.
Even Good Things Can Become Idols
We've gotten a little goofy here. We've even elevated family to an unhealthy position in my mind. When we were at Seaboard Village when we were over there and there was a little mom, a duck and she had her little ducks and all the little ducks were there and a little duck and a little duck all running around. And it made me think of some of the families that I see at church. They're little mother ducks and they've got little kids and little ducks all around.
I know you want to protect the kid and all that goes with it but you know what? They're not ducks. And your job here is not just to get them through life unscathed. Your job is to make them independent of you and dependent upon God. And we've even elevated family I think to an unhealthy perspective in a lot of places.
We'll even talk about a guy and say he's a good Christian guy. Really tell me about him. He's a great husband and a great father. Cut me slack here. So what? I would argue Paul. Paul said be an imitator of me, didn't he? And we don't have any record of what kind of dad he was. What kind of husband he was. That's not what makes you a good Christian. What makes you a Christian is you're following Christ. Now is that going to have importance in the relationship and the husband and wife and all that? Sure it is. But do you see what we're saying? Anything, even good things, that supersede that relationship with the Lord and what He's called you to do. Anything that supersedes that is wrong.
Do You Love Me?
So He says, "Do you love Me?" Now we can get into the Greek and we understand that in the English we're restricted to this word love and that's all we have. In the Greek we have agape and phileo and eros and all this. And Jesus is saying, "Do you agape Me?" And He's saying, "I phileo You." "Do you agape Me?" "I phileo You." "Do you phileo Me?" "I phileo You." We can get into all that. I'm going to let you figure all that stuff out.
Here's what I'm saying. Jesus is saying to him, "I've put a call on your life to be a fisher of men. Now do you love Me?" "Yes." "Then you get out there and you feed My lambs. You do what I called you to do." "Do you love Me?" "Yeah." "You get out there and shepherd My sheep." "Do you love Me?" "Yeah."
Peter's grieved. Why is Peter grieved? Well, I guess I would think I would be. I'm going, why are we doing this? This is the third one. I wonder, I do not know if this is intentional on the Lord's part to perhaps trigger a thought in Peter's mind. What thought would it trigger? That you denied Me three times. Peter talked a good game, didn't he?
One of the things we do when we're over there is play basketball. I play basketball with the kids and they just beat me.
But I talk trash the whole time. I talk smack the minute I get on the court. I'm out there guarding this guy and he said, "Don't you ever shut up?" I said, "No, I'm never going to shut up." He said, "You have no game." I said, "But I can talk, and that is my game." I'm talking smack the whole time and you can't stop me. He said, "I've stopped you for an hour." I said, "No, you can't stop me this time."
Peter talked a good game. He said, "Lord, all these other guys may leave You but I'll never leave You. Lord, if they killed me, I'd still follow You." I think he meant it. Then at crunch time, it didn't happen.
But you see something? That is in the end. Can you remember this? Failure is not fatal. You're going to fail. You're going to make mistakes. You're going to sin. We're probably going to get the best indication of where you are spiritually in those moments. Because failure is not fatal. He's the God of the second, third, 458th, 2 billionth chance. Are you His? The enormous Lord and Savior?
Peter's Death and Calling
Jesus goes on and says, "When you were young, you went wherever you wanted. Now you're not going to." This signified the kind of death that he would experience, and he'd glorify God in it. Tradition says that Peter was martyred, that he was crucified, and that he asked not to be crucified like His Lord, but to be crucified upside down. So here's this spectacular moment.
What I love at the end of this when we close is this is pure Peter. Jesus says, "Do you love Me? Do you love Me? Do you love Me?" Then He says, "This signifies the kind of death you have." They're walking along. Jesus says, "Follow Me." How good is this? Peter sees John and says, "Well, what about him? If I'm going to die, what about him?"
You get a little insight here, and John gives it to you firsthand. Jesus said, "If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you?" Out of that developed this myth, and you see it referred here. Out of it developed the myth that John was going to live until Jesus came again. John points out that's not at all what Jesus promised.
God's Specific Call on Your Life
Do you see the difference here? Here's the application of your life. God's placed a call on your life. I don't know what it is. I can give it to you in the broad sense: it's to glorify Him, love Him, enjoy Him forever. But it's something more specific than that.
He's given you a specific gift set. He's put you in a specific place. Some of you run a corporation. Some of you work in the corporation. Some of you have extraordinary gifts with people. Others of you socially not so sharp, but you're just sharp as can be intellectually. I don't know. He's called you to exercise that gift.
I'll tell you this: He's called you to exercise it, and I'll tell you where—in the church. You may have ministries outside the church, but the church is what God ordained. God did not ordain parachurch living. He did not promise to honor this. He promised the church. If you're not in a church, then something is wrong with you.
The Purpose of Worship
If you're giving me this, "But I don't get anything out of it." I had somebody the other day, and you would think if you've heard me teach enough, you would not say something like this to me. He said to me, "I don't get anything out of worship." You're not supposed to. Worship is not about you getting something out of it. Worship is you giving praise to Him. You're not supposed to get anything out of worship.
That just drives me nuts when somebody says, "I didn't get anything out of worship." Worship is you singing to an audience of one. You're not supposed to get anything out of it. You're there to give. We've hit—and you see it especially in the charismatic churches—we've hit this point where it's this feeling: "I just felt so, felt so, felt so." We're so feeling driven here that we're missing the truth. We're starting to base everything on experience.
Now, should you get something out of church? Sure. The way you're going to get something out of church is to put something into church. If you're not in a church, you need to be in a church. This isn't church. If you've got to choose between coming to this study and going to church, get to church. A good church. A Bible-believing church. Then find out what God's called you to do. Because He's saying to you the same thing: "Do you love Me? Yeah? Then get after it. Feed My sheep. Tend My sheep. Shepherd My sheep. Use the gift that I've given you."
Closing Thoughts and Prayer
That's a great book. I hope that Gospel of John, especially—and we blew through these—chapter 14, 15, 16, and 17. Those four chapters. Jesus, the night before He died, speaking to the disciples. Take some time, especially when we get to our break this summer and you're looking for something. Those would be four great chapters for you to work on in studying. Pick up. I don't know what we're going to do next. I'm working on the calendar. We'll figure it out. We'll have something that will be extraordinary. The greatest series we've ever done.
Father, thank You for this truth. Thank You for loving us and caring for us, for watching over us, for protecting us. To those of us who are here who are followers of Your Son Jesus, God, we thank You for saving us from our sin and then calling us, giving us a ministry, gifting us. Father, help us understand that You have strategically placed us, even in life with some hurts and pains, that You've given us those so that now we can begin to minister to others and understand and sympathize and identify with people who are hurting. God, whatever You've called us to do, give us the wisdom to see it, to understand it, and then the courage to do it.
For those who are listening who have never come to that point of salvation, help them understand that it really doesn't matter what they do. Their works really don't matter because they're not going to contribute...
anything to salvation and they're not going to condemn them anymore. They're as lost as they can possibly be. What they need to do is to come in repentance and faith. To believe that Jesus is who He said He was. That He died on the cross and when He did, He paid the price for the sin of His people.
Father, will You open their eyes and hearts and minds and help them embrace that truth? And then live a life that's transformed as a result of that? God, thank You for this Gospel that emphasizes belief over and over again. It's got nothing to do with our works. Everything to do with our faith. And that faith is a gift from You. We're saved by grace. God, thank You for that saving grace. We pray this to You this morning in Jesus' name, Amen.
Have a great week.