"Do You Love Me More Than These?" (John 21:15-22)

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The Holy Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, according to John, chapter twenty one, beginning at the fifteenth verse.

Glory to you, Lord Christ.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?

He said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.

He said to him, Feed my lambs.

He said to him a second time, Simon, son of John, do you love me?

He said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.

He said to him, Tend my sheep.

He said to him the third time, Simon, son of John, do you love me?

Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, Do you love me?

And he said to him, Lord, you know everything, you know that I love you.

Jesus said to him, Feed my sheep.

Truly, truly I say to you, When you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted.

But when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you, and carry you where you do not want to go.

This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.

And after saying this he said to him, Follow me.

Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them, the one who also had leaned back against him during the supper, and had said, Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?

When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, Lord, what about this man?

Jesus said to him, If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?

You follow me.

This is the gospel of Christ.

Most gracious and almighty Father, we come before you now to hear your voice speaking to our hearts and to our minds.

Father, we pray that any distractions from this week would fall away, that you would draw us to yourself, and that um and that you would just be glorified through this process, Lord.

Bring us joy, Lord.

Fill us more with your Holy Spirit in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Please be seated.

So we're currently in that um in that time between series, preaching series that we do, where um we start selecting random text to uh fill the Sundays until the next series starts.

And um, last week we were in Romans 8, and we were looking at how the Spirit leads us to Christ, and we become children of God through that leading, and that we are able to cry out to God, Abba Father, and that we are adopted by grace.

This week we're popping into the end of John, the Gospel of John.

And Jesus, um, in John's Gospel, we've like the whole thing is the whole gospel has happened.

And Jesus has come, he's lived the sinless life, he was betrayed, and he was murdered through crucifixion, and he's risen from the dead, he rose from the dead, and he has started appearing to his disciples.

And we're coming into this scene where Jesus or where Jesus' disciples have just finished a night of fishing.

They've spent the whole night toiling with nets, moving the boat around, trying to catch fish, and they haven't caught anything.

And then they're coming in at the end in the morning, coming at the end of their shift of fishing, and they see this man on the shore, and this man asks them if they've caught any fish, and they say no, and he casts, he tells them to cast the net again onto their right side.

Is that they don't know it's Jesus yet.

In a moment they will.

But in the moment, right now, it's just some guy on the shore who's telling these professional fishermen that they should cast their net one more time.

I just I feel like if that was in, if I was in that situation, I would not have listened to that, to that man on the shore.

But they do, and they cast the net, and they get a huge catch of fish, around 153, I think it says.

And they realize it's the Lord because the catch is just so dramatic, so massive, and the nets aren't breaking.

And then they start to realize they realize it's the Lord and they rush to the shore.

Peter literally jumps out of the boat into the water and swims as fast as he can to the Lord.

And Jesus then feeds them breakfast.

He has it going, he has breakfast ready going for them.

He asks for some fish so they can get some more.

And this brings us to the text.

This is where when Jesus, in this moment of they just had breakfast on the beach, Jesus turns to Peter and starts talking with him.

And this is where we come up, this is where we pick up the scene.

And the passage may seem like Jesus is being very harsh with Peter.

Um, but he's doing something because previously, before Jesus was sentenced to death, Peter denied him three times.

He was asked three times, Do you know this man?

Are you one of his disciples?

And Peter denied him three times, and then the rooster crowed.

It's a famous scene.

Something that's interesting about this, about those two scenes, because they're linked, is something that's very interesting that Peter denies Jesus at a charcoal fire, and then Jesus recommissions Peter at a charcoal file fire here on the beach.

It's just very interesting.

So let's look at the passage.

Um, we're gonna look at verses 15 to 17 starting off.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?

He said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.

He said to him, Feed my lambs.

He said to him a second time, Simon, son of John, do you love me?

He said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.

He said to him, Tend my sheep.

He said to him at the third time, Simon, son of John, do you love me?

Peter was grieved because he said to him a third time, Do you love me?

He said to him, Lord, you know everything, you know that I love you.

Jesus said to him, Feed my sheep.

Now why is Jesus asking this three times?

One, it's because Peter denied him three times, so he's going to bring it right back at him, ask him three times.

But he wants to do it because this is serious.

This is a serious moment.

It's not a light moment.

Jesus is coming right at him to make a point.

And it's a solemn question that he's asking him because he addresses him by the full name, by his Simon son of Simon son of John.

He says this to him.

So he's a it's a very solemn moment because it's very formal.

And he's doing this because he wants to know, Peter, do you love me more than these?

And by these, he's probably most likely he's around the disciples.

So he's asking him, Do you love me more than these people?

But this can be this can be brought into many things.

Do you love me more than this object that you hold on to dearly?

It's things like that.

This is what he's talking about.

And the word love here is a the word love gets used so much for everything nowadays.

If you really think about it.

When I was driving back from, as you know, me and Creighton were in Ottawa, and as I was leaving Ottawa, there's um there's a strip mall area right as you leave Canada to go down the highway more.

And there's a big sign, a black and white sign, and there's two models on it with the close-up at their faces, and they're wearing jewelry, covered in jewelry.

And is the advertisement just said, be love.

I'm still trying to figure out what that means.

But it's just the word love gets passed around, it gets used so flippantly.

Everyone, it just gets used for everything.

Like I say, I love my pet bird.

I other people say I love my barbecue, or I love my car, or I love coffee.

It just gets used all the time.

So, what kind of love is Jesus talking about here?

C.

S.

Lewis, in his famous book, The Four Loves, he talks about these four different kinds of loves.

And the most basic one he talks about first is the love of affection.

And what this is, this is just when things like when you say I love, I love my coffee, I love having that morning coffee.

It's just having this affection for something or I love my pet.

And then he goes on to talk about friendship.

And friendship is the most rare of them all, he says.

It is hard to have and it's hard to hold on to.

Friendships come in and out of our lives, but it's very rare to have a friendship that goes be your whole life.

When he's um, I'm just thinking about it now, in his book uh The Grief Observed, when he's reflecting on the death of his wife, he talks about a section when you lose people in your life, close, close friends, that when you're in this group of people and when that person leaves and dies, that group of friends isn't ever the same.

That dynamic changes, or that a part of you leaves you when your friend dies.

This is what he's this is the way he's talking about the friendship.

It's most rare, and it's the hardest one to get.

And then he talks about the love of like the marriage, the he calls it the erotic love.

And this is the love between a male and a female in a marriage covenant.

And then he moves on and he talks about the love of charity.

And this is a love of selflessness that you can that you give up everything for this person.

Jesus is talking to Peter about a selfless love.

So when Jesus asked Peter, Do you love me more than these?

He's asking, Will you give up everything for me?

Do you love me more than these people?

Will you go the extra mile for me?

And something that's very um, as I was reflecting on this, that's very helpful, is that in the prayer book during the marriage ceremony, when the the couple is standing face to face, right before they put on the ring, they're asked these questions.

And the questions they're asked is that is this the officiant says to the man, Will you love her, comfort her, honor and keep her in sickness and in health, forsaking all others, keep thee only unto her so long as you both shall live?

And the man you hope would say, I do, or I will.

And then the and he says to the woman, Will you obey him and serve him and love and honor and keep him in sickness and in health?

Forsaking all others, keep thee only unto him so long as you both shall live.

This is the kind of love that Jesus is asking Peter.

Will you love me so much that you will forsake all other?

Will you submit to me and follow me, even if the what I'm asking of you seems so drastic, um, so out of um that you just can't fathom it?

Will you follow me?

This is the kind of love he's asking.

Will you sacrifice everything for me?

And this is something we need to ask ourselves.

Well, as we become disciples of Jesus and we try to live out the gospel in our lives, are we gonna forsake all things to follow him?

Will we not will we not let things take our eyes off of him?

This is what Jesus is asking.

Will you serve me out of love and not of personal gain?

Jesus asks us all this.

Will you serve my church?

Because he says, Will you feed my lambs?

See, this isn't just a command for the select few.

Like I'm becoming or I'm getting ordained next Saturday, and there will be moments where I take vows, and one of the vows is that will you watch the church?

Will you be its messenger, its watchman, and steward?

And there in all through the Bible, there's people who are set apart by the congregation to lead the congregation.

But we are all called to feed the lambs, to tend the sheep.

And who are the sheep and the lambs?

That's us.

Jesus is the ultimate shepherd, but we are and we are his lambs.

And we do this by when we speak into each other's lives, where we come together along somebody along beside somebody who is struggling, who is grieving, and we tend to them.

We serve them faithfully, selflessly.

We come to them.

That's what he's taught Jesus talking to Peter about.

Will you feed my sheep?

Will you tend to them?

Look what Jesus says to Peter next.

Verses 18 to 19.

Unconditional following.

Let's look at it.

If I can find it.

I'll just start at verse 17.

He said to him a third time, Simon, son of John, do you love me?

Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, Do you love me?

He said to him, Lord, you know everything.

You know that I love you.

Jesus said to him, Feed my sheep.

And then he goes on, Truly, truly I say to you, When you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted.

But when you were old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.

This he said to him, to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.

And after saying this, he said to him, Follow me.

In the military, I have my brothers in the military, so I've gone to a couple military ceremonies as he was coming up through the ranks when he does the parades.

And something I noticed about the military is that the military always salutes the rank.

It's never really the person, it's the rank.

And the difference between what Jesus is asking about following, because in the military, you have to follow the rank blindlessly.

But Jesus is asking, will you follow me out of love?

Not out of a respect, not out of me being your boss, but will you follow me out of love?

That you want you love me so much that you just want to follow me.

And this is what Jesus is talking about.

Because without love for Jesus, it is impossible to follow him.

Jesus is looking for those who will follow him out of a deep love for him, not out of force.

It's easy to know about Jesus.

Even the demons knew about Jesus in the Gospels.

But for those, it's hard to love something so dearly that you will follow him.

It's only possible through the spirit within us, as we talked about last week in Romans 8.

See, this is what's going on here is that Jesus says to Peter, Will you follow me?

And then he predicts the kind of death that Peter is going to have.

When it says stretched out his arm, stretch out your arms, that's that's a biblical or um in that era, they would that's a way to describe crucifixion because they didn't even want to say the word crucified.

So they use this analogy of stretch out your arms.

Will you follow me?

Will you follow Jesus unconditionally?

Even if it means that you'll be persecuted, that you will suffer, that you will have these things happen to you, but will you follow me?

That's what Jesus is asking him.

Jesus asks all those who have who have put their faith in him, will you love me unconditionally?

That was the first point.

And then he goes on, but will you follow me unconditionally?

Because that's what it is, the Christian life.

It's that as we put our faith and trust in Jesus and the Spirit works deeply within our hearts, that we get this love for him and that we long to serve him, we long to follow him.

And that's what he's asking him.

Are you going to follow me out of love or just out of respect?

Because when life gets messy, even in grief, even when dreams don't happen, or even when somewhere you're somewhere in life that you don't want to be at the moment, that Jesus is asking, will you follow me because you love me, not because I'm telling you to?

Do you love me?

Do you love me more than these?

That is something to just reflect on for us to pray about.

Like Jesus, do I truly love you the way you're commanding me or asking me to love you?

Now you may be thinking, I can't do that.

That's too hard.

Or it doesn't sound like loving.

How is it loving that if Jesus says that he's going to be crucified, shouldn't he not let him be crucified?

That sounds pretty harsh.

Well, you can't you can't love Jesus on your own.

It's impossible.

You can't follow him on your own, it's impossible.

That's the thing about the gospel is that in the Bible it says that humanity would never follow God.

It's hopeless.

Humanity was hopeless, that God had to send his son into the world to save the world.

It's only through Jesus, when you look to Jesus and the Spirit leads you, that you can truly love him.

And there's a reason why, if you think about it, when you if when you reflect on these texts, this section of John, that Peter doesn't, or Jesus doesn't instantly ask Peter immediately after he rose, Do you love me?

This is happening eight days later.

And it's after eating and resting that he asks them these serious questions.

Because none of us can do this until we rest in Jesus.

That's the application for today is that we must rest in Jesus.

And how do we do that?

It's when we come and we pray to him and say, Jesus, lead me, guide me, come more and more into my life.

Help me to put down these idols in my life, these things I hold on to.

Break my pride, Lord.

I want to follow you, but I can't without your help.

None of us can do it.

We must rest in him because we're always pulled side to side in life.

Things pull us away.

It happens constantly.

But it's when we come back to him and just pray, Lord, I want to follow you.

Help me.

Put people in my life that can help lead me, help disciple me, point me in the right direction.

Something I find so compelling about this section or this about the Bible in a whole is that the Bible shows us what real life is, what it's like to um, what it's like to uh live in the real world.

So let's look at verses 20 to 22.

And that's God uses the weak.

Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them.

When it says whom Jesus loved, that's talking about the deep friendship love, what we were what we were just looking at a couple minutes ago.

This is the deep, deep love that you can have for a friend.

It's not a sexual love, it's a love that you just love your friend.

It's deep.

It's a deep, deep love.

The one who also leaned back against him during the supper and had said, Lord, who is it that's going to betray you?

When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, Lord, what about this man?

Jesus said to him, It if it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?

You follow me.

See, we live in a world that elevates the strong, the smart, the elites, the influencer, and puts down the weak and the uneducated.

But the Bible elevates the weak, the uneducated, the non-influencer.

God uses the foolish to shame the wise.

It's all through the Bible.

We talk we're go in the children's ministry, they're going through heroes of the Bible.

And a couple of those heroes weren't really great people.

But it's their faith that kept that it's the deep, deep faith they have in they had in God, and they wanted to follow God, and God used them mightily.

And that's what's happening here with Peter.

Peter failed horribly.

He denied Jesus.

But then we see here that Jesus is recommissioning him.

See, Jesus uses the weak for his purposes.

See, Peter, right after being recommissioned, right after he gets recommissioned by Jesus, he looks and gets jealous at John.

Because he says, What about him, Lord?

And right away Jesus rebukes him.

Right after he was asked three times, Do you love me?

Will you follow me?

He gets he gets jealous right after.

And this is, I find great hope in this because we don't have to be perfect.

We are not called to be these perfect, mighty Christians.

We're just called to be followers of Jesus.

Beggars looking for bread and beggars leading other beggars to find the bread of life.

And that's what's so compelling about this is that when Jesus asks us, Do you love me?

We can we can say, Lord, help my um I believe, help my unbelief.

And he will lead us to himself through prayer, through communing with other people.

And if you're worried about that you failed, that you're not a good disciple of Jesus, well that's what that's why we come here every week and we confess our sins.

We do it every week together, because we'll never measure up.

But that's the beauty of the gospel, that's the free grace.

And that's what we're gonna look at through Galatians when we get to that in a couple weeks.

But thanks be to God that He sent His Son to be perfect, to be our Savior.

And then as we reflect on Jesus' words, do you love me more than these?

Will you follow me out of love or just respect?

And will you serve my church?

That we can say, Lord, I want to help me, lead me, help me guide people, help me serve your church.

That's what the point of this part of the text is about.

It's that deep, deep question of like, what does your heart love?

Does it love Jesus the most that all it could ever do, or does it love something else that's blocking your eyes from him?

And this is something we need to ask ourselves continually, daily, because it is a constant struggle, and it will always be a struggle until Jesus returns or we go to be with him.

But that's the grace of the gospel because Jesus loves us so much.

Let's pray.

Heavenly Father, thank you that you've called us to follow you out of love, not out of this com this deep command or out of a tyranny, but it's out of just a deep love for you, Lord.

Father, we all pray that you would just fill us deeply with your spirit, and that your spirit would guide us to love you more, that we would rejoice in that your saving work on the cross.

Father, help us to rest in you, to come to you honestly, to confess our sins honestly, and to experience your deep love for us.

And I pray this in Jesus' name.

Amen.

Thank you for listening today.

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