Sermon at South Street Free Church, Eastbourne · John 21:15–25 · October 2023
Auto-generated transcript from the YouTube captions. Light caption cleanups applied; treat as a reading aid, not a polished manuscript.
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3FrdW5oxKAM
On this site: John 21:15-25 – Jesus Reinstates Peter (Paul Wells)
hmm well I don't know how you've come in this evening to the church but no one has come in with the burden on his shoulders that Simon Peter had been carrying bore this terrible weight on his conscience if Judas had committed an act of treason Peter had committed an act of denial Way Beyond anything we can imagine as being our worst sin but the sin that we wouldn't even want and Peter No Doubt is very much humbled before the other disciples you know the Apostle Peter as a disciple of Jesus he'd been a great one for
putting his foot into anything that was going and jumping feet first into any question any situation he was always pushing himself forward Peter was a great Doer he was the one who claimed he would do things for Jesus even though all the rest deny you Lord I Peter was the first one to confess Jesus and then Jesus had to say to him behind me Satan because you don't know what you're saying now Peter was always causing his foot in it because basically Peter was struggling to understand the teaching of Jesus understand
the gospel and if Peter lived today he would be a great virtue signal you know virtue signalers are people who in the media on the television are always putting themselves forward to show you that they are adopting the right agenda that they are doing the right thing that they are virtuous and that they are a great in what they're doing they're they're for freedom and they are always doing something to forward the positions they believe in and Peter was a bit like that because basically virtue signaling is about work
salvation what you can do to show your good what you can do to show your saved what you can do to show your righteous and Peter had to hit up hard against the brick wall to learn that that wasn't the way that the way was totally different from what he'd been trying to do and so we come to this encounter between Peter and the Lord Jesus and the disciples had been having breakfast not fish and ships they didn't have chips but they'd have broiled fish on a kind of barbecue on the beach where Jesus met them in Galilee
and there was Peter on the edge of the group and Jesus fed his disciples with the fish that he'd cooked and then after a little while Jesus Taps Peter on the shoulder and says come on we've got to take a walk so Peter and Jesus walk away from the group of disciples John follows them as a distance huh but Jesus is talking to Peter alone and when he talks to Peter alone there are three words which jump out of this passage at us the first word is love the second word is feed feed my sheep and the third word is follow
in that order love love feed feed follow and this is the right order you notice that it's totally different from the order of virtue signalers which we've been talking about you do to show that you love other people you do things to show your righteous but Jesus inverses the thing totally that's the wrong way around doing must be preceded by love must be the first thing on the board and then we can talk about feeding and then we can talk about following love must always come first now Jesus said this to Peter because
this was a lesson that John didn't have to learn he was the disciple that Jesus loved and Who Loved Jesus well Peter had to learn this lesson and that's why Jesus took him aside and how does Jesus teach Peter this lesson that love is the first of all things which must proceed feeding or doing and following Jesus well we've got to remember that Simon Peter had known an existential crisis say today Simon Peter his life had ended up in disaster because he denied the Lord he'd been a failure as a disciple and where did
his failure come from it came from this impulsion to do do do and always show that he was up to it and that he was the head and that he was the best and Jesus teaches Peter that it's quite the contrary to what he imagines now you notice that Jesus says to Peter three times Simon Peter do you love me we might think that Jesus is going on a bit or going too far but Jesus asked Simon Peter three times because Simon Peter had denied Jesus three times so this is a lesson that Peter has to learn to overcome his denial his
triple denial he has to learn a lesson of humility and dependence the first thing we can say about this very briefly is only the Risen Christ can teach Peter this lesson and can talk about it Jesus had shown himself to be the greatest lover of all time because he'd laid down his life out of love for sinners the Apostle Paul says in Romans chapter that some people mice lay down their life for good people but God loved us when we were still sinners and his son laid down his life for us and Jesus can teach Peter this
lesson in love because he is the one who has love to give he is the one who has overflowing love and can grant Peter to know this love as the solution to his great problem of self-dependence and self-sufficiency and the lesson comes in three points because Jesus asked Peter three times and we can't get us in the English translation but in the Greek we notice that first of all Jesus says Simon Peter do you love me a gap love self-giving and this is the word which is used in the King James version for the word charity
it's self-giving love Beyond any kind of affection or Beyond any kind of sentiments Jesus is saying to Simon Peter do you love me in this sense that you are prepared to sacrifice yourself for me as I gave myself for you and Simon Peter is embarrassed by this question and what does he say s this he says yes Lord you know this I but when Simon Peter replies he doesn't use the word agapio to love deeply and profoundly that Jesus has used in his question he uses the word philio in the Greek which means to have affection
you see Peter has realized through his crisis that there's no love like the love of Jesus and any love we can pretend to have for Jesus can't correspond to the way that Jesus loves us and so Peter says yes Lord you know I have real affection for you but he doesn't dare to say Jesus I love you like you love me he recognizes that he's not up to it and Jesus says in reply to that feed my Lambs and then Jesus says a second time verse 16 Simon son of John and he said to him yes I love you and the same thing is going on
here Jesus repeats the question a second time and then Jesus says to him tend my sheep and he said to him the third time Simon son of John do you love me now there Jesus doesn't use the word agape the big word for love he uses the word Pharaoh that Peter had used for love Jesus turns down the tone and he says Simon Peter do you have affection for me and that's why Simon Peter is grieved because Jesus has asked him twice already and it gives the impression that Jesus has the has the idea that Simon Peter can't love
him and therefore he has to turn down his Demand on Simon Peter's love and Simon Peter is grieved by this by the fact that Jesus turns his question down and puts himself on Peter's level in a certain way do you even have a little affection for me Simon Peter yes you don't love me like I love you and that is for sure that is accepted but do you have a little affection for me at all and Simon Peter is very very upset by this and all you can answer is is Lord you know that I love you you know everything you know this
I love you and Peter has realized here that Jesus loves him his failings his faults his stupidity his his sin is wanting to be first Jesus loves Peter with all those weaknesses and sins but Peter can never love Jesus in that way in return in other words Peter has to realize that the Lord Jesus Christ is the one who gives his love to us for us and not we who demonstrate to Jesus Christ to the Lord Jesus how much we in other words Jesus says that his love is the greatest thing going and we can fall we can have our problems
but here is the healing when we realize that what the Lord Jesus has done for us in his love is greater than anything we can ever do for him and what is important is what the Lord Jesus is for us and what he has done for us in order to save us and anything that we can do for him is nothing in comparison with the greatness of his love for us it's not our love for him but his love for us that counts let this sink into your mind this evening I struggle with this for many years do I love my Lord enough but when I read
Simon Peter's experience I came to see that it's not me loving Christ that matters it's christ-loving me that matters that's the wonderful thing we may never rise above affection for the Lord Jesus Christ but that doesn't matter because it's not all of the Christ that saves us it's Christ's love for us that saves us and this is what Jesus is teaching Peter you may do more or less in my name more or less for me but that's nothing what is all important is what I did for you my love for you the greatness of that The Wonder
of that The Marvelous nature of my love for you yes Peter you denied me because ultimately that doesn't matter because I gave my life to cover even that sin that you committed and the greatness of Jesus is Love is as it cancels out all our sin because when Christ died on the cross of Calvary in the greatness of the love of God he died to put our sins to death and to abolish it once and for all and that's the greatness of the love of Christ for us our love for the Lord Jesus can only be very feeble frail and imperfect
but the love of Christ for us that is True Perfection because that is the life-giving love that saves us as Believers we ought to Bow our knee before the Lord Jesus Christ and say Lord not I but you not me but your love help me to see this and this alone brings forgiveness when we can see this about ourself that it's the love of Christ that matters then we see that we're really forgiven that we've been delivered from sin that whatever we've done the Lord Jesus Christ forgives us and pardons Us in spite of all our sin
and he heals us and Jesus puts to rest all that unfinished business in US what can I do with my sin do I love the Lord Jesus enough do I love God enough no Simon Peter it's my love for you that counts look at that look at what I've done for you and you learn from me what love is and act out of the love that I have given you so it all comes down to the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ who doesn't accept the righteous but he calls Sinners to repentance and here the Lord Jesus is Calling Simon a second word is feed and
we'll move on to this one a lot faster than the first one because it's when Simon Peter realizes the love of Jesus for him and how great it is and how it restores him and how he can build the real me again the real Peter again it's only then the Pizza becomes capable of serving the lord Jesus Jesus is Love is the greatest of all and in John chapter 10 and verse 14 we read the following I am the Good Shepherd I know my own and my own no up know me just as the father knows me and I know the father I lay down my life
for the Sheep and Jesus because he's laid down his life for the Sheep calls Peter now and says Peter feed my sheep my sheep this isn't about Peter's power building Peter's leadership this is about Peter's service and what he will do for the Lord because they're the Lord's sheep they don't belong to Peter they don't belong to the church they belong to the Lord this teaches Peter and us that anything we do in Christ's service must be done out of realization of Jesus's love for us and his restoration of us his healing
of us to be able to forgive others we must like Jesus no forgiveness ourselves the Forgiveness that Jesus brings and in Christ's service whether we'd be officers in the church members deacons pastors or whatever we be it's not what we do in Christ's service to edify the church one another it's above all what we are by the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ and the order here is love for Christ not ourselves love for others not ourselves and as we are nothing and Christ is everything if we learn to put the order right follow
the lord Jesus Christ in serving him Peter feed my Lambs tend my sheep feed my lungs if we put the order in the right way all this is based on Jesus's forgiveness then we would know less struggles in the church and that we would know the sense of true service in the church and Jesus invites us all to learn this lesson that we're not to do anything out of bitter zeal for the Lord because we want to show ourselves to be better than others and that is fundamentally Peter's problem he wants to show himself to be the leader
better but the Lord Jesus has shown him that he has to learn this lesson he not what we do but what we are as forgiven sheep as forgiven lambs and as we know that forgiveness of the Lord Jesus Christ and as we live on that day by day with the Consciousness that Christ loves us than the love of Christ overflows into our life and allows us to love other people even the people we have no esteem for even the people we might hate naturally and so the order is established here and when we see it we see the reason why Jesus
puts love before service only Christ's love helps us to serve and if we're doing anything in the church and it's not out of Christ's love for others where it's out of the desire to do something ourselves then we have to get things the right way around plus our priorities right and know the love of Christ then the third point you say love feed follow love serve follow Jesus and Peter are walking along the beach here Peter's had his lesson he's learned his lesson but there's one thing more he looks round and sees following
close behind his body jump who's following and perhaps trying to overhear the conversation that Jesus is having with Peter and Jesus says to Peter don't bother about him you follow me and we're continually in the service of the Lord Jesus unfortunately looking at others like pizza and wondering whether we're doing better than them or they're doing better than us and Christians spend a lot of time and attribute a lot of honor to people they think are doing many things in the Lord's service and very often we see that
those people who we think are doing many things and doing a great work for the Lord Jesus are in fact Idols with feet of clay and they fall and they're exposed for being what they aren't really so Jesus says to Peter Peter what's going to happen to John well happen to John I've got that all in hand you've no need to worry about what's going to happen to him and what his end will be you've got to worry about following me not looking at others but keeping your eyes fixed on me so here I think we learn a very important
lesson Peter will die as a martyr John will too but that was because they both learned the lesson you follow me and as Believers in the Lord Jesus Christ Our temptation is to look as others and what other people are doing and our eyes get turned away from the Lord Jesus and we get jealous of others we get jealous of everything they're doing we get jealous of the esteem our fellow Believers have for certain people and the way they praise others are not us but Jesus says Peter forgets all that forget about John you follow
me so here we have the three words when we see the greatness of the love of the Lord Jesus then we can serve him and feed and minister to others around us and when we see the greatness of the love of the Lord Jesus for us then we can keep our eyes fixed on the Lord Jesus because he is the one who is leading us he is the one who knows all about us so you the Lord Jesus says to us tonight follow me I love you I call you to serve me but you follow me keep your eyes fixed on me don't worry about doing better than others
don't worry this others are doing better than you but you follow me and so we see how Jesus tenderly and with understanding and love restores Peter and brings healing into his life he says to him you know Peter you thought you were doing something for me but you got it all away all the way around wrong Peter it's my love for you that counts it's my love for you which will allow you to follow me it's my love for you which will allow you to keep your eyes fixed on me and this is essential for us in our weaknesses but
we come this evening and we may be thinking about ourselves Lord I am weak I'm not doing enough for you I'm not witnessing enough for you I'm not obedience enough and my weakness is so great I'm fragile I'm I'm doubting sometimes but it's not us who causes Christ to love us it's Christ who loves us unconditionally in our weakness Christ came into the world to save Sinners the Apostle Paul said of whom I am chief Christ came not to call the righteous but Sinners to repentance Christ came not to heal those who are well
but to heal those who are sick so if you are a poor weak frail fragile sinner impress with your insufficiencies this evening look to the Lord Jesus and the greatness of his love for you Lord I am sinful our sin such as it is whatever we are cannot cancel out the greatness of the love of Christ for us our sin repeatedly day by day my contradict the love of Christ for us but it can't cancel it out if we confess our sins is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness so like Peter
we are weak and sinful but like Peter we have a great savior who says do you love me feed my sheep do my service follow me this is a message of the Lord Jesus Christ a risen savior not just for Simon Peter but for all of us because all of us are sinners all of us are weak like Simon Peter was and we all need to finish that business with our weakness with the Lord Jesus Christ and to realize the Wonder the greatness Christ loves us just as we are Just As I Am Without One Plea but that thy blood was shed for me o Lamb
of God I come Jesus loves us as we are and that is the greatness of his love for Sinners those Sinners we are let's lay hold on the Lord Jesus Christ on his love let's commit ourselves to it and make ourselves over to Christ so that Christ might restore us and forgive us and lead us in newness of life and that we'll be able to keep our eyes fixed on him as we progress along this path of Life which he is at the end standing waiting for us to say Well done thou good and Faithful Servants enter into the rest of the Lord
amen
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