07/07/24 Awaiting Further Instructions [John 21:1-19]
[Sermon Transcript]
The following transcript is a written record of a spoken sermon delivered at Mayflower Church. This document is provided for personal study, reflection, and educational use. It may not capture the full dynamic and flow of the live sermon and might have been lightly edited for clarity and brevity.
Open your Bibles to John chapter 21 and will be looking at the first nineteen verses of John twenty-one. John twenty-one, verses one through nineteen. Plus, listen to the word of the Lord after this, after Jesus' resurrection and appearance to the disciples.
John 21:1–19 (ESV)
1 After this Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he revealed himself in this way. 2 Simon Peter, Thomas (called the Twin), Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together. 3 Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We will go with you.” They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
4 Just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. 5 Jesus said to them, “Children, do you have any fish?” They answered him, “No.” 6 He said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some.” So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in, because of the quantity of fish. 7 That disciple whom Jesus loved therefore said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” When Simon 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. 8 The other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, but about a hundred yards off.
9 When they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire in place, with fish laid out on it, and bread. 10 Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” 11 So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn. 12 Jesus said to them, “Come and have breakfast.” Now none of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” They knew it was the Lord. 13 Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so with the fish. 14 This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.
15 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.” 16 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.” 17 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. 18 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.” 19 (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.”
Father you have given us your word as food for our souls as light for our path. We pray that as we look into that word, You would also give us a renewed measure of the work of your Spirit to open that word to us to make it real to our lives and show us those nooks and crannies where we needed the most. We pray these things in Jesus name. Amen.
Has anyone here ever bought IKEA furniture. I have a bookshelf at home in France that is not built correctly. Nothing major, but one of the shelves is put on backwards. It is an IKEA bookshelf and the problem is with the instructions, the right instructions came with it, but there was so little detail that my brother-in-law who put it together did something wrong know nothing against my brother-in-law. It is a typical problem when you are putting together IKEA furniture. If you have done it before. You know what it is like I cannot count the number of times I have assembled furniture like that, only to have to start over again or to redo several steps before comes out right again. The instructions are never wrong. They are just too sketchy to be clear, at least to sketchy to be clear for me know other people who have no trouble with them because they understand the logic of putting furniture together, but I am not one of them and I wonder how often we feel like that in our lives as Christians in general terms, we know that were called to live as believers. But what is that mean a day-to-day basis. How do we work it out in our career decisions in our family lives may be in the way we spend our time is retired people Scripture gives us directions but sometimes he just seems too sketchy to to know what that means today. In this situation that we are going through right here and right now, and let me tell you that it does not just happen at the beginning of our lives as Christians, it is something we can be confronted with even after years of serving the Lord. In fact, even as pastors or missionaries we can get the feeling that the instructions are not clear enough to know what to do in certain specific situations including major decisions concerning ministry or Christian life that is even more the case when were confronted with failure or unfaithfulness. How often has his failure taken the wind out of your sails and left you wondering if there is really anything you can do right or that you can do as a Christian? And so we wait we we spend our lives awaiting further instructions as we open to John twenty-one. That is this that is a situation that the disciples are in, and so these verses highlight an incident that took place between Easter and ascension and the gift of the Spirit at Pentecost. These verses may have something to say to us this morning.
Notice first of all, in verses one through three. The simple fact that the disciples have gone fishing and why is that in John chapter 20 the resurrected Christ appears to his disciples twice and he gives them a mandate as the father has sent me, even so I am sending you… imagine the excitement that the disciples must have felt after living through the horror of seeing Jesus arrested and condemned and then being nailed to a cross and then his lifeless body being shut up in a tomb. Jesus was alive, he conquered death, and they were being sent out his his witnesses. But what is that mean Pentecost has not come yet the fullness of the spirit has not yet been poured out to guide them and as the father has sent me, even so I am sending you are not the clearest words as to how they are supposed to do that. So now the disciples are back in Galilee, and Peter says I am going fishing. I for think about that coming from Peter. That is not surprising. All four Gospels highlight the fact that on the night Jesus was arrested. He told his disciples that they were going to abandon him, and what did Peter say? Peter said I will never do that. Jesus I will stay with you, even if it means dying for you. In fact, in Matthew's gospel, Peter goes so far as to say though they all fall away because of you, I will never fall away. And yet, by the end of the same night, Peter had denied knowing Jesus three times, Peter. It failed the rest of the disciples had failed since they had fled when Jesus was arrested, but Peter, more than the others, had disqualified himself for ministry. Now, when I was a kid, one of the best memories I have of my childhood would be the times when my dad would say let us spend some time together, go fishing and we would go to some of the lakes around the area of Middleborough. We never really caught anything. We would take a little boat that I think we got from my grandfather, and we would go on the boat and watch the water. Basically it is one of those one of those memories that will remain with me for the rest of my life, not just being able to go out and go fishing and spend time with my dad when Peter says I am going fishing. It is not like when my dad would say let us go fishing and spend some time together. It does not even let us go fishing while we wait for the next big thing to come along in our ministry. No, Peter is going back to his old job his failure. His failure as a disciple means that he is no longer fit, in his own eyes, to be a messenger of the resurrected Christ, and that sentiment catches on the other disciples who had denied Christ but had left him. I have messed up my life so much that I will never be of any value to God. Maybe because of things in your former life or in your marriage. Maybe it is just because you think you do not have the gifts it takes to serve God in whatever capacity he may call you to and friends, but that does not really mean missions or full-time ministry, and it might just be that you save yourself. I do not have anything to offer God or the church and that clouds your whole perspective on how to live is a Christian. So you say I am going fishing. I will go on living my life as a Christian and continue going to church, but I just do not have anything valuable to offer. There been times when I felt like that clearly is and I have been in ministry now for over thirty years and they are still times when I feel that same discouragement and lack of dissent and lack of direction that the disciples did. Like I am awaiting further instructions and do not know what to do next, and if were honest, I think each one of us can point to moments in our lives, maybe even this morning when we felt that way. That is why what happens next is so important it is the second thing a bite you to notice in this passage, and it is the catch of fish itself in verses four through fourteen. The other Gospels tell us that when Jesus called his first disciples, he called them to leave their fishing nets and said follow me and I will make you fishers of men in Luke's gospel. One of the very first things Jesus does right at the beginning of the gospel in chapter 5 is a miraculous catch of fish which comes after night of fishing with the disciples did not catch anything and is based on that miraculous catch of fish right at the beginning of the ministry that Jesus calls Peter to be his disciple so significantly the last miracle that Jesus does at the end of his earthly ministry is also a catch of fish after night when the disciples nets have come up empty. But here is the thing. If Jesus does that. It is not nostalgia Jesus does not do it just to remind them of something he had done three years earlier. He does it to highlight the fact that no matter what happened after he was arrested and they fled. His call on their lives is still to be fishers of men. In other words, this miraculous catch of fish is a reminder that the responsibility that Jesus gives to his disciples and to the church is still to make disciples of all the nations. The miraculous catch of fish also shows them that that will not happen through their own strength.
John chapter 15 tells us that on the night he was arrested, Jesus said to his disciples. John fifteen verses four through 54 and five—abide in me and I in you, as the branch cannot bear fruit by itself in less it abides in the vine, neither can you unless you abide in me. I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. So we see here it is only when the when the risen Christ arrives and gives his command that catch becomes possible. Up to that point, the nets are empty. As an aside, there been lots of interpretations as to why John mentioned specifically, 153 fish. Some commentators have tried to connect it with its numerical value because in antiquity letters had also functioned as numbers so you can take them. Though the letters figure out how many numbers that is inputted together to make various common nations of words. Others have said that the hundred fifty-three fish represent the variety of peoples and nations. Raymond Brown who wrote massive commentary on John that all that often gives a symbolical reading talk jokingly about a dream he had several years after public publishing his commentator in which I quote a voice from heaven spoke to him, saying, you fool. The reason I said there were 153 fish in John twenty-one was that there were 153 fish. The important thing is not the precise number that has a specific detail, but it points out how huge the catch actually was. Jesus renews his call to the disciples to be fishers of men. And he shows them that the results will go far beyond their expectations, but I that will only happen because of him not, of course, were not the apostles but as the Nicene Creed, which I believe Mayflower confesses from time to time as Nicene Creed states we believe in one holy Catholic that is universal apostolic church and we believe that were part of that church that why is the church, apostolic churches, apostolic first, all because it is founded on the apostles message the church will be apostolic to the extent that it remains faithful to the apostolic witness that we find in the New Testament, but in an apostle is also one who was sent effect. The word apostle comes from a verb in Greek. That means to send the apostles are those who are sent so to say that the church is apostolic also means that it is sent into the world with the word of the gospel and sometimes we forget that, again, that does not mean that everyone of us is called to full-time ministry or to become an evangelist or missionary, but it does mean that as members of the one holy apostolic church. We had to make sure that our focus remains on going out into the world with the gospel. Our being sent, and our responsibility is to come back to that and make sure that we understand that that is what the church is all about. Now here is the problem. When things get discouraging or when it looks like Christianity is moving one step forward and two steps back. It is easy to throw our arms up in the air and say I am going fishing. The miraculous catch of fish reminds us that the results will be there and that they will be infinitely more than what we expect and also infinitely more than what we can see today the French painter Claude Monet painted. I believe over 200 paintings of water lilies she go to Paris and visit limited to no harshly one of the museums in Paris. I you will see a circular room with four paintings of water lilies that cover the wall from from one end to the other circular room that is there is no end but but their huge the largest ones are 6 1/2 feet tall by almost 42 feet long. But here is the thing. When you look at them up close you are tempted to say it is just splotches of paint. It is not that precise. In fact you look at some of those splotches of paint. They are not even pretty and is only when you backup and take a look at the whole thing that you realize what a masterpiece it is the mission Christ gives his church is like that. You see, the problem is that the moment we are living in never allows us to see the whole picture we live in one small moment of history and so when we see things going wrong. We panic. We say everything is lost and we forget that it Christ return will see all those Christ has redeemed since the first disciples ever since Christ began working out his plan of salvation that innumerable multitude from every tribe and tongue and people and nation friends. What we see today so limited. Even a best case scenario where the church is thriving were still seeing one small part of the whole. And that is why the magnitude of the catch. In this chapter so important. Jesus gives his his disciples and he gives us the assurance, that is, he gathers his people. The catch will be infinitely greater than what we can see today infinitely greater than what can imagine our responsibility is to be involved at our level where he places us with the gifts he entrusts us with in the specific calling. He places on our lives friends I responsibilities, not even with bringing in the fish. That is Christ's job job. He is the one was promised to build his church, our responsibilities, making sure were casting the nets and then thirdly notice in verses fifteen through nineteen peters reinstatement as an apostle in his reaction Jesus asked Peter three times if he loves him that. Interestingly, when Peter replies to Jesus. John does not render it with the same verb in the Greek that Jesus is just used Jesus as Peter do you love me, and though the verb that he uses is a verb that comes from the Greek word that we generally know as agape Peter answers something like yes Lord you know I have affection for you is not the word that comes from agape is a weaker verb and then the third time Jesus asked Peter. He also uses that same weaker verb that Peter is just used now obviously if my wife asked me you love me and I say clearly, as you know I have affection for you, she will probably say you did not answer the question. Now there is a debate because the two verbs can be pretty much synonymous and they can be used as equivalents, and sometimes they are even in John's Gospel, so it could be the case, here is well but notice how Jesus seems to lower the expectations each time he asked the question, Simon son of John. You love me more than these. Yes, Lord, you know that I have affection for you, Simon son of John, do you love me? Yes, Lord, you know that I have affection for you, Simon son of John, do you have affection for me. So what is going on. Jesus is actually taking up the conversation from where things stood in the upper room before he was arrested before Peter denied him. Remember when Jesus announced that the disciples were all going to flee. Peter said even if they all fall away because of you. I will never fall away. Jesus, I love you more than they do in John thirteen when Jesus says where I am going. You cannot follow me Peter go so far as to say, Lord, why cannot follow I will lay down my life for you, and yet just a few hours later in front of a charcoal fire in the courtyard of the high priest mansion. Peter will say three times. I swear to you I do not know the man. Not only does Peter not live up to his own prideful statements. He sinks down even deeper than his fellow his fellow disciples. Another sidebar the word for charcoal fire that we see in verse nine is only used one other time in the New Testament and that is in John eighteen in reference to the charcoal fire in the courtyard of the high priest mansion the very scene that the resurrected Christ sets for his disciples reminds Peter of his failure, and then to the three times Peter denied Jesus. Jesus asks him three times. Not Peter. The rock, but Simon son of John. You love me more than these Simon son of John. You love me, Simon son of John, do you have affection for me. See the risen Christ brings Peter face-to-face with his unfaithfulness and his failure but it does not end there because in the midst of Peter's realization that he was no more faithful than the others, and that his love for Jesus was not nearly as deep as he thought it was Jesus also said three times be my sheep see that Jesus reaches down into Peter's failure and shame. He extends his forgiveness, and he reinstates him as an apostle. Only now do Peter will not just be someone who proclaims what Jesus did on the cross. He will be a living illustration of God's grace for those who would deceive themselves by their own pride, who failed miserably, and who have been put back on their feet again and brought once again into the service of the gospel down to Florida where we based most of the time were in the states. A few weeks ago I saw a young man with a T-shirt. I have not seen anywhere else. Maybe you have one that says simply, I am a living message. I like that I am living message from now on. Peter will not just be an apostle. He will be a living message. He will not announce the gospel because he thinks the results come from him; he will do it with joy and amazement because he realizes that Jesus is the one who is doing it through him. And because in the midst of his failure and shame. Jesus once again said to him, feed my sheep and friends, that was incredibly humbling and energizing all at the same time as I was working on the sermon and trying to put myself in the place of Peter, thinking through what that meant. I have to confess I literally broke down and wept and wept. It is incredibly energizing and incredibly humbling to hear those words that are dressed not to Peter but to us. We may be carrying around a sense of failure or shame because of our past. Maybe we been dragging that behind us for years or maybe were still like Peter. The rock, before he failed miserably. Jesus reminds us in these verses that he knows us intimately. He knows our failures and he makes us conscious of them not to beat us up with them or or two to grind our noses in the dust. But in order to reestablish us as witnesses of his restoring and renewing grace witnesses of God's glory and holiness. But just as much of preps even more so living messages of his love is grace and his incredible reconciliation. One last thing, quickly Jesus says three times feed my sheep. That command is going to define the ministry that Christ in trust Peter with Peter will be a fisher of men. And in that activity. Hill ten the sheep that the good Shepherd will be bringing into the fold. But what is interesting is that is not the final word. The final word. The last words recorded. The last recorded words to Peter in this gospel are in a sense, much deeper and much simpler. We see them in verse nineteen and it simply follow me. It is the same words he had said to the disciples when he first called them and said, follow me and I will make you fishers of men. And so we come back to what Jesus says in John fifteen Jesus calls us to bear much fruit. How will we do that by abiding in him know. So often, we want results. We want to see the church grow. We want to see God glorified. But we forget that God is pleased to use us as we abide in Christ as we follow him. first and foremost, let me close by saying this: so often, we feel bewildered or discouraged because we think that God's instructions are detailed enough. What Christ does in this chapter's simile reminds the disciples of their calling as fishers of men. He reminds them of the vision and the mission he gives to them and to the whole church. He says to Peter very simply feed my sheep follow me in a sense, all that is just as sketchy as instructions for IKEA furniture, but Jesus shows the disciples that when they want to give it all up and go back to fishing. What is important is not so much the specific instructions but being reminded of what is essential to fishing, which is the mission of feeding the sheep following Jesus. The fishing the feeding. The following all the rest flows out from that made the living Christ reminds us of what essential as we seek to be used by him to bring men, women, and families to himself and as we seek to abide in him as those who follow us pray father how easy it is to see in Peter in his shame and failure. A mirror of ourselves, we confess that in multiple circumstances. We have thought ourselves to be a rock just before we failed by thew we ask you for forgiveness for all those times when we have tried to do it ourselves, and we ask you for forgiveness for all those times we have simply thrown her arms up in the air and of said I am going fishing, but father the grace of Christ the grace that you have given us in your son is there to raise us back up to put us back on our feet as renewed restored people called to live as living images of your son and as living witnesses of the gospel he entrust us with. But we pray that in the days the weeks the months to come we would truly be those living witnesses, and that you be pleased to use us as you bring in sheep into your fold as you continue that work of the great catch of which you are the master and in which you are glorified. We pray these things in Jesus’ name.