We'll read from the Gospel of John, chapter 21, verses 1 to 14.
And this is the reading of God's Word.
After this, Jesus revealed Himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias,
and He revealed Himself in this way.
Simon Peter, Thomas called the twin, Nathaniel of Cana in Galilee,
the sons of Zebedee, and two others of His disciples were together.
Simon Peter said to them,
I am going fishing.
They said to Him,
We will go with you.
They went out and they got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.
Just as the day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore,
yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.
Jesus said to them,
Children, do you have any fish?
They answered Him,
No.
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.
That disciple whom Jesus loved therefore said to Peter,
It is the Lord.
And when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord,
he put on his outer garment,
for he was stripped for work,
and he threw himself into the sea.
And 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.
And when they got out on land,
they saw a charcoal fire in place,
with fish laid out on it,
and bread.
And Jesus said to them,
Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.
So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore,
full of large fish,
one hundred and fifty-three of them.
And although there were so many,
the net was not torn.
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.
Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them,
and so would the fish.
And this was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples,
after he was raised from the dead.
This is God's holy word.
Let us pray.
Lord, we ask now that you would open our hearts to hear
what you have to teach us,
to show us how you want to change us today,
from your word.
And we pray that in Jesus' name.
Amen.
This summer we're looking at some encounters with Jesus
throughout the Gospels.
There are forty-six people that Jesus encounters
individually in the Gospels.
And then if you add the corporate,
the group encounters,
it's a lot more than that.
All types of people,
all different backgrounds,
all with different aches and pains
and issues going on in life.
And so one of the things you can do
when you read encounters with Jesus
across the Gospels
is look for yourself
across these encounters.
This text, John 21,
is an encounter with a group of disciples,
particularly Peter.
And this text has been read
in lots and lots of different ways.
And the way I want to come at it today
is really through that lens
of the encounter with these disciples.
And I want to suggest,
I want us to see in this third post-resurrection appearance
of Jesus to his disciples
that Jesus is encountering people,
apostles here,
who are restless and running away
and hiding and fruitless, really,
in the ministry that they've been called to.
And that is the reason that Jesus comes to them
and comes to encounter them.
They had little impact.
They had not done great things for God yet.
And so Jesus comes to them in that context.
Now, lots of people in this room today
are believers, Christians.
You follow Jesus.
You're a disciple.
And you, like me,
struggle with the fact
that you're intellectually committed.
Credo, I believe,
and I know what I believe,
that Jesus Christ died
and he rose again on the third day
and that happened.
The facts are there.
But you find it really difficult
to get the intellectual assent
to those truths
down into your heart and your hands
where you're actually living
out the Christian life thoroughly.
And so if you're a Christian today
and you've ever said,
in your heart,
maybe to somebody else,
I have a really, really difficult time
getting Sundays to matter for Mondays
and bringing the whole
of what the gospel means
and all of its resources
down into my normal everyday life.
And I can say today,
can you say with me today,
I have the existential anxiety,
the ache,
that I know that there are aspects of me
where I am not who I am
in Christ and the way I live.
That I've not yet put on all
that the gospel calls me to do.
And live for him thoroughly
in every single way.
And that's exactly what's going on here.
One way to express this
is through David Downing's works.
David Downing is an author
who's written a number of books
about C.S. Lewis.
And he wrote a really good book
called The Reluctant Convert,
The Most Reluctant Convert.
And it's about C.S. Lewis' conversion.
And he records some of the letters of Lewis.
And we found a letter from C.S. Lewis
to his friend Arthur Greaves.
Lewis was 17 years old when he wrote this.
And he says,
I believe,
Arthur,
I believe in no religion.
There is absolutely no proof
for any of them.
And from a philosophical perspective,
Christianity is not even the best one.
So he was 17.
And then at 32,
he writes back to his friend Arthur Greaves.
And this is what he says.
Christianity is God expressing himself
through what we call real things,
namely the actual incarnation,
crucifixion, and resurrection.
So from 17 to 32,
he had been converted.
He had come to faith.
And one of his other,
a young man that knew him at the time
that's written a couple books
about him as well,
and David Downing records this interaction,
Walter Hooper,
said that as he watched Lewis over the years,
very famous quote,
in time, he said,
he was the most thoroughly converted man
I ever knew.
Now, God does all the converting.
But what did Hooper mean by that?
What he meant by that was,
over the years,
he saw how much the gospel
got into the bones of Lewis.
And how much it expressed
in every area of his life.
And if you come today,
and you think,
you know, boy,
God is out of sight,
out of mind for me most days.
And I've got a lot of prayerlessness
in my calendar.
And I really struggle
with addiction
to an idol
that I've not been able
to get away from
and kill.
John 21
is for you.
Let me show you two things.
Just two.
Number one,
the restless and running
disciples that we are.
And secondly,
the revealer
who comes for them.
So first,
the restless and running disciples
that we are,
that we can be,
that the apostles were.
All right,
to understand this passage,
there's lots of different readings of it,
but I think you've really,
really got to pay attention
to the context
and the details
that John gives here.
This is the third
post-resurrection appearance.
We're told that twice
in the passage.
And in verse one,
it says that Jesus
revealed himself to them.
In John's gospel,
the word,
the concept reveal,
means far more
than just show up.
John's words are so important.
He's very careful.
And reveal means
an unveiling,
a pulling back the curtain,
a showing his glory.
You saw at the end of the passage
when they're sitting with Jesus
to have breakfast on the beach,
they say,
it says,
they dared not ask
if it was him.
What does that mean
when you're standing right next to him?
When you're sitting right next to him,
you dare not ask?
They knew
there was something different about him
after the resurrection.
And here,
you have this unveiling
of his glory.
Now,
how did he do it?
That's verse one.
Who did he do it to?
Verse two.
And we're told here
about seven disciples
that he revealed himself to.
And it could be,
Peter's mentioned,
Nathaniel,
John the beloved,
and others.
It could be
because John is so
typically using words
and historical facts
as symbols.
It could be that
because there's seven listed,
he's talking about
all of the twelve.
We don't know.
It could be seven.
It could be twelve.
But here,
there's this group of disciples
and we're told that
they're fishing.
Verse three,
they're fishing.
Peter said,
I'm going to go fishing.
Do you want to go with me?
And they went with him.
And so,
they are 95 miles away
from Jerusalem
and they're in Galilee
and they've gone fishing.
And it says here
that it was nighttime,
very important.
It was dark.
They had caught
absolutely nothing
all night.
And John is trying
to get you to see
throughout his whole gospel
that when he uses
a word like darkness,
night,
empty,
nothing,
that he's conveying
not just a historical fact,
and it is.
But also something going on
about the spiritual condition
of the people
that he's speaking about.
So you can remember
someone like Nicodemus.
Nicodemus came to Jesus
at night.
It was dark.
He was spiritually empty.
And he came to ask,
what can I do to be saved?
In the same way,
John is trying to get us
to see through
the little details
that the darkness,
the empty nets,
the fact that they're
not catching any fish
is a revelation
of what's going on
in their souls.
It's a spiritual life
issue as well.
And the empty nets
refer to empty hearts
that there's something
wrong here.
They're not who
they're supposed to be
in this passage.
You can even see this
in verse 4
when it says
that Jesus shows up
on the beach
and when the breaking
of the day came,
when the sun came out,
everything changed.
Right?
And so John's signaling
that this historical detail,
this fact,
when the morning came,
boy,
the spiritual realities
came too.
Everything changed.
And you see how much
John's using his language
to point us to something
deeper,
spiritually significant
throughout the text.
Now, what does that all mean?
What's the takeaway here?
When you see those facts
in the light of chapter 20,
in chapter 20,
the first two resurrection
appearances,
in the first appearance,
Jesus shows up
raised from the dead.
He's in a room
with these same disciples.
And in chapter 20,
verse 22,
he says to them,
I'm now going to breathe
on you.
And I'm going to give you
the Holy Spirit.
And you're going to go
into all the world
and where you forgive sins,
sins will be forgiven.
He gives them apostolic authority
saying,
as you announce the gospel,
sins will be forgiven.
Now,
when that happens
in chapter 20
and you turn to chapter 21,
where do you expect
to find these apostles?
When Jesus has just said,
I'm breathing upon you,
the Holy Spirit's coming upon you,
go into the world
and announce the gospel,
forgive sins,
you expect to find them
in the towns
and the communities
and the cities
doing the work of ministry,
being fishers of men,
announcing the gospel,
going to all the world.
And instead,
you flip the page,
chapter 21,
and it says,
they went to their hometown
and they're fishing.
And one more thing
to really put this in context.
You've got to know
that this is a parallel moment
to Luke chapter 5.
And in Luke chapter 5,
we have the initial calling
of Peter
and these very disciples.
Some of them, at least.
And how was Peter first called?
He was fishing.
Jesus got into a boat with him.
He was casting his net.
No fish were being caught.
And Jesus said,
but cast your net
on the other side
in deeper waters.
And they did it.
And as soon as the net came in full,
they bowed before him.
And Jesus turned and says,
now I will make you fishers of men.
What's going on here?
You see,
this is a parallel moment
after the resurrection.
And what has happened?
This is not just them waiting.
They're actually here,
I think,
sitting on their hands.
They've been given
this post-resurrection commission,
go into the world.
You've got the Holy Spirit.
You've got the authority
of the gospel.
And they went home
and they started fishing.
They're going in reverse.
They're going back to Luke 5
all over again here.
And that's why in verses 4 and 5,
when Jesus asked the question,
he asked them the question,
friends, children,
do you have any fish?
What is that question?
It's more than just
the historical fact.
There's something spiritual.
There's a heart issue
going on in that question.
Friends,
do you have any fish?
And what is he asking?
He's saying,
are you catching people?
Have you gone out
and made,
and gone to the towns,
the cities,
and the communities
and brought people
into the kingdom?
Like I just commissioned you.
It's the issue of Luke 5.
I will make you fishers of men.
And here they are,
they're fishing for fish,
not for people.
They're sitting on their hands.
They're not doing great things
for the Lord.
They're not who God
has called them to be yet
in ministry at this moment.
And these are the apostles.
Thomas,
in the previous chapter,
he was not there
for the first appearance
and so he doubts.
And he says,
you know,
if I can't see Jesus' hands
and his feet
and his scars,
I can't believe.
He doubted like a scientist.
He said,
I need empirical verification.
Chapter 21,
the third appearance
is a different kind of doubt.
It's existential doubt.
It's the doubt
that we all struggle with
as Christians
where we say,
I'm just not really sure
that I totally believe
that if I go out
and fish for people,
serve the Lord
in every way he's called us to
as Christians,
as the church,
that there's going to be
any transformative power.
In other words,
they're in a place
where the Holy Spirit
is a theological concept
but not a belief
in a living,
personal,
transformative.
And the power of God
with us
in the city
that God has sent us to.
And they've got weak faith.
And it's a type of doubt
that resides in weak faith.
It creates an existential ache
that says,
I know that I'm a Christian.
I know that I'm called
to be transformed
in every way
throughout my life.
And I also know
that I am not
who God's called me to be.
And I can't figure out yet
all the ways
that that needs to change.
And there's this ache
deep down in the heart
as a disciple
where you know
that there's a gap there
between those two realities.
And this is exactly
what the apostles
were walking through here.
We learn here
that you can be a Christian
and a rebel to God's will.
You can be a Christian
and you can be a runaway.
You can be a Christian
and not walking
in the ministry
that God has called you to
in your normal day-to-day life.
And what this passage
tells us is that
you can do that
surrounded by your busyness
and normalcy.
What did they do?
They just went fishing.
That was their job.
That was their day job.
And fishing is not bad.
I went fishing last week.
I took the kids fishing
in Mississippi last week.
Fishing is a good thing.
It's not about fishing.
It's about wherever God
has called you
to your day job
being thoroughly converted,
as it was said of Lewis.
Or asking the question,
what is God calling me
to do with my faith at work?
What is God calling me
to do with my faith
as I raise up children?
What is God calling me
to do with my faith
as I get to know my neighbors
in the place
that God has put me?
In other words,
using the resources
of the gospel to ask,
what is God calling me to
in every area of life?
And so,
before I move on
to the second last point,
look,
Peter exemplifies
this reality here.
You could think of him
as a runaway prophet here,
a runaway disciple.
In verse 6,
Jesus unveils himself.
How?
He says,
cast your net on the other side,
and they haul in 153 fish,
and then John says,
it's the Lord.
Remember Luke 5?
This is the Lord.
And Peter dives into the water.
Now, remember that John
wants you to really notice
the details,
and here's a detail
that's very strange.
Before Peter jumps in the water,
we're told that he put on
his outer garments.
Now, I don't know
how it is when you go swimming,
but when I get ready
to go swimming,
I don't put more clothes on.
We don't, you know,
we, he,
it says even more,
the details.
The Greek text here says
he was naked.
Now, it's been translated
in a way that suggests
probably he was wearing
an undergarment
that was typical
underneath the main cloak,
but the Greek uses
the word naked.
And you see,
I think what's going on here
is that this runaway disciple
who had denied Jesus
three times
and who had gone back
to his day job
after he had been commissioned
to go into all the world,
to the city,
and tell people
about the gospel,
he's naked.
He's ashamed.
And he feels that guilt
and he knows that
he wants to run to God.
He wants to run to his Lord
and yet at the same time
he knows,
if I'm going to go to the Lord,
I've got to be clothed.
I've got to be covered.
And so he covers himself
to dive into the water,
to appear before the Lord.
There's another way
that clothing is used
throughout the Bible
that's really significant,
that I think matters here.
And it's also that anytime,
when you come to experience
the grace of Christ,
Old Testament and new,
you're clothed,
you're robed in righteousness.
And a second act of clothing
often happens
in the Old Testament.
What is it?
It's that when a priest
is ordained
or a person is commissioned,
they receive investiture.
What is that?
That's this type of clothing
in the Old Testament
that says you're commissioned,
you're sent.
Both things I think
are going on here.
He's covering his shame.
He's knowing he needs
a robe of righteousness.
And at the same time,
he's being recommissioned
by Jesus.
He's about to have breakfast
on the beach
and be told,
this is who you are.
Remember,
I'm sending you
to feed the sheep.
Both things are happening.
What is this?
Some commentators,
and I think they're right,
have pointed out
that when you look
at the details
of this scene,
especially verse 7,
what is it?
How does John put it?
Peter hurled himself
into the sea.
He threw himself
into the sea.
Where do we see
that language
in other parts
of the Bible?
It reminds us
of language
very similar
to the book of Jonah.
When Jonah was in a boat,
there's a fish in the water,
and he knew
that he was naked
and ashamed
and running
from the Lord.
He was a Christian.
He was a Christian
in the Old Testament sense,
a disciple,
a follower of God,
but he was running
and he was sitting
on his hands,
and it says that
when he realized,
the only way
you're going to be saved
is if I'm thrown
into the sea.
He hurled himself.
Peter here looks like Jonah.
John is telling us,
Christian friends,
we are little Jonas.
We have been,
if you're a Christian today,
you've been called,
you've been converted,
you've been changed,
you have the power
of the gospel
in your life.
You have all the treasures
in Christ that you need,
and yet we know
the ache of struggling
to be thoroughly
living out the gospel
in that way,
of knowing what it means
to come from Sunday
to Monday,
and feeling the existential pain
of not knowing
how to grow
and how to change
and how to be fishers
of people
in our day-to-day lives
and thinking,
you might look up today
and think,
you know,
I don't know that I've ever
shared the gospel
with anybody,
and I've been a Christian
for many, many years,
and God has called me
to be a fisher of people,
and that's the ache
that Peter's feeling.
John 21,
it's about all of us.
What does Jesus,
the revealer,
do about it?
Secondly,
finally,
let me give you
a few things.
You might come today
and say,
I'm a Christian,
and I have not lived
for God.
I'm a Christian,
and I have not done
great things for the Lord.
What does the revealer
have to say about it?
Let me give you a few.
And we'll close.
First,
the first thing Jesus does
is he reveals himself.
He reveals himself
to runaways.
Jesus comes here,
and in verse five,
he calls them children.
They're in the midst
of sitting on their hands,
and he says,
my children,
my family.
If you look back
at years of sitting
on your hands
and buried treasure
and buried talents,
and you say today,
again,
I'm not who I should be
in Christ.
When Jesus shows up
on the beach here
and says,
children,
what he is saying
to you today,
to Peter,
to all of us today,
is your,
your weak discipleship
will not keep you
out of the kingdom
of God.
your little faith,
your weak faith,
your lack of growth
is not going to rip you
out of God's hand.
Jesus,
the revealer,
comes and encounters you
and pursues you
and says to you
once again,
children,
your lack of discipleship
is not going to pull you
away from the Lord.
He's saying here,
I'm going to keep you,
and I've purchased you,
and I've bought you
with a price.
In verse,
sorry,
back to Luke chapter 5
when he calls them
to be fishers of people,
they had this huge catch,
and there's this
immediate conversation
between Peter and Jesus.
Now,
in this passage
in John 21,
I would love to know,
maybe you would love to know,
what happened
in the conversation
between Peter and Jesus
when Peter dove in the water
and made it to the beach
before everybody else.
We don't know what happened.
We're not told.
The reason we're not told
is because the boat
was 100 yards,
100 meters from the land,
and John was in the boat,
and John is writing
this gospel,
and so John didn't hear
the conversation
between Peter and Jesus.
Maybe it was 10 minutes,
15 minutes for them
to get the fish in,
get back to the land,
but there is a conversation
that takes place
between Peter and Jesus
on the shore
that we never know about.
I wonder what was said
if you go back
to Luke chapter 5
when they hauled
the fish in,
Peter,
you know,
if Jesus tells you,
you haven't been
catching fish all day,
Jesus says,
cast your net
on the other side
and you bring
all these fish in,
you might say,
wow,
you're amazing.
How did you know
there were so many fish
on that side of the boat?
You have real power.
That's not what happens.
Instead,
in Luke 5,
it says that Peter
bowed his knee
before the Lord
and said,
I am a sinner,
depart from me.
Now listen,
friends,
you know that you've
had a real encounter
with God,
not when you say,
whoa,
you're amazing,
but when you say,
I'm a sinner,
depart from me.
I need to get away
from you.
And I would imagine
that in John 21,
though,
I don't know what was said,
of course,
this is imaginative,
I don't know what was said,
but I would think
in John 21
that when Peter
got to the beach,
he probably got down
on his knees
and said,
Lord,
I abandoned you
three times
and I'm sitting
on my hands,
I am a sinner,
I don't deserve
that you would come
and look for me.
I don't deserve,
I don't deserve this.
And this passage
is giving something
so simple
but so profound,
so important
to all of us today
and that's this.
Jesus says,
maybe Jesus
said it like this,
you know,
you're a little Jonah,
you're a runaway
and you've been running
and running
but Peter,
you remember
what I told you?
Look for the sign
of Jonah.
Three days
I'll descend down
into the belly
of death
but on the third day
look,
look for the sign
of Jonah.
You know,
what he may have said,
he may have said,
you're a little Jonah,
you're a runaway,
you've not done
great things for the Lord,
you've got weak faith
but I'm the true
and better Jonah
and I went down
into the water
so that you might rise up
and he's telling you
here today
to restless
and maybe fruitless
and maybe folks
in the room
that have had little impact
on their community
and on the person
that you've been walking
with for so many years
but never shared
the gospel with,
he's telling you today
your lack of discipleship
will not keep you
away from Jesus.
He comes for you.
His grace
will not let you go.
Then he tells them,
he tells them,
let's respond to that.
He tells them,
now go
and cast your net
on the other side.
Look at those empty nets
for just a second.
What is the empty net
they're saying
to us as disciples?
It's telling us
something so simple
that when you're not
looking at Jesus
in your daily life
and you're not listening
to Jesus
in your daily life
and Jesus is not
the active practical center
of your entire life
then there's going
to be fruitlessness.
So fruitfulness
in ministry
depends upon dependence
and all this text
is really saying
is disciple of Jesus,
follower of Jesus,
listen to Jesus,
look to Jesus.
There's an opportunity
in God's providence.
He's gathered us
all here today
and in God's providence
today,
this morning
is the morning
where he's coming
and asking you
to ask yourself,
in what ways
am I not following Christ
in my day-to-day life
and to come and say,
hey, it's time to cast
your net on the other side,
to seek change,
repentance,
to dive into the water
and go down
so that you can
come up again.
The third thing
that he tells them here
of four,
and this is the more
specific point
and I think the main point,
he says,
you are called,
the main calling
of the church
of followers of Jesus
is to be fishers
of people.
And so in this scene,
he's asking all of us
to look and renew
our calling
to be fishers
of human beings,
to go out into the world
and share the message
of the gospel
with people
in our lives.
What does it mean
to be a fisher of people?
Not obvious language
to us in the 21st century.
Most of us
don't fish very often.
Why did Jesus
take this idea
of fishing
to talk about
the sharing
of the gospel?
And the reason for it
is that in the
Greco-Roman world
and the ancient Near East,
the sea is a place
in most people's minds
of chaos
and darkness
and death.
And I don't know
if you've ever been out,
if you've ever been out
to the very tip top
of Scotland
or the tip top
of the Isle of Lewis
or Shetland.
If you have,
you've seen
the North Sea
and if,
on the east side,
and if you've seen
the North Sea,
you know that
on a stormy day,
you look out and say,
I have no idea
how pre-modern people
ever navigated
these waters.
That's the image
of the seas
to people
in the pre-modern world.
What is Jesus saying
when he says,
go and be a fisher
of people?
He's saying
that you're called
to bring people
out of the place
of darkness,
the domain of the seas,
the place of chaos,
into the light
of the land,
into the sunshine.
And so this is,
this is a simple
recommissioning
to every disciple
in this room
that the calling
is to go out
into the world
and help human beings
that God has put
in your life
by works of mercy
and ultimately
the words of the gospel
to help them move
from a place
of darkness to light,
from a lack
of hope to hope.
And Jesus is calling us
to renew our sense
of that.
I heard this week
a celebrity
that has come
to faith in Christ
from a really,
really hard life,
and they're a very
well-known person,
and I was listening
to a podcast
with them this week,
and one of the things
they said,
they were asked
about how they were
going to use
their celebrity
as a Christian
in the coming years,
and this person said,
well, my mission now
is to preach the gospel,
to love people,
and to be forgotten.
So I'm trying
as best as I can
to be forgotten.
And Jesus is saying here
that to God's glory,
every single Christian's mission
is to love God,
love people,
love the church,
and love the people
God's put in your life
and then preach the gospel
in order to be forgotten,
in order to not be
that important,
in order to give God
all the glory,
and that's the renewal
of discipleship
and commitment
we're being asked to.
And then lastly,
the last thing
Jesus invites you today
to renew discipleship
is to come,
he says at the end,
come and have breakfast
with me.
He calls them children,
he calls them family,
even though they're runaways,
but the climax is in verse 9,
when they get to the beach,
Jesus had prepared
a breakfast for them,
he had set the fire,
and it says
that he took bread
and he gave it to them.
Now what does that sound like
to you?
And we're about to celebrate
the Lord's Supper,
and you see,
Jesus Christ was saying,
because I rose,
because of John chapter 20,
today I can come
and say to you,
you are my family,
even in the midst
of your weak faith.
I will not let you go.
And the Lord's Supper
says to us today
exactly that.
Now I want to finish
with this.
The details in the Gospel of John,
so important.
There are only two places
in the Gospel of John
where a charcoal fire
is mentioned.
So sometimes John
says something
and then he adds
an adjective
or a little detail
that you think,
this is extraneous,
if the editors
were on top of this,
they would say,
you don't need this
to progress the story,
but he puts it in anyway.
And there are two places
in the Gospel of John
where he adds a detail,
a charcoal fire.
One is right here,
John 21.
The first is in John 18.
And in John 18,
Jesus had been arrested
and he was at
the high priest courtroom,
the courtyard
of the high priest.
Peter was with him,
but Peter was not allowed
to go inside.
And so Peter was outside
the courtroom
and he was standing
at the door
and it says there was
a slave girl at the door
and she said to Peter,
are you not one
of his disciples?
And he said,
I am not.
And then John writes,
and there was a charcoal fire
sitting next to them
because it was cold.
And you say,
John,
you didn't need that clause.
And then you come
to John chapter 21
and the only other place
in the New Testament
charcoal fire is mentioned.
And here it is.
And when they got back
to the beach,
it said Jesus had already
prepared the charcoal fire.
And you know what I think
is going on there?
I think John's trying
to bring a connection to us
and I think what he's saying
to us is Jesus was using
the charcoal fire
to say to Peter,
do you remember?
Do you remember the first time
you were asked,
are you my disciple?
And you said,
I am not.
And he's saying,
Peter,
we're back here again.
And are you my disciple?
And this time,
it is not Peter's job
to answer.
You see,
the fact of the fire,
the fact that Jesus
is sitting there,
he's prepared breakfast,
he's become the host
of the covenant meal.
And he's saying,
you said no,
but I say yes.
You said no to me,
but I overcame your no
with my yes.
And you are my disciple.
And by the power
of the cross and resurrection,
I have claimed you.
Your family,
you're loved by God.
Your weak faith
will not get you
out of my hands.
You were ashamed of me.
That's not enough
to take the gospel
away from you.
That's not enough
to take the power
of the cross away.
The first fire
announced Peter's betrayal.
The second fire
announced his belonging.
The same hearth
that witnessed Peter's rebellion
is the very hearth
by which he was restored.
That's what John's
showing us here.
The cross of Christ
turns restless rebels
!
into family!
And then it keeps us there.
And if you come today
saying,
I have not done
great things for God!
And I am not
the Christian
in terms of my life
that God has called me to be!
Jesus Christ wants you to know
as you come
and you take and eat
that His grace is sufficient
and it will never let you
get out of the hand of God.
He loves you
to the uttermost.
And that the true
and better Jonah,
He went down into the depths
so you could rise up.
And as long as you're in Him
and you are,
you will be family.
He will never let you go.
Weak faith people,
come and eat with Him today.
Let us pray.
Father,
we ask now
that you meet with us
in just a moment
as we come to dine
at your table.
You are the host.
Thank you for wanting
to have breakfast with us.
And so we see that
in this passage,
Lord,
come and eat with us.
We ask now,
Lord,
that you would come
and speak especially
to those in this room
who think,
I have years and years
and years
of nominal faith.
I've not lived for the Lord.
I've not shared my faith.
I've not changed.
Lord,
come to them
and speak your love to them
and then send us out
into our city
to be fishers of people.
And so that's our prayer today.
We ask for that
in Jesus' name.
Amen.