from the Lord what I also delivered to you. The Lord Jesus, on the night when he was betrayed, took bread. And when he had given thanks, he broke it and said, this is my body, which is for you. Do this in remembrance of me. In the same way, also, he took the cup after supper, saying, this cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me. For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes. This is the body of the Lord, which is given for you. This cup is the new covenant in Christ's blood shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins. And as we sing our final hymn this morning, please turn in your red hymnals again to page 642. 642 in the red, Be Thou My Vision. Be Thou my vision, O Lord of my heart, not be all else to me, save that Thou art. Thou my best thought, my day, Waking or sleeping, Thy presence my light. Be Thou my wisdom and Thou my true word. and Thou with me, Lord. Thou my great Father, I Thy true Son, Thou in me dwelling, and I with Thee one. Be Thou my battle shield, sword for my fight, ♪ Thou my dignity, Thou my delight ♪ ♪ Thou my soul's shelter, Thou my high tower ♪ ♪ Raise Thou me heavenward, O power of my power ♪ ♪ Riches I need not, nor man's empty praise ♪ Thou mine inheritance, Thou and always, Thou and Thou only, first in my heart. My King of heaven, my treasure Thou art, My King of heaven, my victory won. May I reach heaven's joys, O bright heaven's sun. Lord of my own, hard would ever befall. Still be my vision, O ruler of all. Amen. Now would you please stand for our responsive reading this morning. Our responsive reading comes on page 800. We will be reading Psalm 42. Page 800 in the red. Psalm 42. As the deer pants for streams of water, so my soul pants for you, O God. My soul thirsts for God, for the living God. My tears have been my food day and night. While men say to me all day long, where is your God? These things I remember as I pour out my soul. How I used to go with the multitude, leading the procession to the house of God, with shouts of joy and thanksgiving among the fested throng. Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? For I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God. My soul is downcast within me. Therefore, I will remember you from the land of Jordan, the heights of Hermon, and Mount Mizar. Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls. All your waves and breakers have swept over me. By day, the Lord directs His love. At night, His song is with me, a prayer to the God of my life. Why must I go about mourning, oppressed by the enemy? My bones suffer mortal agony, as my foes talk to me, saying to me all day long, where is your God? Why are you downcast, O my soul? Why so disturbed within me? Put your hope in God, for I will yet praise Him, my Savior and my God. And let us pray. Heavenly Father, Lord, you are the great God and savior of this world. You sit on your throne and you rule over everything, Lord. Father, we are thankful that your son has made his enemies his footstool. Father, I pray that even now the power of your gospel, Lord, would continue to be proclaimed throughout this world. that your kingdom would continue to conquer to the ends of this world, that you would save souls from their wretched selves, Lord, and bring them into your eternal glory. Father, I pray for Josh Hayward at Kenney Avenue Baptist Church, Lord, and Father, I pray that you, The spirit of unction, Lord, would be preached through him this morning. The spirit of power would go out into his congregation and that your gospel would continue to be proclaimed from that pulpit, Father. I pray that your gospel would continue to be proclaimed in this pulpit, Father, that you would sustain this body and that you would sustain our pastor, Greg, Lord. Father, that he would stand upon the gospel and not stand, Lord, in his own wisdom, but in the wisdom that comes from you. Father, I ask that your hand would be upon the leaders of our government. Lord, that they would rule and they would deliver justice, Lord, to the oppressed. Father, that they would rule in the righteousness of you, Father, that you would save them, Lord, save their souls, Father. Father, I pray that you would continue to be upon us all, Lord, and be with upon those who are unable to be here this morning, and Father, be with Ben Fletcher, Father. Lord, I pray that you would be with Marie Collins, that you would be with Sandra, Father, that you would be with Chuck and his migraines, Lord. I ask that you would be upon all of us, Lord, as we go about our days, that we would worship you and that you would be our vision, Lord. I pray this in your son's name, amen. You may be seated and the children may go out to Children's Church and Greg, please come preach the gospel to us. As our children go out, if you would turn with me in your copy of God's life-changing, life-giving Holy Word to the Gospel of John. Back to chapter 21 of John's Gospel. As we are wrapping up our series in John, here at the epilogue, tying up some loose ends specifically regarding the relationship between the Lord Jesus and the Apostle Peter. You'll be helped to follow along in John chapter 21. I'm gonna start reading for us at verse 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. 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." Well, it's an incredibly heartfelt passage, isn't it? This intimate conversation here between Jesus and Peter And it still has that kind of mysterious setting to it that we talked about last week. So you've got the early morning waves of the Sea of Galilee lapping on the shore, the sky is now brightening as the Dayspring rises over the water to the east. There's that charcoal fire, remember, that would have certainly reminded Peter of his denial. And right in the middle of this breakfast of broiled fish on the beach, Jesus, just kind of out of nowhere, he looks at Peter and says, Simon, do you love me more than these? Now at the macro level, just at the highest level, I think what's going on here in our passage is pretty clear and pretty easy to see. Jesus asks Peter, do you love me? Three times, and in each one of those three times corresponds, right, to one of the three times that Peter had denied Jesus. So I think it's pretty obvious what's going on here is that that Jesus here is restoring and reinstating Peter as a faithful apostle, putting him back in. He's saying, this one is not like Judas. But even if that part is clear, even if you can read that and see immediately that that's really what's happening here in our passage, I think there's still a lot of questions that this passage raises. I mean, why does Jesus follow up each affirmation of Peter's love with some variation of, shepherd my sheep? It's said in three different ways, but all the words mean the same thing. And then what's happening with this last part where Jesus says, you know, one day Peter will stretch out his arms and be led where he doesn't want to go. What does John mean when he says that that was referring to the kind of death that Peter would die? And what does he mean for that matter by saying that in his death, Peter would glorify God? Well, all of those things are questions that we're gonna talk about this morning, but in the midst of that, answering and asking all of those questions, I don't want you to miss out on the main point of all of this, because what this passage does ultimately, and most importantly, is that it tells us what lies at the very heart of what it means to be a follower of Jesus Christ. So here's the main idea. The main thing that this passage is trying to get across to us is this. The right response to being forgiven by Jesus is to love his people and to suffer for his glory." The right response to being forgiven by Jesus is to love his people and to suffer for his glory. So when Jesus pulls Peter back to his side, when he forgives him and restores him and launches him out onto this mission that was going to define his life of fishing for men in the ocean of the nations of the world, that's what he tells him. Peter, if you're going to love me, if you're going to follow me, if you're going to give your life to my service, this is what it'll mean. You must give your life to loving my people and ultimately to suffering for the glory of God." So what he tells them, in other words, is that forgiveness, true forgiveness, has legs. Forgiveness doesn't just drop with a thud into your life and then sit there. It has legs, it goes somewhere, it does something. Jesus says the way that you now live is by loving his people and ultimately accepting suffering when it comes for the glory of God. So I want to look at this passage today in just two points, considering each of those things. So first point, the right response to being forgiven by Jesus is to love his people. The second point is that the right response to being forgiven by Jesus is to suffer for His glory. So those two things, those two points, love His people, suffer for His glory. So let me tell you up front just what my hope and prayer is for all of you this morning. I pray that you'll be reminded, if you're a Christian today, that you'll be reminded of just the amazing fact that you have been forgiven of all of your sins. That is such a good thing for Christians to remember, right, to be reminded that you and I as believers in Jesus have been completely forgiven of all of our sins, past sins, present sins, the sins you committed on the way here this morning, future sins, all of your sins completely washed away by the blood of the Lamb. All accounts have been cleared. The slate is wiped clean. And in fact, it's actually filled up with Jesus's righteousness, not just clean. You've been forgiven of your sins and you have been credited all the righteousness of Jesus Christ in your place. Just like Peter, you've been embraced by Jesus again, and now that forgiveness, it's got to have legs. That's what I pray that you'll realize today. You've been forgiven, you've been pardoned, you've been redeemed, you have been set free, and that has got to have legs to it. If you're not a Christian, then I pray that maybe through studying this passage with us today that you will come to know what it actually means to be forgiven. You'll know the eternal joy that springs up from a heart that's been made clean and pure because it has been forgiven of all of its sin by Jesus. So I hope that even today that you will Look to Jesus, that you'll come to Jesus for salvation, and that you'll call yourself a Christian as you leave here today because you have turned from your sins, and you have trusted in Jesus alone to save you. So let's look at point number one together. The right response to being forgiven by Jesus is to love his people. So look down at the passage with me at verse 15. We're gonna look at this in quite a bit of detail, just looking at various phrases here. Verse 15, first notice it follows just right on the heels, of course, of verse 14. You can see that because John flags it there, when they had finished breakfast, right? So this is coming right on the heels of when they had finished eating the fish and the loaves. It's immediately after their breakfast, and right there, Jesus turns to Peter and says to him, Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these? Okay, several things to notice here. First of all, it's important, in fact, it's critical, I think, to see that apparently Jesus, he asks Peter this question right in front of all the other disciples. Do you love me more than these? Not those over there, but these right here. For those of you who are grammarians, this is the near demonstrative, not the far demonstrative, which means they're right there with him. Do you love me more than these guys right here with us? And do you see why that's important? Why is it important that he makes this such a public thing? because Peter's sin of denying his Lord was public. Peter had publicly humiliated himself by his action, and so here Jesus publicly confronts him and publicly, as it were, cauterizes that wound. I'm sure Peter, for his didn't like this very much at the time, right? I mean, nobody likes being called out, and nobody certainly likes being called out in public. He probably winced when Jesus said this. He may have even thought initially, gosh, why do we have to do this in front of everybody else? He probably would have very much preferred if Jesus had just taken him aside and done this privately. But you have to see that it's critical that the other disciples, they witness this act of Jesus reinstating Peter so that they know he has been fully restored. So even though it hurt Peter to be confronted publicly about this by the Lord Jesus, it was ultimately for Peter's good. It was an act of love on Jesus's part. Peter had sinned publicly, and that self-inflicted wound, it would need to be cauterized publicly so that all the apostles would realize that it was not just Peter trying to move past his denial, it was Jesus putting it behind him. That's why he did it. But I'm sure even the wording of Jesus's question here stung Peter in the moment. So let's think about that for a second. Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?" I mean, there's the obvious sting of just, you know, the painful reminder of the denial itself. Peter probably had the charcoal fire stinging his nostrils. He was already reminded of the courtyard of the high priest's house. and that charcoal fire where he denied the Lord. He was already in that frame of mind here, and now Jesus reminds him of it again. But it also goes deeper than that, because when Jesus, when he asks the question, he specifically calls Peter Simon. Now why does he do that? He does that because that is the name that Peter had before he encountered Jesus. He was Simon the son of John when they first met. But remember, Jesus had renamed him Peter. But here he reverts back to Peter's original name, the name he had before Jesus had changed it. And that stings, doesn't it? I'm sure it stung. It stung Peter. When Jesus called him Simon, he may not have even responded to it immediately. Who's Simon? And then he realized, oh, that was me. But you see what Jesus is doing there. He's telling, he's reminding Peter and pressing it deep into Peter's heart that his actions of denying Jesus three times, that was a relic of his past, of the man that Peter used to be before. This rash, unthinking, selfish, impulsive man. And Jesus wants him to understand more deeply and more profoundly that he's not that man anymore. He wants him to understand that, and he wants him to not want to be that man anymore. And so he calls him by this former name with the intent of making it sting so that Peter will never want to be that man again. Brothers and sisters, I wonder if there's anything like that in you as a Christian. But is there any of the old you, any of the old actions, the old way of thinking that really by rights are just relics of the old you and that are just kind of sticking around and holding on to you in your Christian life? And what do you think about those? Do you want those to be there? Do you not want them to be there? Do you just kind of not care? But by the time Jesus was finished with Peter, he didn't want to be Simon anymore. He never refers to himself as Simon. He refers to himself as Peter in his letters, embracing his identity as a Christian. I am Peter, the name that Jesus gave to me, the rock, right? I'm not going to be that old man anymore. Do you have that desire? when it comes to your past that still shows itself from time to time in your life, well then, brother, sister, pray. Pray that God would not just remove those things, not just take those things away, but pray that He would cause your heart to want them to be taken away. It's actually far more important that you want that to actually happen. Pray that the Lord would do that in your heart by increasing your affection for the Lord and for his people. Notice too here that Jesus asks Peter specifically, not just, Peter, do you love me? Or Simon, do you love me? At least not in the first instance. He simplifies the question in the second too. But in the first one, he says more specifically, Do you love me more than these?" Okay, what does that mean? People have actually interpreted that in various ways over the centuries. So some have said that what he's asking amounts to something like, do you love me, Simon, more than you love these other disciples? But if you think about that, I mean, Peter's great love for the disciples, if that's even a thing, it just never really shows up as a theme in John's gospel at all. It'd be a really strange thing to bring it here at the very end in the epilogue of the book. So I don't think he's saying, do you, Simon, love me more than you love these other guys? Others have suggested a little more far-fetched, I think, a far-fetched interpretation that maybe Jesus, like, pointed to the fishing gear when he said this, to the boat over there and the nets, and he said, do you love me, Peter, more than these things over here? Do you love me more? More than your career, more than your old life as a fisherman. But the story just doesn't seem to suggest that. Well, what makes the most sense is probably what all of you thought anyway, and most of you were thinking when you read it the first time, and that is that Jesus is asking, do you, Simon, love me more than these other men love me? That's what he's asking. Now, what kind of answer is Jesus expecting there? Is he challenging, is he saying, Peter, you're the leader, you're the big man here, you should love me more than all these other guys here with us. Is that what he's doing? No, I don't think so. I think he's asking the question for an entirely different reason. And I think that the reason that he's asking that question, Simon, do you love me more than these others love me? because Peter, before his denial, his thrice denial of Jesus, Peter had insisted that he did love Jesus more, right, over and over and over again. He insisted that he loved Jesus more than they did. So back in chapter 13, remember when Jesus was in that upper room with all of his disciples? He was telling them about how he was about to be crucified, and the others were kind of growing quiet in the realization that Jesus was going to die. Peter leaned over the table and said, Lord, why can't I go with you? to the cross. Why can't I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you. It's not, Lord, we will lay down our lives for you. It is, I will lay down my life for you, Lord. And remember what happens next. Jesus tells them, he quotes Zechariah, the shepherd will be struck, the sheep will be scattered. He says, all of you are going to fall away. You're all going to abandon me. And remember what Peter does. Peter jumps in and says, even if all of them fall away, not me, I will never fall away. So you see the point. The point is that Jesus, what he's getting at when he asks that question, Peter was deeply confident in his own love for Jesus. deeply confident in his determination and his ability to stay by Jesus' side even unto death. Even if all the rest of them fell away, he was so confident right up to the moment that he crumbled. And so Jesus just goes right at it here. He looks him in the eye right across that charcoal fire and he says, Simon, do you love me more than these now? It's an amazing moment, isn't it? Because even in the midst of restoring him, right, even in the midst of reinstating him as a faithful apostle, Jesus reminds Peter of his sin. He reminds him of his former self-confidence, his arrogance. And when Peter says, Simon, do you love me more than these others love me? Peter's not willing to say that anymore. He's done with the Even if everyone else abandons you, Lord, I will lay down my life for you. I will never forsake you. My loyalty is so strong." He knows his failings now. He knows his weaknesses. He knows his sin. So he does not look Jesus in the eye anymore and say to him, yes, Lord, I love you more than all of these do. And I will lay down my life for you and never forsake you. He's been humbled. And so all he can say is, yes, Lord, you know. You know that I love you. He didn't say, yes, Lord, you know I love you way more than these other guys. He just says, Lord, you know. that I love you." This is a much humbled Peter, isn't it? This is a Peter who has seen his sin. It's a chastened Peter, but it's a stronger Peter because of that. This is a Peter who is not leaning on his own strength anymore. He's not leaning on his own comparison of himself with his brothers. You know, one of the greatest marks, really, of Christian maturity, is that you come to a point of giving up on comparing yourself to other Christians. You despair of the absolutely hopeless game of trying to love Jesus more than other people, or serve Jesus more than other people, and you just learn to rest on the only thing that matters. I do love you, Lord. You know. You know I love you. If you've come to that point in your Christian life, then you know just how wonderfully freeing it is to be there. But if your heart today, if it's still striving to be better than others, to love Jesus more than others, to serve him more than others, pray that the Lord would teach you this lesson that Peter had learned. It's a simple lesson, but it is a deep one. Pray that the Lord would quiet your heart and bring you to a place where you can be content with a simple, yes, Lord, you know. You know that I love you. Do I love you more than all of these others? I have no idea. It doesn't even matter. I love you, and you know that. Well, the next few verses, Jesus, he goes on and he asks Peter that same question two more times in slightly different language. It doesn't have the more than these anymore, that's been dealt with. But he says, Simon, son of John, do you love me? Two more times, and Peter answers two more times, Lord, you know that I do. Verse 17, he's even grieving. When Jesus asks the third time, you see that? He said during the third time, Simon, son of John, do you love me? Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time. What's going on there? Why is Peter grieved? I think there's a way that you can read that verse and you can say, well, he's just kind of irritated as though he's like, you know, I've already answered the question. Are you seriously asking me a third time? I don't think that's what's going on here. I think it's rather that Peter was not entirely clear on what was going on, on specifically how Jesus was lining these three confessions that he's eliciting from Peter, how he's lining those with the three denials until he asks the third time. And when he did that, It all clicked for Peter. It just all clicked. He's asking me to fill in the holes of my sin by denying him. I did that three times, and now he's giving me the opportunity to publicly affirm that I love him. Instead of deny him, I love him. And so Peter finally realized what was happening with the three times he gets to affirm his love for his Lord. what he was grieving. His sin was just laid there. And so he grieved his sin. He repented, in other words. And look at how Jesus responds each time to Peter. Each time it's three different times, verse 15 and 16 and 17. Jesus says some variation of the phrase, the sentence, the command, feed my sheep. Now there are several different words that Jesus uses in that formulation. People have often tried to make a big deal out of the word changes here. You've got feed, you've got tend, which is just the word for shepherd. You've got lambs, you've got sheep. Some people try to make a big deal out of those. But the thing is, you can't really do that because John, characteristically, he loves to use synonyms in his writing. It's just a stylistic thing for John. And as you read John, you'll notice all the time he just swaps out synonyms. He does the same thing to describe words that will just communicate the same thing but make the writing a little more interesting. And that's the case here too. He doesn't mean some profound difference between feeding and tending, or between sheep and lambs. He doesn't mean a profound difference there. And he also doesn't mean any profound difference between the two words that he uses here for love. He uses two different Greek words, agapao and phileo. And people have made a huge deal about that, but John uses agapao and phileo all the time interchangeably in his gospel. I mean, even when he says that the Father, God the Father loves the Son, God the Son, sometimes it's agapao, other times it's phileo. There's no difference whatsoever. in meaning, just overlapping words, synonymous. And I should point out here that 10 years ago, almost to the day, 10 years ago in May, our founding pastor Jackson was preaching this passage in John's funny, when I joined, he had already been in John for a couple years. And then in 2005, he was still in John and was preaching on this passage. He tried to make the argument against D.A. Carson that the word phileo and agapayo have very different meanings, and they're intentionally being used to say, well, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you at least kind of like me as a friend, is the way you may have heard it preached. That's the way Jackson. preached it. And he knew the arguments about stylistic variation. Here was his argument, which I think will just help you hermeneutically to understand how we study and understand and read the Gospels. His argument was, yeah, stylistic variation, that's a literary thing, but this isn't literary. These are the words of Jesus that are being communicated. That was his argument. Now, the reason I disagree with that and why I think that that's wrong is because this is literary. One mistake we can make when we come to the Gospels is to read the quotations put in Jesus's mouth as if they are transcripts of the video, right? And that's not the genre. The Gospel genre is theological historiography. It's not a transcript. In fact, Jesus didn't speak in Greek. He would have been speaking in Aramaic. So these aren't his exact words. The Chicago Statement on Inerrancy is really helpful in distinguishing between what theologians called ips, ipsum of vox versus ips, ipsum of verba, which means the exact very words of Jesus are the exact voice of Jesus. This is true to his teachings, true to his saying, but we don't have word for word for word exactly what he said. The authors, Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, they have license as writers to do this sort of stylistic variation, which is why we see things like Matthew and Luke have Jesus talking about the kingdom of God all the time, telling parables about the kingdom of God. You go to Matthew, exact same place, exact same moment, out of Jesus's mouth comes what? Not kingdom of God, kingdom of heaven, right? Matthew, he's free to do that. So we shouldn't be uncomfortable with that. So anyway, that's just genocide, how to read the Gospels. These are just synonyms overlapping. So Jesus's response to Peter is, okay, if it's true that you love me, then Peter, shepherd my sheep. Now, I don't know if it strikes you this way, but honestly, I think that that is kind of a surprising word from Jesus, because what I would have expected, if I didn't know this story, right, somebody asked me to guess what Jesus was gonna say next, what I would have expected would be something more like, okay, great, since you love me, now go tell the nations all about me. Go preach the gospel to the ends of the earth. All authority has been given to me. Now go, baptize them in the name of the Father and the Son. and the Holy Spirit. That's what I would have expected. But Jesus, he's already made that point in the previous passage, as we talked about last week. Here he turns to the other part of Peter's calling, to shepherd the flock of God as a leader in his church, particularly by teaching, or what Jesus here, by metaphor, calls feeding the sheep, tending the lambs. Now, this is not some unique calling for Peter. The Roman Catholic Church takes it that way. This is, you know, Jesus establishing Peter as the Pope. That's not what's going on, right? Feeding the sheep, it turns out, in the rest of the New Testament, is the task given to literally everyone who is set aside as leaders of the Church. So, for example, Paul The Apostle Paul, he's going to tell the elders in the church in Ephesus, shepherd the flock of God. Same word as tend here. And Peter himself probably remembering this episode in 1 Peter 5, he's going to say to all the elders in the local churches, shepherd the flock of God among you. Exact same word. So this isn't something unique to Peter. Jesus is just reinstating him into the leadership of the church, into the the apostolic band. And the reason that nobody else gets this kind of special treatment from Jesus is not because Peter's the pope, it's because nobody else had fallen quite like Peter had with his three denials. He doesn't get this special treatment because he's especially good, he gets it because he's especially bad. And Jesus reinstates him. I think it's worth thinking for a minute, too, about exactly what Jesus is telling Peter, and by extension, all elders in all of the local churches, what he's saying is that the main and most important role of shepherds, pastors, elders in the church is to teach the word of God, to nourish the flock with the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ so that they grow by it and are equipped by it for every good work. Above all things, that's the charge and the task of being a pastor, to feed the people of Jesus the living and active, life-transforming Word of God by which we mature and grow. That's why we organize our local church the way we do. This is why we center the public service of worship here on these Lord's Day mornings, here at Dayspring. like this one that we're in now, we center it, right, on the whole thing around being fed from the Lord's Supper and being fed through the preaching of the Word of God. So that's the right response to being forgiven by Jesus. It's to love and care for, feed his sheep, shepherd his people. Second point, Second point, the right response to being forgiven by Jesus is to suffer for his glory, to suffer for his glory. And that's the point of verses 18 and 19 here. So look down at those with me. After Jesus gives the last command in 17, feed my sheep for the third time, he says, truly, truly, I say to you, Peter, 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 Peter was going to glorify God. And after saying this, he said to him, follow me. So why does Jesus say that? He's made his point, right? He says, Peter, if you love me, if you're you know, if you actually love me here, then feed my sheep. He's made that point. So why does he say this now about Peter first being young and being able to go wherever he wanted to go, and then being old and having to stretch out his arms and being led where he doesn't want to go? I mean, is that just a bare prediction? Like, is Jesus just going into genie mode now and saying, I have something to tell you about your future. I don't think so. I don't think this is just a bare prediction. It actually follows logically from this task that Jesus has now given Peter of feeding the flock, teaching the flock. It's connected. Because what's going to happen, and Jesus knows it, what's going to happen is that as Peter feeds the flock and speaks the truth about Jesus, as he proclaims the lordship of the resurrected Christ in a fallen world, he's inevitably going to draw opposition. And Jesus knows that. So some people have suggested that Jesus is kind of using a common proverb about the difference between being young and being old, so when you're young, you get to dress yourself and go where you want to go. When you're old, somebody else has to dress you and take you where you don't necessarily want to go. People have said that this is just an ancient proverb that was used all the time. And Jesus is telling it to Peter, that that's what's going to happen to him as he grows old. But there's actually no evidence of a saying like that ever existing. I mean, it kind of sounds like there should be a proverb like that. But there's no evidence that that kind of saying ever existed. And even that sort of thing doesn't explain that you will stretch out your hands when you're old, does it? I mean, what is it about just being old that would say you're going to stretch out your hands? So it's not that. And besides, John tells us in that parenthetical statement exactly what it means. It indicates what kind of death Peter is going to die. On top of that, everybody knew that stretching out your hands was a picture of crucifixion. The Bible doesn't actually tell us how Peter died, but the tradition is pretty solid that he was ultimately crucified, probably in Rome, and he was certainly crucified and dead by the time John wrote this book. There's some later traditions in Christian history you may have heard that Peter asked to be crucified upside down because he thought he was unworthy to die as Jesus had died. But really, that tradition's way too late to be very reliable. Probably we shouldn't put a whole lot of stock or weight on that story. Well, notice that last verse, verse 19. This he said to show by what kind of death he was going to glorify God. And after saying this, he said to him, me. Follow me. There's probably several layers of meaning to that. I mean, on the one hand, it just looks like Jesus is just inviting Peter to, you know, go join him on a walk down the beach, right? By the time you get to verse 20, that's exactly what seems to be happening. Peter turned, he saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them, so now they're going somewhere, right? So follow me, just come on, follow me. And they head off down the beach. But I think there's a deeper meaning to it, too, or else John wouldn't have put it in his book. It's got this, this deeper meaning of a call from Jesus to Peter to follow him in the sense of obeying him, being his disciple, serving Jesus all the years of his life. Just at the beginning of the gospel when he called his disciples and said, follow me, but here it has even more weight to it, because this is the now-crucified risen Jesus saying, follow me. So this means that following him could even lead to his death. It's as if Jesus is saying, I'm telling you right now that as you feed my sheep, as you tend my lands, it's going to lead to such opposition that they will ultimately crucify you and stretch out your hands. Nevertheless, take up your cross, follow me." It's amazing to think about, isn't it? I think it's incredible to think about that Peter knew beforehand. He knew what his following after Jesus was going to entail, where it was going to lead him to. It was going to lead him to an excruciating, torturous death on a cross, on a Roman cross. And yet, he followed Jesus anyway. Why did he do that? I mean, how did he do that, knowing that this was how it would all end? And yet, for 30 years, he followed Jesus anyway. Would you do that? I mean, would you do that if you got an email from heaven They just said, you know, dear so-and-so, if you follow Jesus, what's going to happen to you years from now, if you follow Jesus, is that you're going to be crucified in the most excruciating way possible. That's the result of your following Jesus. My guess is that many of us would have a second thought about it. write back an email that says, is there any way that I can avoid that part? Well, Jesus tells Peter that this is how it's going to end if you follow me, and Peter just followed. How did he do it? What was it that was so deep down in his heart that even knowing that that threat of crucifixion awaited him at the end did not deter him from going down that path and following Jesus. I think it's two things that you can sort of see in this passage even. First, Peter followed Jesus even unto suffering and death because he knew the glories of having been forgiven. He followed Jesus even to death because he knew the glories of having been forgiven. He knew the pain and the shame of that sin of denying Jesus. And he also knew the joy of having that pain and that shame lifted off of him. That forgiveness, that eternal, unbreakable joy of having a cleansed heart drove him to follow Jesus all the way to the cross. But secondly, Peter also knew that his suffering was ultimately going to glorify God. He knew that his suffering was ultimately going to glorify God. So you look at verse 19 there. By the time this book was written, Peter was already dead. But John says that little phrase there, he said this to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. It doesn't just say to show by what kind of death he was going to die. It's by what kind of death he was going to glorify God. There's a very tight, logical connection between the suffering of Christ's people and the glory of God. It's because when you suffer as a Christian, whether it's just insults or even death, whatever it is, when you endure all of those things for the sake and the name of Jesus, you know what you're saying to the universe? What you're saying to the universe is this. What Jesus has done for me, who Jesus is, is worth more to me than my very life. than my comfort, than anything. Jesus is worth it. It's worth more to me than my honor. It's worth more to me than my job. It's worth more to me than all of my relationships. It's worth more to me than my health. I will lay everything else down if I can only hold on to Jesus. And so I suffer everything that the world has to throw at me if only I can have Jesus. Look, I don't know how much any of you as individuals will be called to suffer in the name of Jesus, but I do know what's required of you as a child of the King. It's to stand firm in knowing that even that suffering, whatever is coming, the insults, the reviling, the loss of your job, scoffing of professors or your friends or your neighbors. It is all for Jesus's glory. Hold tight to him. We're not there yet, but we're on our way home. So hold tight to him. After the cross comes the glory, even when the going gets tough. Let's pray. Our Lord Jesus, we praise you and we honor you today as the great shepherd of the sheep, the great head of the church, the great king of your people. And we thank you, Lord, that you care for your people so much, that you gave elders and teachers and pastors and shepherds to lead and to teach and to feed. Our Heavenly Father, we pray for ourselves as a church that you would bless us always with good, loving, and gentle leadership, with godly elders and pastors and shepherds. And Lord, we pray that in all of that, that we would honor and glorify Jesus Christ, even in our suffering. We ask all of this in his name and always to his glory. Amen. Well, please stand together. Be sure to take a moment to greet one another. And remember that a week from today, it is the fifth Sunday. And so we will be having a fellowship meal in the fellowship hall right after our worship service next week. You're all invited. Invite your neighbors and friends. It'll be a great feast and a great time of fellowship together. And now may the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the fellowship of His Holy Spirit be with you all. Amen.