Hello and welcome to our broadcast. We call it plain and simple. We're in the last final message here in the book of John. Have your Bibles ready and we'll continue the broadcast in just a minute. Well, in our last broadcast we were dealing specifically with Peter. Jesus had turned the attention totally on him before everyone and had said basically, Peter, we've got some things we have to deal with. You publicly denied me. Now we are going to publicly deal with this. There's no, well, let's just pretend this didn't happen. Peter needed to deal with it. The people around him needed to know that he got his heart right, and that is what was happening here. And so we read that Jesus did get to the heart of Peter, and Peter was amazingly changed, and he was set on fire here for the Lord. Well, in verse 18 we have Peter's final commission. It says, Verily, verily, Jesus said, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdest thyself, and walkest with us wherever thou wouldest. But when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee and carry thee whither thou wouldest not." Well, that phrase, stretch forth thy hands, was a phrase that had to do with crucifixion. And Jesus went on to say that in verse 19. This spake he, signifying by what death he should glorify God. And when he had spoken this, he saith unto him, follow me. Now there it is, simply, follow me. Now salvation is free. That is not to suggest that it's cheap. It is free to us. Jesus paid the price, and it certainly wasn't a cheap price that he paid that we might have salvation. Salvation is free, but discipleship is very, very costly. Jesus said in Luke chapter 14, verse 27, And whosoever doth not bear his cross, and come after me, cannot be my disciple. Luke 14 and 33, so likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple. Well, the next question that we have here in verse 20 is Peter is asking the Lord concerning John. He sees John and he says, What shall this man do? And Jesus saith unto him, If I will that he tarry till I come, what is that to thee? Follow me. What shall this man do? What are you doing here, Peter? You're going to do this as long as you don't have to leave some friends behind? My, we have a lot of that in the world today. If you're going to stand up for Jesus Christ, you're going to lose some friends. It's just that simple. Not that Peter lost. John is a friend, but what's the lesson here and the principle is if you can't do what's right because your friends might not like it, then you cannot be my disciple. You see, you remember back in our early part in this series in the book of John that Peter had his eyes on a throne. Oh, you can't go and get yourself crucified, far be it from you. But why? Well, because I need that throne, I want that throne. Well, Jesus said at that time, get thee behind me adversary, you think too much about the things of the world and not enough about the things of God. Well, what are you going to do, Peter? Where are we going here? Well, the real world is this, not thrones, trials, tests, tribulation, torture. What's your choice, Peter? Peter said, count me in, I'm with you. And he was with him. We read in the book of Acts, in Acts chapter 1 and 15, Peter stood. We read in Acts chapter 2 and verse number 14, Peter standing. We read in Acts chapter 12 and number 16, Peter continued. He's named 58 times in the book of Acts and got to write two books in the New Testament. Well, John sums up his book here in verse number 24, and this is what he says, this is the disciple which testify of these things and wrote these things and we know that his testimony is true and there are also many other things which Jesus did the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written." Well, he talked about these things, 24, these things again in 24, and many other things that Jesus did. In verse number 31 of chapter 20, John said, but these things are written that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing ye might have life through his name." Well, as time permits here in the broadcast, I want to sum up the chapters. In chapter 1, we found that Christ is the Word, capital W on the word, Word, means he's God, he was made flesh. the Bible says, and dwelt among us. In chapter 2 we had the miracle. I think it's interesting that that miracle took place in a small town, and also we find that first miracle not only in a small town, but it's showing us the importance of marriage, Then in chapter 3, we have a religious man by the name of Nicodemus, very, very religious, but on the road to hell. The Bible says, except the man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God. Chapter 4 deals with the woman at the well, a very interesting portion of scripture. Basically, what it's telling us is that whosoever will may come. She was a wicked woman, but she got saved, went back and told everybody. what went on, and then all the men came out to meet Jesus and invited Him back into the city, and many people got saved as a result of her testimony. We got to chapter 5, and there was a cripple, been laying 38 years as a cripple. Jesus came and healed him, and the main thing that happened there was the Pharisees got upset. They did that a lot. Then in chapter 6 we have the feeding of the 5,000. There were thousands and thousands of people following Jesus because of the miracles that He was doing. They came to Him and they said, Oh, tell us what we must do that we might work the works of God. And he told them what they had to do and they all went away. He looked at his disciples and said, will you also go away? Oh no, they said, we will never go away. Jesus said, be careful about that we thing. Answer for yourself. Have not I chosen you twelve and one of you is a devil? He knew exactly who believed and who didn't believe. We get to chapter 7, and Jesus' half-brothers are trying to talk Him into going down to the feast. They say, you really ought to go to the feast. Well, they knew down there that they were trying to get Jesus and kill Him, and they would just be just as happy if they did that, because the Bible says they didn't believe in Him. They didn't want Him around. You get to chapter 8, we have that amazing story of the woman who was taken in adultery. Jesus was in the temple early in the morning. He was in the court of the women talking to some people in that particular section, and that is how it is that these Pharisees could bring this woman right in there. And they said, you know, she was caught in the very act and we think she should be stoned. And Jesus just wrote on the ground and nobody knows for sure what he wrote. But as he wrote from the oldest to the youngest, they all left. And he looked at the woman and says, where are your accusers? I have none. And so then some of the Pharisees came back. And the Bible says they took up stones to stone him. Well, in chapter 9, Jesus, Bible says, slipped out. It wasn't time for him to die yet. He would die on a cross in God's timing. But as he is slipping out, he comes out of the temple area there and he finds a man by the pool and he stops and he heals the man. And the result of that was that man got thrown out of the synagogue because he confessed that Jesus did it. Well, chapter 10 we have the discourse on the good shepherd and Jesus talks about my sheep. He said they're my sheep. We need to keep that in mind. He said my sheep hear my voice and they follow me. Chapter 11 we have the story of Lazarus and he is about to be brought back from the dead. It says Jesus wept just before that. I think he wept because of the fact that everybody was weeping and of course he had compassion. Maybe he went because he was going to have to bring Lazarus back to this sin-sick, ugly, dirty, filthy world. In any event, Lazarus came forth, and the next thing we have in chapter 12 is they're having a supper at Bethany, and they're having a supper there for the Lord. Of course, it is not in Lazarus' house, it is Simon the leper's house. But there they are having a supper, wide open for everybody to see, and the lesson there is the Lord always has a remnant. He's always going to have a few people who really don't care what anybody thinks. They love the Lord, and they're going to let everybody know it. We have a few people like that around today. There's a lot of people call themselves fundamentalists, but there's not very many in the remnant department. Well, in chapter 13, we have the Passover meal where Judas was present. Then when he was gone, it switches from a Passover meal to the First Communion service. And so some would argue, was Judas at the Passover, at the First Communion service? No, he was at the Passover, but when he was sent out, that was the end of the Passover and the Communion service was started. It was totally different. from what had gone on in the Passover. Then in chapter 14 we have that amazing story. Jesus starts out, let not your heart be troubled. You believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father's house are many mansions. I go to prepare a place for you. He is preparing them for the fact that he will be leaving and he tells them that the Holy Spirit will come. He will send the Holy Spirit. He will live within us and he does live within the Christian and give us direction. And the Bible says he will guide us into all truth. All truth is all truth. There's something wrong that we're all going a different direction. Somebody's not listening to the Holy Spirit. Well, in chapter 15 we have the vine and the branches story. Jesus talks about abiding in Christ, then he talks about loving Christians, and then he talks about the fact that we'll be hated by Christ rejecters there in John chapter 15. He said, except you abide in me, you cannot bear fruit, you can do nothing of itself. Chapter 16, the greatest lesson there is that the Holy Spirit is a person. He is not an influence, that's what He does. He is the third person of the Trinity, and we need to understand that. Chapter 17, that amazing Lord's Prayer, if there's any one spot in the entire Bible that's more holy ground than the rest of it, It certainly is that area right there. Chapter 18, we have the story in the Garden of Gethsemane, and Jesus says to his disciples, what? Could you not watch with me one hour? Not one hour, and no, they were sleeping when they should have been awake. They should have been praying, and that is why Peter got into trouble. Judas came, and we find that Judas stood with them that came to get Christ, and a little later on in the chapter, we find that Peter stood with them, warming his hands at the enemy's fire, and he ended up denying Christ and said he never knew him. Chapter 19, the trial goes on. He is crowned with thorns. We have this trial by night. It is absolute, total, complete mockery. Peter denies the Lord for the third time, and then we read that he went out and he wept. bitterly. Chapter 20 deals with the resurrection of Jesus Christ, and while all the men were hiding somewhere for fear of the Jews, the women had come to the tomb, and the tomb, the stone, had been rolled away. We said it wasn't rolled away so Jesus could get out. He's already out. It was rolled away so those who were interested could have a look and see that he wasn't there anymore. It is interesting that Jesus said to the women, particularly to Mary, go and tell the disciples and Peter that I have risen from the dead. Peter was not tossed away because of the fact that he denied Christ. Why? Because he went out and he wept bitterly and he repented of his sin. Well, then in chapter 21, I think some of the most amazing words you're going to find in the entire Bible, the Bible says there that Jesus stood on the shore. He stood on the shore. There he is talking to his disciples. He had been talking to them for 40 days after the resurrection. And while they're having a discussion, Peter's saying, I've had enough of all of this. I go fishing. And because he was so influential, the rest of the disciples said, yeah, we're going with you. And they went out and they fished and they fished all night and they caught nothing. Well, it says in the morning they looked, and there was someone standing on the shore. Now, he was 350 feet away, but he was there. He was standing on the shore, and they knew not that it was Jesus. Well, probably because it was still kind of dark, and maybe because it's 350 feet away. In any event, Jesus stood on the shore. He'd been there all night. And he's still there in the morning. What love and what grace. Jesus stood on the shore. Well, as we said earlier, Peter got his heart right. He was mightily used of God. There's hope for all of us if we would just repent when we make the mistakes and we're going to make them. Well, this sums up our series in the Book of John. Be sure to be with us again tomorrow as we begin a new series on the program we call Plain and Simple. so so