Message by Pastor John Culp :  September 7, 2008

“Rocky – Part 13”

Text – John 21:15-19

     I met a man, many years ago, who really made a difference in my life.

     That doesn’t happen too often.  You might well live out all your days without ever encountering someone who truly changes you – who makes a difference in the way you view everything.  But this one did just that for me.  In fact, this man changed me forever.  His name was Jesus.

     I was at work when I met Him.  I worked in those days as a fisherman on the Sea of Galilee.  Jesus did several very strange things that day we met.  My name was Simon, son of John.  But Jesus changed my name.  He said that I was to be called Cephas, in my native tongue (John 1:42).  The Greeks would say Petros, Peter.  You might call me ‘Rocky.’

     But that was not the only unusual thing Jesus did that day.  He called us – my brother Andrew and me, and our fishing partners, two other brothers, James and John – He called us to leave behind our whole lives – for what, we certainly knew not.  Now Jesus had a way with words, a way like no other.  He was forever painting the most marvelous pictures with them, pictures which we understood sometimes, and sometimes not.  I remember so well what He said to us that day.  It was a word picture which we surely could not fathom at the time.  He said He would make us to become ‘fishers of men (Mark 1:17).’

     A lot happened from that day on.  We saw many amazing things.  We grew much.  We learned much.  We began to realize how far we had to go still.  Between that first day and the story I just read to you, however, something big had happened – something so big that I thought it would mean that our friendship was over. 

     But I stand here today to tell you that

Jesus always related to me on the basis of love,

and He wants to do the same in your life.

     What had happened in those days threatened to make me forget that life-giving truth.  You probably know what I’m talking about.  They had come and taken Him away.  After a mockery of a trial, they had tortured Him and then hung Him up on a cross to die.

     I had a part in all that.  I had boasted that I would always stand up for Jesus, that I would stand with Him – even if I had to die with Him.  But when the time came, I had not.  It had not been any priest who had questioned me, no soldier who had threatened me.  It was a lowly servant girl before whom I had denied Him!  I fled from the scene and wept.  I could do nothing else.  I wanted to die. 

     But what happened three days later was even more astounding than that had been horrific.  Jesus was dead in the tomb.  But then the almighty Father made Him alive again.  I saw Him!

     I saw Him that morning on the shore.  And He asked me that penetrating question: “Do you love Me more than these?” (John 21:15)  Now I told you that the Master was a  master with words.  He used them the way I once used a net, the way He had used a hammer and chisel when He had been a carpenter.  Sometimes He used words the way a soldier uses a sword.  What did He mean?  Was He asking if I loved Him more than any of the other disciples loved Him?  Or: Did I love Him more than I loved that life to which I was thinking of returning?  The nets; the boats; the secure living I knew I could earn for myself and my family?  Maybe He wanted to confront me with both meanings.  In any case, that was clearly the most important question of all: Did I love Him?

     Three times I had denied Him.  To drive His point home, three times He asked that burning question.  He knew that I loved Him.  Now I knew it as well.  And I knew then that I would never go back to my old life.

     He would put that very same question to you.  You can fear God as a King.  You can obey Him as your Lawgiver.  But you can do both with closed fists and clenched teeth.  Love Christ, and you will fear and obey Him precisely as He longs for you to do both.

     So He asks you today: Do you love Me more than these?  Whom – or what – do you love more?    

     But of course, when I insisted – not once; not twice, but three times – when I insisted that I loved Him, He did not respond as I might have expected.  He showed me what that love would look like.  Three times He had asked the question.  Three times I had declared my love.  Three times He gave me that command: Feed My sheep (John 21:15-17).

     I am a fisherman.  What do I know from sheep?!  Yet I knew at once what He meant.  None of you looks like a shepherd either!  But I suspect you understand as well.  In your language you have a wonderful expression: Talk is cheap.  If you say you love Jesus, does your life look like it?  The shepherd cares about the sheep.  He provides for their needs.  He makes sacrifices for them.  Do you relate to people like that?

     ‘Fishers of men’ – now that speaks in my language!  The very best way of all to feed sheep is to be just such a fisherman, to point them to Jesus, the one who alone can give them the Bread of Life.

     But Jesus didn’t just ask me that probing question.  He didn’t merely give that glorious commission.  He told me what lay ahead for me: how I would glorify God.  He said that one day I would stretch out my hands, and that others would take me where I did not want to go.  And in His perfect time, I would do just that.

     What will look like in your life, to take up your cross, and follow your crucified Savior?  I know not.  But this I do know: That is exactly what He calls you to do.  That is what He calls all who would follow Him to do.

     True as all that is, though, none of it was what struck me most that morning on the shore.

     You know, it takes a lot of work to catch enough fish to earn a living.  You have to clean the nets.  You have to repair the nets.  You have to maintain your boat.  You have to find a buyer for any fish you do catch – and all that is before you ever even put an oar to water.  Once you are actually under way, you must navigate through calm and storm.  You have to do the backbreaking work of reeling the nets out and reeling them in.  You have to deal with the frequent frustration of nights when you catch nothing.

     But then there are those glorious times when the Lord smiles on your labors, and the bountiful catch makes it all seem well worth your effort.

     For me the ‘catch’ at the end of our conversation on the beach that day was this: He forgave me!  He never said those exact words.  But I knew of a certainty.  I could tell it from the way He spoke my name; from the tone in His voice as He asked me that momentous question.  I could tell it especially from the kingdom work He gave me to do, the task of feeding His precious sheep.

     King David himself wrote that God is compassionate and gracious; slow to anger and abounding in love and faithfulness (Psalm 86:15).  The Master showed Himself to be all that toward me that morning.  And He will do the same for you.

     You may fear that God could not possibly forgive you.  But I promise you: Nothing you could ever do is worse than what I did to Him.  Nothing you could ever be is worse than what I was.  I promise you, if you trust in Him alone as your Savior, He will forgive you.  And He will bid you to ask yourself, in every circumstance of life: Do you love Him?  He will tell you every day to feed His sheep.

     There had been that time, not terribly long before this, when I had put together those two words which no real disciple can utter in the same breath.

     We were at Caesarea Philippi.  I had just pleased my Master by telling Him that I knew He was the Christ, the Son of the living God.  But then Jesus began to say some hard things.  He told us that He was even then headed toward Jerusalem, where He would be rejected by the leaders of our people – the religious leaders.  He would suffer terribly at their hands, and ultimately be killed by them, and then be raised up again on the third day.

     None of us wanted to hear any of that.  So I said those two simple words that together make one either a fool – or else a liar: “No, Lord” (Matthew 16:22). 

     I was not lying!  But fool I surely was.  If He truly is your Lord, you cannot say ‘No’ to Him.  And if you do say ‘No,’ can He really be your Lord?

     How very fitting that you are about to pray for those the Master has called to the ministry of helping others grow to know Him better.  Christ commissioned me that day on the beach so long ago.  He Himself today commissions those who have heard His call to become fishers of men, who have answered His call to feed His sheep.

     How very fitting that you come today to the table He has spread.  He fed my brothers and me on the shore that morning.  He longs to feed you this morning.  He knows full well that there have been those times when, like me, you have failed the test, those times when you have not loved Him, have not fed His sheep.  Those times when – just like me – you have been foolish or rebellious enough to say: ‘No, Lord.’

     He spreads this table to remind you, in the most powerful way, that He died to forgive you for all those times.  He wants to be here for you the very Bread of Life, the food that alone can empower you to love more perfectly; even to be more perfect.

     Come to His table, knowing that here you will meet your risen Savior Himself.

     Let us pray.  Thank You, precious Lord, for putting that most difficult of questions to each of us, to all who would be Your followers – for asking us each if we truly love You.  Thank You for the miracle that You forgive us for all the times we fail the test of love, the many times we fail You.  By the power of the Spirit You have promised, please help each of us to answer Your call to live as Your forgiven people, to show our love for You by loving each other, by feeding Your sheep.  Please give us the grace to answer each day that call by which You change our lives: “Follow Me.”  Please help us to live, just as we now pray, in Your great name.    Amen.