Our Struggle to Say “Any Thing”

Sermon Transcript

Well, there are certain days of our childhood we never forget. One of mine was my first day of junior high. It’s awkward enough being a 12-year-old, but then to enter the big jungle of your junior high school, that was a traumatic experience just in itself. But my first day was that and then some.

I had normally, of course, as most kids growing up in Long Beach, had walked to school, ride my bike to school. But the first day of school, it was my mom’s pattern and tradition to drive us to school. That was our treat, I suppose. So, of course, after being properly decked out in my new school clothes, off I went as a new seventh grader to my junior high and was filled with trepidation, approached the buildings there at the corner of the school.

Of course, you want your mom to drop you off far from the front of the school, but she got closer than I was comfortable with. But nevertheless, took my deep breath, had my lunch sack in one hand, had my notebooks in the other, and I stepped out of the car right into a puddle of standing water. Not like a normal puddle, but the kind of puddle that perpetually sits in the corner of an intersection that’s like three inches deep and has like at the bottom a half an inch of green algae growing on the bottom.

That was my first step. My second step, I basically launched myself literally with all my notebooks and lunch flying in different directions, face down, perfect belly flop right in the standing water at the corner of the intersection in front of the school. I got up looking like the creature from the Black Lagoon. You young people Google that. You’ll see the image of that.

And you know how compassionate and understanding junior high students are, right? They all rushed over to see if they could help. No. They jeered. It was one of those moments that will live on in your memory. They jeered and they laughed and they mocked and they pointed. It was unbelievably embarrassing.

So of course, I quickly scurried up onto my feet, grabbed whatever I could find there that I had strewn about the corner. And I crawled into my mom’s car and I said, take me home now. I’m skipping junior high school. I was done. I could not imagine going back.

Well, my mom, of course, was compassionate and gracious. She took me home, gave me a chance to put on some dry clothes, get a new sack lunch, and then she said, son, you’re going back to school. Imagine my heart at that point, you know, of going, I don’t know, I vaguely remember a stop, maybe at the donut shop to help coax me back to start my junior high career that day.

But that story I thought of when I was reading through John 21 here, because it is the story of John 21. It feels a lot like the story of John 21, where we meet Peter at the donut shop, if you will, with Christ. After falling flat on his face in Caiaphas’s courtyard, denying Jesus three times, you remember that story. He is now, after the crucifixion, after the resurrection, Jesus makes a, in the book of John, the third appearance in the post-resurrection ministry of Christ, shows up while Peter is out not preaching, not leading the disciples, but fishing his old career.

Pick it up with me, if you would, in John 21, verse number 15, as Jesus talks to the demoralized Peter about what in the world he’s doing.

Verse 15, they had finished breakfast. Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” And he said, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” And he said, “Feed my lambs.” He said a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” And he said to him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” And he said, “Tend my sheep.” And he said to him a third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved because he had said a third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you.” And Jesus said, “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.”

John adds this, he said, to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. And after saying this, he said, “Follow me.”

Whether you recognize it or not, with a quick read through of those verses, this is a battle of the wills between Jesus, the Lord of life, saying to Peter, who he had chosen to be the quarterback of the early church, a rock, if you will, in which he was going to begin this movement of concentric circles in the book of Acts. And he says, you’ve got to get to work here. “Feed my lambs,” verse 15. “Tend my sheep,” verse 16. “Feed my sheep,” verse 17. You’ve got a job to do, and it’s not fishing. The job is for you to get off of this fishing thing and get back into the pulpit. I’ve got a job for you to do, and it’s not this.

Peter, of course, is struggling with all of that, and for, you know, understandable reasons. Battle of the wills. Interesting, as you look through this text, the way Jesus asks the question and the way that Peter answers it, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Verse 16, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Verse 17, “Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you.” He uses the word to address Christ, not by his name, but by his title, the word “Lord.”

It’s almost ironic, revealing the disparity between the reluctant preacher, the would-be fisherman, and the Lord. We previewed it, and we’ll get to it eventually here in Luke 6. But in verse 46, a good memory verse for us all, Jesus asks the question, “Why do you call me ‘Lord, Lord’” — not “do what I say”?

It’s ironic that Peter is having a showdown with Christ about his future, and he’s calling him Lord, and yet he’s really not all that excited to do what he says.

Number one in your outline, when it comes to your little battle of the wills, with the will of God for your life, you need to, number one, you need to rethink the lordship of Christ. That’s a good place to start. Well, we call him Lord. I get that. But we need to really see the disparity between who we are and who he is.

I mean, let’s think about this. The resurrected Christ. If there’s ever a position that has been established by the behavior of Jesus that you are in charge of all life, it would be after you’re crucified and rise from the dead three days later. If anyone has the right to tell me what to do with my life, it should be the Lord, the resurrected Lord of life.

And I know the exchange may not be as tangible as this one, but we all struggle at times in our life with the will of God. It’s not just at the outset of the Christian life. It may be like Peter after years of walking with Christ. There’s that fork in the road, and you know what Christ wants of you, and you’re struggling to do it.

You know, even if I did say to my mom, hey, I’m done with junior high. I mean, this was before homeschool was, you know, a thing. I was figuring out in my head how to do it, right? I can pass junior high. There’s no way. I’m dealing with my parents. I told you my dad was a cop. My mom eventually worked for the L.A. Bar Association adjudicating legal disputes. Cop, judge, law and order. You’ve ever seen the show, right? You talk about losing an argument before it starts.

You’re a seventh grader, man. I don’t care what your plans are for your future here for seventh and eighth grade. We are in charge of your life. We’re going to tell you you’re going to seventh grade. I mean, there’s no argument. I may feel like battling with my parents over my junior high career, but I’d better figure out real quick it’s not even worth arguing about.

And at some point, you’ve got to get yourself in perspective when you’re dealing with the will of God in your life. I know there are things you don’t want to do. I understand there are things that are scary. I’m understanding sometimes in your life there are understandable reasons for you to balk at the will of God. But it’s time for us to recognize that we really have no right to say to God, I don’t want to do it.

We dealt with this in paradigm in Jeremiah chapter 1 in our reading. Might be worth looking at afresh. I know we just read it. Hopefully you’re reading the daily Bible reading with us. If not, you can catch up with us. We’ve just started the book of Jeremiah. Yesterday we read this in Jeremiah chapter 1. Not a hard book to find. It’d be good for you to turn there and just refresh your memory on this scene where Jeremiah is reluctant to do the will of God. And he’s got understandable reasons for not wanting to be a prophet in Judah.

It’s not a real good time to be a preacher in the southern kingdom of Israel. And certainly he doesn’t seem to be the best qualified candidate. He’s just a teenager. And God says, well, I’ve chosen you for this. Look how he puts it. You want to talk about who you’re arguing with in your heart when you’re reluctant to do the will of God. Here’s a great paradigm for you.

Jeremiah 1:4. “Now the word of the LORD came to me, saying, ‘Before I formed you in the womb, I knew you.’” Now that puts things in perspective. You want to talk about dad? You want to talk about authority? You want to talk about the fact that he gave you life? “I constructed you. Before you were born,” middle of verse 5, “I consecrated you.” That’s kind of a church word, but you understand what that means. To be consecrated means to be set apart. I put you in my mind, in the decrees of heaven, in this box, this category. I’ve got a job for you to do. I’ve got a plan for you. And to be specific, “I appointed you” — this is before he was born — “to be a prophet to the nations.”

Do you think Jesus could say the same thing about Peter? Absolutely. You’re not supposed to be a fisherman right now in this season of your life. You’re supposed to be a preacher. This was planned out long ago, and so it is for your life.

“Then I said,” he speaks autobiographically about this exchange, and says, “Ah, Lord GOD! Behold, I do not know how to speak, for I am only a youth.” I’m not cut out for this. I’ve got reasons that you should pick someone else, for I’m only a youth. I mean, I don’t know, young, early 20s, and teenage, whatever. He’s a young guy. He’s not going to stand before leaders of the nation and address them authoritatively as a prophet.

The Lord doesn’t like our excuses, whatever they are. And to Jeremiah, he says in verse 7, “Do not say, ‘I am only a youth’; for to all to whom I send you, you shall go.” You’re going to be obedient here. You’re going to lose this battle. It’s like you’re going to the seventh grade. Don’t argue with me. “And whatever I command you, you shall speak. Do not be afraid of them, for I am with you to deliver you,” I’ll get you through this.

“And the LORD put out his hand and touched my mouth” in this vision, this scene that he’s having with God. “And the LORD said, ‘Behold, I have put my words in your mouth. See, I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms, to pluck up, break down, to destroy, to overthrow, to build, and to plant.’ I’ve got a job for you to do, and you’d better get at it. Stop being reluctant about my will for your life.”

I love it down in verse 17. He says, now get up, get dressed, get ready, get to work. We’ve got a job to do. I mean, that’s what’s being said here in John 21. And I think we need to quickly apply this to our own lives and recognize that God has designed you, he’s made you, he’s consecrated and appointed you to do something in this world. And whatever that is, no matter how scary that might be, no matter how reluctant you may be, whether you think it’s a step up that’s too high or a step down that you’re not willing to take, don’t argue with the Lord. Rethink the fact that you’re talking to the Lord of life.

Sometimes we lose track of who that is. I think of next door in the book in front of this in Isaiah chapter 6. You don’t need to turn there, but you remember the scene in chapter 6 where it ends with Isaiah saying, “Here am I! Send me.” Remember that famous line from Isaiah? It starts with a vision of an exalted God. It’s almost like he’s saying to Isaiah, remember who I am. The train of the robe filling the temple, the smoke, the seraphims, the burning ones. That’s what it means. The angels that are like fire going around saying, “Holy, holy, holy is the LORD God of hosts.” And then the question, seeming strange out of this majestic scene, “Who are we going to send? Who’s going to go for us? Who will do our will here?” “Here I am. Send me.”

That’s what God wants you to say. That’s the beginning of what it means to be a Christian. Really, it’s to say, whatever you want, you’re the Lord. As I say often, he’s not signing up to be the co-pilot in your life. He’s here to take charge. He’s got a plan for you. He wants you to be a disciple, a follower. He wants you to say yes to what he has for your life.

Well, I suppose the question is for everyone who hears a call by a pastor to follow the direction of God in your life. How do I get that? How do I know what that is? It’d be great if I could have breakfast with Jesus and he could tell me what I’m supposed to do, but it seems pretty hard to decipher. It’s not as hard as you may think.

Let me give you a quick five sub points. You know, let’s call it a sidebar, a little parenthetical section, just to quickly run through a few things that if you’d like to know what God would have you do with your life, I mean, here’s how it works. Five things.

Number one, you have to be willing to do anything. That’s how it starts. Don’t tell God, well, show me what it is, and then I’ll let you know if I’m interested. That’s not how it works. I like to put it in terms of the blank check. You need to be able to say to him, here am I, send me, whatever it is that you’d want me to do. That’s what it means when Jesus says, if anyone would come after me — he says this repeatedly — let him deny himself. You put your agenda aside. Take up the cross, no matter how scary or painful it may be, and follow me. That’s the plan. You say, my agenda, second fiddle. Your plan, that’s the priority. Willingness.

Number two, immerse yourself in God’s word. Immerse yourself in God’s word. Here is the written will of God on paper. When you immerse yourself in the written word of God on paper, you begin to think in terms of life decisions differently than when your mind is not saturated in the word. Let me give you a passage for this. Psalm 119 verses 104 and 105. That’s a lot of numbers for a reference, but Psalm 119, 104 and 105. It says this. It says, when it comes to the word, the precepts of God, it is through your precepts that I get understanding, wisdom, insight. And I, because of that understanding — here’s how it’s put — I hate every false way, every wrong way. In other words, the more my mind is saturated in the precepts of God’s word, I start to see doors kind of shutting in terms of that’s not right. Shouldn’t do that. Shouldn’t be investing in that. Shouldn’t be going there. I get clarity about that. That’s the negative way to state it.

Verse 105 puts it this way. “Your word” becomes “a lamp unto my feet and a light for my path.” I start to see where it is I’m supposed to be walking. The word of God, if you saturate those principles in your mind and you’re in it, you begin to see more clearly the path God would have you walk. But you’ve got to be in the Word.

Number three, then you ought to, as is taught by example throughout the scripture, you need to look for providential circumstances. Providential circumstances. God is a sovereign God. He’s a God that orchestrates everything in life. We believe he’s involved in all the details of life. And when it comes to the things that happen in life, we need to look for those situations that seem to be, as Paul would put it, open doors.

Passage for this, 1 Corinthians chapter 16, verses 7 and 8. Notice how this is worded. Listen to it. 1 Corinthians 16:7 and 8. He says, “I hope to spend some time with you, if the Lord permits.” Now, you can go back through the rest of what he says in Corinthians to try to decipher what that might mean. Some of it internal, some of it external in his life. Then he says this, “But I’m going to stay on in Ephesus,” in the city of Ephesus, “until Pentecost,” the feast of Pentecost, “for a wide door for effective work has been opened to me.” Now, he doesn’t describe what that is, but he uses that term in other places to talk about the providential circumstances like there’s an open door here. There’s something here showing me this is a path that seems to be the right path to walk through. Now, there are many adversaries. It’s not a red carpet. They’re not ushers with flashlights going, hey, here’s the will of God for you, but it’s an open door. There may be opposition. There may be bumps on the road, but I’m connecting with the fact that this is a providential open door.

Now, you take someone who’s willing to do anything for God. You get their mind in the scriptures. You get them aware now for circumstantial providential opportunities, which I guess, I don’t want to make this too personal, but I would not be standing here as your pastor preaching the Bible were it not for sensitivity to providential open doors and walking through those when they presented themselves.

Number four, you need to be sensitive to godly desires. You need to be sensitive to godly desires. And we can look all throughout the scripture for this, but we see opportunities are often matched with a desire or the impulse of a desire to please God, to do God’s will, to serve God that is generated in my life. Put it this way, to use the desire and the open door in concert with one another, 2 Corinthians chapter 2 verses 12 and 13. 2 Corinthians 2:12 and 13. Notice this now. This is an interesting juxtaposition of the two. It says this: “When I came to Troas” — the city of Troas — “to preach the gospel of Christ, even though” — now listen carefully — “even though a door was opened for me in the Lord,” looked like a providential circumstance, an opportunity, “my spirit was not at rest because I did not find my brother Titus there. So I took leave of them and I went on to Macedonia.”

You had an open door and you didn’t walk through it. Why? I didn’t have peace about that. I had the desire to locate Timothy, and that took me here. Now, that was a godly desire that made a lot of wise sense. It was part of the will of God being revealed through a willing heart, saturated in the word, providential open doors, godly desires directing that man’s path.

Lastly, and don’t ever miss number five, don’t ever miss number five, Proverbs 15:22, which is one of many passages I could take you to. It says, “Without counsel plans fail, but with many advisors they succeed.” Now, that’s just one terse way to put a principle we see throughout the Bible, and that is this: seek wise counsel. You got to seek wise counsel. Again, I would not be standing here as your pastor had I not sat with many godly people and consulted as to their external objective wisdom on my life. I wouldn’t have married who I married. I wouldn’t be doing the job I’m doing. I wouldn’t be doing a lot of things in my life were it not for the wise counsel ratifying, if you will, confirming, if you will, the willing heart, saturated in the word, open doors, providentially established circumstances, godly desire, wise counsel.

You don’t know the will of God. You’ve got to have all of these, but notice where it starts. Willing heart.

This is the beginning of a three-part series I want to do for you called Adapat. If you’ve been around, you know that. Anything, any place, any time. The letters on your bulletin there. Anything, any place, any time. “Anything” is where it starts. Everything starts with that. Are you willing to deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow him? Anything. If you’re not, we’ve got to deal with that.

Peter had been walking with Christ for years and still struggled at this juncture in his Christian life to look at the task, the will of God for him, and do it because he was struggling with what he preferred. I’m much more comfortable right now fishing than I am preaching. I do much better in a boat than I would in a pulpit. I don’t think I want to do that.

I get the fact that there are many times in our lives, for many reasons, we don’t want to do the will of God. We need to do the will of God because we understand that the Lord is the Lord, and to have him as our Lord, we’ve got to do what he says. Of course, we have to do everything that’s explicitly commanded in Scripture, but beyond that, we’ve got to find out, as it’s put in Ephesians 5, what is pleasing to the Lord.

Now, by the way, if you’re not sold on that, because I know there’s endless debate about the will of God amongst Christian people, and I get that, and I know there’s books that are battling each other. Let me say this, one of the reasons I believe we’ve got to look through a list like this of principles that will help me determine the right steps for my life, isn’t because it’s not about, you know, the will of God in terms of what color socks you wore this morning. I know it gets to that place in some debates, theological debates, but let me say this. I’ll give you two quick passages on this, and then we’ll get off of point one.

1 Corinthians chapter 12 and 1 Peter chapter 4. 1 Corinthians chapter 12 and 1 Peter chapter 4. In 1 Corinthians chapter 12, it speaks about the fact that the Spirit invades Christians’ lives and then works in their lives in different capacities. Manifestation of the Spirit for the common good, verse 4 says. And then it goes on to talk about ears and eyes and, you know, a foot and a hand and all these things. In other words, the way the Spirit wants to work through my life that will identify who I am in the body of Christ. And I guess by paradigm we could go beyond into culture and life. Don’t bifurcate your life into secular and sacred. I could say not only within my service in the church, but what is my job in the world? I’d better recognize this. If I’m a hand, I better be a hand and not a foot. If I’m an ear, I’d better be an ear and not an eye. I need to recognize the distinctiveness of God’s equipping and calling in my life.

And let me add 1 Peter 4 to that, which ups the ante. It says this, that we ought to be good stewards of the manifold grace of God, the varied spectrums of the way God wants us to live our lives. In other words, you’re an architect. Great. Is that God’s manifestation of not only his will for you in how you serve people in the body of Christ, but in the world? Great. Then don’t be a preacher. See, but for me not to be a preacher would be to not be a good steward of the manifold grace of God in my life.

Therefore, I know if I just say, well, I’m just going to obey the Bible. The will of God is only here. And I get that. I understand that. But then I’ve got to make some decisions, even just based on those directives in 1 Corinthians 12 and 1 Peter 4, to make a decision about what role am I supposed to play? Am I an ear? Am I an eye? Not only in the body of Christ, but in the world — which, by the way, thanks to the Puritans in the long line of that tradition, when it comes to the idea of God’s will, they called our work and coined this phrase, they called it our vocation. You’ve ever heard of that? You know that comes from the Latin word that means “calling,” the vocation. In other words, what do you do Monday through Friday? If that is your vocation, this is the way we should think as Christians, then that is the calling of God on your life.

If Peter goes and spends the rest of his life being a fisherman, he would be in sin, really, whether he had this face-to-face conversation with Christ or not. Why? Because God had equipped him and called him, just like he’s equipped you and called you to do something in this world, which may, by the way, when you say to him you’ll do anything, it may radically turn your world upside down. It may take you from where you’re at and what you’re doing to do something completely different, or it may just mean something small that gets adjusted in your life. But what I’m saying is everything’s on the table. Are you willing to do anything for Jesus Christ?

Back to our text, John chapter 21, verse 15. It’s interesting the discussion is not, “Hey, listen, you need to go to school.” Or in this case, you need to feed my sheep. Now, he does say that. You need to tend my sheep. You need to feed my lambs. This is not a discussion, though, or a question that says, “Don’t you like preaching better than fishing?” That’s not what he says. “Don’t you like preaching? Don’t you think that’s a good idea? Don’t you think you’d be a good preacher?” That’s not what he says.

The question he asks three times in verse 15, 16, and 17 is, “Do you” — what? — “love me?” Now, that’s an interesting approach to this. Do you love me? That gets to the heart of the matter. As a matter of fact, when it comes to the will of God in your life, you might want to jot this down. Number two, you need to re-evaluate your love for Christ because that’s the real core of it all. Your love for Christ needs to be questioned when you’re balking at the will of God. “Simon, son of John, do you love me?”

Now, he asked the question three times if you look at it there. Verse 15, 16, and 17. But he begins the question in verse number 15 with a comparative. “Do you love me more than these?” Underline that and then put a little question mark next to it. I guess there already is one, but maybe whatever in the margin of your Bible, because we’ve got to answer what that demonstrative pronoun is referring to. What is the antecedent for that? What is it pointing to? “Do you love me more than these?” What’s the comparison?

Jesus wants Peter to consider his love. And the first time he asked the question, he wants him to consider his love compared to something. “These.” What are the “these”? Well, pick up any commentary that’s of any size at all, and they’re going to say, well, there’s at least three seemingly logical, contextual options for that.

“Do you love me more than these?” And the first one, I suppose, if you want to think about it in terms of the context, would be, hey, you’re out here fishing. That’s what verses 1 through 3 say. He’s out fishing when he is called to now by Christ to tend sheep, feed sheep, which is the analogy for him to be the pastor, which is what he’s going to do and what he’s eventually going to obey and do. The question is, do you love me? And what I’m asking you to do is not the real focus. The focus is me, but if you love me, you’ll do this.

Do you love me more than these? What has he just done? He’s holding a big catch of fish. He’s been out all night fishing. Do you love me more than the nets, the boats, the career? Do you love me more than that thing you’re doing right there? Do you love me more than these? That’s the first, I suppose, logical, contextual option.

The next one is, as any good commentator or any Bible student would tell you, just looking at it for 10 minutes: “These.” Do you love me more than these? What else is around? If you look up in the context, verse 2, Peter’s there, Thomas is there, Nathanael’s there, you’ve got the sons of Zebedee, that’s James and John are there, and two other — you’ve got a whole team of disciples. Maybe he’s saying, do you love me more than you love these guys? Do you love me more than these guys? And if you love me more than these guys, you’re going to do what I want.

Most commentators are quick to dismiss that. “Well, what do you mean? You know Peter’s never known for loving the other disciples.” I mean, there’s no passage about, “Oh, I really love Nathanael, he’s such a great guy, I want to…” Most people dismiss that, but I mean logically it’s at least grammatically possible.

The third one is — and most commentators would like to say this must be it because of the preceding context of Peter proclaiming his superior love for Christ — some people would say, is Jesus asking the question, “Do you love me more than these disciples love me? Do you love me more than they love me?” Now, that would be an odd question to consider, and maybe we should, but let’s start with the first one.

Do you love me more than these things, this career, this thing you’re doing right now? Which you may say, well, I’m not sure that’s what Christ had in mind, and perhaps it’s not, but it is the thing that holds a lot of us up, isn’t it? The reason we don’t do the will of God is we like what we’re doing better. And certainly in the context, Peter seems to be more comfortable, as I said, in a fishing boat than he is in a Christian pulpit. So perhaps we need to think that through.

When you consider your love for Christ, ask yourself the question, do I love him more than the stuff that I want to do? Do I love him more than that? And that’s a good place to go. And I hope you know this isn’t varsity Christianity. How does Jesus approach every non-Christian? He calls everyone, everywhere. Here’s some of the terms: “Anyone who would come after me. All who would come after me. Whoever would come after me.” I mean, these are the words of the Gospels. “Let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.”

Let me put it this way. When someone came up to him and said, hey, what’s the greatest commandment? What did Jesus say? “Love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, all your strength, all your mind. This is the greatest and foremost commandment.” That’s what Jesus said. So when it comes to my love, I need to love Christ more than anything else that I might love to do. I would love Christ and follow him. And when you love Christ supremely, you find yourself doing things you never thought you would do.

It’s like a teenage boy who falls in love, and you think, who is this kid? I’ve never known who he is. Now he’s vacuuming his car out, planning a picnic, writing long letters by hand. Who is this kid? Well, he’s in love. He’s in love. And when you’re in love, when you have this supreme love, you start doing things that you never thought you would do.

I can guarantee you this. My love for Christ certainly has propelled me into a job I never would have done. I mean, I don’t want to make this sermon about me, but I am saying it is interesting how — and I’ve told some of you my testimony before — the last thing in the world I wanted to do with my life is speak publicly. It’s the only thing I can tell you, and I didn’t cut class much at all. I didn’t. I wish I had a more dramatic testimony for you. But the few times I was willing to ditch out the back of the room and go, you know, truant on the day would be when I was called upon to give some kind of oral report in the front of the class.

I hated speaking in public, and half the time I still do. Not my thing. But see, I’m here today speaking as what Christ would have me do because at some point in my past, God made it very clear, much like he’s making to Peter, do you love me more than the things you like to do? Am I your preference over the things you enjoy? He doesn’t say, don’t you enjoy preaching more than you enjoy fishing? That’s not how you need to think this through. Do you love Christ more than you love all the things that you do? Then we can determine what he wants you to do.

Supreme love. It may lead you in places you never thought you would go, but we need to start there. Do you love Christ?

By the way, and I hate to use inflammatory language here, but you do understand what it means when you love something more than you love Christ. When you love something more than you love Christ, when I am supposed to supremely love God, the triune God, more than anything else, when something else supplants that — do you know the Bible word for that? Idolatry. It’s even called this in the Bible, adultery. I mean, this is a problem.

The second option these commentators toss around, and clearly, contextually, could be possible, is do you love me more than you love these guys? Nathanael, James, John, do you love me more than you love them? Now, that would be a weird thing to say in the immediate context, it would seem, because it’s not those guys that said to Peter, hey, let’s go and fish. As you’ll see up there in verse number 3, it was Peter that said, “I’m going fishing,” and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So that’s a weird question to ask, and probably not what Jesus had in mind.

But before we leave that option too quickly, I think we should at least spend a moment there, thinking that that is a serious problem that Jesus did talk about often, and that is, do you love me more than you love other people? As a matter of fact, when I start talking about, do you love Christ supremely more than anything, some of you, if you really were honest and giving that a little thought here in the last few minutes, your mind didn’t go to a career or an activity. Your mind went to a person.

One passage on this, I need you to turn to Matthew chapter 10, just to show you how focused Christ is on this one common temptation. Oh, and by the way, as we’ll see in this text and in many others, and I should kind of round this discussion out. If you’re starting to get a view of God, perhaps because you haven’t been taught this, that God sure seems to be really, I don’t know, jealous, so focused, so controlling, so domineering. He wants all of our attention. He wants to be first. What kind of Christ is that?

Let me make this very clear to you. When Jesus wants to be first, it’s not so that he can just look down on all the peons and all his slaves and go, “Look at me, I’m in charge now.” He’s not an egomaniac. Now, he is the center of the universe’s attention and rightly should be, and every knee will bow and every tongue will confess that he is Lord. But note this carefully: when he says to people, “Deny yourself, take up your cross, and follow me,” he’s quick to follow that up with this: while that may feel like you’re losing your life, he says, if you choose to keep your life, you’ll lose it. But if you are willing to lose your life, you will — what? You’ll find it.

There’s something about the loss of all these things that we cling to that really allows us to find our lives. For me to say to you, you need to be willing to do anything for Christ should not be seen as some subservient person coming to Christ going, “Oh no, he’s going to make me, I don’t know, scrub the floor with a toothbrush.” That’s not the point. There’s nothing better for a human being to do than to find the right ordering of his life, which begins with letting God be God, which means that you and your heart need to realize there’s nothing better that could happen for your life than for you to get all the idols out of the way and to let the Lord be the Lord and let your agenda take a second place to his.

And while this is the hardest part of it for a lot of us, verse 37 makes it clear it can’t have any human rivals. Your devotion to Christ. “Whoever loves father or mother more than me,” verse 37 says, “is not worthy of me.” This won’t work. He’s not here to be your co-pilot. He’s not here to play second fiddle to somebody you really love in your life.

Now, while there’s not a lot of pangs of conviction through the centuries reading verse 37 — you know, not that you don’t love your parents, but okay — in the middle of the verse is where it gets quite convicting, particularly for 21st century Orange County people. “Whoever loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.” And if your mind doesn’t immediately race, you Sunday school graduates, to Genesis 22 and an altar on Mount Moriah and an old man with an only son, then it should. “Take your son, your only son, the son that you love, and sacrifice him on the mountain I’m going to show you,” which happened to be the place where all the sacrifices would take place as David conquered the city of the Jebusites and created the altar there — or his son did at least, as he planned for it. It was the very spot where the sacrifices would take place, and here was Abraham doing the unthinkable, responding to God, who is not seeking to make something bad of Abraham, but to free Abraham to find his life by making sure that Isaac didn’t take a place of supremacy over his love and devotion to God.

“Do you really love me more than your son, your only son, the son that you love?” As morbid as it may sound, your kids need to be on the altar in your own mind, or we’ve got a problem. You’ll lose your life. Verse 38, here it is again, “Whoever does not take his cross and follow me is not worthy of me. And whoever finds his life” — you want to hang on to all your relationships and make them supreme to God — “you’re going to lose it.” You’ll lose it not only in the future, but read the book of Ecclesiastes, you’ll lose it right now. “And whoever loses his life” — if you’re willing to get the ordering of your life the way God intended it — “you will find it. If you lose your life for my sake, you’ll find it.”

I wish I had more time for that, but for those of you new to all of this, it sounds like God sure wants to be some ruling monarch in everybody’s heart. You’re right about that, but it’s not for the reasons that you may suspect.

Re-evaluate your love for Christ. Do you love Christ more than the things that you love? Do you love Christ more than the people that you love? And lastly, as strange as it may sound, it may be exactly what Jesus had in mind when he said, “Do you love me more than these?” It may have exactly meant the fact that, do you love me more than Nathanael loves me? Do you love me more than Thomas loves me? Do you love me more than James loves me? Do you love me more than John loves me?

Why would Jesus ask that? And is the answer supposed to be yes? What do you want Peter to say? I’ve already told you that in the story of Peter, just before he takes the belly flop in the algae pond, he said to Jesus, “You know what? If everybody else falls away, everybody” — this is Matthew 26 now — “if everybody falls away, I won’t.” In the parallel passage, he even adds this, “If I have to go to prison for you, I’ll do it. If I have to die with you, I’ll do it. I’m not going to deny you. I’m not going to step back from you. I’m ready to go to death for you.”

Now, what was he doing in that passage? Comparing his loyalty to the other disciples, saying, “I love you more. Even if all these losers aren’t going to love you or be loyal to you, I will.” Which, of course, Jesus says, “No, you won’t. You’re going to stumble, you’re going to fall. Before the rooster crows, you’re going to deny me three times.” Remember that? And that’s what he did.

Why would Jesus be bringing up that, if that’s indeed what he has in view here? And why would I ever want to think, do I really love Christ more than the people sitting around me in church?

Well, let me take you back in your minds to that supreme love, whether it’s the teenager in love or the man who’s traveling across the world or selling his stuff to buy the engagement ring. When you listen to love songs — which most of you, I don’t know if you do or not, maybe you’re avoiding those at this season of your life — listen to the lyrics. Listen. There’s always this sense that creeps into love songs when there’s supreme love in someone’s heart that all of a sudden there’s all this comparative language. “No one could love a woman the way that I love you.” Really? You believe that? Well, I don’t know. Part of my brain probably doesn’t, if you want to be logical and analytical about it, but that’s how it feels. “No one could love you more than I love you.” It’s that comparative language.

Is that a good way for us to think? I don’t know if this is what’s in view. I suppose that it is what’s in view in Jesus’ mind when he asks him the question. But all I know is it’s where he wants Peter to go back to. I know that in part because Jesus later addressed an entire church in Revelation chapter 2, the church at Ephesus, and he said, in essence, the very same thing. “You’ve left your first love.” It’s a kind of love that was supreme, and it’s a kind of love that you can’t help but think is comparative. It’s a kind of unparalleled commitment that you think you have, and there’s nothing wrong with that. And even as new Christians, I hope some of you have looked at your life and said, “Wow, no one could love Christ the way I love Christ,” which you know is not analytically, technically, objectively true, but it’s the feeling in your heart.

You remember there in that passage, which I’m quoting now as Revelation chapter 2, verses 4 and 5. He says, “You’ve got a lot of things going for you, but I have this against you: you have” — here’s the way the ESV translates it — “you’ve abandoned the love you had at first.” That kind of love that you felt was unparalleled, you’ve left that. He says, “Remember from where you’ve fallen.” And what was it like for you, by the way, if you’re the Peter here in the room thinking, yeah, there was a time when I was willing to say, I will go to the ends of the earth for Christ. I’ll do anything for Christ. I’ll die for Christ. My commitment to Christ is superior to anybody in this small group. I’m ready to — if everyone else falls away, I won’t. He says, think of the things you did in that period of your life. “Remember from where you’ve fallen. Repent and do the deeds you did at first,” start acting like that again.

I’m not asking for us to make overt, open statements about comparative love and “Do you love Christ more than the next person?” But I am saying there’s that place in your heart when your love for Christ is new and your zeal for Christ is fervent, and you have that sense in which it’s just all about the fact that you would do anything, and if no one else would do it, you’d do it. You’d go there.

This going back to your first love is really what’s in view in the larger context of the passage, is it not? If you know your Bible, we’ve already studied it in Luke chapter 5. The same thing that happened when Peter was called is what’s happening here again. Providentially, Jesus is putting him in the same setting. What’s that? On a boat, on the Sea of Galilee, skunked on a night of fishing, there’s no fish in the net. And Jesus says in Luke 5, “Hey, put out to the lake, put your nets down for a catch.” Peter goes, “Oh, there’s no fish out here. There’s no way. But if that’s what you want me to do, I’ll do it.” And the miraculous catch of fish begins Peter’s commitment to Christ.

And now as his love is waning and flagging, Jesus says, let’s go back to that. That’s exactly what happened. And if you glance back up at it, that’s what’s going on. This net was full, verses 11 through 14. All of this was a reminder of where he was.

Now, the key word in Revelation chapter 2 is to “repent,” and clearly that’s what’s in view in this passage. “Hey, do you love me? If you do, let’s feed the sheep. You’re not feeding the sheep. It’s time to repent. It’s time to turn.” But to do that well, I think we need to identify the aspects of our lives, maybe, that are holding us back. Let’s put it this way. Number three on your outline: relinquish your apprehensions.

You and I need to look at the things that make the will of God seem either unattractive or impossible. What is it that’s holding you back?

The last two verses, verses 18 and 19, Jesus surprises us. If he’s trying to convince Peter to leave the nets behind and get back into the pulpit and lead the people of God, I don’t know that this would be the thing that you or I would do. Verse 18, “Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted. But when you are old, you’ll stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.”

Now, scholars try to figure out where this line came from. Is it an echo from some ancient saying or proverb? Whatever it is, John makes a clear connection. We know what he’s saying. This is said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. I don’t know if there were visuals to this and Jesus stretching out his arms, but I think he got the point. Certainly John did. And you may say, well, John is writing this in the 90s, and clearly Peter was already dead by then. Nevertheless, there’s a sense in which Jesus is obviously showing, according to John, that he is going to die as a martyr. That’s what it means to stretch out your arms and to be clothed, because they don’t clothe you in clothing when you get crucified. They strip your clothes off. But then they put that beam across your shoulders, and you are dressed with that, and you now have to carry it to the place of crucifixion. Oh, and by the way, when you can’t carry it, like in Jesus’ case, when — and now I’ll correct myself — Simon of Cyrene had to step up and carry it along, so it’ll be with Peter. And “you will be carried where you don’t want to go.” Who wants to die as a martyr on a cross?

Just for the sake of reference point here, this was about, I don’t know, let’s say 33 AD, which this conversation took place. Some ambiguity as to the exact date, but probably in 66 or 67 AD, Peter was crucified in Rome. First Clement speaks of this. That’s a second century letter. Tertullian spoke of it several years later. Maybe you’ve heard that he was crucified upside down. That story, I don’t know, was added to the thing, at least in extant manuscripts, much later. We don’t even know if that’s accurate. But we do know that he was crucified in Rome as a martyr. And obviously, as Jesus’ prophecies would be, it’s exacting and it’s correct. He would die and glorify God in his death.

Now, again, back to the story. If you’re trying to be talked into doing the will of God, and all of a sudden you have Jesus saying, “Oh, and by the way, this is going to take your life,” I’m thinking, why are you telling him that? “Oh, you’re going to junior high, son. Oh, and by the way, they’re going to kill you by the time you’re in the eighth grade.” I don’t want to go back. What’s with this strategy?

Now, this is an apprehension that’s real. Think this through. Why did Peter fall on his face? Well, because it was the first time he was out of the shadow of Christ. Christ was being tried. Caiaphas was seeing him. He was standing in the courtyard. The little servant girl said, “You’re a Galilean. I can tell by your accent. You’re with him.” He starts calling curses down and doing all that he can to separate himself from the moral teaching rabbi, Jesus the Messiah, and says, “I don’t know him, never see him, never met him, don’t know him.” Why did you do that? Why did you deny Christ? I’m afraid. I don’t want to be arrested. I don’t want to be tried and dragged before the high priest. I don’t want to be killed. I don’t want to be martyred. He feared for his life.

Jesus says, “Feed my sheep, tend my sheep, feed my lambs. Oh, and by the way, when you carry out the will of God, it’ll end with your death.” Why? Why? Why? Here’s why: until you’re willing to do anything for Christ, even if it costs you everything, you’re never going to engage in that the way God would have you engage in.

In other words, let’s put it this way. Until you’re ready to die for Christ and his will, I mean, I doubt you’re ever going to really live for Christ and his will. As a matter of fact, that’s a good way to put it. You’d better be willing, as you sit here in this air-conditioned, comfortable auditorium, ask yourself the question: if Christ is the Lord and I’m to follow his will, if his will costs me everything — everything, including my life — am I willing right now to die for the Lord Jesus Christ? If you are, now you’re ready to live for him. Now you’re ready to walk out in productive, fruitful ministry.

Which, by the way, do the math. If he dies in 66, 67 AD, he starts this ministry after this confrontation in 33 AD. He has over three decades, 33, 34 years of fruitful pulpit ministry, leading and directing the people of God. And it all started with a willingness for him to die. He didn’t say this because it was going to happen tomorrow. “Hey, prepare yourself. You’re going to get killed tomorrow.” He did this so that he could give himself fully to the cause of what God wanted him to do. You’re never going to live fully for Christ until you’re willing to die for him.

Is it too costly for you? Again, and I don’t want to make this sound, “Oh man, just another life on the pile of sacrificed lives.” This seems so cruel of God. Anything you sacrifice for Christ, as Peter had been well taught — and one of the most poignant teaching moments was when the rich young ruler walked away, remember that? He had an idol he wasn’t willing to give up. He wasn’t going to give Christ the supreme place in his heart. He loved his money more than Jesus. And so Jesus said, leave it. Come follow me. He said, no, I can’t.

He turns to the disciples. He says, man, it’s hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God. Because the more you have, it’s easier to love that more than you’d ever love me. Peter, you might remember, chimes in and says, “Oh, we’ve left everything to follow you. Aren’t we great?” To which you’d expect Jesus to rebuke him, but he doesn’t. He turns to him and he says this: “I say to you, no one has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundredfold now in this time… and in the age to come eternal life.” Catch it both ways.

This whole series is not about you sacrificing for Christ, “Anything, any place, any time, oh, I’ll just be a servant and be deprived my whole life.” You gain everything by losing everything. When you’re willing to let it go, you will find your life. That’s the whole point. Do I do it for that reason? I do it because he’s the Lord. But I recognize this is not a loss for me. This is not some great sacrifice. As Jim Elliott, who actually did lose his life on the mission field, put it, “He is no fool who gives what he cannot keep to gain what he cannot lose.” You do live with that in view, I hope.

What are you going to sacrifice? When I think of our missionaries that are coming back, the Thompsons, who sat through a sermon just like this. And I guess what’s the ultimate fear they could have going as missionaries sent by our church to a Middle Eastern country that’s not all that keen on the gospel? I guess they could sit there and think, “Man, if I do what God is leading me to do through providential open doors with my mind saturated in the word, with godly counsel leading me, if I do what God asks me to do, I might die over there.” The minute they came to grips with that, they were now prepared to go and live for Christ and be productive for Christ in that moment.

The question is, what did they give up? Whatever they lost, the Bible says, you’ve gained far, far more — not only now, which I think they will testify to when they get on this stage next week, but so much more that you’ll never see until we walk through the kingdom. I trust that you know that you will mock whatever it is that you used in your own life as an excuse for not giving it all to the Lord. You’re going to look back and say, what was I thinking? I hung on to that.

Maybe you know, though, because you’ve studied this passage with me before, that maybe it wasn’t in Peter’s mind the cost of tending the sheep that led him not to do it, though Jesus spells that out here. Maybe you’ve assumed with me — and I think rightly — that Peter was probably bringing into this a sense of dejected, demoralized, “I’m unworthy to do this work.” Put it this way: some of you have the apprehension that it’s too hard and too costly. Some of you have the apprehension of doing God’s will that you’re inadequate and incapable and not worthy and too, I don’t know, messed up to do it.

That is the context. The demoralized Peter is fishing not because, I think, he liked fishing more than preaching, but I thought he thought he was more adequately equipped as a man to fish than he was to preach. Remember this, if you would, about that principle, if that happens to be your stumbling block, which it was for Jeremiah: you’re thinking far too little of God than you should.

To put it in terms of 1 Corinthians chapter 1, why does God choose the weak things of the world? So that no one can boast before him. To put it in terms of 2 Corinthians chapter 3, so that it’ll be clear that the sufficiency of what we do is from God, not from us. To put it in terms of 2 Corinthians 4, “We have this treasure in jars of clay, to show that the surpassing power belongs to God and not to us.”

Don’t think that you can’t do the will of God in your future because of some failure in your past. You’ve got to get over that. God is not a God who sees stained lives and says, “Well, that one’s got a bad stain on it. Throw that in the rag pile.” You do understand how the book of Isaiah began: “Though your sins are like scarlet, they shall be as white as snow.” Do you think that the sacrifice of Christ on the cross was enough to get you prepped to do ministry for Christ? A vessel in his hand that’s clean can happen. You just need to come clean with your sin. God will take care of your account.

He uses things that you would think would never be the tools to do great things for his kingdom. The apostle Paul is a case study in that, isn’t he? You’re going to pick someone to write most of the New Testament, to be this key leader in the New Testament church? I don’t think you’re going to pick, as he put it in 1 Timothy 1, “a blasphemer, persecutor, and insolent opponent” of God. Prideful, arrogant. But he received mercy. He was put into service. He was saved, the foremost sinner, so that Christ Jesus might “display his perfect patience as an example to those who were to believe in him for eternal life.” That’s you and me. He’s an example to us.

To quote another famous Christian who’s often quoted, Corrie ten Boom, she used to say this: “Never be afraid to entrust an unknown future to a known God.” Yeah, you’re going to stumble. I know you don’t want to walk back on the campus if you fail. That’s exactly what Peter did. And Peter would stumble, as the book of Galatians makes clear. He’s going to have his problems. But the sufficiency to do the work that God has called him to do, he’s got to see as being equipped and coming through God’s continual work.

What did God say to Jeremiah? “I’ll be with you.” When Moses balked, “I’ll be with you.” And he says the same to us. If your apprehension is inadequacy, get over that. You want to make God mad, just keep telling him you can’t do it. You’re inadequate. That’s not a good strategy to use with God.

I guess the upshot of all this is to look at this passage and recognize that while it’s a historic snapshot of a narrative with Jesus and Peter, it was recorded for your sake and mine. In other words, you need to see this text and envision you having breakfast with Christ and him looking at you this morning and saying, “Do you love me? Do you love me?” And if you love him and you trust him, I think you’re going to be willing to do whatever it is that he says.

That’s my hope for you to grapple with this week. I hope you do the discussion questions. You deal with the issues that are really going to be, I think, in the hearts of every single Christian that sits here today, even non-Christians. And to become a Christian, we’ve got to deal with this issue.

Maybe the best words to wrap this up with that have ministered to me over the years at the times I’ve struggled with doing the will of God come from an old hymn written back in 1872 by John Whittier, the guy who the city up the freeway was named after. He wrote a hymn called “Dear Lord and Father of Mankind.” Love the title. That puts everything in perspective. Want to talk about who we’re dealing with here when we’re struggling with the will of God? He is the Lord and the Father of Mankind. You’re going to do what he says.

In one of the verses, speaking of the disciples, he talks about them responding to the call of Christ by the Syrian sea. That’s kind of the old English way to talk about the Sea of Galilee. Great words:

In simple trust, like theirs who heard
Beside the Syrian sea,
The gracious calling of the Lord,
Let us, like them, without a word,
Rise up and follow Thee.

I hope you love him and trust him enough to do anything that he asks you to do.

Let’s pray.

God, let us, like them, without a word of argumentation, without a word of excuse, without a word of talking back, recognize that there’s nothing that makes more sense than for us to rise up and follow you. We’d all enjoy the clarity of a breakfast with Jesus to know exactly what you’d have us do, but you haven’t left us as orphans. We have not only the written word of God to make it clear that you have enabled and equipped and gifted and called people to do different jobs. We just need to suss out and investigate what that is, discover what it is that’s pleasing to the Lord for our lives.

And God, we know that you work in providence. You work through godly desires. You work through godly counsel. And God, we need to be good stewards of that manifold grace — that way in which you want to use us that’s different than the way you want to use him. And we want to be obedient and faithful.

God, I know it all starts with that fundamental response to the call of Christ to be willing to do whatever it is you’d have us do. So God, whether it’s a career change, whether it’s just an involvement in something we need to be involved in, whether it’s getting out of something we shouldn’t be involved in, let us today have everything on the altar, recognizing that we as your children want to do whatever it is you ask us to do.

Make that the reality in our hearts through the work of your Spirit. In Jesus’ name I pray. Amen.