Jesus, why did you bother with this loser? Simon Peter took all awards for being your biggest screw-up. Sure, he was all bluster when things were good. Yet when the real trouble started, he wouldn’t even admit he knew you. Just let him ride and find someone who’ll do you a favor.

You’re so right. A “rocky” relationship between them went on the whole time. Jesus wouldn’t let him go, and Peter’s missteps led to major stumbles. When Peter took some of the guys fishing, everything flashed back to how this whole take started: fishing all night, empty nets, and a figure on the beach in the just-beginning dawn light.

A Start Over

He urged them to cast their nets one more time. Just like before, the net filled with fish beyond its capacity to hold them all. Peter immediately swam ashore knowing again it was Jesus who was calling him. Breakfast was made, fish and bread bringing memory of that other miracle of provision,  and once again, Jesus becomes their servant in nourishment with food and grace.

After breakfast, separate from the others, Jesus calls him, “Simon, son of John,” His words wouldn’t let Peter shake the sense this had happened before. Jesus called him by his given name, but his calling also had given him a new name, Cephas (or Peter, meaning rock.)  Considering his piles of failures these last few years, using his name Simon may have sounded like a rebuke, for Peter had been less than rock-steady in his faith.

 Like that time the disciples were caught in a storm on the water, Peter had been the one to sink when he looked at the high waves rather than on Jesus walking on the water.  Sure, Peter had been the one to answer another one of his questions, “Who do you say that I am?” with “You are the Son of God.” Wouldn’t that declaration of Jesus as Messiah be enough?

Jesus must have had his doubts, for he prayed for Peter’s faith even before he denied him late that last night.  His bold declaration of Messiah was canceled out later in the courtyard outside the high priest’s house. A servant girl accused him of being a follower. Peter’s next words held more than what he spoke. “I don’t even know the man!”  All who heard it understood his clear denial he had followed Jesus. But in Peter’s soul, it cried out that the Jesus he followed was not the Messiah he thought Jesus was, but instead a Messiah that would bring deadly trouble upon himself.

Ok, so give him credit for at least not raising dust in the road by running away from this loose tribe of losers you lead. Yet, why hound him about what he did? It’s like you keep throwing it in his face what he did. You really think this is going to help him or the rest of the guys in any way.

Listen. Truth be told, we all have something. Something in our past which we’d like to forget except memory won’t completely deny it. That’s where Peter sat in the beach sand that day. If he’d ever be able to get past himself, to be what Jesus intended for him, the two of them needed to confront it together. So not once but three times, still calling him Simon, Jesus pressed him with the question, “Do you love me?”

The answer to Jesus’ question was the core issue. Only with an honest answer could their relationship be restored. Jesus had to know, and Peter had to examine his shaken soul.

Jesus asked for that love leaving nothing off the table.

First Question

“Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” More than these brothers with whom you have followed me since that first day on another beach? Gathered there were James and John, Nathanael, Philip, Andrew, even Thomas. All of them had been through so much. Today seemed like a chance for them to start over again. Simon, son of John, will you start over again?

But I need to know, “Do you love me more than these?” The love Jesus required was a love that would leave everything behind again, to leave one’s net and all that is held vital in life. It was a God-consuming love that meant nothing could be in front of it, not one’s security and safety in life nor one’s understanding of all God meant nor even one’s right to oneself.

Even our deepest cares and good hopes have to be put aside? Love you more, you ask? Acknowledging you as Son of God, seeing/believing you raised in whole body from a grave isn’t enough? You do want it all, don’t you? You never stop with the asking, do you?

The trouble Jesus brings goes deeper than what rationally should be required. Jesus had faced trouble by sacrifice; now he asked Peter to do the same. Jesus asked him for a return of the unconditional love that God had for Peter and all who followed Jesus, what the Greeks knew as agape love.

“Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Peter means it. Or at least as much as he can mean it. Yes, Lord, I love you for I know you as the one who is closest to me, who has known me better than myself and has raised me to more than I’d ever be without you. I follow you and hold you as close to me as my own brother, that is, the love found in philos love, again as understood by Greek culture.

Peter realized he could not face life after all he’d known these past three years or so, especially in the last weeks, without Jesus, trouble and all. And true as well, Jesus was not going to let him go. This conversation did not have to take place with only him separate from the others there that day. But it did, and Peter was to learn that the one who called him Rock was going to see he was solid. Jesus means to complete this reversal fully in Peter and anyone else who would follow him as Lord.

“If you love me, keep my commandments,” he had said. Now, Jesus clarified with a specific directive: “Feed my lambs.” Take care of those who need me, need my provision not only of body but also of soul, who reverse their lives and follow me as I asked you that first day by this very lake. “Yes, Lord, you know I love you.”

You would think his point had been made. Troubling it can be, but Jesus never gives up asking and calling.

A Second Time

Jesus asks Peter not only if but how much Peter loved him. And again, Peter’s response was the same. God, I love you as much as I can love, love for you and what you are in your Son, Jesus. I love you for what you have taught me about you and what you have done in my life. For when I follow you, my world is better for it. You show me how to avoid bringing trouble upon myself through negative choices, and you show me how to serve others in their trouble. Isn’t that enough? Why ask that I love you more than these, the lives you have given to me to share with you?

Jesus understands. Peter has been through a lot, and the trouble he’s known has worn him hard. Maybe there’s only so much a person can give, only so much you can ask of someone. “Then take care of my sheep,” Jesus tells him once more.

Not Letting Go

But again, Jesus insists, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was “grieved” that Jesus had asked him three times, grieved in the need of Jesus’ emphasis and grieved that he could only give so much. “You know everything. You know I love you.” The grace of God was large enough to love him even now just the way he was. This third time, Jesus instead asks for what he knows Peter can give, a love that comes from a dedicated life as a soldier fulfills marching orders from a high command. It’s not necessarily a love uniting desire with message and mission, but it’s a step. Full union with God will come another day.

“Then feed my sheep.” For Peter and all those who will take on this trouble in the world, feed my sheep. Feed them with love, feed their basic needs out of the resources I have provided you, feed them with respect and wholeness and these words I have given you. Feed them not with approval for all they say they want but with love that attends their deepest need and desire.

Tell them that the trouble with Jesus reverses all they are for what all they were meant to live, a life that meets the trouble of today by abundant living through love of God and neighbor and the confidence that life in Jesus does not end.

Another day, when old and no longer grasping to control life, Peter will meet trouble in a sacrifice that honors his Lord. But for now, Jesus gives Peter a task that he could live into again, the call which had dragged him in like a net deep fishing for souls.

 “Follow me.”

John 21:1-19