Altered // The Failure - Peter // John 21:1-22

Amen. Amen. Aren't you thankful for the love of Jesus? And if you are, can you pray today?

And man, I love, love, love that song. And not only that, He's loved you, but He's also made a way for you. And I love to be able to worship, hear the Lord together. And that's why we've came and gathered here today. Well, listen, it is so good to see you here at church. In fact, look to your neighbor, say it's good to see you.

All right. And it is beginning to look a lot like Christmas. And I know Pastor David mentioned that. I love this time of year. I'm all in on it. And I'm excited about everything that we have planned over the next several weeks and leading up to Christmas. It's just a great, great time. And it's always an exciting time around Union Grove at this time of year. So I encourage you be as involved as possible and jump all in and connect as deep as you can.

I know sometimes in the month of December, things can be a little bit slower and you're busier. And it's easy sometimes to take a back seat to church and the things that God has for you here. And let me just encourage you as your pastor, stay faithful and as involved as you possibly can during this season. And I believe God wants to do something great. We got a lot of fun things planned over the next several weeks.

And I'm excited about all of it. Well, if you have your Bible today, and I hope that you do, John chapter number 21, John chapter number 21 here today, and hopefully you have tuned in or been a part of our services over the last several weeks. But over the last several weeks, we have been looking at a series that we entitled called Altered, that when you meet Jesus, your life's going to change.

And in every one of these scenarios that we have seen through the Gospel of John, that has been the case that their life will change when they come in contact with Jesus, when they have an encounter with Jesus Christ, their life is going to change. And that's the same for you. And so we've looked at seven. In fact, this is the final week in the series. Next week, we will be in a Christmas series taking us all the way through Christmas time, called the gift. And I encourage you to be a part of that over the next several weeks.

We'll start that next week. But today is the conclusion of a seven week series with all these different individuals through the Gospel of John. So here's the one just to give you a little backstory. We looked at the skeptical. That was Nathaniel, we looked at those who are curious. That was Nicodemus, John chapter three. Then we went to the outcast, if you remember, john chapter four, the Samaritan woman, how Jesus must needs go through Samaria. Then we looked at the sinful, that was the adulterous woman. And then we looked at the blind man.

Last week to get when we were together, we looked at the doubter that was Thomas. And then today, we are going to look at the failure. And I hate to call it that, but we're going to call it that today because I think it'll make sense as we jump into this, the failure, and we are going to look at the life of Peter, the life of Peter. Now, I want you to know up front as we kind of jump into God's Word here today from john chapter 21, that this story is a bit different than some of the other stories in the series. Several weeks of this series, when they encounter Jesus, they needed to believe for salvation for salvation. This story, Peter was already a believer, he was already a follower of Jesus. And so he was a Christian. But yet there was still an encounter with Jesus that matters so much to his faith journey here in john chapter number, number 21.

So if you remember, last week, we were in john chapter 20. And we saw Thomas and, and Jesus had had resurrected from the dead. He had shown himself to the disciples all together. And then they were together, you know, a whole another week later, and Thomas happened to not be with him the first time and he actually was with them the second time and, and all of them the first time that they were together told Thomas like, Hey, Thomas, we had seen the risen Jesus, we've seen the Lord. What did Thomas say? Thomas said, Hey, I'm not going to believe it until I have, you know, touched the palm of his hands and, and everything like that. Well, then a week later, he reveals himself again. And he reveals himself to the disciples and Thomas is with them. And he has this moment where he moves from this unbelief to, to believe and he recognizes God as Lord, and just an incredible moment. And then at the end of that, john, he makes this statement in verse number 31 of john chapter 30. He says these are written in other words, all these stories that I have just, you know, recorded for you.

They're written that you might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you might have life through his name. It's easy to see chapter 20. And just assume, hey, the book should be over.

Right? That's kind of a concluding thought, right? That john, he's like, hey, all these things that I've written to you, so that you can believe on the name of Jesus, it's easy to look at that and think, hey, everything's been done, Jesus has revealed himself to his disciples, he's revealed himself a couple of different times, and he's resurrected, the work is finished, this has to be has to be it. But as you come to the last chapter of this book, chapter number 21, that we're going to look at today, there's still one person that has not been restored back to the Lord, and his name is his name is Peter. Now, in the Gospels, Peter is mentioned a lot. In fact, Peter kind of has a very up and down experience with God. And I think that's why so many of us resonate with Peter, right? And I love looking at Peter's life, because it makes me kind of sometimes feel a little bit better about my my falls, right? And my struggles from time to time, if you look throughout Peter's life in the Gospels, there were some times where it seemed like he had just this ginormous faith in God, and that he was able to, you know, trust God, no matter what the case. And then there was other times where, you know, he struggled to even believe or struggle to even place his faith in God. And so Peter, we see his life, you know, he walked on water. And then when he took his eyes off of Jesus, what happened? He sank. He cut off a man's ear. You remember that? Any of you ever done that before?

All right, then feel you can feel pretty good about yourself. When you look at Peter's Peter's life, he was constantly sticking his his foot in his mouth. How about when Jesus told him to pray and what happens?

He comes back and he finds Peter sound asleep. Right? You ever fallen asleep at a prayer meeting? Right? That's embarrassing. I know I've been there. It's kind of like, my favorite thing is when somebody in a church setting is falling asleep next to me, I let them get into a pretty deep sleep, you know, I try to let it sit for a little bit.

And then I just nudge them and say, hey, they just caught on you to pray, you better stand and pray. Right. And so, but like Peter, he fell asleep while praying.

He was that guy that, you know, struggled in a lot of ways. And then it was kind of, there was this moment in the upper room before Jesus went to the cross. And before he went to the cross, he's predicting some things that are going to happen.

Right? And he's talking about somebody's going to betray me. And think about how devastating if you were in that room and, and, and Peter is there, and he's talking about this and Jesus. And you know what Peter does? Peter stands up and he tells Jesus, he says, listen, these, all the rest of them, all the rest of the disciples, they may deny you, but Jesus, I'm never going to deny you.

I'd never do that. In other words, like I'm going to trust in you until the very end, they may leave you, they may deny you, but Jesus, not, not me. So you see, Peter, he has this incredibly good, good start, right? He has this great start, but then we know the story of Peter that Jesus even said, hey, Peter, you know, before the night, before the, the rooster crows, you're going to deny me three times. And so Peter finds himself that night, you know, he's by the fire and these people are coming by him and saying, you know, hey, weren't you with this man? Don't you know this man? And three different times, Peter says, I've never seen him before in my life.

I don't know him. And then Jesus dies. And that's the last moment of Peter's journey until chapter number 21, which is what we are going to see, Peter's interaction with him. And if you imagine, as we jump into the, the story, imagine how Peter feels.

Humiliated, embarrassed, like a big failure, right? Have you ever, have you ever been there? You don't have to raise your hand, but have you ever just felt that way? Like you, you felt like you could never, maybe, maybe you made a decision at a camp or a conference or a church service or revival, and you made a decision and, and then you made and there were, I mean, you meant it, you were sincere and you said, God, I want you to work this out of my life for God. I'm going to go do this or, or God, I'm going to stop doing this through your power and your strength inside of me.

And then next thing you know, it's like now months, maybe years even have passed and you've kind of gone right back to the same thing that, that you said or promised and vowed to leave behind. And, and you might be sitting here today like, man, God could never use me because of what I've done. Or some of you might have things in your life today that nobody else in this room knows about.

Nobody else. In fact, it makes you scared to death that anybody would ever find out what you are involved in. And you have feelings like, no, God could never use me. I'm a failure. I'm embarrassed. I'm humiliated. God could never use me again.

Or possibly you've just made some mistake in your life and you feel like this is it. God cannot use me. Peter had denied Jesus three times. Think about that.

Think about that. As Jesus, you know, had talked about him, his death so many times with Peter up to this point, and he'd left everything to follow him. And then just hanging around a campfire type setting, people are like, wait a second, I've seen you with him. And he's like, whoa, no, no, no, I got the wrong guy.

Never seen him before. Three different times. And then we jump into John chapter 21. It says this, verse number one, after these things, Jesus showed himself again to the disciples at the sea of Tiberius and on this wise showed he himself. There were together Simon Peter and Thomas called Didymus and Nathaniel of Canaan and Galilee and the sons of Zebedee. And then there were two other of his disciples. We don't know who they are.

And by the way, that was, you know, you, if you were one of those, wouldn't you hate to not even have your name mentioned there in that verse? I think it's funny, you know, you got Simon Peter, you got his full name, right? You got Thomas and his nickname. You got Nathaniel and he even gets where he's from, right?

And a lot about him. And then you have two other guys there. It's like, it's like if somebody, you know, you ever taken a picture with somebody and they posted on like Facebook and they don't tag you, but they tag everybody else around you. You ever been there and you feel like, should I tag myself?

I feel like these two people are probably like feeling like a little left out here. But verse number three, Simon Peter sayeth unto them, I go a fishing. So he's going fishing. They say unto him, you can tell he's from Davidson County with the way that he talks.

I go a fishing. They say unto him, that's a joke. We also go with thee.

They went forth and entered into a ship immediately. And that night they called nothing. Now there's a lot of commentators about that specifically, you know, you can read and see a bunch of different things about this verse. A lot of people think the reason that this is put in there that John recorded this particular instance is because this is a sign that Peter is kind of so discouraged with what he had left in his relationship with God and denying him that now he's just going, you know, he's just going back to everything he had originally left be left behind. And I think you could make a case for that.

We're not going to spend a whole lot on there. But what I will tell you this is if if that is true, that that is the reason why he's going a fishing is that the reason that they called nothing is because everything when you choose to follow Jesus, everything that you do leave behind will always leave you unfulfilled. And that's what he finds here. That's what he finds. He's out there fishing. And here he is, they fish for all this time.

And he's finding himself they've caught absolutely nothing. And it's a reminder that many of you have chosen to follow Jesus. And in order to follow Jesus, we got to leave this life behind. And when you go back to that, here's what you're going to find every single time.

unfulfillment every single time it cannot fulfill you. So they're out there, they've called absolutely nothing. But verse number four, when the morning was now come, Jesus stood on the shore. But the disciples knew not that it was Jesus. So so he's on the shore and verse number five, Jesus calls out to them. And he says, children have any meat?

They answered him no. He said to them, cast the net on the right side of the ship, and he shall find they cast therefore and now they were not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes. So so you have this incredible, incredible story.

So I want you to see the picture here. So they're out there at this out at sea in this boat. And and they're fishing. And remember this, they were professional fishermen, this is what they did, you know, before they chose to follow Jesus. So they knew what they were doing, right.

And now this person, which we know him, Jesus, but they didn't know it was Jesus. So they're in the boat, and they have no idea who's on the shore. And all of a sudden, this man's on the shore, yelling, Hey, kids, these are grown men. And not only that, he says, Hey, kids, you got any you got any fish? And then you know, like any other fishermen, you know, you're embarrassed by that, right? How many of you like to fish?

Raise your hand. Okay. And, and listen, I'm not a fisherman. I mean, I'm the guy if you ever say, Hey, Pastor, I want to spend some time with you. Let's go out and fish together.

Listen, I will go with you. I'm not the most patient in the world. But I'm the guy that's always hung up. You know, I'm kind of like, Hey, my line's hung again.

Can you help me out? You know, I'm that guy. Okay. And so, but here's the thing. They're out there.

They knew what they were doing. And here's this man. Hey, hey, you guys caught anything? They're like, No, we haven't. And here's what he says. He says, Have you tried casting your net on the other side of the boat?

Now, have you ever like had somebody give you advice on something that you know really well? Right? You know what I think you know what I think about when I read this? It's like this, like, I am a sports fanatic.

Okay. So like when I watch a basketball game, okay, just say that I'm watching the Duke Blue Devils. They don't really know how to play basketball right now. And so but say I'm watching Duke play basketball, right? And it's like my wife comes up to me and she says, Hey, have they tried this? Like, that's how I would feel. It's like, she doesn't watch basketball.

She knows nothing about basketball. And for me, who watches it, like religiously and knows a lot about it, I'm probably not going to take you know, the first thing she wants to say about suggestions, you know, I started coaching here for the first time with our little Patriot basketball league. And if my wife says, Hey, why don't you run this type of thing or whatever? I'm probably going to say, man, that's a great idea. But we're going to go a different direction. Right?

Why? Because they know what you're doing. And that's what they probably felt like. So Jesus is on the shore. And he says, Hey, cast your net on the other side. And they did. And there were so many fish in the net, so much that they couldn't even draw them all together.

They couldn't even get them inside the boat. Verse number seven. Therefore, that disciple whom Jesus loves saith unto Peter, it is the Lord. Now, when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he girded fishes code unto him for he was naked and did cast himself into the sea.

So it's like morning time, they're done. He's cleaning himself off. He's kind of he's laid aside his coat over here. And he's kind of cleaning himself off because it's been a long night there at sea. And the other disciples came in a little ship, for they were not far from land, but as it were 200 cubits, dragging the net with fishes. So so you have this scene that that here, Jesus, they recognize Jesus for who it is. And what happens is Peter, like, leaps out of the boat, leaps out of the boat, grabs his coat and like, I'm going that they were, they were pretty close to shore. And they were in a boat.

Like, don't you think that'd been the better decision? Just Hey, hey, guys, can you just take the trolling motor and send me on to shore? I want to, I want to get close to Jesus. What's interesting about the story is we know this has happened before to the disciples, right?

Right. Remember, it's happened another time and the other Gospels record this. And, and here's the thing, the other time that this happened for Peter, is Peter fell down on his face in front of the Lord when this happened when they had all this, and he fell down on his face.

And he said, God, I'm not even worthy to be in your presence to part from me. In other words, like the first time that this happened for Peter, he was there and, and it drew him to where, man, I am distant from who God really is. But here in this story, when Jesus did this and revealed himself after the resurrection, it drew Peter close so much to the point that he was willing to send himself out of the boat and jump into the sea in order to get close to Jesus. Verse number nine, as soon as they were come to land, they saw a fire of coals there and fish laid thereon and bread. Jesus said, got this breakfast together for them and, and he saith unto them as they get to shore, hey, bring of the fish, which you have now caught. Simon Peter went up and drew the net to land full of great fishes, 153 for all there were so many, for all there were so many, yet was not the net broken. So they, they like bring all these, these fish and they're carrying it. I mean, 153 fishes is a lot of fish and they're kind of dragging it up if you would, to Jesus working religiously to get all of those fish up there. Verse number 12, Jesus saith unto them, come and dine.

In other words, come and, come and get you some breakfast. And none of the disciples durst ask him who art thou, knowing that it was the Lord. They all knew at this point that it was God. And then Jesus then cometh and taketh bread and giveth them and fish likewise. This is now the third time that Jesus showed himself to his disciples. After that he was risen from the dead.

So when they had dined, and this is where it gets real, remember all those feelings of Peter. Denied Jesus after he made this huge scene. I would never ever deny you, the rest of these disciples, I can't vouch for them, they might leave you, they might deny you, but Jesus, I would never do that.

And then later, acted like he didn't even know him, three different times. Jesus is going to restore Peter here. He says this, verse number 15. So when they had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of John, loveth thou me more than these. He saith unto him, yea Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, feed my lambs. Verse number 16. He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, loveth thou me. He saith unto him, yes Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, feed my sheep.

Verse 17. He saith unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, loveth thou me. And Peter, I think Peter's getting it. I think Peter in this moment, when it says that he was grieved, I think he was somewhat like, yes, I get it, Lord.

I'm understanding. Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, loveth thou me. And he said, or he said unto him, Lord, thou knowest all things, thou knowest that I love thee. And Jesus saith unto him, feed my sheep. Jesus continues, verily, verily, I say unto you, when thou was young, thou girdest thyself, thou walkest whither thou wouldest, but when thou shalt be old, and get this, this is so good and so important. Jesus is prophesying about how he's gonna, how Peter's gonna die.

Thou shalt be old, thou shall stretch forth thy hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry there thee whither thou wouldest not. This spake he, signifying by what death he should glorify God, and when he had spoken this, he saith unto him, follow me. Then Peter, verse number 20, turning about, seeth the disciple whom Jesus loved, following, which also leaned on his breast at supper, and said, Lord, which is he that betrayeth? Peter seeth him, saying to Jesus, Lord, what about this man, John?

What about him? Jesus said unto him, if I will that he tarry till I come, what is it that to me? Follow thou me, Peter. Then went this saying abroad among the brethren, that the disciple should not die. Yet Jesus said not unto him, he shall not die, but if I will that he tarry till I come, what is it that to, to thee?

Here's the idea, and I'm gonna give you just a few things. I think the story speaks to itself, that there, there's a lot of us who have made mistakes in our walk with Christ, and, and there's a lot of us, and, and I'm right there with you, who have struggled, right, in their relationship with Christ. I mean, even the apostle Paul, you know, what did the apostle Paul say? He said that the things that he wants to do, he just can't find himself doing, and the things that he hates, he finds himself doing. Listen, from time to time, there's, there's times in your life and, and pitfalls and struggles that, that you find yourself in, and, and in your relationship with Jesus under the conviction of the Spirit. Sometimes it's, it's painful, right? If you've ever wronged the Father, that is painful. We grieve over those things. Sometimes we're humiliated by the decisions that we have made.

Even the private ones, but especially the public ones, that everybody knows. And, and it hurts us when we fail in our relationship with, with God. But if I can share three things about what Jesus does for us here in this story about this idea, this is really the big idea that I want you to drive on. If you forget anything that I say, here's what I want you to remember, that for your life, if you're a believer in here today, and you know Jesus as your Savior, you've trusted in him, your eyes have been open to the Gospel at some point. Listen, regardless, if you're in here today and you've walked in and you're carrying weight and you're a failure and you feel like you've messed up badly, and that Jesus could never use you, he could never love you, you can never do anything for him, you can never be a part of his mission, anything like that, if that's you here today and you're feeling that, I want you to know this, that failure does not have to be final in your life.

Failure does not have to be final in your life. We can go out and screw our life up and yet Jesus is still there ready and welcoming us back to the fold. It's like the prodigal son. We love that story, right?

Right? He has those two sons and, and one of them, you know, grabs his inheritance, he wants it, he doesn't really care one thing about his father, he goes and he squanders every bit of his life, everything, and then he comes to the end of himself and that's it, and he runs back to God, or he runs back to his dad, and his dad has been waiting on him, sees him in the midst of his mess, knowing that he's done some pretty wicked, vile, terrible things, and his dad leaps and runs to greet him, throws a party for him, and forever forgives him. Listen, failure for the Christian does not have to be final in your life. It doesn't have to have the final word, and that's what Jesus is trying to teach Peter here. It doesn't have to end with, with this denial. So you say, what does Jesus do?

If that's where you are today, listen, here's what I want you to know about our God. Number one, God pursues us in our failures. He pursues us in the midst of our failures. You know, when we do wrong, what, what's typically the thing that we are drawn to do?

We run, right? It's like, it's like your kids. When they're little and they've wronged you, a lot of times they go in hiding.

You know what I'm saying? It's like you got to find them. When you notice a mess or a problem, you got to go chase them down to find them, because a lot of times when we do something wrong, the natural tendency of our heart is we want to go in hiding. Remember in Genesis chapter number three? Remember when Adam and Eve, what did they do?

They went and hid, right? That's what, what we want to do, because that's the natural tendency of any of us when we have wronged our Father. And for some of you today, that's what, what you're doing. You feel that because you have done something wrong in your life, you've failed, you've gone back on a, on a decision at some point that you had made, and you've kind of backslidden and, and you've ran the opposite way. For some of us, we think that the only solution to our brokenness and to our failure is to keep distance from God. And that's where some of you are at right now. You've backed away from Bible fellowship.

You're like, I don't want to be a part of that. I want to, I want to get as far away from the things of God as I possibly can, because I don't want anybody to know what I have done. Let me tell you this, that distance is dangerous. That, that for some of you that want to get as far away from those things and you want to disconnect all together, listen, distance from God and the things of God is always dangerous for your relationship with God.

Always. I'm not, I'm not really ever as a pastor, and I mean, there's probably exceptions to this rule, but as a pastor, I've never seen a lot of, you know, success stories by getting further and further away. But I've heard a lot of really bad stories of people who distanced themselves from the things of God. And so it's easy for us when we fail to get as far away from the things of God as we can. And so it's easy for us when we fail and when we do something wrong to get away from God and to run the other way. And in essence, that could be what Peter was experiencing and what he's doing.

But here's what I want you to know about your life. If you're a failure here today and you're broken and you've come in here thinking God can never use me. I want you to know that today God is on the shore of your heart, just like he was for Peter. He was on the shore right there waiting and pursuing him where he was. Listen, God's on the shore.

He's calling out to us. He's calling out to you today, telling you that, listen, failure, it doesn't have to be final in your life. It doesn't have to be final in your life.

It doesn't have to have the final word in your life. Failure's not it for you. There's more. There's more. So what you learn about our God is he pursues us in the midst of our failures. He pursues us. He's standing there and he's standing there on the shore calling out to you and to me to come back home.

Number two, what we find about our God is this. God provides rest for your soul. You know, for some of you when you've done something wrong, your heart is restless, right? You know it and you try to justify it a lot of different ways. Try to blame.

Maybe you try to run. We do a lot of things and I'm right there with you. I do all those things and I put all these things around my life trying to trying to justify what I have done wrong in my life and what I'm in essence trying to do is I'm trying to fix the problem by doing all of these things around me and what I want you to understand about this story is that Jesus, when you choose to run back to him and choose to accept the truth that he's there waiting on you and pursuing you right where you are in the midst of your failure, there's an invitation on his side to come and dine with him. To come and dine. In other words, hey come and come and have breakfast. The significance here is, in other words, the rest that Peter's soul needed, the forgiveness that Peter's soul needed, the love that Peter's soul needed, everything that his soul was looking for was found in companionship with Jesus Christ.

Everything. And so if you're in here today and and you are on the outside and you've been you've been running from God because of failure in your life, let me tell you this, there's an invitation from Jesus to you to find rest for the soul that you look for. In verse number nine, here you see it, there was a fire made. Remember when Peter denied Jesus? He was around the fire. He was around the fire when people asked him and said, hey don't you, aren't you with this guy? Don't you know Jesus, the prisoner that's about to be crucified? Peter's like, I've never seen him before. And now Jesus has this fire made.

There was fish cooking, the bread was ready, everything. And I want you to know that when you decide to return to him, what you find is rest for your soul. I want to encourage, and you might not be in this boat today, but if you are in this boat like where Peter was, where you're running, you just don't want to return.

You're thinking, man God can never use me where I'm at. I've done some things that I know that the scripture tells me not to do. I've gone back on the decisions that I've made to trust Christ and to live for him and to walk with him and I've found myself far, so far from God.

Yeah, maybe I come to church, but I've distanced myself from everything else and the people that want what's best for me. The invitation today is come unto him and you can find everything that your soul is looking for right now in the presence of Jesus. The third thing that we find, not only does God restore or does God pursue us, he provides rest for our soul, but then you see that God restores us. And this is the beauty of the gospel, is that God is in the restoring business.

Aren't you thankful for that? God is in the restoring business. God is in the reconciliation business. God is in the business of making things right with us. And by the way, we should be that way with others.

As Christians, you know, that means Christ-like, right? In the same way that Christ has treated every single one of you, you should treat everybody else. That's why as a pastor, I'm always, you come to me with a problem. Here's my first thing, is you need to go to that person and try to reconcile that and restore that relationship.

That's always the first thing. Like avoiding it, that is the opposite of what you see in the gospel. That's why it blows my mind where people, that they have problems in local churches all the time, and I've seen it time and time again when there's conflict.

And anytime we put 400 people in a church together, there's going to be disagreements, there's going to be conflict. But here's what I see time and time again in churches and for Christians, is like we rather avoid the problem than actually look somebody in the eye and say, I reconcile and restore. You see what Jesus does throughout the gospel is he's teaching us that the right way is to restore the relationship, to reconcile the relationship.

Not to harbor bitterness, not to go around and talk about it with everybody else, not to gossip, not to run from it, but to look somebody in the eye and make something right. That's what we, we're more like Christ-like when we restore relationships than about anything else. Because that's what God's doing with us. That's what God's doing. Remember, we were born into this world as sinners, alienated from God, with absolutely nothing in ourselves to ever be able to get us to him.

So God sent his son Jesus to die for us on a cross, and what that cross did for you, it bridged the path so that now we can be reconciled with the father. Aren't you thankful that Jesus didn't just say, hey listen, they're not worth it. I'm not gonna die for them. I'm just gonna die for these people over here. But yeah, that's exactly how we treat other Christians all the time.

Just run the other way. Listen, Jesus died so that you could be reconciled and restored back to the father. So you see here in this story, verse number 15, when Jesus is saying to him, hey Peter, do you love me? He asked him three times.

You know the significance of that. Peter had just denied Jesus three different times, and now here Jesus is responding back to him three times with a question. It doesn't get more clear than that. It says, do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me?

Peter, frustrated after the last one, as you can imagine, and probably so grieved in the spirit. God, you know all things. Of course you know.

Of course you know that I love you. You know what God was telling Peter? He's telling Peter, listen Peter, here's what I want you to know. You denied me, but I've never given up on you. I've never given up on you.

Everybody else might have given up on you. The rest of the disciples, they might have given up on you because of you denying. They might, listen, you were humiliated, and yeah you're embarrassed, but Jesus teaching Peter here, he wanted to teach us something that God has never and will never give up on us.

He still has a purpose for our life, and that's what he does. He tells him to feed his sheep. Here's the most amazing thing about this story, is that Peter denied Jesus, and yet Jesus still wants to use Peter to be a part of the mission that God came to seek and to save that which is lost. In fact, Peter's the very one that God says, you know, I'm going to build my church, and if you look through the book of Acts, I know we see, you know, the apostle Paul, when he gets saved and is the greatest church planter, but you know who God really used to kick-start the church?

It was the guy who denied him three times. The guy who said the very night that Jesus died, the guy that said, no, don't recognize him, never seen him before. That's the one that Jesus chose to start the church and to extend the gospel across cultural and racial barriers to eventually get to you and to me. Listen, God restores us. He's in the restoring business for you and for me, and not only that, once you come to him and realize that he's on the shore waiting for you for forgiveness and rest for your soul, when you run back to him, here's the awesome thing, he invites you to be a part of the mission.

In other words, he has a purpose for your life that he still wants you to accomplish. And then the capital off, in verse number 18 and 19, he encourages Peter with this. He's telling Peter that one day, like in verse number 19, you can see it, this spake he's signifying by what death he should glorify God. If you look at verse 18, he says that one day you're going to be old, you're going to stretch forth thy hands, and another person's going to gird thee and carry thee whither thou wouldst not. In other words, he's saying this, Peter, look, yes, you denied me. Yes, you said, I don't know you three different times, but I'll tell you this, it's almost as if God is saying, or Jesus is saying this, that the promise that you broke to me, one day you're going to make good on that promise. We know that Peter went to die and got crucified upside down because he felt like he wasn't worthy to die the same way that Jesus did. He's saying, one day, Peter, you're going to be nailed to a cross and still, even then, you will not deny me.

What an amazing restoration. Listen, failure does not have to be final in your life. You say, God was telling Peter, Peter, you said you would sacrifice it all for me. You said that you'd leave everything and you'd never deny me. And I'll tell you this, in our own self, Peter, by himself, he can't.

He can't go back. He has to have God, and so God is in essence telling him, I sacrificed it all for you so that you, through my power, can sacrifice it all for him. Listen, that's the Lord that we serve. So I want to ask you, where are you at today? Are you where Peter is?

Seriously, are you where Peter is? Did you just come to church because this is routine and you're so far from God? Like, you can't even remember the last time that God got a hold of your heart.

You can't remember the last time that God spoke directly to you. You just come out of routine now and there's nothing in your life and you're just running from it. You've backed away from everything good in your life because of something that you have done. Listen, the enemy's scheme is to encourage all of us to go back to those things, to run away when we fail. You're never going to be used again.

Things like that. That's what the enemy always wants for us. And here's the thing, Jesus today, is waiting on the shore of your heart and he's inviting you to find rest and to find forgiveness and to be restored again to the mission that he has called all of us to. Failure does not have to be final for those who know Jesus.

Can we bow our heads today? Listen, I know this is a direct message and it's embarrassing almost for some of you to even, it's embarrassing for some of us to even admit that maybe you're where Peter's at. Maybe that's where you are today, but listen, I know that you're not where you are today. Maybe you're where Peter's at. Maybe that's where you are today, but listen, I want you to be honest before God here today and I want to pray for you. I'm not going to embarrass you. I'm not.

I'm not going to call you by name. I'm not going to do any of those things, but I want you to know if that's where you are today, that you can find reconciliation and restoration for your soul. If you're in here today and you say, pastor, that's where I'm at, I'm kind of far from God. I can't remember a time where I really, God was doing something special in my life. I've kind of ran from all of those things. I've failed.

I've gone back on maybe some things that you've promised or some decisions that you've made that God's done in your heart and you've kind of ran all the way back away from that. You've went back to your old life and if you're in here today, nobody's looking around, nobody's looking around, but if that's where you are today, I want you to be honest with me. Would you just slip up your hand high enough for me to see it, long enough for me to recognize? Do not be embarrassed, but if that's where you are, yes, I see that. Yes, I see that hand. Thank you for your honesty.

Several hands going up. Yes. If that's where you are today, listen, I'm not going to embarrass you, but here's what we can do. This is so good. We can learn from Peter. Peter denied Jesus.

I mean, it's, that's pretty bad, but yet Peter realized here in this story that Jesus is pursuing us when we need to be restored. He's on the shore of your heart today and listen, you today can run to him and find forgiveness and rest. Everything you're looking for everywhere else, you can find it in Jesus.

He can fulfill every need of your heart. Would you please stand with me, everybody? Heads bowed, still looking, nobody looking around. I want to pray for these and then we're going to have a time of invitation and if you raised your hand, maybe you need to come. I know we don't have the steps up here, so it's a little harder, but if you need to come down front and pray or we got Pastor David down here, my wife's down here, we'd love to pray with you and to help you. We are here for you and listen, just like Jesus is in the reconciliation business, that's what we are as a church. We rejoice in anybody getting reconciled to the family of God or to a relationship with God, so I'm going to ask, I'm going to include you in this closing prayer and then the music will play for a few minutes. Father, we love you. I pray for these that have raised their hand, that they can find forgiveness, that they can find reconciliation in you. God, give them the courage to respond.

Give them the courage to make a decision here today in their heart to come back to you. Bless in this invitation time, for it's in your name. As the music plays, God speaks, you come. If you need prayer, we'd love to pray with you.