What's Next?

John 21:15-22

April 10, 2016 (Confirmation) • Mount Pleasant UMC

Sermon Study Guide

When I stop to think about it, there are, in each of our lives, several significant moments—turning points, you might want to call them, moments when you could go one way or another and your life would be significantly different depending on the choice you make. When I chose to go to Ball State, when I chose my major area of study, when I asked Cathy to marry me, when we both answered calls to our vocations, when we decided to have children…and many, many more moments when a choice one way or the other would have meant a very different life from the one we are now living.

But, in the wake of each of those decisions—and you know what this feels like—there’s always this moment when you can’t help but ask, “What’s next?” I went to Ball State as a journalism major and knew by the end of my freshman year that wasn’t right, so I changed my major to speech communication. And I remember thinking, “What’s next?” My professors kept telling me this major had no practical application—way to sell a major!—and I was still discerning God’s call on my life. After it was clear we were headed into pastoral ministry, we moved to Wilmore, Kentucky for me to attend Asbury Seminary, and once we got the two or three things we owned unpacked in our tiny little 2-room cinder block apartment, I remember wondering, “What’s next?” What would classes be like? Could I actually do this? Just going from a state university to a Christian seminary was quite a world changer, and I had a lot of catching up to do!

I remember bringing Christopher home from the hospital late in the night on his second day of life, and after we laid him in his crib, in the nursery that had been well prepared for his arrival, I sort of watched him sleep, wondering, “What’s next?” Where is the owner’s manual for new children? They really ought to come with one! Can I get an “amen”? And every time we have been appointed to a new church, there is this anxiety that probably comes with every new job, this wondering if it will really work. I remember many such moments last year about this time, as we closed on our home, as we began to move items to Terre Haute, as we began to meet the staff, as we learned the enormity of the rebuild project…and I couldn’t help but wonder, “What’s next?” Or maybe it was more like, “What have I gotten myself into?” Yet, we followed God and the Bishop’s direction and came here, and now, nine months later, I sense and hope you do too that we are headed in very exciting directions.

This morning is sort of a merging of a couple of those sort of moments in the life of Mount Pleasant. Two weeks ago, we opened this beautiful new worship center, accomplishing a goal that you have been pursuing for three years. And there was and has been much celebration and rejoicing. But now as we begin to settle into the regular rhythm of worship and outreach, it’s easy to wonder, “What’s next?” What is God calling us to next? Add to that the celebration we’re having today, Confirmation Sunday. Today, ten youth will confirm their faith and publicly declare their intention to follow Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. Confirmation is a big deal, and it should be, but it’s also “just” one more step on the journey of faith. As we come to this moment in the lives of these youth, we and they should also be wondering, “What’s next?” Where do they go from here? Sometimes, for some folks, Confirmation becomes a sort of ending point; this important moment arrives and sometimes we think this is all there is. But today, for the church and for these youth, we’re really just at a beginning place from which we will live the rest of our lives.

A moment like this was experienced on the Sea of Galilee once. Jesus was risen from the dead, but his appearances to his disciples were intermittent, and must have seemed few and far between. So one afternoon, some of the disciples were hanging out together. If we strictly follow John’s chronology, they might have still been in Jerusalem, a long way from their homes in Galilee. It’s not entirely clear where they are, and yet Peter gets an itch to go fishing. And not just an afternoon of recreational fishing. Peter, in reality, is returning to what he knows. He was a fisherman before Jesus called him to be a disciple, and now he figures since he doesn’t have anything else to do, he’ll go back to what we knows. He’ll return to fishing, which means going back to Galilee. So some of the others go with him, and they fish all night (which is when you fished in those days; fish were more plentiful in the darkness) but this night they catch nothing. A night’s work, and nothing to show for it. In the morning, they hear a man on the shore call to them, encouraging them to fish on the other side of the boat, and when they do, they catch 153 fish. You know they were Methodists because not only did they count the fish, they also had a fish fry right there on the beach!

The man on the shore is Jesus, and Peter realizes that when he sees the fish filling the nets. So Peter does something supremely strange. He puts on his clothes, then he jumps in the water. It’s just a side note, and probably mainly an eyewitness detail, but I can’t help but wonder why he does that. Why put his clothes on before he gets in the water? Perhaps Peter is remembering another time Jesus called to him when he was in a boat, and the last time, Peter walked on the water briefly before he lost faith and sank. I think Peter puts on his clothes because he believes he’s going to walk on the water back to Jesus. This time, he determines, he’s going to do it! Of course, he doesn’t, but after he swims to shore, Jesus already has some fish fried up for them and invites them to bring some of their 153 to add to the breakfast. Once again together, they have a meal of bread and fish (21:1-14).

But it’s what happens after that breakfast that I want to focus on this morning. After the meal, Jesus asks Peter to take a walk with him—or at least that’s the way we picture it. John doesn’t actually say that, but he does say later someone was “following” them, so there is some sort of movement away from the rest of the crowd. Now, had I been Peter, I would be a bit nervous. I mean, Peter was the one who had, true to Jesus’ prediction, denied even knowing Jesus when Jesus was on trial. Now Jesus wants to talk to him alone? Yes, this is the third time Jesus has appeared to him (21:14), but still there had to be some lingering concern. Peter would naturally be tempted to believe he had given up the right or the privilege of any kind leadership (maybe even participation) in this newly forming community (cf. Card, John: The Gospel of Wisdom, pg. 216). And that concern might have been heightened even more when Jesus calls him by his full, pre-disciple name: “Simon, son of John…” (21:15; Fredrikson, Communicator’s Commentary: John, pg. 295). Three times Jesus calls him by that name; that would be the equivalent of those moments when your mother calls you by your full name. You know you’re in trouble then, right?

And then there’s the question Jesus asks. Three times Jesus asks Peter, “Do you love me?” And the first time, he asks, “Do you love me more than these?” (21:15). Have you ever wondered what the “these” is? Is Jesus asking if Peter loves him more than the other disciples do? After all, Peter had dared to say as much, that he would follow Jesus to the death even if the rest fell away (cf. Mark 14:29). Perhaps Jesus is asking, “Do you love me, Peter, more than the rest of these disciples do? Do you still believe that?” Or possibly by “these” Jesus means the boats, fish and the nets? Peter had gone back to his default setting once Jesus wasn’t around all the time. He went back to what he knew. Some people do that today, too. Maybe they don’t “go fishing,” but all too often, especially early in a new Christian’s life, the temptation is always there to go back to an old way of life, even if that way is destructive or harmful. For instance, experts say that an abused woman will leave her abuser seven times before she leaves for good; it’s too easy to go back to what she knows even if it’s unsafe. The same is true in many other situations because temptation is always there to go back to old ways of life, even if they are harmful. Perhaps Jesus is asking Peter, “Do you love me more than your old way of life, Peter? Do you love me more than the fish?” We’re not told what the “these” is, and perhaps John leaves that detail out so we can fill in our own “these.” Because here’s the point: Jesus goes to the heart of Peter’s pain. Jesus focuses on Peter’s broken place. Peter knows what the “these” is in his own life. You do, too. Jesus asks, “Do you love me more than ‘these’? Do you love me? Do you love me?”

Much is made of the fact that Jesus asks Peter the same basic question three times. And the usual explanation is that he asks once for every time Peter denied him, to give Peter a chance to “make up” for every denial. And there may be some truth in that, but then the question that comes to me is if we have to ask forgiveness for the same amount of times we sin, or is God’s grace big enough to cover us no matter how many times we mess up? Jesus forgives us the moment we ask; he doesn’t keep tabs and say, “Hey, wait a minute, you sinned one more time than you asked forgiveness for, so you’ve still got that against you.” It doesn’t seem Jesus works that way; in fact, the thief on the cross, the one Jesus said would be in paradise, didn’t recount all his sins. He simply asked Jesus to “remember him,” and Jesus poured out grace on him (cf. Luke 23:40-43). Perhaps Jesus asked him three times much like we might check and double-check on something. He wants Peter to remember this moment. He wants this to sink in. He wants Peter to understand, to “get it” (cf. Wright, John for Everyone, Part Two, pg. 163).

The beautiful picture I want you to see from this walk on the beach, though, is that at no point does Jesus ridicule or embarrass or put Peter down. To a disciple who feels unworthy now of carrying on the mission, Jesus gives not a put-down nor does he give a pat on the back or an “it’s all right, come on over here and give me a hug.” No, what Jesus gives Peter is a new commission, a fresh challenge, a task to complete. Peter, you’ve been a fisherman, but now you’re going to learn to be a shepherd. “Feed my lambs. Take care of my sheep. Feed my sheep.” Now that Jesus is risen, Peter has a lot of questions. And for every “What’s next?” rattling around in his head, Jesus gives him a direction: feed the young ones, discipline the stubborn ones, tenderly watch over the older ones (cf. Fredrickson 296). Then, after giving Peter a glimpse of what his death will be like (and it won’t be pretty), Jesus reiterates the command one more time, in a slightly different form: “Follow me!” (21:19). Follow the one who is the good shepherd (10:11), the one who laid down his life to protect, save and take care of the sheep (10:15).

I wonder, then, if there was some noise behind them because all of a sudden, Peter notices that he and Jesus are not alone. He turns around and sees that “the disciple whom Jesus loved was following them” (21:20). Almost all scholars agree that this phrase, “the disciple whom Jesus loved,” is John’s way of referring to himself, but let’s not hear that in a bragging sort of way, as if John is saying, “Well, Jesus loved me and he only liked the rest of you.” Instead, let’s hear that as John’s way of not putting the spotlight on himself but on Jesus. It’s really as if he’s saying, in amazement, “I can’t really believe Jesus loved and loves a guy like me, but he does, it seems. I am a disciple Jesus loves, and that’s pretty amazing.” In that respect, we could all use that phrase to refer to ourselves, because amazingly enough, he loves me, too. And he loves you. We are disciples whom Jesus loves. Try that on for size—say it with me, “I am a disciple whom Jesus loves.” Turn to your neighbor and tell them, “You are a disciple whom Jesus loves.”

So, then, Peter notices John following behind and instantly that temptation to go back to the old, petty Peter rises up in him. Here he is, on the Galilean beach with the two men who have been like brothers to him (Card 216), Jesus and John, and instantly Peter feels like his “special status” with Jesus is threatened by John’s presence. “Lord, what about him?” Peter asks. I hear that statement in a whiney, nasally voice, don’t you? “Lord, what about him?” What’s going to happen to him? How often are we like Peter in this regard? It’s so easy for us to want to run other people’s lives, to decide for them how they should respond to Jesus’ call to “follow me” (cf. Fredrickson 297). We certainly do that as individuals. We forget how God has wired each of us differently, so we decide that if someone doesn’t read the Bible just like we do or do their devotions the same way we do or doesn’t worship the same way we do they must not be really following Jesus. But we do that as organizations, or as churches, too. I remember when I was a kid the big controversy in churches were people who were raising their hands to worship, and there were actually discussions I remember about how those folks were just showing off or something like that. “Holy Rollers,” they were called. We stand there, on the Galilean shore, and we say, “Lord, what about them? Surely you don’t love them as much as you do us because we’re doing it right! Right, Lord? Tell me I’m right!” We are so prone to try to run other people’s lives, when all the time Jesus says to us the same thing he says to Peter: “What does it matter to you how I’m working in their lives? You follow me. You just worry about your relationship with me.”

When I was a student at Ball State, I was president of the InterVarsity Christian Fellowship for three years, and in my last year there, we had a drop in participation from previous years. I began to take that personally, and more than that, I began to look around at other campus Christian groups and noticed that many of them seemed to be growing. One, in particular, was sort of a rival to InterVarsity in that we generally appealed to the same sort of students, and when their ministry began to take off, I remember getting frustrated. “What about them, Lord? Why them and not us?” And I can still see the place I was sitting in the Arts and Communication building on a Thursday night when God spoke to my heart and said, “You stop worrying about them. Have you been faithful to do what I asked you to do? Then just follow me and let me take care of the rest.” And I tried. Churches do the same thing, though. We look around and see others growing or reaching people we wish we could reach and we collectively say, “What about them, Lord? Why aren’t you doing such-and-such here?” And Jesus looks back to us, and says, “Haven’t you learned the lesson of the Galilean seashore? You follow me!”

The temptation is always going to be there—the temptation to look around, to compare, to expect God will work here the way he works there. When we ask, “What’s next?” God says to us, “Follow me.” That’s all that’s ever been “next.” Mount Pleasant, our “next” is to follow Jesus faithfully. Do what he’s called us to do. Be who he’s called us to be. And don’t be afraid to take the next step, to move beyond what we’ve always been into who God is calling us to be. I said this two weeks ago, on Easter: the completion of this rebuild project is not an ending, it’s a new beginning. This building is not a resting place, it’s a launching pad, a place from which we go forth into the community to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world. In the coming weeks and months, there are going to be opportunities to reach out beyond these walls and make a difference in the life of this community—don’t miss it! The days when we can sit here and wait for people to come to us are over. Jesus calls us to go; he said, “The harvest is plentiful,” and may the rest of the verse never be said of Mount Pleasant, “the workers are few” (Luke 10:2). Don’t worry what others are doing. Jesus says, “You follow me,” until he tells us to stop.

Confirmands, the same can be said of you. You come here this morning for an important moment in your life. You will stand here this morning and publicly declare your faith in Jesus Christ, that he is and will be your Lord and Savior. “What’s next?” you might ask after this day, so it’s important to remember that, as important as today is, it’s only one more step on the journey. A life of following Jesus is what comes next, a life in which you faithfully follow him wherever he leads. Many of you have already been doing that in different ways, and that doesn’t stop just because you are confirmed. In fact, in some ways, it intensifies after this moment. There is an enemy who does not like it when people stand up and publicly declare they are followers of Jesus, and he will try to distract you, take you back to old habits, or even cause you to look around and wonder, “What about that person over there?” In those moments, listen carefully, for the voice of your savior will whisper to you, “Don’t worry about them. You follow me.” You go and boldly live your faith, share your faith, never be ashamed of your faith. Every once in a while, I see someone post on Facebook or say to me, “You know, the youth are the church of tomorrow.” And, forgive me, but I have to disagree. The youth are the church of today, just as much as we adults are. Together, we need each other to stay on the path of following Jesus. We sharpen each other, spur each other on, and together we are better than we are apart. Remember, confirmands, what Paul told Timothy: “Don’t let anyone look down on you because you are young, but set an example for the believers in speech, in conduct, in love, in faith and in purity” (1 Timothy 4:12).

So, church, here’s what’s next: following Jesus and knowing that even when we’ve let him down or even denied him, he still has work for us to do if we will accept his commission (cf. Wright 165). Here is the secret to the Christian life: love Jesus, follow him, and don’t be distracted by what others might be doing. You follow Jesus. Amen.