Recognize the Lord

We are in the second week of our sermon series where we are focusing on ways in which the Lord can be revealed to us. We are allowing the Gospel of John to help us discover how God is at work in us and through us. This week we turn towards “Recognizing the Lord.” Our scripture comes from John 21:1-9.

21 Afterward Jesus appeared again to his disciples, by the Sea of Galilee. b It happened this way: 2 Simon Peter, Thomas (also known as Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other disciples were together. 3 “I’m going out to fish,” Simon Peter told them, and they said, “We’ll go with you.” So they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. 4 Early in the morning, Jesus stood on the shore, but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus. 5 He called out to them, “Friends, haven’t you any fish?” “No,” they answered. 6 He said, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” When they did, they were unable to haul the net in because of the large number of fish.

7 Then the disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord!” As soon as Simon Peter heard him say, “It is the Lord,” he wrapped his outer garment around him (for he had taken it off) and jumped into the water. 8 The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net full of fish, for they were not far from shore, about a hundred yards. 9 When they landed, they saw a fire of burning coals there with fish on it, and some bread.

Please pray with me…

We find a fishing story at the beginning and at the end of the story of the disciples life with Jesus here on earth. Some of them receive their calling while by the seashore and today we have John ending his Gospel and the ministry of Jesus on earth with the disciples by the seashore.

Last week we had the disciples receiving the Holy Spirit. The problem they are facing is that they don’t know what to do with it. “Thanks Jesus but what are we supposed to do now? We have heard of the Spirit of God but how are we supposed to use it.”

They also may be wondering where Jesus is. He leaves them but where did he go? Is he still on earth or did he go somewhere else? They were trying to figure out what to do next. When in doubt, during times of the unknown, during times of fear and anxiety what we tend to do is go back to where we are comfortable.

That leads Peter to decide that he is going to go fishing and we have the other disciples decide that they don’t have anything better to do so they decide to join him. We will find ourselves in times of struggle or stress going back to what we know.

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Depending on what that crutch is for you this can be a good decision or a detrimental one to your well-being. When life is overwhelming, we go towards things that are easy for us. Things that are second nature.

This can sometimes mean destructive behaviors. Behaviors that we believe have helped us in the past. A focus on alcohol, drugs, self-harm. We can end up heading in that direction because this has been a numbing agent for us in the past.

It is true that we may believe that these behaviors help us and they might in the short-term but in the end, they will push us farther away from God and healing from our hurts. Before we know it, we are asking the question “how did I end up here again?”

We need to try to remember how these ways of dealing with problems have harmed us in the past. We need to seek help and search for better ways such as fishing to help us when we face times of anxiety and loss.

We need to remember that God will be there for us no matter what is going on in our lives. He wants us to recognize that he there for us through the good, the bad and the ugly. We need to be willing to let him in and trust in him.

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This does not mean it is going to be easy. It will often be difficult to break away from these methods that we have used in the past to kill the pain we are feeling inside us. We may need to turn to human help outside of only trying to rely on God alone.

We have groups around us such as AA and Alanon. There is a group some find helpful called Celebrate Recovery. You may find yourself in need of a counselor to allow you to discover the deeper problem which leads you down that same path over and over again.

God has provided ways for us to get the help but many times we struggle with understanding that we do need help. We see ourselves living good lives as we are, so we don’t recognize the ways we are not fully connecting to God and those around us.

John Ortberg in his book “Steps” offers up that there is no one that is perfect and therefore each person needs to quit trying to make it on their own. He wants us to be willing to ask for help from God regarding our areas of weakness.

He goes on to say that we are unable to “fix, manage, and control our own lives.” We need to be willing to allow God to do the work within us with us. We need to be willing to turn our lives over to him.

The church hopefully can be a safe place for you to tell others about what you are going through and allow you to receive support. Ask for God to put people in your life to help you find better ways to help you overcome what you are facing.

(Transition)

When we return back to our text, we find the disciples fishing the night away and looking on the seashore as the sun rises and they see a lone figure by a fire. They were probably thinking of joining him even before they knew who he was. They were hungry, tired, and had nothing to show for it.

In case you haven’t noticed every fishing story we find in scripture we have no fish being caught before Jesus intervenes. It makes me wonder how good of fishermen these people were. Maybe Jesus was doing them a favor by offering them a new occupation.

The thought is that God prevented them from being able to catch any fish in order to allow what takes place to occur. We have God setting up the parameters that will allow Jesus through only his voice cause a miracle. The disciples go from no fish to too many fish.

We need to believe that God will do the same for us. I am not much of a fisherman but if I fish again, I will just say that God prevented me from catching any fish.  He must be setting up the parameters for some miracle. That is my story and I am sticking to it.

We have John or as he calls himself, the disciple whom Jesus loves, able to recognize that the person by the fire was Jesus. He is closer to Jesus than the rest of the disciples, so he recognizes him first. That is John’s story, and he is sticking with it.

John may have been first, but we have Peter reacting to the news in a way that shows he wants to get to him first. Peter doesn’t wait for the boat to get to the shore. He jumps out of the boat so that he can get to Jesus right away.

We have these two individuals reacting differently to seeing Jesus. John just points out it’s him while Peter wants to get to him. That shows the difference in their personalities and relationship with God. John is happy just knowing that he is loved by Jesus. Peter wants to be the first to be next to Jesus.

Neither of these two reactions are wrong. We are each unique in the way that God created us. Each one of us have our own ways in which we interact with God and those around us. God will use our unique gifts to help us become the person that he desires for us to be.

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We have a God that desires to help us be successful when we are following his will, but we have to be open to the ways that he is attempting to help us. We need to recognize and thank God for helping us.

There maybe more but here are three ways that God helps us be the person that he desires for us to be. They are that he has given us the gifts needed for us to succeed, he has placed people around us to help us succeed, and he will do for us what we need him to do for us to succeed.

We are each unique in the way that God created us. Each one of us have our own ways in which we interact with God and those around us. God will use our unique gifts to help us become the person that he desires for us to be.

The first person that we find within scripture that was filled with the Holy Spirit was a man named Bezalel. He was given the task to be in charge of building the Tent of Meeting while the Israelites were in the wilderness.

The Tent of Meeting is where God would reside during the Exodus. God had a very specific way that he wanted the structure to be built. He filled Bezalel with the Holy Spirit in order to allow him to build the Tent of Meeting as God designed it.

What we can assume is that God had already given Bezalel gifts in the area of building. Most likely these gifts were improved upon during his time in captivity in Egypt. There is a good possibility that he was put in charge of the building projects there which would end up preparing him for this building project for God.

Bezalel’s time in slavery was used to allow for him to serve God in the future. We never know how God is preparing us for serving him. We have to be open to our gifts and when called by God be willing to use them.

What can happen is that we don’t believe that we are good enough to be able to do what God calls us to do. We have doubts about our own gifts. We have to believe that God will help us in our weaknesses. We, like Bezalel, have the Holy Spirit within us to help us as we serve the Lord.

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God will also place people around us to help us. He may not give us all the gifts needed to succeed on our own even with his help. He may attempt to bring people around us that will allow us with their help to succeed.

God knows the areas that we need help. God is able to help us find those that can help us accomplish what God has called for us to do. He is all knowing which allows him to set us up for success.

God had a plan. Jesus would come down to earth to be God among us. He would train a group of people to allow for his message to continue on long beyond his time on earth. We have in the Gospel of Luke Jesus praying before naming his twelve disciples.

His father helped him to choose the twelve that would be the best group to cause his demise, Judas, and then later to allow the message to continue for generation after generation. We need to believe that God will do the same for us.

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There also may be times that God asks for you to be the supporting cast. You are not needed for the lead role but to help someone else fulfill what God has called for them to do. We need to have the humility to fill the role that God needs for us to fill in the moment.

We need to put what may be our own ego on the back burner and allow God to work through us for someone else. We should not do things for God in order to get the credit. We have to be willing to serve God out front or behind the scenes. Our actions need to be for the glory in Heaven not for us to receive glory here on earth.

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God doesn’t only have callings for us as individuals but also for the church. We are a group of people gathered together to help God fulfill the mission that he has for the Church of the Good Shepherd.

It is my belief that God has provided us with the people with the gifts to allow us as a church to fulfill the calling he has for us. We are called to be obedient to what God expects from us. We have a mission that God has given us the gifts to fulfill.

We need to be willing to connect with those in our communities, love all people, and grow in faith together. This means that we need to be in prayer asking for God to help us know how to live out our mission. We need to ask for God to direct people towards our church that have gifts that we need to succeed.

We have to be willing to focus not on what we may want to do. We have to focus on what God is desiring for us to do. We need to make sure that we are not moving in our timing but that we are waiting for God to lead us to where he desires for us to go as a church.

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There also may be times where God reveals himself in such a way that he allows us to succeed or helps us to recognize that he is attempting to have us work with him. God will be the one that will either remove obstacles or create situations that allow us to become who he desires for us to be.

We find this throughout the time of the exodus. We have God parting the Red Sea. We have God providing food for the people when they cry out to him that they are hungry called Manna. We have God providing water from a rock when the people believed they were dying from thirst.

God protected the Israelites and took care of them because in that situation he was the only one who could allow for them to be successful. We may find times in our lives where it will take a miracle for us to also be successful.

(Transition)

We also may find ourselves believing our purpose is one thing and we have God leading us in another direction. We believe we know what God wants us to do but God has a greater plan that he desires for us to follow.

We find an extreme example of this in our first reading. We have a man named Saul who is working towards becoming a Rabbi within Judaism. He is at the stoning of the first Christian Martyr, Stephen. We are told that he agrees with the way Stephen was treated.

Afterwards he seems to be in charge of rounding up the Christians in Jerusalem. We are told that he arrested many of them. He is no longer worrying about the Christians in Jerusalem, most likely that means that he has driven them out or silenced them.

He is moving to a new place that he heard may have a large Christian contingent called Damascus. He goes there for the same reason to arrest and harass Christians. It is when he is almost to the town when God intervenes

He asks Saul why he is doing what he is doing. When he asks who is talking to him Jesus reveals himself to him and orders him to go into the town. We ended our scripture with Paul being blind and following the orders of Jesus.

(Transition)

Saul is who we will eventually know as Paul. He will end up writing a majority of what we call the New Testament. We will have him becoming someone who now instead of mistreating Christians becomes a Christian who is mistreated.

We will most likely not find ourselves receiving a transformation like we find in the case of Paul. But we may find that God is at work and attempting to lead us in a direction that we did not expect to go.

We need to be open to what God is saying to us. We need to recognize the work that God is doing in us, through us, and around us. Let us do all that we can to be the individuals and the church that God desires for us to be.

Let us pray…