Great Wisdom about God from an Eyewitness of Christ

The Gospel of John

John 21:20-25

Sermon by Rick Crandall

Grayson Baptist Church - September 5, 2018

(Revised August 5, 2020)

MESSAGE:

*Please open your Bibles to John 21. This chapter records the third appearance of our Risen Savior after He died on the cross for our sins. This time Jesus appeared to 7 of the original 12 disciples.

*In vs. 1-14, Peter had decided to go fishing in the Sea of Galilee, and six more of the disciples decided to go with him. It was a frustrating trip, because they fished all night and didn't catch a thing. But Jesus appeared on the shore the next morning, and that changed everything!

*At first, they didn't recognize Jesus. But when the Lord gave them a miraculous catch, John did realize it was Jesus, and they all got to shore as soon as they could. Peter even jumped out of the boat and swam! On shore, the Lord had already fixed breakfast for His followers, and I love that part of the story.

*Then in vs. 15-19, breakfast was over, Peter was walking along the shore together with Jesus. And three times the Lord asked Peter this question: "Do you love Me?" Remember that in the hours before the cross, Peter had miserably failed Jesus three times by denying the Lord. Now Jesus gave Peter three opportunities to reaffirm his love for the Lord, and that's what Peter did.

*But don't miss the fact that Jesus is asking the same question to us today: "Do you love Me?" In other words: "Do we love Jesus?" "Do we love God?" This is life's most important question because it is God's greatest commandment.

*As Jesus said in Matthew 22:37-40, "'You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind.' This is the first and great commandment. And the second is like it: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' On these two commandments hang all the Law and the Prophets.''

*Tonight in vs. 20-25, we will finish our verse by verse study of John's Gospel. And in these closing verses John gives us some great wisdom about God.

1. FIRST: WE NEED TO UNDERSTAND THAT GOD GIVES US A LIMITED REVELATION.

*This is part of God's message for us in vs. 20-22:

20. Then Peter, turning around, saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following, who also had leaned on His breast at the supper, and said, "Lord, who is the one who betrays You?''

21. Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, "But Lord, what about this man?''

22. Jesus said to him, "If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow Me.''

*Jesus gave Peter a limited revelation, and that's what God gives to us. He doesn't tell us all, and many times, He doesn't tell us why.

*Jesus almost sounds harsh as He speaks to Peter here, but John Hamby gave us this insight: "Peter was guilty of playing the 'comparison' game, and we like to play it too. We are still tempted today to turn and ask, 'But what about them?'

*Paul warns us about this in 1 Corinthians 10:12, where he said, 'For we dare not make ourselves of the number, or compare ourselves with some that commend themselves: but they measuring themselves by themselves, and comparing themselves among themselves, are not wise.'

*Have you ever been guilty of comparing yourself to some other believers? I suspect that we all have. 'I'm more committed than those slackers.' 'I'm a better preacher than that guy.'

*But God doesn't want us to play the comparison game, and Jesus made the whole matter quite clear to Peter." Again in vs. 22, 'Jesus said to him, "If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow Me."'

*In other words, Jesus said, 'Peter, I have told you my plans for your life. What I choose to do with John is basically none of your business. Peter, you have enough to be concerned about in yourself.' And Christians, so do we." (1)

*God gives us a limited revelation about many things. He doesn't tell us all, and He may not tell us why. He may not tell us all we want to know, but praise the Lord! -- He will certainly tell us all we need to know. And sometimes He will give us amazing revelations, glimpses of glory, so to speak

*I remember how the Lord revealed His will for us before I answered God's call. I had been resisting His call for at least a year, but the Lord would not let me go. I was getting to the point of desperation. I felt like I was going to go crazy if I didn't surrender to the ministry.

*I didn't have anybody to preach to but my wife Mary, and boy did I preach to her! She wanted no part of it at first. I had a good job. We had a nice house, small children, stability.

*My poor mother thought I was going crazy, and so did Mary. But I would preach to my wife and really hammer away. Then we would have a huge argument, and I'd shut up for a couple of weeks. That was about as long as I could go.

*But God was working to reveal His will to Mary too. One Wednesday afternoon we talked about it again. And she said, "IF YOU WANT TO GO TO INDIA TO BE A MISSIONARY. -- FINE! WRITE ME WHEN YOU GET THERE!"

*Later that night at church, the first thing the preacher said was, "Tonight we are going to study the life of William Carey, -- the first modern missionary to India.

*We were worried about being able to sell our house, so we asked a real estate friend from church to come talk about trying to sell it. He called back the next day, and said that he would like to buy our house. It never even went on the market. And by the time we came out here in September of 1983, God had completely convinced Mary that this was His will for our lives. There wasn't a shadow of a doubt.

*God may not tell us all we want to know, but He will certainly tell us all we need to know.

2. HE GIVES US A LIMITED REVELATION. HE ALSO GIVES US A WORTHY OBLIGATION.

*And we see our obligation at the end of vs. 22. There Jesus told Peter: "You follow Me."

*"Follow Me." It's just two little words, but two extremely important words. This original word for "follow" is found 92 times in the New Testament. It's the same word Jesus used in Mark 2:14 when He called Matthew Levi to be His disciple: "And as He passed by, He saw Levi the son of Alphaeus sitting at the tax office, and said to him, 'FOLLOW ME.' And he arose and followed Him."

*The same word is in Luke 9:23, when Jesus spoke to all of His followers and said, "If any man will come after me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and FOLLOW ME." It's the same word Jesus used in John 8:12, when the Lord said: "I am the light of the world. He who FOLLOWS ME shall not walk in darkness, but have the light of life.''

*And it's the same word Jesus used in John 10:2-5 when He said:

2. "But he who enters by the door is the shepherd of the sheep.

3. To him the doorkeeper opens, and the sheep hear his voice; and he calls his own sheep by name and leads them out.

4. And when he brings out his own sheep, he goes before them; and the sheep FOLLOW HIM, for they know his voice.

5. Yet they will by no means follow a stranger, but will flee from him, for they do not know the voice of strangers.''

*Then in John 10:27 Jesus said, "My sheep hear My voice, and I know them, and they FOLLOW ME."

*Just two words: "Follow Me." And the idea is that we keep on following Jesus. Don't stop! Don't quit!

*Christians: We are on the road of life with Jesus. He is moving in our world tonight, and He wants us to move with Him. Move forward in love, faith and compassion for others. That's why Jesus says: "Follow Me!" And we can be inspired by the great heroes who did.

*William Borden was a man like that. In 1904, he graduated from high school as a millionaire, because William was heir to the Borden dairy fortune. For one of his graduation presents, William's parents gave him a 10-month trip around the world. But traveling through Asia, the Middle East, and Europe gave him a burden for the world's hurting people.

*William wrote home and said, "I'm going to give my life to prepare for the mission field." And he wrote two words in the back of his Bible: NO RESERVES.

*After he graduated from Yale, William turned down some high-paying job offers, and he added two more words in his Bible: NO RETREATS.

*Then, when he finished seminary at Princeton, William sailed for China to work with the Muslims there. But he stopped first in Egypt for some preparation. There William was stricken with spinal meningitis, and died within a month.

*Now, William's life may seem like a waste in the eyes of the world. But when his friends leafed through William's Bible they found two more words: NO REGRETS.

*Since then, countless other Christians have been inspired by William Borden's devotion to our Lord:

-NO RESERVES.

-NO RETREATS.

-NO REGRETS. (2)

*May God give us that kind of devotion to His worthy command! Jesus said, "Follow Me!"

3. HE GIVES US A WORTHY OBLIGATION. HE ALSO GIVES US NEEDED CLARIFICATION.

*We see an example in vs. 23, where the Apostle John spoke of himself in the third person, and said, "Then this saying went out among the brethren that this disciple would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, 'If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you?'''

*John inserted a personal note here because he wanted to clarify what really happened. And this reminds us that it's easy for us to misunderstand what's going on around us.

*Communication is difficult. We think we know what going on, but often, we don't. We think we know, but we don't know, so we make all kinds of false assumptions. We misjudge people, and we take what people say in the wrong way.

*The truth is that we never have the whole story about what is going on in someone else's life. Chuck Swindoll got a painful reminder of this truth when he was speaking at a Christian retreat in California.

*The first day, a man came up and told Dr. Swindoll how much he had looked forward to hearing him speak. That evening Swindoll noticed man sitting near the front. But a few minutes into the message, the man was sound asleep.

*Not too encouraging for a preacher, but Chuck thought maybe the man was tired after a long drive and couldn't help himself. Then, the same thing happened the next night and every other night, so Chuck got annoyed with this man who said he 'really' wanted to hear him teach.

*But then, on the last night the man's wife came up and apologized for her husband's lack of attention. She explained that he had recently been diagnosed with terminal cancer. And the pain medication he was taking made him extremely sleepy. But it had been one of his lifelong ambitions to hear Dr. Swindoll speak in person before he died, and now he had fulfilled that goal. (3)

*Imagine how Chuck Swindoll felt when he learned the whole truth.

*We must be careful about jumping to conclusions. We must be careful not to make false assumptions about other people and all kinds of other things too. We need to carefully ask the Lord to give us the understanding we need, so we can keep moving forward with Him.

4. GOD WILL GIVE US THE NEEDED CLARIFICATION. AND HE DESERVES OUR GLORIFICATION.

*This is one of the lessons for us in vs. 24-25, where John said:

24. This is the disciple who testifies of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true.

25. And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen.

*What is John doing here? I read one preacher who claimed this was an exaggeration, but I don't believe that for a second! No. What we see here is glorification.

*John is giving glory to Jesus Christ for all the things that He has done. And I don't know anybody in a better position to do that than the Apostle John. He saw it all!

*Our Lord and our God Jesus Christ is so great, there really is no telling how much space it would take to tell it all that He has done! That's why Frederick Lehman wrote one of the hymns in our hymnal. It was written in 1917, and it says this about the infinite love of our God:

"Could we with ink the ocean fill,

And were the skies of parchment made,

Were every stalk on earth a quill,

And every man a scribe by trade;

To write the love of God above

Would drain the ocean dry;

Nor could the scroll contain the whole,

Though stretched from sky to sky.

Oh, love of God, how rich and pure!

How measureless and strong!

It shall forevermore endure --

The saints' and angels' song." (4)

*The Apostle John gave glory to God, Frederick Lehman gave glory to God, and we should always give glory to God!

*Just think of all we know that Jesus did here on earth. He miraculously fed the hungry, healed the sick, raised the dead, cast out demons, walked on water, calmed the storms and more.

*But the greatest thing Jesus ever did was die on the cross for our sins. Jesus took our eternal punishment, and rose again to give us His eternal life. Glory to God! John gave Him glory, and we should always give God glory for the good things in our lives.

*But we should especially give God glory for the cross of Christ! As the Apostle Paul said in Galatians 6:14, "God forbid that I should glory except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world."

*Paul gave glory to God, and so should we. Psalm 96:7-9 tells us:

7. Give to the LORD, O families of the peoples, Give to the LORD glory and strength.

8. Give to the LORD the glory due His name; Bring an offering, and come into His courts.

9. Oh, worship the LORD in the beauty of holiness! Tremble before Him, all the earth.

*Always give glory to God for the good things in your life.

*The first radio broadcast with voices was on December 24, 1906. Up until that time, all radio transmission had been by the long and short tapping alphabet of the Morse Code. But a Canadian engineer had invented the new process. His name was Reginald Fessenden, and his dad was a preacher.

*I mention that, because Reginald used that first broadcast to give glory to God. On Christmas Eve of 1906, Fessenden sent this Morse Code message from his workshop in Chestnut Hill, Massachusetts: "CQ -- CQ," alerting all ships at sea to expect an important transmission.

*Then the signalmen in their radio shacks heard something unimaginable: The sound of the human voice coming over their earphones! They were as stunned as if a tree had talked to them. At that moment Fessenden spoke for the first time ever over the public airwaves. And when he did he gave glory to God.

*Reginald read part of the Christmas story, including these words from Luke 2:14: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." (5)

*Those were some of the best words that have ever been heard on the radio, words that should always overflow from our hearts: "Glory to God in the highest!"

5. GOD DESERVES OUR GLORIFICATION. AND HE GIVES US A CONFIDENT EXPECTATION.

*This is another lesson for us from vs. 24-25, where John said:

24. This is the disciple who testifies of these things, and wrote these things; and we know that his testimony is true.

25. And there are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. Amen.

[1] GOD GIVES US A CONFIDENT EXPECTATION. AND I SAY THAT BECAUSE WE CAN TRUST HIM!

*John said that his testimony is true, and John was talking about himself. But John was also talking about God, because every wonderful word in this Book ultimately came from God. That's why 2 Peter 1:21 tells us that "prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit."

*We can fully trust in everything our God has told us in His Word! We can trust Him, because His testimony is true. And we must trust in Him, because this is the only way for people to be saved.

*John 20:30-31 puts it this way: "And truly Jesus did many other signs in the presence of His disciples, which are not written in this book; but these are written that you may believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that believing you may have life in His name."

[2] GOD GIVES US A CONFIDENT EXPECTATION, BECAUSE WE CAN TRUST HIM, AND BECAUSE HE'S NOT THROUGH YET.

*The same Lord who did so much when He walked on this earth is not through with us yet. Jesus has promised to do a whole lot more, and He will! He is going to show us things we've never seen before.

*Mot Richey was a longtime friend of ours in West Monroe, and Mot once told me about a close friend their son Mark had in high school. His name was Charlie. Charlie was a good boy and a strong Christian, but sadly, he was diagnosed with bone cancer.

*After doing all they could to fight the disease over in Houston, Charlie lay in the bed unconscious for days. But one day, he sat up in bed with a big smile on his face. Then Charlie stretched out his arms and said, "I see Jesus!"

*His mother said, "Go to Him Charlie!" -- And he did! Charlie laid his head back down and died. But he is not dead. Charlie is in Heaven. Just think what He saw!

*Christians: God is not through with us yet! There is no telling what the Lord still wants to do down here in us and through us. Then, one day we will see the Lord too! And that is the greatest expectation of all.

CONCLUSION:

*Again in vs. 25, John said, "There are also many other things that Jesus did, which if they were written one by one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that would be written."

*Now the Bible is finished, but God's not finished! He's got more great things to do in us and through us, so put your trust in the Lord. Keep trusting in the Lord. And follow Jesus more closely every day.

(1) Adapted from SermonCentral sermon "Excitement Fades - Ready to Quit" by John Hamby - John 21:1-22

(2) Sources:

-"No Reserves. No Retreats. No Regrets." - William Borden's life - Quotations taken from BORDEN OF YALE 09, by Geraldine Guinness Taylor, Philadelphia: China Inland Mission, 1927 - Portions based on material in "Daily Bread," December 31, 1988, and "The Yale Standard," Fall 1970 edition - https://home.snu.edu/hculbert/regret.htm

-THE TREASURE PRINCIPLE by Randy Alcorn, 2001, p.37 - Source: "In Other Words" - October 2008 - #2 - produced by Dr. Raymond McHenry - www.iows.net

(3) SermonCentral sermon "Culture's Favorite Biblical Misunderstanding" by Jerry Watts - Matthew 7:1-6

(4) Sources:

-"History of The Love of God" - Adapted from Al Smith's TREASURY OF HYMN HISTORIES - https://westpark-baptist.com/frederick-m-lehman/

-"The Love of God" by Frederick M. Lehman - http://library.timelesstruths.org/music/The_Love_of_God/

-Diana Leagh Matthews - Rebel to Redeemed…Sharing HIS Kind of Love - http://dianaleaghmatthews.com/the-love-of-god/#.Xyq9bX5OnIV

(5) SermonCentral illustration contributed by Ralph Andrus