Dennis Tuuri

# Sermon Transcript – John 21:1-14

Sermon text today is John 21:1-14. It’s provided on the back side of the outline today. And today we’ll be singing the prayer for illumination. So after I read the text, then we’ll sing the song provided, the prayer of illumination, “Break the Bread of Life.” If you don’t have an outline or if the young children don’t have their outline, which is pink today, I would encourage you to get one. Feel free to as we stand up go back and get an outline to follow along in the text.

I’ve tried to lay the text out in the structure by which I’ll be speaking about it. So please feel free, children or adults, to go to the back now and get outlines. I think there were some available when I was back there earlier. So please stand as we read John chapter 21, verses 1-14.

Okay. John 21 beginning at verse one.

After these things, Jesus showed himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias. And in this way, he showed himself. Simon Peter, Thomas called the twin, Nathaniel of Cana and Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together. Simon Peter said to them, “I am going fishing.” They said to him, “We are going with you also.” They went out and immediately got into the boat. And that night they caught nothing. But when the morning had now come, Jesus stood on the shore.

Yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. Then Jesus said to them, “Children, have you any food?” They answered him, “No.” And he said to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will find some.” So they cast and now they were not able to draw it in because of the multitude of fish. Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It is the Lord.” Now when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he had removed it and plunged into the sea.

But the other disciples came in the little boat, for they were not far from land, but about 200 cubits, dragging the net with fish. Then as soon as they had come to land, they saw a fire of coals there and fish laid on it and bread. Jesus said to them, “Bring some of the fish which you have just caught.” Simon Peter went up and dragged the net to land full of large fish, 153. And although there were so many, the net was not broken.

Jesus said to them, “Come and eat breakfast.” Yet none of the disciples dared ask him, “Who are you?” knowing that it was the Lord. Jesus then came and took the bread, gave it to them, and likewise the fish. This is now the third time Jesus showed himself to his disciples after he was raised from the dead.

All right, let’s use the song as we sing our prayer that God might indeed open his word to us.

*Break thou the bread of life, dear Lord, to me,*
*As thou did break the loaves beside the sea.*
*Through out the sacred page, I seek thee, Lord.*
*My spirit pines for thee, oh living word.*

*Bless thou the truth, dear Lord, to me, to me,*
*As thou did bless the bread by Galilee.*
*Then shall all bondage cease, all fetters fall,*
*And I shall find my peace, my all in all.*

*Thou art the bread of life, oh Lord, to me.*
*Thy holy word the truth that saveth me.*
*Give me to eat and live with thee above.*
*Teach me to love thy truth for thou art love.*

*Oh, send thy spirit, Lord, now unto me,*
*That he may touch mine eyes and make me see.*
*Show me the truth concealed within thy word,*
*And in thy book revealed thy blessed word.*

Please be seated. Rest in the knowledge that God will do this very thing. He has brought you here today that he might shine his light upon you, that he might open your eyes to see, that he might transform your life, that he might empower you for your mission as you go into this week—as this is the first day of the rest of the week, the rest of our lives.

The Lord God has brought us here together today to reveal himself to us and to feed us upon his very flesh and blood. It’s a wonderful time of year. I know some of us today are a little bit tired. We went out to an event last night—a Celtic yuletide. And we went last year, which was a little more Christian in their presentation of songs. Some of the people are kind of New Age, you know, but the last half of the program was more Christian.

And I loved it the last two years to sing the Boar’s Head carol, which you’re probably not familiar with. It’s a simple song with a Latin refrain. And it’s about the bringing in of the boar’s head that has been prepared by the stewards in gratitude for the King of Bliss. It’s a Christmas song about the coming of bliss, the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. And then there’s a Latin chorus that everyone’s supposed to sing:

*I bring in the boar’s head with praise to the Lord.*
*Ardens lauds domine, giving praise and thanks to the Lord.*

And you know, we’re this side of the cross of Jesus Christ. James B. Jordan talks about this particular carol in his book called *Pig Out*, an exhortation to eat swine flesh. This side of the cross of Jesus Christ, he has definitively cleansed the world. And the distinction of clean and unclean, which did not begin with Adam, but rather with the fall of Adam—uncleanness—is a manifestation of the fall.

It doesn’t mean something’s bad in and of itself. Sex was unclean, made you unclean in the Old Testament, manifesting the fall, death, the effects of the fall. Jesus has come to roll back the effects of the fall. He’s come to definitively cleanse things. The Puritans on the eastern seaboard when they came to America, they loved eating oysters. They thought it was a fulfillment of the prophecy that Naphtali would suck the benefits out of the sea, and they’d suck the oysters out of the half shell.

Well, the Boar’s Head carol is a great rejoicing Christmas song, and that’s what this time of year is. This is the Advent season. It’s a time when the light of Jesus Christ comes in a particular way in the midst of darkness, and light comes and God reveals himself in this way. It’s the two great feasts of the Christian liturgical cycle: incarnation and resurrection, brought together in our Psalm 22, which we recited and then sang the last refrain of today, because what we’re learning about in today’s text is this wondrous blessing of what happens with the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Chapter 20 sort of tied off John’s gospel. You know, it ended with this personal realization of Thomas and his confession: “My Lord, my God.” And then it’s driven home to us: “These things are written that you personally might believe”—corporate dimension, individual dimension. The implications of that are then given to us in this beautiful epilogue in John chapter 21.

But the context—you know, God has brought us here in the Advent season. He’s brought us here in preparation for a couple of meetings, preparing for a heads of household meeting in January at which the elders of the church are going to be developing further and fine-tuning and then presenting to the congregation our strategy map, our vision: Love the triune God, transforming the fallen world. That’s what Advent and Christmas—the incarnation—and then the resurrection, the other great liturgical feast of the year, the movable one in the springtime—that’s what these are all about. Loving the triune God, transforming the fallen world.

And those of you who know our strategy map—I meant to bring a copy. We have copies today for every household of the draft initiatives. And we put a copy of the strategy map on the front. And as you look at that, you’ll remember that we drew the strategy map the way it worked out—it really reflects the great commission of Matthew 28. They meet with Jesus to worship and he brings them together to send them out, right? John’s gospel pool of shalom. We’re the sent ones. Shalom means “sent ones.” Jesus was sent by the Father. He sends us. We’re gathered together in worship to delight, to rejoice in the presence of the King of Bliss, to eat the finest food, and to start all that up, that rejoicing every week. But we’re brought together to be sent out to go with a mission.

We’re brought together. Our worship must drive the mission of every individual as well as the corporate mission of the church. And then secondly, our worship—Jesus says to go. And that mission involves discipling the nations. And he says, you do that by baptizing them and teaching them, by bringing them into the institutional church, the order of the church, the new creation, the waters of baptism bringing about new creation, and then teaching them in the context of that. Discipleship is the second wave of what Jesus does in the great commission.

And in our strategy map, we’ve got worship that drives mission. Worship that drives discipleship. And then finally, Jesus says in the great commission, “Lo, I am with you always.” We have community. You and Jesus, you and Jesus’s people. Community is the third great wave. It’s the great gift.

You know, yesterday, St. Nicholas Day, some families here celebrated that. I think quite a few in my ten and eleven year old class said they did, you know. St. Nicholas is a real guy, pastor at Myra, who was a real man. Children, that guy who was the pastor who became known as Santa Claus in our day and age was a real person named Saint Nicholas—real person, bishop of Myra.

And he was known to give gifts as if he was orphaned at a young age. His parents were very wealthy. Then he used his wealth to help other people. The whole idea of presents and stockings has its origin apparently in some gifts he gave to some girls—young women who didn’t have a dowry. And the dowry was messed up at that point in time. Instead of men giving it to women, gave it to men. That’s what men do when they want to oppress people—demand you give them things instead of serving them. But we know we’re supposed to give women dowers when we marry them and dower them, gift them. But they didn’t have that, and so the girls needed a dowry, and so St. Nicholas gave them bags of gold, supposedly went and fell in a stocking, and there you go. We’re off and running with St. Nicholas and presents and stockings and all that stuff.

So his saint day is December 6. That’s the day he died, and it’s one of the great holidays in churches that are liturgical. One of the great saint days that people remember—whether it’s the Eastern Orthodox Church, the Catholic Church, or the more liturgical Protestant churches. It’s a great thing to remember. You know that Christmas is about the giving of gifts. And the model is not some mythical omnipresent Santa Claus. It’s a real guy, a real pastor who served real people and helped people with his blessings and his presence.

And we’re reminded that God gives gifts to us, right? God gives us gifts in worship. And this great commission is about God giving us these gifts. Jesus calls us together to give us the first gift—a sense of mission, purpose, hope, something to do, a job to do that is going to be wondrous and glorifying. And he’s going to feed us and strengthen us to fulfill that mission.

So the first gift, the one we’re going to talk about today, is mission. But then the second gift is that discipleship, the knowledge of God’s word. And then finally in the great commission and under strategy we have is community. Lo I am with you always.

Now in today’s text it’s really the beginning of three little stories all in one little chapter here that kind of does the same thing as the great commission. It’s the end of this gospel the way the great commission was the end of Matthew’s gospel. But it doesn’t do it with just a series of very short statements. What we have here is a beautiful set of stories.

There’s the story first of the fish and Peter and the beloved disciple. And what Jesus does in this story is to give us the same sense when he said to go in Matthew 28. Peter and the disciples are being told that they are going to go and evangelize all the world. Mission, purpose linked to vocation. And this should set us up in our own lives to leave this worship service today with a sense of mission and purpose. That’s the great gift we’re going to talk about today.

Now, next week, we’ll talk about the next thing that happens in John 21. Once they gather around that fire with Jesus, Jesus then has a little dialogue with Peter. And he tells Peter and commissions him to feed the fish. But now they’re not fish. Now they’re lambs. Now they’re sheep. God doesn’t have any trouble mixing metaphors. You’re not supposed to do it in your homeschool, in your private school. You’re not supposed to mix metaphors, people tell you. But God does it. They catch these fish. Now they’re supposed to feed them as lambs. And so discipleship—to be feeding the lambs that have been identified as being part of Christ’s church. You see?

So next week we’ll talk about the advent of Jesus to be with us, the gifts and the blessings he gives us in this time of bliss. And we’ll talk about this gift of knowledge and discipleship. And that means some things. You know, next week would not be a good week to be late for Sunday school or to miss Sunday school. Next week would be a great week to start coming to Sunday school, whether you’re an adult or a child, because next week I’m going to talk about the importance of pastors feeding the flock the word of God and the importance of the flock wanting to be fed a knowledge of the scriptures.

Now, if you don’t go to Sunday school because it’s boring, you tell somebody, we’ll get you more interesting classes. But we want to feed you the word of God, not just in the preaching of the word, but in the Sunday school time as well. So next week would be a great time to start because we’re going to talk about discipleship and on our strategy map. We’re going to be talking about ways not just to evangelize the world, to plant churches, to carry out mission. We’re going to be talking about specific steps by which we’re to disciple one another, train each other up with the knowledge of the word of God, and being in an order, in an orderly fashion in the context of our church. So that’s going to be the second great gift we talk about next Lord’s Day.

Now, two weeks from today, Christmas Sunday, we’ll talk about the incarnation—baby Jesus. We’re going to have a lot of neat songs. We’re going to have this beautiful accompaniment of our worship again with some musical ensembles, and we’ll just kind of break away from John 21 for one Sunday. Then when we come back, we’ll do the last thing in John 21.

At the end of John 21, after this back and forth with Peter and Jesus, then Peter is kind of jealous—almost, it seems at least. There’s some thing going on between him and John, the disciple who is beloved by Christ. And so Jesus ends by giving us instructions how to live together in community. So that’s the third element of our strategy map—how to build a sense of community here at our church, in our neighborhoods, and specifically in Oregon City.

So God is preparing us during this Christmas season, during the series of Advent and Christmas messages, to take the gifts that he gives us on Sunday and use them in the rest of our lives, the rest of the week. And to do that and to learn how to give gifts of mission, discipleship, and community to one another, how to use those gifts throughout the year.

I love giving gifts. It’s great time to buy presents. I’m tired of everybody complaining and moaning about the commercialization of Christmas. I think it is delightful for people to go to a mall, credit card in hand. I mean, if you’ve got money in the bank—I think in January we’re going to talk about thriftiness as the beginning of some topical messages. But I think it’s delightful to go to the mall and go shopping and for you to think, “What would my wife joyful? Would that be a big thing? What would she like? What would really, you know, make her happy, make her smile on Christmas morning, whenever it is you give gifts, what would make my friend joyful? What would make a brother or sister that you argued with last week? You go to the mall, forget that arguing. You think about them, you love them, you think about who they are, not who you are, not what you would like. You think about them, right?”

Well, that’s what God does. He comes to us and he knows what makes our hearts delight. And he’s giving us these gifts. These are like the foundational kind of gifts. Everything else reflects them. So we’ll talk today about this great gift of mission. And God has given us not this little truncated sermon that Jesus gave in Matthew 28. But he gives us something that is very much like it, although set in a story, which is kind of neat, you know, because you remember the story. And what I want you children to do is as you remember this story to remember these gifts and to remember the great commission and somehow, you know, and think of and pray about what our church is going to be doing with our strategy map as well.

You know, if one of you—I failed to bring up here a copy of the children’s outline. The last thing I want to do today is frustrate the children. Could somebody bring me a copy of the children’s outline so I can make sure I’m hitting these blanks that we’re supposed to do? Thank you. You’re my son. That’s great.

Okay. So, what pastor was the origin of Santa Claus? St. Nicholas. God gives us gifts in worship. The gift we’re discussing today is mission. Mission, sense of purpose, something to do.

You know, in order to fulfill a mission, you’re somebody important. You know, there was this movie that some of the older folks might remember—the Blues Brothers. I don’t remember the name of it, but these guys were on a mission from God—was the line. And you know, when you’re on a mission from God, it’s important, and now you’re an ambassador for Jesus Christ. You’re important. You got glory. Wait, God has told you to do something. So when God gives us this gift of mission, he gives us a sense of glory or weightiness—it’s important what we’re doing, you see?

Whether we’re fishing or preaching the gospel, whether we’re working at our jobs, which is sort of what Peter and those guys were doing out on the boat, or whether we’re preaching to people, whatever we do this week that God has called you to do—if it’s being a good student, talking to your friends about Jesus, being kind to your brother or sister, going shopping this week and buying a good Christmas present, that’ll help bring the joy of Christ to your brother or sister or friend or parent—mom or dad or husband or wife. It’s a mission from God. You see, I want us to leave here today with a sense that we’re on a mission from God. He makes us important to fulfill, to work out the implications of the resurrection. The light shines, right? Advent, great star in the heavens. The light shines. We’ve seen his light. We come to worship him. He sends us out to make a new world in what we do. That’s the mission. And so that’s what we’re talking about today.

God gives us this gift of being on a mission from him.

Jesus came to them. Oh. The disciples went fishing. Well, now we’ve got to get into the text itself. So we’ll get back to your outline in just a minute, kids.

So far, we’ve talked about where we’re going today. We’ve talked about St. Nicholas Day and shopping, Advent, and gifts. I’ve talked about the sermons here. I’ve mentioned that we’re going to have this meeting coming up, and these sermons directly relate to it. I mentioned chapter 21, that it’s kind of an epilogue dealing with the themes of mission, discipleship, and community. And as I said, this can be compared as well as contrasted to Matthew 28. It hits the same basic themes—John 21—but it does it with a story, a narrative, something that really happened, but recorded in such a way as to be just awe-inspiring.

And we’ll get to the actual text here in just a moment. I mentioned also on the outline that in terms of this part, we’re dealing with this in three sections. First, we have Peter and the beloved disciple. In the text we just read, the beloved disciple knows him first. He tells Peter. Peter runs and goes to be with him. At the end, Peter—”What about the beloved disciple?” There’s an interaction in the middle story. It’s just Jesus and Peter. So we kind of start the same place we end in John 21. And the very middle is this interaction between Jesus and Peter, which we’ll talk about next week.

All right. Now, if you take your outline and turn it over. Now we’re going to go through the actual text itself and see the way I’ve kind of outlined it. Find it. Now, this is helpful to me. Hopefully it is to you. Some of this I’m very confident that this is the right structure. Other parts I’m not quite sure. In the middle, I get a little confused. But I wanted to show you at least what I’m clear about.

Notice in verse one that after these things, Jesus showed himself, epiphanied himself, he manifested himself at the Sea of Tiberias.

Details: What’s the Sea of Tiberias, kids? Well, it’s the Sea of Galilee. Same sea. In John chapter 6, Jesus fed the 5,000 by the Sea of Galilee. And in John 6, it says the Sea of Galilee, which is also Tiberias. Now though, it’s not called Galilee. It’s simply called the Sea of Tiberias. Galilee was the Jewish name. Tiberias was the Roman name. So Jew and Gentile—and now the same lake is called by its Gentile name only. Jesus comes to bring together Jew and Gentile, to get rid of the distinction. All the world is what our mission is. All the nations are going to be brought in to Jesus. And we’re told that right away here with the identification that this is a lake, not Galilee, the Sea of Galilee, but Sea of Tiberias—the Gentile name is used.

And in this way he showed—the text says verse one, well, in your outlines I’ve given you it says “himself,” that’s the way most translations read. But you’ll notice that “himself” is in italics in most Bibles because that word isn’t there. What it says is “these things Jesus showed” him to the disciples at Tiberias, and in this way he manifested. See, he’s showing them himself, but he’s manifesting really the nature of all reality.

And at the end of the text—drop down to the bottom of that page—the manifestation, verse 14: “This is now the third time Jesus showed himself to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.” So see, it’s telling us now that chapter 21 is telling us about the effects of the resurrection. And it’s telling us this is the third manifestation. Let’s not worry about counting how we get to three. I could do that, but let’s not. But let’s remember that he rose on the third day. The third number in a sequence of three is important. So it’s a way that the text is saying—this whole section here is about Jesus manifesting himself at a lake that’s called by its Gentile name. And this is the third, the important manifestation. You see, this is the one that helps us to understand all the rest. This is the purpose of the resurrection. And what happens?

Well, in verse two: Simon Peter, Thomas called the twin. Now, that’s good. Remember last week—first we have Simon Peter. Simon is the leader of the group. You know, it’s interesting because later in the story, Simon jumps out of the boat, right? Runs over to Jesus through the water. The rest of the disciples bring the boat in. Why does it—why did Peter run, jump out, and why does the text tell us that? Because it wants us to see Peter leading the disciples. You see, he leads them here. He’s the head of the list. Then he leads them in getting into the fishing mode: “I’m going fishing. Okay, we’ll go too.” And then now John is the one who first knows it’s Jesus. He tells Peter, and Peter leads the disciples. Right? So the text is telling us by the way these names are given us that Peter is a leader.

Missions and any mission, any task, any goal needs a leader. You see, in the church, elders are the leaders. And what we’re doing with this strategy map is the elders are deciding how we’re going to do what God wants us to do as a church. You see, leaders—your fathers in your homes are the leaders. They’re leaders. So they can learn from Peter here. Peter is the leader.

Next thing the text tells us is that along with Peter is Thomas called the twin. He’s leading you. Remember, Thomas is the individual. He says “My God, my Savior.” You’re in a group of people. You’re a disciple of Jesus. You’re part of the church, but you individually and personally are important to God. You’re a Christian. You’re the twin of Jesus, right? You got his name on you. Thomas is a twin. And Thomas is given to us here right after Simon Peter to link this back to the thing we just learned about at the end of chapter 20, to remind us that really Thomas represents all of us—remember, the ones who will not be there to actually physically see Jesus and yet will believe also. So even though this is about specific disciples who are going to become preachers and pastors, he’s telling us right away it’s important for us personally, those who don’t become teachers, preachers, and pastors—so that you might believe, so that you might have a mission. You see, not just the pastors.

Nathaniel of Cana in Galilee. Now, he’s not been called that before. Remember, we said that Nathaniel was also kind of the twin of Peter. They both had these double confessions. But now we’re reminded of Cana in Galilee. Super abundance of wine in Cana, right? Wedding feast of the Savior. Lots of wine. We’re going to talk a little bit about John 6. Lots of bread left over after Jesus feeds the multitude. Here, lots of fish. Jesus comes to bring plenty. Lots of things for us. Lots of gifts. Lots of people. Lots of blessing. Lots of food, hopefully downstairs today. Lots of people, friends to have fun with and do things with. Lots of people in our Christmas play. Lots of things at Cana. It’s Cana of Galilee again. Galilee was always associated up there in the north with the Gentiles. It’s why the Jews in Jerusalem didn’t like it a whole lot. So once again, you see, we’re being told of this Gentile dimension of what’s going to happen here.

Sons of Zebedee, and the others of his disciples and two others of his disciples were together. Simon Peter said to them, “I’m going fishing.” They said to him, “We are going with you also.” So they went out and said got immediately into the boat. And then at night they caught nothing.

Here we go. This is pretty. I hope your children know these patterns. Now, the sun shines, the great star happens at nighttime, right? In our Bible, lots of things—or in John’s gospel, lots of things—at night. Nicodemus comes to Jesus at night. Remember, after the feeding of the 5,000, they’re out there on the boat. The disciples are out there without Jesus on the same lake, the same sea. It’s nighttime. They row all night long. And then, just as it’s getting to be dawn, Jesus comes walking across the ocean, or the sea, to them.

Here the disciples are fishing at night. And at night, without Jesus, they’re all gathered together, but not Jesus there. And now they catch nothing. Now, you know, a lot of commentators say, “Well, see, they’ve given up on Jesus. They’re going back to being fishermen.” I don’t know why people say that. It’s like that doubting Thomas thing. In reality, Jesus—we don’t read it in John’s gospel, read in the other gospels—Jesus had told them that he would meet up with them at Galilee. So he told them to go up there. They’re actually already obeying his instructions, and they’re just getting hungry and they want to go out there and catch something to eat.

But without Jesus still, Jesus says, “I’ll be there, but not yet. I want you to learn that without me, it’s dark. Without me, you don’t catch anything. Without me,” he tells us in John 15, “you can do nothing.” Right? These disciples are fishing at night, which is supposed to be the best time to fish. They won’t let you fish in Oregon at night because you catch all the fish on the lakes. But they catch nothing at night. It’s a beautiful imagery going on here.

And then the very next verse—you know, first they’re gathered without, but by the end of the text, they’ll be gathered with Jesus around the fire. And then when the morning had now come, Jesus stood on the shore. Yet the disciples didn’t know that it was Jesus.

So they don’t know him here. But see the change. They’re fishing at night. Now the day comes. Jesus, the light of the world, comes to be with his people. You know, we’ve seen his light. We’ve come to worship him. Jesus and the dawn is happening. The new world is being created. Light’s coming all over the world. That’s why it’s kind of neat in our hemisphere. We get to celebrate Christmas. You know, December 21, the days start getting longer again. In the midst of our darkness, brightness happens. The days get longer and lighter around Christmastime. Jesus, the light of the world. This is what history moves in terms of.

And here morning time, but they don’t know it’s Jesus. They don’t know him. By the end of the text, they’ll know it’s Jesus, but not at the beginning. Jesus comes to them in the morning, and they don’t have anything to eat. He yells across to them. Jesus says to them, “Children, have you any food?” They say, “No. We don’t. You know, I don’t know. We. This is a text for meditation and wonder and awe.”

Jesus calls out to them, “Little children.” It’s really a better translation. Jesus loves us. These are grown men. Jesus is calling them little children. He’s probably younger than some of them, calling them little. He’s the Ancient of Days. So he’s, you know, certainly we’re children in that sense. Earlier in John’s gospel, remember, he comes to his own, his own don’t believe him. But to as many as received him, to them he gave the right to become children of God. And these disciples, without him, having no success fishing, are still his children.

Some of you men are going to go to work this week. You’re going to be rowing across that lake again. It’s going to be night. No blessings, no gifts from your managers or employers. No success at work. You’re working away. You’ve got to remember—Jesus still has his eye on you from the shore. And you’re his dear children. He will provide for you in due time for his purposes, for his mission. You see, but this is what he does. He calls out to them, “Do you have anything to eat?” And of course, by the end of the narrative, he’s going to feed them breakfast. And that’s why he’s calling them. It’s why he calls us here today—to give us food. Doesn’t call you here today to make you feel bad. Doesn’t call you here today to give you a whole list of new things you should do. Now, at the end of the sermon, you’ll think of some things you should do. That’s good. But he calls you here to rejoice, to eat the boar’s head, to eat good food.

This is the food of all foods. You know, in some churches in the medieval period, you couldn’t eat till you came to church because this is the beginning of all food. This rejoicing stuff, this wine that makes you happy, this raised, victorious, delicious bread we eat. That’s the beginning of everything. You see, our family should have great times around dinner tables. Jesus calls us to his table today. He gets us together to eat with us. That’s why he does it. He calls us together to eat with us.

So zero fish were caught without Jesus. And then what we’re going to see later is children, from your outlines again—with Jesus, when he tells them to, they’re going to catch a whole bunch of fish. And in fact, they’re going to catch 153. Okay? They have nothing to eat at first. And then he says to them, “Cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will eat—you will find some.”

So they cast, and now they were not able to draw it in because of the multitude of fish. So super abundance of fish. Now, again here, there’s an italicized word in verse six: “Cast your nets to the right side of the boat and you will find”—that’s the literal translation, not “some fish.” They will find some fish. But what they will find is what? They’ll find Jesus. Right? When that happens, that’s when John says, “It’s the Lord.” They’ll find meaning and purpose when they obey Jesus. When they do what Jesus tells them to do, in spite of it seeming stupid at times, right? Who is he? The old guy on the shore. We don’t know what’s going on. We’re only—we’re close enough to where we can talk to the guy. How’s it going to be a lot of fish here? See, still, when we follow Jesus, that’s when we get blessed. You see, Jesus says, “If you do what I tell you to do, you will find.”

What do they find? They find Jesus. They find his love for them. They find that while they’re fishing at night, he’s already got a meal ready for them. They’re going to go onto the shore. He’s not going to cook their fish. He’s got his own fish he’s cooking for them, and bread. They’re going to find happiness. They’re going to find that meal. They’re going to find fellowship with Jesus. They’re going to get gathered around a warm charcoal fire. They’re going to find fellowship together over food. They’re going to find what you found this morning, what you’re finding right now.

Jesus said, “Cast the net on the right side.” He said, “Get up this morning. Obey that alarm clock. Get to church.” “Well, I’m tired.” “Well, get to church.” And you’ll find—what will you find? You’ll find friends. You’ll find Jesus. You’ll find Jesus telling you that you’re his dear, dear children. You’ll find Jesus coming to feed you with mana from heaven and the best of all wines abundantly. See, you’ll find presents from Jesus. You’ll find that he will send you out really and truly on a mission for God as you go into your week tomorrow.

Obey him. You will find.

Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved said to Peter, “It’s the Lord.” See, this John-Peter thing—it’s gonna. We’ll talk more about it in a couple weeks when we talk about the last section. But it’s always so interesting. Remember, this is kind of like the tomb, right? When they ran to the tomb and Peter got there first—or John got there first, rather. Peter goes in first, but then John’s the first one to believe. He’s the first one to recognize it’s Christ, he’s resurrected. So here, John says, “It’s the Lord.”

Now when Peter heard that it was the Lord, see, he’s told by somebody else. He’s told by another man: “This is God who wants you to do this. This is who we’re following. It’s Jesus.” As soon as he hears it, he put on his outer garment, for he had removed it, and plunged into the sea. You see, as soon as we recognize Jesus, we want to go toward him. Is Peter running toward Jesus or away from him? He’s running toward him.

Now, I’m getting a little ahead of the outline, but you know, in Luke there’s another story of Jesus telling the disciples to fish, catching nothing. Jesus says, “Throw the nets out this way.” They do it, and they get a whole bunch of fish, and the boat nearly sinks. But that was a different time. That was three years ago. That was when Peter first became a disciple, you see, or early on in his discipleship. Different story. And back then, at three years prior to this thing happening, Jesus does the same thing. He calls to them. He says, “This fish out here.” They get a whole bunch of fish.

But back then when that happened, and when Peter recognized it was the Lord, he didn’t go toward him. He wanted to run away from him. And I’ve got it on your outlines later on, but in Luke, it’s Jesus—John, Peter rather, says, “Well, keep away from me, Lord God. I’m a sinful man.” And so Peter, the first time this happened, three years previous, he wanted to get away from Jesus because all he could think about was his sin. See, but now Jesus knows that his sins have been dealt with. He’s forgiven of his sins. And now he runs to Jesus.

If you’re running away from Jesus, probably because you’re thinking about your sin, and you need to confess that sin. You need to believe that Jesus has forgiven you that sin. When Christians run away, remember what Adam and Eve did? They ran and hid because of their sin. Jesus wants us to go toward him. And Peter now has been moved from early in his life, being ashamed of his sin, thinking about himself, now he’s thinking about Jesus, and he’s running to Jesus, and he’s leading again. He’s leading the disciples.

So they have this multitude of fish. John knows the Lord. Peter runs to the Lord, and then the disciples follow Peter’s lead. The disciples then come to the Lord. But the other disciples came in a little boat. They were not far from land, but about 200 cubits, dragging the net with fish.

Then there’s this beautiful verse, which we’ll talk more about next week. But then as soon as they had come to land, they saw a fire of charcoals there—a fire of coals—and fish laid on it and bread. Now there are only two places in the Bible where this word “charcoal fire” is used—this Greek word here, and earlier in John’s gospel when Peter was warming himself in the high priest’s courtyard where he denied Jesus three times, around that charcoal fire. Peter was hanging out with the wrong people, and he ended up denying Christ.

This text tells us that Peter, following Jesus now in the power of the resurrection, now he’s around having communion with people around the right fire, not the pagan fire, Jesus’s fire. He’s gathered together at this fire. So it kind of matches—John, the beloved disciple, who let Peter into the courtyard, and then Peter turned against John and fellowship with Christ’s people and hung out around the wrong fire with the wrong people and ended up denying Jesus three times.

Now we have the same kind of fire, a charcoal fire. Peter’s drawn to that fire. Now he’s around that fire with John, with the disciples, with Jesus. You see, Peter moves away from bad company to the right company, to being apart from Jesus and with his enemies, to being with Jesus and with his friends. Peter is saved. Peter is matured. Peter is given this gift of being brought together. And we’ll see this very much next week. Peter denied Jesus three times at the other fire. And Jesus is going to talk to or—Jesus is going to talk to Peter three times about his job of now feeding Jesus’s people and loving him, correlating with these three denials.

So, and Jesus has already got fish there. Remember, Jesus doesn’t cook the disciples’ fish. He’s got his own fish. He has no need for what we bring to him. He feeds us.

So then again, this full net is talked about. Jesus says to them, “Bring some of the fish that you have just caught.” Simon Peter went up, dragged the net to land full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not broken.

So, you know, prior to this little incident at the fire and the coming together, you had a whole bunch, a multitude of fish. Now the whole multitude is numbered. There’s 153 great fish, okay? And the net isn’t broken. The church is united. The seamless tunic that Jesus had wasn’t cut up by the soldiers—remember, they gambled for it. It was a picture of the church, the unity of the church. And the church is unified. Even though it brings in all kinds of people, the church is unified.

I had a weird thing happen yesterday, or Friday rather. Takashi and I had a benevolent situation come up with a man who was Japanese, but actually racially not Japanese—Korean and Hawaiian parents—and his wife was Korean, and they were on hard times out here. And it was just the strangest situation I’ve ever seen. This fellow was brought down to us by originally a man from Fort Lewis, Washington who knew that they had their possessions stolen in Seattle. He tried to bring them to his Catholic father down here. Long story and complicated. But the end result is that, you know, we’re helping him out. And his wife, who’s Korean, Takashi, myself, and this man were standing at the end of our little meeting together, holding hands and praying. This man’s a pastor. He’s planting a church in Virginia. And I thought, you know, I don’t understand this. This guy, I’m not sure who he is or what he’s doing. But in the providence of God, it seems like I have to mention this in my sermon when a sermon is about catching all the nations of the world and bringing them into the one church.

And I’m sitting here in my office with, you know, Takashi—Japanese. This man—Korean, but Japanese citizenship. His wife—who is Korean. Myself. This guy was talking to Takashi in Japanese. They always talk quickly. I don’t get that. But always fast. And then he’s talking—then he’s explaining to his wife in Korean what him and Takashi are talking about. And he’s explaining to me in English. And I’m thinking, “What a beautiful thing—image of God bringing together diverse fish, and the net not being broken,” you know, everybody gets along. The net, the church, is united.

And so Peter drags in this—it was what he couldn’t drag it in before. Now Peter himself drags the net in to shore. And then Jesus feeds them. They were hungry. He prepared food for them. And now he says to them, “Come and eat breakfast.” And now they know the Lord, right? Before when they saw him on the shore, they didn’t know him. But now they know him.

Yet none of the disciples dared to ask him, “Who are you?” knowing that it was the Lord. So now full cognition—they didn’t know it was God. Now they know it’s the Lord. All this happens in the context of this fire, communion, and eating a meal together.

And then they’re gathered with Jesus. Then Jesus then came, took the bread, gave it to them, and likewise the fish. This is now the third time Jesus showed himself to his disciples after he was raised from the dead.

So a beautiful story moving us from a lack of knowledge of Christ to knowledge, moving us from being hungry to being filled up there, moving us from darkness to light, from, you know, being gathered without Jesus to now being gathered with Jesus, to not having any success and now bringing in all of this great number of fish for Jesus Christ. So it’s a delightful text for us.

And let’s see—I want to make sure the children’s outline is being followed. How many fish were caught by Jesus? Without Jesus, zero. With Jesus, 153 fish. When Peter knew it was Jesus, did he go away or towards him? He went towards him. Whose fish was Jesus cooking? His own. Jesus has no need of us. What did Jesus want the disciples to do? Eat with him. Jesus called them. His whole purpose in meeting with them was to eat with them. Eat with him.

Okay. So now let’s go on to a few echoes. Now that we’ve looked at the text, we can quickly go to some echoes that this text reminds us of in other portions of scripture.

I’ve already mentioned a couple of these. In Luke 5:8, Jesus told them they’d become fishers of men. Maybe this is why John knew it was the Lord when he said to throw the nets over there, and then they caught a lot of fish. Maybe it wasn’t that. Maybe John just remembered three years ago the same thing happened, and that’s how he knew it was the Lord. Don’t know. But certainly we’re intended to think of that text in Luke 5. And this is the quotation: “When Simon Peter saw it, the fullness of the net, the boats almost being sunk, he fell down at Jesus’ knees saying, ‘Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, oh Lord.’” And so that’s, you know, that’s not a wrong reaction if it doesn’t stay there. But we want to confess our sinfulness but not tell Jesus to go away from us, but to run toward him, to tell him we’re sorry. You see? So that echo reminds us of the movement of the call of Peter to now him becoming the leader of the church and running and leading the people to Jesus.

In the Old Testament, both in Jeremiah 16 and Habakkuk 1, there are these verses that talk about how God will indeed bring in people as fish. In the New Testament, lots of fish being eaten, right? In our text today, do you know how many times fish were eaten in the Old Testament? How many times? I don’t know of one instance where any fish is eaten in the Old Testament. How many fishermen were prophets or men of God in the Old Testament? I don’t know of any. What were they? They were farmers. They were herdsmen. In the New Testament, now the apostles are, you know, the big profession that they represent is fishing. You see, the Bible is written in such a way as to have a movement from the land to the sea.

In the Old Testament, the Israelites were on the land. The Gentiles were across the sea. So the land and sea were set up as a way to think about how things work before Jesus came. Now, when Jesus comes, they’re going to move from the land to the sea. You see, they’re going to move from becoming just farmers and herdsmen, and now they’re going to bring in all the nations of the world, the Gentiles, who are associated in the sea. They’re like those fish out there, the islands. It’s another reference to them. So there’s this great picture given to us in the text today of the movement of history with the coming of Jesus—to now we’re not going to have a constricted priestly people, the Jews on the land. Now the gospel is going to go out in its fullness to every nation of the world. And so all the nations are represented by these fish. And that’s all set up in the context of the Old Testament. There’s this movement from the land to the sea, from Israelites to Gentiles, that’s set up for us.

Now, another echo of a text here that isn’t quite so obvious, but it’s, I guess, kind of is. In Ezekiel 47, the picture is that you’ve got this temple that Ezekiel sees, and the water comes out of the temple and the water goes into these rivers and it goes into the Dead Sea and makes it alive so that fish can grow there. That’s what Ezekiel 47 is about. It’s about the transformation from deadness to life, to a lot of fish being able to grow through the living waters coming out of the temple. And I’ve got this verse here for you, verse 10:

“It shall be that fishermen will stand by it from En Gedi, that’s the stream Gedi, to the stream En Eglaim. There will be places for spreading their nets. Their fish will be of the same kinds as the fish of the great sea, exceedingly many.”

So this is describing a downstream waterway with two specific specific streams—En Gedi and En Eglaim. And En Gedi or Gedi rather and En Eglaim. And these are places that, you know, fishermen will cast their nets for fish. Well, the numerical value in the Old Testament—in many cultures, names had numerical values to them. And En Gedi, its numerical value is 17. And En Eglaim, its numerical value is 153, the same number as the great fish that Peter catches, or the disciples catch, in our text.

Why are we told 153? Well, I think, for those of us who study the Bible, not for everybody, but for those that study, it’s to remind us of this text. 153 is the triangular of 17. What does it mean? Well, it’s easy. It means that 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 + 7 + 8 + 9 + 10 + 11 + 12 + 13 + 14 + 15 + 16 + 17—add all those up, and you get 153. It’s called the “triangular” because if you represent it by dots—one dot, two dots, three dots, four dots, five dots, six dots—going down to the base of 17 dots—what you have is a triangle. And if you add up all the dots, it’s 153.

Now, we don’t know this, but some of the kids who are in their math classes, you’ll learn this. I was talking to an conn last night. She said that one of their books they’re talking about triangulars. Now, they don’t call them triangulars, but they refer to numbers, numbers that add up the values of one to that number. So 153 is the addition of all the digits from 1 to 17. It’s the fullness of 17. It’s a movement from 17 to its triangular, 153.

And in Ezekiel, we’re told that when the true temple comes—the Lord Jesus Christ—and when lifegiving water flows out of him—water comes forth from his side. He is the water of life. “Come and drink of me,” he says. When Jesus, as the true temple is opened, and the water, the Spirit, pours out of him, then there’ll be this movement from 17 to 153 as all the nations of the world are gathered together.

In the Old Testament, there was a list of 70 nations. 70 is 7 × 10. 17 is 7 + 10. So now we have the fullness of those nations, going from 70 to 153. Day of Pentecost in Acts, 17 specific peoples enumerated. The nations of the world are represented by a 17. And here they’re represented by 153.

Now, if I lost you at the math, don’t worry about it. But believe me, there is little or no doubt that the purpose of the number 153 is to remind us and to show us in very nice story terms this great truth that all the nations of the world, all these diverse kinds of fish, will be gathered together in the church of Jesus Christ.

To have mission without a guarantee of success is to have no mission. We have a mission that is accompanied with hope, being told that the mission will be fulfilled. All nations of the world will be discipled. Jesus tells us that in the great commission. Now he tells us to us in a beautiful story that your children can remember—that a whole bunch of fish were gathered together representing all the nations of the world. And the church isn’t broken. The church brings those nations of the world to the Lord Jesus Christ.

And then finally, another echo is John chapter 6. You know, we’re back at the Sea of Galilee, okay? We’re in John chapter 6. We’re back to a meal, right? He fed them miraculously—the 5,000—not just with bread, but with fish. In fact, I’ve got this verse for you on your outline, verse 11: “Jesus took the loaves. When he had given thanks, he distributed them to the disciples, disciples to those sitting down, and likewise of the fish as much as they wanted.”

Exact same Hebrew terminology in terms of the basic pattern here that he takes the bread and gives it to them, likewise of the fish. We are supposed to link our story today back to John chapter 6. And now Jesus again is miraculously feeding people with his fish, his bread, and a miraculous catch of fish.

Remember in John 6—five loaves, 12 baskets left over, 17. But a lot of bread was the point, right? Super abundance of bread. Like there was a super abundance of wine at Cana where Nathaniel came from. And now there’s a super abundance of fish. The Lord Jesus Christ gives presence without end, multiplying them, blesses us greatly through these things.

And remember too that in John chapter 6, immediately after the feeding, the disciples had to go by themselves on that lake—that I mentioned earlier. Now it’s reversed, right? We had feeding—lake. Now we’ve got lake and feeding, and the cycle is brought to completion. A renewed reminder to us that in the power of the resurrection, Jesus will move, is with us, even though we don’t see it. And he’ll bring us to the shore in his timing for his purpose and for his mission.

So John chapter 6 is clearly an echo to us of this text.

Well, what does it all mean? Beautiful story. More imagery than I can possibly get into with you in terms of these 14 verses. You see, I’ve opened it up a little bit. What does it mean to us?

Well, first, as I’ve been saying, God gives us the gift of mission and purpose, the transformation of the world. That’s what’s going to happen here. Those fish aren’t just going to be brought to the shore. They’re going to be discipled, right, as lambs, and they’re going to be brought into community. That’s the big picture. That’s the big picture of our church. That’s our vision: Loving the triune God. We can say that these gifts relate to the person, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. The Father’s mission—assure us that the Father is transforming the world. The Son, who brings us into discipleship with him. And the Holy Spirit, who creates our community and extends that community around the whole world. The fire in the midst of Jesus and his people, right? The Holy Spirit. So God is doing his work. God gives us this gift of mission and purpose, the transformation of the world.

And so it’s so important that we take up this mission first as a church, right? And we’re going to do this strategy map, and we’re going to think of specific ways to do what God wants us to do, how to fulfill our part in the mission. But it’s also true of you as well, your mission in the world.

Because number two, the link to Thomas means this truth is for you. John 15:5 says, “He who abides in me and I in him bears much fruit. Without me, you can do nothing.” The picture here is an obvious one. If you go to your vocation tomorrow without Christ, without a desire to follow him throughout the day, then you can do nothing. If you go about your homeschooling, if you go about as a student, if you do your tasks, your chores, without following Jesus, you can do nothing. But with Jesus, you can do everything. The mission of transforming the world is what you’re doing when you go to work tomorrow, when you teach your children, when you clean the house, when you do your tasks, when you love your brother and sister.

Three, this gift is set in the context of vocation. Peter strips down so we win with diligence and service, not glory and power. You see, I don’t think the purpose of this is just to show a transition of vocation from Peter from fisherman to preacher. I think that the purpose of setting it in vocation is to glorify what you’re doing—most of you who are not preachers. The link through Thomas means that this is for you. And if the truth is that the transformation of the world comes about through vocation as well as through the preaching of the word.

Remember I preached on this when I got back from Poland in Zechariah. The horn of power is defeated by the craftsmen, the four craftsmen, the vocational men, the men that go to work and are diligent and serve, and don’t seek to be served in their work, but labor hard, honestly, and diligently in their calling. God says that this is related to the transformation of the world. You’re called to be excellent fishermen. Peter had taken off that robe that would hinder him as he did his work. And then he puts on the robe to meet with Jesus. You do the same thing. Tomorrow you’ll go to work and you’ll not serve in glory. Most of you, you’ll take your thing jacket off, you’ll roll up your sleeves, and you’ll get to work. And you women will do that in your homes or if you go to work, at your work as well. You’ll do it in your child—husbands and wives. You children will do it—do your schoolwork. You’ll get at it, right? You don’t seek to be glorified externally. You’ll seek to serve with diligence, removing robes of glory and honor.

It’s set in the context of vocation. What we do tomorrow is important to every one of us in this transformation of the world, and it’s important to our strategy. We have to understand that and to make these links. The purpose of church is not to just give mission to me or to men that may go preach the gospel. The purpose of purpose of worship is to give you the sense of mission that you go about this work tomorrow through your vocation, through your calling, whether it’s at work, in your home, your recreation, whatever it is.

Now, Peter does dress up to meet with Jesus, and so should we. We don’t come to church the way we go to work typically. Some people might. We dress up to come here, right? This is what Jesus—Peter did when he wanted to go see the Lord. He got that coat of glory back because he wanted to go with him respectfully in terms of the one he was worshipping. So that’s important for us as well.

Four, Peter is a flawed leader who will be used to move towards the goal of the mission. He’s not going to accomplish the full mission. He’s going to start a little—his little part. It’s been going for 2,000 years. It’ll go for another 10,000 years or more. But Peter is a flawed leader. The whole point is to see this movement of saying, “Go away. I’m too sinful,” to now running to Jesus, from hanging out with the wrong people and denying Jesus at one fire, to now embracing Jesus and hanging out with the disciples at the other. He doesn’t lead them successfully at first. He doesn’t know where to fish. Maybe he’s flawed. He’s an obviously flawed guy. He denies Christ at the height of his trial earlier in this gospel.

But it doesn’t end there. You have leaders in your church, elders. You have leaders in your homes. The fathers are the leaders. They’re flawed men. They’re sinful men. You know them. The more you know your leaders, the more you’ll know their flaws and shortcomings. But that shouldn’t discourage you. You should trust that God is working through them anyway. You should follow your leaders the same way that these disciples followed Peter. “I’m going to go fishing. Okay, we’ll go too.” Makes no sense. But we’ll go. He jumps toward Jesus. “Okay, that’s when we’ve got to take the boat. Let’s follow Peter.”

So we’re to follow those leaders, even though they’re flawed men. And we urge you to follow the lead of the elders of this church as we plot the strategy for the next few years through these meetings that we’ll be having. Follow us. And then to the men at our church who are leaders, understand that you’re a flawed person, and don’t let your flaws overcome you the way that Peter did at the beginning of his calling three years prior to this. You know your flaws. The more you love Jesus, the more you know your flaws. The more you love God and get close to him, the more you’ll see how wicked you are. But don’t let that hold you back from leading. Peter had to lead. He didn’t trust in his own righteousness or holiness. He trusted in the fact that Christ had called him to do it. And so he took the lead. Take the lead in your homes. If you’re a manager at work, take the lead in your work. You’re in the church. If you have a leadership role in some activity, take the lead. God expects us to lead.

This is a tremendous story about leadership—flawed leadership, but God working through it to affect change. God is sovereign.

Number five, forgiving and empowering. You know, the fish are dragged, right? Couldn’t be dragged any drag. It’s the same word that Jesus had used earlier. “If I be lifted up, I’ll draw all men to myself.” It’s a good Calvinistic term. God is sovereign. He’s going to draw those nations—flopping and flipping and kicking and screaming, if need be. He’s going to draw them to himself. We can have hope that is assurity of hope, not Jiminy Cricket hope, but true hope—the assurance of things not seen yet. This is the reality. Jesus was raised from the dead to accomplish this very thing. God is sovereign. History is his story. And he’s sovereign forgiving and empowering you.

You see, the story is not one driven to make you feel bad about what you haven’t done. The story is one to assure you that you are dear children to the Lord Jesus Christ. And he calls you here today to hear that you are near and dear to him, to give you the gift of restored mission. He will empower you. He has forgiven you your sins. You are a new man today, a new woman, a new boy, a new girl—that you walk into this life, the rest of your life today, as new people forgiven and empowered for the mission God has called you to.

We do move from darkness to light, from failure to success, from the absence of Christ to the presence of Christ, from false communion to true communion. We should get at it. We go about doing the work God has called us to do joyfully, knowing that it’s a great high and holy calling from him.

So lead. Follow. Know that Jesus Christ is the grand leader of all history. Let’s pray.

Father, we thank you for this wondrous text. We thank you for this wondrous time of year. Fill our hearts with delight and joy. And as we come forward now, let us do so with great confidence, knowing that your mission of the transformation of the world will surely and is being affected through your sovereignty, your forgiveness, and your empowering. In Christ’s name we pray. Amen.