Dennis Tuuri

Today’s sermon text is found in John 21:20-25, the concluding verses of John’s gospel. It should be obvious by now, I suppose, by the song selection that we’ll be talking about the gift of community and being warned against a particular sin against community in today’s message. So please stand for the reading of God’s word, John 21, beginning at verse 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?’ Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, ‘But Lord, what about this man?’ Jesus said to him, ‘If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow me.’ 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?’ This is the disciple who testifies of these things and wrote these things. And we know that his testimony is true. 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.

Let’s pray. Father, we thank you once more for your holy word, and we pray that you would minister to us, Lord God. Gift us with knowledge, life, joy, and glory. Help us, Lord God, to understand our mission in the world. Help us to rejoice, Lord God, in the knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ and our discipleship. Help us to be good disciples by learning this word today. May your Spirit write it upon our hearts, and help us, Father, to extend and build and not tear down community.

We pray, Lord God, that your Spirit may minister your word to us today. In Jesus’s name we ask it. Amen.

Please be seated. It’s a delight to have baptism in the context of today’s sermon. I’m wearing a tie today that represents a flock of sheep—individual sheep put together in a flock. And that’s kind of what we’ll be talking about in the text today.

One or two of you said that they wanted some kind of comment from me on Return of the King. So I thought, well, let’s work it in this way. We’re returning today to chapter 21, this what we might call an epilogue. It kind of balances out the prologue at the beginning of the book. It seemed like the book came to its natural end at the end of chapter 20 when John says that these things are written that you might believe and have faith and might have life through Christ.

And it seemed like that kind of wrapped it up. But then we have this extra chapter, and people have said that Peter Jackson changed the ending of Return of the King because it seemed like the ending in the book was kind of tacked on. And this sort of seems tacked on. And hopefully I’ll be able to explain a little bit as to why this chapter isn’t really tacked on, but it’s quite important for us.

Another thing that was interesting in watching Return of the King was the bookend nature of Sméagol and Frodo. Of course, rather obvious things being played out, but there’s a reference there that maybe wasn’t quite so obvious to everybody who saw the movie.

And if you haven’t seen it yet, or if you’re going to see it again, you might look for this. I think I’m right on this. I didn’t notice it until my second viewing. At the very beginning, the movie tells the story of Sméagol and Déagol again—how Sméagol kills his brother Déagol and then is cursed. And the book actually says it this way. After Sméagol has killed his brother:

“And everywhere we went, the yellow face watched us, the sun, until we found a hole, and we followed it into the mountain. And in the darkness, we forgot the sound of trees, the taste of bread, the softness of the wind, even our own name.”

Now toward the end of the book, Frodo is talking to Sam, giving a description of the effect of the ring upon him as he got close to Mount Doom. In the movie, it changes that. What happens there instead is it makes Sam try to make Frodo remember the Shire, and Frodo in response says he can’t remember these things. Now, in the book, it’s a longer set of things that he can’t recall, but in the movie, Frodo says that he can’t recall grass, water, or food. So I think that Jackson deliberately in the movie tries to put this chiastic bookending of Sméagol and Frodo with an obvious reference to three things that are forgotten.

Now, with Sméagol, it’s a result of the curse, and in the movie it says they cursed us and we had to go underground, and then he forgets these things. We can think of these three things that are really the identity of Sméagol pre-fall. He says, “We even forgot our own name.” So his name is related to these three things that are given to us: the trees, the sound of the trees, bread, and then the feeling of wind.

And now these are pretty clear imagery in the scriptures, of course, of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Trees are transcendent things. They represent rule and authority and the transcendence of God, and they represent the Father in that way. Bread clearly is the Lord Jesus Christ, the bread come down from heaven. And Peter is to feed that bread to the disciples. And then the wind, of course, is a representation of the Spirit of God that creates the community.

So I don’t think it’s too big a stretch to see those three things. And then Frodo’s kind of version of it: trees become grass, and bread becomes food, and wind becomes water. And clearly in the scriptures, as you go from the Old Testament into the New Testament, particularly John’s gospel, the imagery of the Spirit is really bound up with water. Now there’s wind there too that Jesus talks about to Nicodemus, but water becomes the primary image in the New Testament.

And so our identity is bound up with remembering who we are in relationship to a knowledge of and participation in the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. And as chapter 21 comes to a close, those are really the gifts of God that are seen as distributed in the context of these three little narratives at the end of John’s gospel.

We have the sense of mission, right? And it’s very interesting, you know. We move in chapter 20 into kind of a paradise setting. We have the garden all over again, breathing on the disciples, and all this wonderful thing happening, a revelation of who Christ is. It’s a paradise setting. And then in chapter 21, now we’re on the edge of the ocean. We’re on the edge of the sea. In fact, we’re in the middle of the sea as it begins. So there’s this movement from paradise to now this sense of mission, to go out from that place.

You know, in chapter 20, it all takes place within closed doors, right? Jesus comes and appears to disciples twice within closed doors. John comes to believe in a tomb—a closed place, so to speak. It’s open, but it’s a tomb. And so that’s kind of the picture in chapter 20: the beautiful new creation that we experience and is preached to us and proclaimed, and we believe when the doors are shut and Jesus speaks to us through his word.

But chapter 21 takes us beyond that now—to go out into the lake, into the ocean, on the side of the sea—to realize we’ve got a mission as we leave this place. And that mission is to bring in the nations of the earth—153 great fish. And so the nations of the world are our mission to bring them in. And that bringing in is not done when they become converted or brought to the worship of God. That begins a process of discipling them, baptizing them, and making them part of the flock, and then feeding the flock as well, governing the flock, and teaching them.

And so discipleship is in that second narrative. And here is this very odd ending. From my perspective, as I’ve meditated on this for several weeks now, it’s an odd way to conclude this gospel from our perspective. It wouldn’t be the way we would write the story. Peter Jackson thought the ending of Lord of the Rings, Return of the King, was odd, so he made it different—a little more modern, I suppose, kind of ending, a more natural ending.

But Jesus wants us to think here by ending it this way. And I’ve chosen to focus on these last few verses as a description of what Jesus has restored: community. Besides discipleship and mission, community. These are the three phases of our mission as we seek to transform the world by loving the triune God here at RCC. This gift of community is described.

Now we don’t have Peter and Jesus going back and forth in the middle of chapter 21. Now we return to an interaction between Peter and this other disciple whom we know is John, who wrote the gospel. So this community—but there’s a threat to community in this text. And so it closes in a kind of odd fashion, but in a way that is very important for us to think about and to meditate upon and to ponder. As Mary pondered Christ in her heart, we should ponder this kind of ending.

If this is the great conclusion of the gospels—which was the conclusion of all the Old Testament, this is kind of the pinnacle—but it’s more like an epilogue put on to bring the pinnacle, the new creation, paradise into the world. Then we should recognize the importance of this particular warning as it were, as well as this piece of gospel given to us in terms of community.

So today we come to the end of the gospel, and as I said, it may seem tacked on, but it really isn’t. It brings us to a very important point as we here at RCC look at the edge of a new year and as we look at more fully implementing our strategy map. We’ll have the next strategy map meeting on January 12th. These texts in John 21 serve as a useful meditation as we take up and commit ourselves to specific series of initiatives to obediently follow Christ, as he told Peter to do—loving the triune God and transforming the fallen world.

Now, this is the last sermon, my last formal sermon on the Gospel of John. Although I will probably, in the weeks to come, return to it with some topical sermons. In fact, next week we’ll kind of hit the end of the Gospel and go back to what the last section was about—the discipleship of Peter, that he was told to disciple the flock. And I really thought it was important—and this is what I’ll do next week—is to dwell on teachability as we, in the new year, focus upon what it means to be a disciple, to be able to be taught by other people, and to be humble before God and men in that.

So we’ll return with perhaps some topical sermons, but this is the formal conclusion to this book. And this seems like an important lesson to us, a lesson on community.

So what we’ll do now is we’ll work through the text first, verse by verse, and then I’ll make three observations at the conclusion of looking at the text itself.

So in your Bibles, if you look at verses 20 and 21, we have Peter, the beloved disciple, and Jesus. So we have a return now to this interaction amongst the disciples. It’s interesting, by the way, that the disciples have been absent throughout most of the Gospel of John. In the Synoptics, the disciples have a big role throughout the gospels, but here in John’s gospel, the disciples are very much in the background right through most of the gospel. But now they come full center stage. And it’s the interaction of two of these specific disciples that Jesus desires to conclude his gospel with.

So verse 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?’ Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, ‘But Lord, what about this man?’”

Now remember what’s going on here. We’re leaving the meal scene, right? They’d gone fishing. Jesus had brought in the miraculous catch. They bring it to shore. He doesn’t need their fish. He’s already cooking fish for them. He serves them breakfast on the shore. And at the end of that breakfast, there’s this dialogue between Jesus and Peter in which Peter is commissioned as the chief shepherd of the church of Jesus Christ. And then at the conclusion of that dialogue back and forth, Jesus tells Peter, “Follow me.” And it means two things, is the twinning up in John’s gospel over and over again.

It means, of course, that Peter will be a shepherd as he is a sheep. Good shepherds are good sheep. So Peter will follow the chief shepherd as he is an undershepherd of him. He will shepherd by being a follower. He’ll lead by following Christ. And that’s the big picture. But literally, Jesus seems to be telling him to follow me as I walk away from the campfire now. And so Peter starts to walk with Jesus away.

And now the scene goes into this next section, and it begins by saying, “Then Peter turning around.” Turning is a literary device used to show change, right? John, in the Book of Revelation, kind of pairing up with this, John turns to see who it is that’s speaking to him, and it’s the revelation of Jesus. So John turns to a deeper understanding and revelation of who Jesus is. Turning can be positive, turning can be negative.

Here I think it’s negative. Peter turns away from Christ to look at the disciple following them. That’s kind of interesting too, isn’t it? Because Jesus has just told Peter, “Follow me.” And then Peter looks around and another disciple is following him. So it’s kind of, you know, we’re being brought to this twin thing again—Peter and the beloved disciple are being twinned together in some way, but they’ve been that way throughout the rest of this gospel.

So Peter is turning, and notably, he’s turning away from Christ. And he sees the disciple whom Jesus loved. Now there’s three designations. Did you notice this here in this text? First, it says this is the disciple whom Jesus loved. Doesn’t Jesus love all of his disciples? Well, I think he does. I’m sure he does. And yet here, John is called here, as well as in other places in this gospel, the disciple whom Jesus loved.

And I think we have to take that at least in some sense—that Jesus particularly loved John. And now, you know, I remember reading a book on heaven, and it was a book written to assure us that we will be able to recognize each other in heaven. I think the book is correct. Paul comforted the Thessalonians with this knowledge that we would see each other in heaven, that we will know each other. And I think that it’s not at all out of line to think that we’ll have particular fondness for those that we were particularly fond of here on earth, in heaven.

Here we see that God’s love can place its particular emphasis upon a particular person, John. I think there are other things going on, but I think we have to at least say that much is true. We see Peter knows that this is the disciple whom Jesus really loves, right? So he’s designated that way—John. But he’s also designated as the one who leaned on the breast of Christ at the Last Supper, a closeness and affinity between these two men again is described in the text for us.

And so it’s interesting that it shows the intensity of the relationship between John and the Lord Jesus Christ. But then the third thing—it’s very interesting—it identifies Jesus as identifying this disciple as the one who, as he was leaning on the breast of Christ, said, “Lord, who is the one who betrays you?”

Now, you may not remember this, but what happened was they were wondering who it was that was going to betray Jesus at the Last Supper. And Peter, as the leader of the group, leans over and asks John, who is the beloved disciple, who leans on the breast of Christ and who has closer communication with Christ apparently than Peter. He asked John if he will ask the Lord who it is that betrays him. So again, here we have a threefold repetition of the closeness of John to Jesus and Peter not being that close.

More importantly, though, I think the text wants us to remember once more. After the threefold affirmation of Jesus’s love for Peter—we’ve just been reminded of the threefold denial of Christ by Peter. And here we have a text that brings us to the question, “Lord, who is the one who betrays you?” Now, in its first meaning, that’s Judas, of course, but in its second meaning, it reminds us again that Peter, in spite of protestations to the contrary, did indeed betray Christ—and not just once but three times, as Jesus had predicted.

So the text draws our attention to the beloved disciple John in a way that shows his closeness to Christ and also reminds us of the infidelity of Peter in his threefold betrayal of Jesus. So you know, it sets us up for this comparison. It wants us to think about these two men in juxtaposition to one another. And the place at the supper was not the only place where these two men had interaction.

We remember, for instance, that at the arrest of Christ, as Jesus is taken into the courtyard of the high priest, Peter wants to go in there, and it appears the way the text is written that this other disciple is the one who has access to the courtyard of the high priest. And this is John again. So Peter gets access to where Jesus is and is being questioned by this same man. Peter has access to get closer to Christ, in terms of the courtyard, through John.

And then it is John, of course, who goes with Peter on the resurrection morning, and who actually outruns Peter. He gets to the tomb first. So John is there first. Again, by way of imagery, John is closer to Jesus, gets there first. Now he waits and lets Peter go in first because Peter is the head of the church. He’s the leader. He’s the high priest. That’s why he was in the high priest courtyard. He’s being contrasted but also compared in his fallen nature to that fallen high priest.

So this is set up, and then you remember at the tomb as well that it’s the disciple who is loved by Christ—a beloved disciple, John—who comes to belief by going inside and seeing in the tomb what’s going on, and then comes to believe in Christ and his resurrection. Peter does not at this stage. So again, John precedes him.

John is the one whom Jesus has entrusted his mother to from the cross, right? He’s given the mother to the care of John, not to Peter. So John throughout this gospel is portrayed that way. He’s portrayed as the one who is close, being trusted by Christ for the care of his mother, who gives access to Peter through either questioning of Christ, access to the courtyard. He’s the one that comes to faith first, and he actually, here in this particular narrative in chapter 21, John is the one who recognized Christ from the boat, right?

When Jesus says cast your nets here, they bring in a bunch of fish. John is the one again who identifies Christ and points him out to Peter. And so Peter then leaves the boat and rushes toward Jesus. But it’s John who has brought him that identification.

So we have a study here—as these verses are written—in these two men, a comparison and contrast. Yes, they’re doing many things together, but the contrast is that, interestingly, Peter is the one whom Jesus says three times, “Do you love me?” And Peter affirms his love for Christ. John is the one who is beloved by Christ. He is the one whom Christ has loved.

And so we have these two elements with two different disciples, two different roles in the context of the church. So we have this setup that describes community here at the conclusion of John’s gospel by two very different sorts of people, by two very different paths in life, by two very different approaches to how they go about doing things.

And so all of this sets us up for Peter’s question to Jesus Christ: “What of this man?” That he asks. So having all that in mind, Peter then turns and looks at this disciple and then asks, “What about this guy?”

Now remember, Peter has just been told that he will suffer martyrdom for Christ—”When you’re young you’ll do what you want to do; when you’re old they’ll stretch out your hands like on a cross”—theme of a cross—”and other people will lead where you do not want to go.” Peter will die for the flock. And as we said last time we preached on this, two weeks ago, he actually does end up crucified upside down on a cross because he wasn’t worthy of the same death of the Savior. So he requests and is then crucified upside down.

So Peter asks this question, and we don’t really quite know what to make of this question. I mean, does the question mean that Peter is concerned about John? Well, okay, I understand my job, but does John have a job? Is Peter concerned about, you know, whether John will have a nicer end than I will, an easier path to walk? We don’t really know. The text itself doesn’t tell us, but it does give us this indication that he’s turned from Christ to look to John. An even stronger indication of the negative nature of Peter’s question is verse 22 of Jesus’s response to Peter.

“Jesus said to him, ‘If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow me.’”

So he just told him, “Follow me.” Now he makes an emphatic, “You follow me.” And his statement here seems to be, if perhaps not a rebuke, at least a sharp retort to Peter.

“If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you? You follow me.”

So we have here an emphasis first of all on the will of Christ, right? He says, “If I will that he remains.” Now this is very important because it helps us to understand that these two different paths of Peter and John—the two different personality types, the two different roles that they play in the context of the church and of the community—these things are all according to the sovereign purposes of Christ. It is Jesus Christ’s will, his determination, his predestination of the paths of these two men that stressed in his response to Peter.

“If I will that he remain.”

Now again, we have a contrast here. John is being identified as one who will remain. Peter is one who will follow. Well, what does that mean? We don’t want to draw that contrast too sharply. But it does seem with this pairing up of these men and the different approaches that God has taken to them and the different ways they’ve been portrayed to us that this is a significant difference as well.

Peter is a man of action, a man who will follow Jesus. John is a man who seems more contemplative, remaining at the center of who Jesus is. One commentator has described it that way: that Peter is the epicenter and John is the center. You know the epicenter of that earthquake in Iran—what it means geologically is the place on the surface of the earth over where the earthquake actually occurred. So the actual center of the earthquake is down underneath the earth’s surface. The epicenter is the place on the earth’s surface that is directly over where the center of the earthquake is.

And so some people have looked at John and Peter and said: we have in John the center—the remaining with Christ, the abiding in him, the simple childlike faith, the knowledge of Christ’s love for him. And then the epicenter—the implications of that life, in the more active role of Peter. And he’s the one that, you know, based on that same center relationship to Christ, has this active following, whereas John is described as remaining.

But here, again, my point is that God is stressing the absolute sovereignty and predestination of the Lord Jesus Christ, who determines, who decrees whatsoever comes to pass. And Jesus is asserting his sovereignty. In other words, if Peter has problems comparing his path to John’s, or his destination to John’s, or John’s—even if it’s a positive spin and he’s concerned that John might have to suffer—Jesus is saying, “If that’s my will, what is it to you? You may be seeming to be motivated by a sense of well-being for John, or it’s not being fair that your path is different. But all of that are simply covers for a failure to submit to my sovereign will, my decree for your path and his path.”

Two very different paths with two very different ends. After all, John is the one who—at least church history tells us this and I don’t see any reason not to believe it—John is the sole disciple that wasn’t martyred, who died of old age. So quite a different end, quite different paths.

And so we have here the absolute predestination and sovereignty of the Lord Jesus Christ in the paths that are talked about here. So Jesus, in this retort, this concluding rebuke perhaps, Jesus calls on Peter to submit to his will. His will apparently means not just a different route for John in the track of his life, but a far different death as well.

So Christ told Peter seems, almost perhaps a rebuke to Peter. An odd way to conclude this gospel, but a way that’s very important for us to think about. You know, why is this given to us here? Because it represents a real danger to community. There’s a real threat to community, I think, that Jesus focuses us on at the end of this gospel.

Remember, community is the great gift that Jesus gave from the cross, involving the same disciple as he gave the mother—his mother to John and John to his mother. He restores community in the context of the family of faith. So community is the great gift of Christ, and it’s the focal point here: danger to community.

It’s interesting that when I preached through the Book of Joshua many, many years ago—not quite the end, the very end of Joshua’s last charge—but there’s a closing kind of epilogue in that book too. You have these great wars of conquest and all this stuff, and that’s what most of the book is about. But right at the end, there’s an odd story where the two and a half tribes beyond the Jordan go home and they put up an altar of some type at the river. And then the tribes back in the actual land of Israel get upset about that. They’re afraid that those tribes are going to worship in a different place rather than going to Jerusalem. They send Phinehas the spear chucker over there. And they say, “Oh, you know, we’re going to kill you guys because you’re setting up false worship over here.” And they say, “Well, oh no, you know, if we did set up false worship, may God strike us dead. But that wasn’t our purpose. Our purpose was to set up this altar as a reminder to our children that we had to go to Jerusalem.”

So it’s very opposite. Now, it’s interesting because, again, once the conquest is completed in Joshua, then the attention of the divine writer of that book turns to problems within community, difficulties in communication that can destroy community. You know, Balaam knew that the only way to destroy Israel was from within—was from moral breakdown and decay.

And Joshua, and now here the end of the end of John’s gospel, remind us that the way that the church’s mission will be hindered and hampered will be if community breaks down. And the way community breaks down is found in Peter turning away from Jesus, looking at John, and thinking about his path, his end, as opposed to the walk of Christ. Community will be preserved as Peter puts off comparison, commits himself afresh to follow Christ in his own individual path.

Then we have a parenthetical text of explanation in verse 23:

“Then the 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?’”

So we have an explanation text here. And again, it seems strange to us for this to be inserted right almost at the end of this gospel. But understand that of course one thing it’s doing is helping us to understand what was just written.

And apparently there were probably people in the church who had heard this rumor—we certainly know it’s true—that John wouldn’t die. John says, “That’s not what he says. You have to listen carefully to what Jesus says: ‘If he remain till I come.’ What is that to you? He’s not saying that he will remain till I come. And he’s also not describing what that coming is.”

And many people think that this coming is actually the coming and judgment in AD 70. And that what’s being described here is John’s making it through that period of martyrdom of the first fruits church being martyred prior to AD 70. We don’t know. But John is saying, “You know, be careful with the text of Scripture. Be careful with the words of the Lord Jesus Christ.”

And what a verse, you know, for our day and age when people want to draw out eschatological implications of the coming of Christ based on arcane, weird interpretations of what Jesus says in his word. John reminds us here—in preparation for reading his Revelation, which is his eschatological discourse—that we have to be very careful with the words of the Lord Jesus Christ and don’t want to run off thinking this that or the other speculation about him.

So we have a warning about the Savior’s words in verse 23.

And then we have the conclusion in verses 24 and 25. A true though necessarily limited testimony is affirmed in these two verses:

“This is the disciple who testifies of these things and wrote these things. And we know that his testimony is true.”

So now we find out that he’s the writer of the gospel. And so his path has not been to lead the church the way that the chief shepherd of the church, or the chief undershepherd of the church, Peter will do. But his mission has been to develop this written gospel for the Lord Jesus Christ. And then he’ll have his epistles in the New Testament as well. But this is his great mission.

“This is the disciple who testifies of these things and wrote these things. And we know that his testimony is true.”

Testimony. Testimony. Testimony. Witness. Witness. Witness. Witness is used 33 times. The Greek word translated witness or testimony in this gospel. You know how that compares to the Synoptics? In the three other gospels combined, this Greek word is only used twice. Here in John’s gospel, 33 times.

With witness at the conclusion of the new paradise, the new creation of Christ, witness is what it’s all about. We’re being witnesses to the gospel of Christ that we might be witnesses of Christ in our particular place, in our particular path, in our trek that God has ordained for us to walk in.

And the witness of Peter will be martyrdom. The Greek word actually means—is the base for the word martyrdom. Martyr means a witness. And it’s a word that usually refers to witness by dying of the faith, and that’s what Peter will do. But John is the one who won’t die in that same way. He’ll die differently. And yet his witness, his testimony that is being proclaimed here as true—this is his witness, this gospel that he has written.

So the point here is that we’re all being exhorted to witness. Even if it doesn’t mean dying for Christ, but instead writing, speaking, whatever it is—the path that God has called you to—we are all called to witness to the truth of the Lord Jesus Christ.

And then finally, verse 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 could be written.”

Amen.

Now, this reminds us of two things—two other texts. The conclusion of chapter 20 is very much the same in the first verse. “Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples.” There are also many other things that Jesus did. There are many signs, things done by Christ, which are not written in this book—going back to chapter 21. “There are also many other things that Jesus did which, if they were written one by one, even the world itself could not contain it.”

So there’s this—it ends the same way chapter 20 ends, but it ends instead of focusing on signs, now on things done by Christ and the writing of them—the literary development of them. So that’s one link.

But the other link at the end of this gospel goes way back to the beginning: “In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God. The Word was God. All things were created by him, and without him nothing was made that has been made.”

The world is the creation of the Lord Jesus Christ. How then could the world contain writings about everything that the Lord Jesus Christ did, with the full implications of it? It can’t. The world created by Christ cannot contain a record of what Christ did in terms of the full significance of those items.

Theoretically, it’s possible to write an account of, you know, a man’s life, but not of Jesus, the second person of the Trinity. His life and the implications of it. So we’re brought back to the beginning. We have a statement here, I think, that is a beautiful literary way of asserting the deity of the Lord Jesus Christ because it’s because he is the second person of the Trinity that the world could not contain the number of books that would be resulting from writing a description of what the second person of the Trinity has accomplished and done and revealed about the Father.

So we have this kind of beautiful picture of the divinity of Christ—not stated overtly but stated by way of a literary device. You know, there has been much in John’s gospel that’s been that way—that hasn’t really been the kind of didactic line-by-line exposition of things but rather has been said in a way that has several meanings, to cause us to meditate and reflect.

This gospel is not written by Peter. This gospel is written by John. And John’s take is completely different than Peter’s take. They’re both accurate reflections of following Christ. But this is John’s gospel. He’s the one who is loved by Christ. He’s the one at the center, not at the epicenter. He’s the one that causes us to meditate on the full implications of Christ.

Read as an exercise this afternoon in your Sabbath day reading, perhaps, or this week: read the first epistle of Peter, and then read the first epistle of John, and you’ll see this very difference. And you’ll see that John’s epistles are like his gospel. And this conclusion is so fitting and appropriate, to cause us, at the height of the gospel account, at the fulfillment of all the Old Testament, not to have the straight, didactic Synoptic gospels, but to have John—the center, as it were, the middle point—of dwelling with Christ, of the child recognizing the love of Christ for him, remaining there, the implications of that drawn out in his particular gospel.

So we have this rather beautiful ending to a beautiful gospel, a gospel that’s filled us with wonder and awe as well as practical implications, of course, of what all this means.

Let’s talk about three practical implications of this text. Three things I want to point out.

And as I said earlier and alluded to, first we have a stress on, an emphasis on community. And this emphasis on community takes form in talking about what is a common stress difficulty that community suffers: different paths and outcomes, keeping our eyes on ourselves too much and on others, rather than on Christ’s will for our lives.

Peter, as I said, turns. He takes his eyes off Jesus. By way of literary device, begins to lose his focus. He needs the Savior’s sharp retort to get him back on track.

And so, first, I want us to recognize a couple of things here in Jesus’s retort. He draws him, as I said before, back to Jesus’s sovereignty—that Peter’s path, John’s path, are a result of Christ’s will. This is gospel. The Lord Jesus Christ proclaims to you today that your path in life, the particular way God has made you—Peter and John completely different kind of God—and you different—you know, we’re all sheep. We’re all brought into the body of Christ. But each of you will grow up distinct from one another. You know, Doug Wilson has used the illustration that modern man thinks of us as BBs—all unrelated to one another. And a better way to think of us is as leaves on a tree. And that’s good. We’re connected together in community, but there is a diversity in the context of that unity, and each person has his individual path, his individual makeup.

And if we try to make cookie-cutter images of what Christian discipleship is all about, we’re going to fail. This is the failure of all too many Bible schools or seminaries that try to make cookie-cutter images out of people and force them all into a particular pattern.

The gospel, the good news, is that you’ve been recreated as a distinct individual. It is the will of Christ that you went through whatever you went through this last week. It is the decree of God that he is affecting through his providence.

We talk about providence as a good thing, but providence refers to every single path of God fulfilling his decree for your life. The gospel is that your path, troubled it may be—as you look back, you may have moments of great betrayal and denial of the Lord Jesus Christ, great sins in your life, the way Peter looked back—but the true disciple is one who was healed of all of that and brought to a recognition of the grace of God. Knowing that even in the future, he’ll fail again, as Peter did in massive ways.

So you may look back on failures, sins of yours this past week, this past year, and you may wonder, “Why? Why did God let me go through that?” You may look back on difficulties, trials, and tribulations in your life. You may look forward to difficult circumstances as you look into this next year.

Peter, when drawn to the future by Christ, saw a future that eventually is glorious, but in the short term is not glorious at all. It’s a dependence upon other people. It’s being drawn about by others. It’s losing his own ability to direct his path. And eventually, it’s being martyred and being killed in a violent death in following the Lord Jesus Christ.

I don’t know what you look forward to in this year, or what you look back on this year. But I do know this: this is the will of Christ for you, to this point in your life. This is the will of Christ. That’s gospel.

The proper response to that gospel, though, is also called for in our text. The text says: recognize this, and do not engage in the kind of comparisons, the kind of looking at other people’s lives and saying, “It’s not fair what’s happening to me. Why is this happening to me? Why do I have to be like this? Why can’t I have money? Why can’t I have health? Why can’t I have friends? Why can’t I have better kids? Why can’t I have a better husband? Why can’t I have a better wife? Why can’t I have a better job?”

To make these kind of comparisons to other members of the community is natural. It’s demic. It’s what we tend to do in our fallen nature. But Jesus, here at the conclusion of this gospel, says, “As a new creature in Christ, recognize that—that will destroy, that will tear down the beautiful community that he has stitched together in the context of the tapestry of a particular group of people.”

This flock can be destroyed by that kind of comparison, by that kind of negative measuring ourselves not against the path that Christ has called us to walk in and our obedience to it, but rather the path that somebody else walks.

John, at least in the Gospel of John, has an absolutely trouble-free, blessed life. I suppose I can make comments about certain people in this church that their lives just seem to be blessed. Everything falls out right for them. And the other people of this church are people that, you know, are plagued by difficulties and trials.

And Peter is that kind of a guy. God says both of those are his disciples. And even the guy that’s plagued—you know, we all kind of want to be like John: contemplate him at the center, focused, knowing the love of Christ. But all too often, we’re probably more like Peter.

But it’s Peter who is placed in the job of leading the church, not John. The Lord Jesus Christ doesn’t rely upon our giftings or our abilities as much as his calling, his sovereign determination for our lives. That’s where he’s placed you in your particular place, your family, your work, church work.

So our job is to joyfully submit to that and to put off sinful comparisons.

What do we know about the breakdown of community? Well, after the fall—well certainly we have Adam and Eve and that whole thing going on—but then in terms of community, we see the real effect of sin on community immediately in the two brothers story. No, in Cain and Abel. And what do we see? We see Cain comparing God’s response to Abel with God’s response to him. He compares himself to his brother. He turns away from God. Instead of learning from the experience—”Oh yeah, the tribute offering follows the ascension offering. That we draw near to Christ first through the lamb, and then we present our work. Nothing wrong with presenting cereal. He had the order mixed up.”

Instead of learning from the experience the way Peter learned from his experience, right, Cain compares himself to his brother and can’t stand it. He can never have what Abel had. That moment is passed. That moment of God’s blessing upon him.

Now God warned Cain. He said, “But hey, you know, if you do well, you’ll be approved. You’ll see my love upon you as it is upon Abel.” But that wasn’t good enough for Cain. He saw the disciple loved by God—yeah, Abel. And he wasn’t that disciple. And Cain turns and he kills his brother. Destruction of community follows these kind of unhealthy comparisons.

The other thing, of course, that kind of comparison can do is produce a kind of pride, which is also absolutely devastating for community. People who are not blessed externally the way that others are blessed have a tendency to compare themselves unfavorably, walk away with bitterness, resentment, or envy in their hearts.

But then the other side of that coin is to compare ourselves to others, as opposed to keeping our eyes upon the Lord Jesus Christ, to compare ourselves to others and end up favorably inclined: “Oh well, I’ve got money and they don’t. I’ve got a position in the church and they don’t. I’ve got wonderful, quiet, obedient children and they have loud, boisterous, clamorous children, like the pastor has.”

You know, you make those kind of comparisons and then they can walk away from that prideful. This is the Pharisee, right? The Pharisee and the publican story, where the Pharisee walks away comparing himself to another man and says, “Oh Lord, I thank you. He gives God the credit. It’s all grace. But oh, I’m so glad that I’m not like this guy.” His problem is this comparison. It’s completely destructive to community.

The scriptures warn about this. Peter’s path is his path. John’s path is his path. Peter is on the verge—or perhaps has actually fallen into—this trap of envy and comparing himself to others.

We read in Romans 14:4: “Who are you to judge another’s servant? To his own master, he stands or falls. Indeed, he’ll be made to stand, for God is able to make him stand.”

We do not compare ourselves in our walk to others. That’s his. Let him be. The one who might not want to eat meat after the mad cow thing has come out or whatever it is—let him be. He’s got his relationship to Christ that he’s trying to follow as best he can.

It’s really important. It’s very practical here. We’re going to have a men’s discussion this Friday night about whether we should start a Christian school or not. And we’ve got homeschooled people, and now we’ve got some private school people. And you know, “Well, what’s the best path?”

Well, what we have to be very careful to do: we want to encourage each other, build each other up. We want to look at strengths and weaknesses of a Christian school. But what we don’t want to do is this kind of ungodly comparison with one another that builds up pride on the one hand or envy on the other, to insist that our path—whether it’s John or Peter—is the path to get to the promised land.

You see, this is a great danger to Christian community and can destroy it.

2 Corinthians 10:12: “We dare not class ourselves or compare ourselves with those who commend themselves. Paul said, I’m not going to enter into this comparison thing.”

How often, you know, Christian ministers—it’s so what a tendency it is! Peter, of course, is first and foremost the new pastor of the church, and how difficult, how frequently the temptation comes to Christian ministers to look over their shoulders: “Well, how’s that guy doing over there? How’s Wilson’s church going? How’s Randy’s? How’s Ry’s church going? How’s Burke doing over there in Illinois? How’s God blessing? Why doesn’t God bless us with that kind of thing?” So easy to do that in our lives.

Paul said, in context of ministry, that he would not allow himself to enter into comparison with others. “They measuring themselves by themselves and comparing themselves among themselves are not wise. Not wise at all.”

Because that was the sin of Cain, as he struck out at Abel. And that’s the sin of the Pharisee: pride on the one hand, resentment and bitterness on the other. Envy.

You know, it was envy that killed the Lord Jesus Christ from one perspective. It was the envy of the Pharisees, comparing themselves to Jesus and then seeing that they didn’t match up and failing to bow the knee to King Jesus. It was envy of Christ. The scriptures say over and over again that led the Pharisees to plot his death and murder.

Romans 13:13 says this: “Let us walk properly, as in the day, not in revelry and drunkenness, not in lewdness and lust, not in strife and envy, but put on the Lord Jesus Christ. Make no provision for the flesh to fulfill its lusts.”

Ecclesiastes 4:4: “Again, I saw that for all toil and every skillful work, a man is envied by his neighbor. This is the lot of life under the sun, in the context of the fall. When men do work well, all that does is create men around him who are envious of their neighbors. This also is vanity and grasping for the wind.”

Proverbs 14:30: “A sound heart is life to the body, but envy is rottenness to the bones.”

And Peter is on the danger of running into envy. Now, Peter recovers. Peter learns what Jesus teaches him here, and then he writes this in his epistle, 1 Peter 2:

“Therefore, laying aside all malice, all deceit, hypocrisy, envy, and all evil speaking, as newborn babes, desire the pure milk of the word, that you may grow thereby.”

Peter passes on the same advice to us in his epistles, as the Savior told him: “Do not come close to that sin of envy and comparison, one to the other.”

1 Peter 1:22: “Since you have purified your souls in obeying the truth through the Spirit, and sincere love of the brethren, love one another fervently with a pure heart.”

So Peter recovers, and he gets to the place of knowing and writing that we’re to love one another with this pure love that doesn’t have mixed with it, “Well, I love him, but boy, you know, he certainly has this or that I don’t have, or I’ve got this or that he doesn’t have.”

Peter understood the lesson. How did he come to understand it? Well, the text tells us somewhat. Jesus drives home repentance, right? Was it enough for Jesus to know that Peter wept and repented after he denied Christ three times? As he’s commissioning Peter, in the very context of his commissioning, Jesus makes Peter feel bad.

You children think, “Why do our parents want to make us sad? Why do they want to make us feel bad? Why do they want to hurt us by spanking us? And then why don’t they want to just leave alone our sin? Why do they want us to weep about our sin?”

Well, this is why. Jesus knew that for Peter to be healed of his denials of Christ, to get rid of it, it had to be brought out into the open. And Jesus affirmed his commission of Peter in spite of it—in relationship to Peter’s denials. And he made Peter feel bad. It says that Peter grieved after the third time that Jesus asked him. And I would imagine—the text doesn’t tell us here—but I would imagine Peter’s grieved by the sharp words of the Savior here. He’s recovered, finally, right? And the denials have been left in the past. He’s been commissioned. He’s walking with Christ. And the first thing the text tells us that Jesus tells to him, in response to a seemingly off-hand remark by Peter, is a rebuke. It’s a rebuke. Warning Peter, “Don’t start that up. You follow me. Get back with your eyes on me.”

God tells Peter, “Well, that’s what the Psalms tell us: Faithful are the wounds of a friend, but the kisses of an enemy are deceitful. It’s good to rebuke each other when rebuke is necessary. It’s good in our words to minister grace to our children, to one another, through the words of Christ—being the words of Christ, rather—in bringing a sense of rebuke.”

Psalm 141:5: “Let the righteous strike me, it shall be a kindness. Let him rebuke me, it shall be an excellent oil.”

I’ll talk more about this next week, but you know, teachability means hearing the correction of friends who love us. Now, it’s the wounds of a friend that are good. If someone in the church doubts your friendship to them, then probably you’re not the right guy that God’s going to bring along to rebuke them. God will have a friend rebuke them in that context.

But we want to learn how to take rebukes in this church. We want to be teachable, as Peter became teachable, to the warnings of the Lord Jesus Christ and to the sharp words that he had for him.

This warning is aimed at each and every one of us. And so each and every one of us should hear the rebuke of Christ to the comparisons that we regularly enter into and the destructive nature that we then unleash in the context of our families, our communities, or this church.

The basis again is the sovereignty of God for correcting this. 1 Corinthians 4:7 says this: “Who makes you differ from one another? And what do you have that you did not receive? Now if you did indeed receive it, why do you boast as if you had not received it?”

So don’t be like Cain, envious, feeling bad and neglected. And also, don’t be the other sort of error of comparison, thinking that somehow you’re better, and as a result you’re better in your person. No, it’s the sovereign work of the Lord Jesus Christ that produces the blessings in our life.

This is a message that is universal. It’s a message that Jesus focuses on here at the climax of the gospel and this gospel—the climax of all the gospels. We’re moving from paradise, in the closed room, to the open sea. We’re moving from great rejoicing and fellowship with the risen Christ and believing in him personally and corporately, to now doing the work that’s called out in the real world, so to speak.

And in that work, Jesus emphasizes the great danger. At the very conclusion of that work, he warns us against this particular besetting sin. It’s a sin that plagues mankind since Cain and Abel. It’s a sin that plagues every age and every time and culture. But it’s a warning that has particular significance for us because we live in an age of rampant equalitarianism. We live in an age where everything should be equal—all opportunities equal, all outcomes equal. This is the age in which we live.

We haven’t quite reached the radical Anabaptist solution to their view of building plans in the Reformation period, where they wanted to level all buildings, have all buildings the same height, because we don’t want some man who has more money building a taller building than his neighbor. They began to institute a leveling of all structures, even. You see, it had gone that far. But we’re moving that way.

This culture is a radical equalitarianism. And as R.J. Rushdoony points out, we all hunger for a leveling that will benefit us. So that’s our nature, you see: this kind of—this is the kind of wind that blows at the doors of our family and church. This desire to compare ourselves to others and to say, “It just isn’t fair.”

I have tried unsuccessfully to root that expression out of my home. I will continue to strive to get rid of the expression “It’s not fair.” I hate the expression. Now, the expression has a legitimate purpose in use. I mean, there’s the thing justice and all that stuff. But that’s not normally the way it’s used. And we can certainly, even if there is a proper use of the term “It’s not fair,” I think it’d be appropriate for our culture to fast from that term for a good century or two. Try to root out these sinful comparisons that we enter into.

No, the gospel is that whatever has happened to you has happened according to the decree of the Lord Jesus Christ, who loves you more deeply than you can know. Maybe not as much as he loved John, but more deeply than you can know or understand. We must repent, look to Jesus, and assure these kind of evil comparisons and don’t fall into these traps that’ll be so destructive of community.

First lesson, then, is to avoid these comparisons.

Second lesson: quickly, individual action and the well-being of community. Remember at the end of chapter 20 we ended up with the personal confession of Thomas. Now it’s all put in the context of the restoration of community. But community exists and thrives as individuals attend to the individual paths that God has placed them on.

So at the end of chapter 20, each individual of the community is urged to submit to and follow the Lord Jesus Christ to make that same confession as Thomas: “He’s your Lord and God. He’s your Lord, my God. My Lord, my God.” Personal interaction.

Here at the end of chapter 21, the same thing is emphasized, is it not? Individual paths. Even in the context of the restoration of community, Peter’s been called to give his life for community, to serve the Lord Jesus Christ by serving his sheep until he dies from that service, to work himself to death, literally, following Christ for the sake of the flock.

So community is there, but it’s the individual responsibility of Peter that will fulfill those demands of community. And his path is completely individual from the path that John will travel. John will not have those same labors. He’ll produce a gospel. He’ll produce a life of a witness through a long age, dying in old age the way the more normal pattern of blessing from God works in a culture. He’ll be the one who won’t be focusing all the time on his need to love Christ, but he’ll be the one who sits at the center, receiving the love of Christ in his path—an individual path.

So individual actions are emphasized here at the conclusion of this gospel. The corporate dimension has been stressed from beginning to end. But that corporate culture is preserved as individuals attain to the specific paths that God has placed before them.

Individual actions are stressed at the conclusion of John’s gospel. Each of you, through the words of this true testimony, are urged to belief in what Jesus Christ has accomplished. When you come forward with your tithes and offerings, you come forward as part of the corporate body of Christ, but you come forward individually, asserting your faith in the Lord Jesus Christ in his new community, in his sovereign predestination of your path today. You assert that, and you commit yourselves afresh as God renews covenant with you, to be a covenant keeper by walking in the path that he has called you to.

No mind whether it seems ten times harder than the path of the guy next to you. No mind that its end seems so much less glorious than the guy next to you. No mind any of that. We follow the path as individuals.

Third: both men are necessary parts of the church of Jesus Christ. As I said, there is this wonderful picture through these two disciples of two different kinds of men in the context of the church: the active epicenter sort of guy, Peter, and then the calm, centered guy, John.

And I know in my life, we had one of these games we played at Christmas Eve, and maybe it was Christmas Day, and you’re supposed to—well, which of these characters would Dennis be more associated with? And one was Conan the Barbarian. Apparently my family doesn’t perceive me as the calm, centered, Johnlike character, but rather the guy at the epicenter where the earthquakes are rumbling up top and volcanoes are going off.

Well, you know, part of me really desires that contemplative life. But it’s not what God has called me to do. But it is what God has called others to do. And so God has made up the church of completely different individuals with completely different paths. Praise God for that. Both kinds of men are necessary.

And I suppose that in conclusion we might say that there is a sense in which we could say that these are really two halves of the same—Amen. I mean, after all, none of us are complete unto ourselves. We’re not all this way or all that way. We’re not all active. We’re not all passive. We’re not all epicenter or all center.

The disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ are those who ultimately have the same kind of thing going on individually, but also within themselves. You know, when we talked last week about the conclusion of the Christmas story in Luke’s gospel, I stressed the action of the shepherds returning to vocation after hearing the wonderful news and doing what’s required there, glorifying God in their workplace and in the fields.

But the other person that’s mentioned at the end, in contrast somewhat to them, is Mary. “But Mary kept all these things in her heart and meditated on them.” See? Mary is kind of like John, that quiet, centered, contemplative, meditative sort of life. And then the shepherds are more like Peter—active and doing these things.

And really, both of those things are elements of the Christian life. There is a centeredness that we all must have, being completely assured of the love of the Lord Jesus Christ. When we come to the table, it’s the great demonstration that Christ loves you, that you’re John, you’re the beloved disciple. You’re to identify with this beloved disciple at the end of this text. You married, pondering these wondrous truths in your heart, and meditating today, resting in the work of Jesus and his love for you.

But then we’re also called to be empowered to go forth from this place as Peter, not just having a center that doesn’t ever manifest itself, but a manifestation at the epicenter of the great reversal that Christ has accomplished in our souls, a working out of that work in the context of the world by activity, by doing things, by fulfilling the mission.

There’s certainly a sense in which there are different personality types, but they’re only aspects of one basic disciple. You know, we can emphasize in the three gifts the gift of mission, discipleship, and community—Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. We can emphasize particular things, but it’s not as if the Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, isn’t involved in mission, or if the Father is not involved in community. There are aspects of these things, but we have one God, one Trinitarian God.

And in serving that one Trinitarian God, we appreciate unity and diversity. We can see where we may be mostly a John or mostly a Peter, but each of us has a centeredness that John displays for us here—a knowledge of the love of Christ. And each of us is called to follow the Lord Jesus Christ by loving him, by loving his people.

These are the true great paths that we all must follow as we walk into this new year. These are the paths that will build community and appreciation of unity and diversity. This is a path that will allow us to fulfill some element of our vision this year as a church. This is the path that will keep us from destroying community and building community up instead—building upon the great gift that God has given us through Christ.

Alleluia! Not as orphans has God left us here. Christ is always with us, and he’s always with us in the context of the church. God calls on us to rejoice in that and give him thanks for it.

Let’s pray. Father, we do thank you for the community you’ve given us. We thank you for this wondrous image in this gospel of the new creation in paradise. But we thank you that the text moves on to go to the side of the sea, to where work must be accomplished for the Lord Jesus Christ, accomplished in different ways through different kinds of witnesses, and yet work for you all the same.

We acknowledge, Lord God, your sovereignty. If you will, Father, that is what determines our path in life. May we rejoice in our paths, and may we rejoice also in your blessings to others. Help us, Father, to be knit together as a community, assuring no envy or pride, and instead serving the Lord Jesus Christ, enjoying the unity of our church and its diversity.

In Christ’s name we ask it. Amen.