We've been looking at the new beginnings of a guy named Peter. 160 times his name comes up in the New Testament. (Paul 156 times) (Jesus Christ 1538)

Peter was a proud, arrogant, big mouth bully. Yet Jesus chose him as one of his 12 disciples… Peter failed Jesus…and failed him…and failed him…

But God kept restoring… and restoring until Peter became one of the greatest Christian leaders on record and ended up writing two amazing books in our New Testament.

What do we learn from that? That God can take any of us and transform us into somebody radically new!!

Are you a bully, do you get into people's faces and tell them where to go? God has a plan for your inner transformation…and it is not just to continue on being the same old person you now are!

Peter would one day write:

Are you proud and arrogant? That's not the person God intends you to continue to be… Like Peter; God has each of us on a journey…. to move us from the un- usable sinful us…to the new righteous us… through whom He can change our part of the world!

Peter would one day write:

1 Peter 5:6-9 So humble yourselves under the mighty power of God, and at the right time he will lift you up in honor…8 Stay alert! Watch out for your great enemy, the devil. He prowls around like a roaring lion, looking for someone to devour. 9 Stand firm against him, and be strong in your faith….

Have you just failed God over and over and over…Have you gone back to God repenting and promising to get it right next time only to repeat the same sinful actions again. That was the story of Peter's life.

Remember, after all Jesus had taught him…After his bragging claims that if everyone else denied Jesus he never would… yet when the crucifixion came…he denied that he even knew Jesus…not once…but three times.

Remember the crowing of the rooster?

Remember the compassionate stare of Jesus from across the courtyard?

Remember Peter, and the other disciples, despondency after the crucifixion?

Remember Jesus revealing himself to his disciples after the resurrection?

Remember Peter and six other disciples on mental overload and the decision to return to fishing?

Remember Jesus showing up and filling their nets with a huge catch then sitting them all down to breakfast on the shore of the lake.

That where I want to take you this morning…. Imagine how their frazzled minds began to settle. Not only had their Lord risen from the dead… here they were sitting with him like old times beside the Galilee.

We're not told what conversation went on during the meal… but you can just imagine the questions bubbling out of the disciples about what Jesus death, and resurrection, meant to them…(and to the whole world). Perhaps Jesus even described to them what went on during those hours his body lay in the tomb. The Bible says he descended into hell and took the keys of death and of hell! These guys, perhaps, got a first hand account.

But there is clearly tension in the air… You know how… when there has been a big argument between you and someone else and you come together in a group…each is smiling and talking…even to each other… but there is clearly something hanging in the air?

Everyone was painfully aware that Peter, after swearing on a stack of Bibles, that if all the other disciples forsook Jesus…he never would! He swore… if anybody tried to kill Jesus he would go to death with him… But when the soldiers actually hauled Jesus off for trial… Peter is running like a scared rabbit… then denies three times, that he even ever knew him. Peter is living with that truth hanging over his head every minute of every day!...and everybody else knows it!

Now… the lakeside breakfast is over….Jesus finally looks across the fire and centers his gaze directly on Peter. Everyone knows its showdown time. Again, I think, in Jesus look…(just like after Peter's denial) there is not accusation…but compassion… and restoration.

We'll dissect every part of this short conversation, (because it's cram full of meaning), but first… let's read it.

A) What is Jesus up to… here?

1) Is he trying to embarrass Peter in front of his friends? Of course not!

2) Is Jesus trying to jab Peter publicly to make a point? NO…No!

Jesus is getting ready to restore Peter…it has to be public...it is designed to make a point…but it's not going to be a negative point… some of what Jesus says, to Peter, does cut deeply… but that's not the purpose…

Jesus purpose is going to be the final restoration of Peter into total forgiveness and back into a lifetime of ministry…. By this time everybody knows about Peter's triple denial…it's hanging over his head every day. Jesus public restoration is the kindest thing he could have done for Peter. Once it's over everyone will know that;

Jesus forgives Peter

Jesus accepts Peter

Jesus wants Peter, in spite of all his faults, to be a leader in the new church

B) How many questions does Jesus ask Peter? ________ Three!

Why three…why not two or five? Is Jesus stuttering? Is he like a scratched CD that just keep playing the same place over and over. NO….

Note the setting…sitting around a campfire…not only eating but warming themselves after a miserably cold night on the lake….When was the last time you saw Peter warming himself at a campfire?________________ Here it is…

Here's something I didn't notice before…

John 18:26 One of the high priest's servants, a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, challenged him, "Didn't I see you with him in the olive grove? "

Three times Peter denies Jesus warming himself by a fire…three times Jesus questions over the breakfast fire. To our western minds this seems like just so much coincidence…to their eastern minds it was significant…very significant.

And every part of Jesus questions has so much meaning…

How does Jesus start the questioning?... with Peter's name! Oops…

John 21:15-17  When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon son of John, do you truly love me more than these?"

There really is a deep cut there…do you see it? He calls Peter… Simon… his original name. Jesus, himself had renamed Simon…into Peter. Simon: means pliable blowing reed…Peter: means stone, rock. Jesus had told Peter he would no longer be called Simon but would be known as Peter… but here at this campfire setting he again calls Peter a reed.

It was a hard reminder of Peter's self-centered arrogance… Jesus is calling him to finally put all of that behind…and move toward what his life was designed for…

These what…. These other disciples? That would be an insensitive question. And how could Peter possibly know if his love was greater than anybody else in the group. Jesus must have been pointing at something… you don't say "these" unless you are specifying something. What could these have been. The fire logs?... the sand along the lake. What was right there that was unusual?

The huge catch of fish! What did the huge catch of fish represent? Self- sufficiency… the ability to do what Peter had learned to do best!

(It's interesting, to me, that Jesus originally called Peter, on the shore of this lake… he came along and re-commissioned him on the shore of this lake and now he restores him on the shore of this lake? (each time perhaps within a few feet of each other)

We used to have four families of commercial fisherman in this church before the net ban drove them out of the state or out of business. I've been out fishing with them and their attitude was a lot like gold prospectors. One week they would haul in thousands of lbs. of fish and make a killing…. The next five weeks they would hardly make gas money…. but that next big haul, always drove them back out.

Peter…are you willing to put me ahead of all the things that give you security and comfort? Just how far are you willing to go, Peter, to give your life, all-out, no-holds- barred to me. Here was the clincher question…

"Simon son of John, do you truly love me more than these?"

Here's the final link you can't quite see there in the English Bible. Jesus uses a word for love which means…all-out…self-sacrificing…give-your-self away type of love.

Agape - Agapao - same kind of love Jesus had for us when he died for us!

Peter; are you ready to return to me the kind of love I've just demonstrated to you?

T or F; Peter enthusiastically answers yes! False….he waffles

Again… what you can't see here in the English Bible is that Peter's response uses a different Greek word. His word for love means that he has a deep friendship with Jesus.

…Jesus…without blinking an eye…commissions him to tend his church after he's gone

Again same question from Jesus…slightly modified.

Notice… Jesus left off; "more than these" He's focusing purely on Peter's heart attitude.

I've been bothered… in the past…that Peter was not ready to make an all-out declaration of "agape" love. The more that I looked at this…this time… the more I thought:

You know what…Peter is just being honest. He's saying, the reality of what is in most of our hearts. Jesus is asking us for a radical commitment. Most of us have come to have a dear friend relationship with Jesus.. ( and that's not a bad thing)

Jesus is asking Peter for more: The truth is; the process of getting from friend-relationship with our Savior to all-out self-sacrificing love relationship… takes a lot of living and a lot of serving. By the time Peter watches his wife crucified… and then endures a violent death of crucifixion himself…a lot of growth had happened inside of him.

The neat thing is that Jesus was,still, ready to use him…even in his faulted condition.

So…on the final question Jesus slips back to the word Peter has been using and asks one more time:

John 21: 17 The third time he said to him, "Simon son of John, do you love me?" Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, "Do you love me?" He said, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you." Jesus said, "Feed my sheep.

This time Jesus using the same word as Peter is saying…are we friends… are we really friends. Peter is hurt because, even though he hasn't been directly answering Jesus "love" question, he has been assuring Jesus of his deep friendship.

And… I think Jesus is saying, O.K. Pete… I can work with that for now…What I want from you is for you to pour yourself into telling others the news of what I have done in your life. In turn, I will transform you into a man who truly "agapes" me with a self-sacrificing love.

Let's face it…at some point in our lives, each of us will miserably fail our Lord by giving in to some temptation…sooner or later we will hear the "rooster crow."

At that moment, the accusing voice of satan will ring in your mind telling you that you are finished….. trying to please God is hopeless… your future has been destroyed!

But that is never God's message to you! It doesn't matter who you are or what you have done…God is not just ready to forgive you…he is ready to transform you… and reshape your live to be used in ways you could not have ever imagined.