Peter's Restoration — W.F. Anderson

Jesus Appears to His Disciples by the Sea

Very quickly, the first step in Peter's respiration as our Lord says that he has prayed for him that his faith would not fail. So, I want to read from John chapter 21, beginning with verse 1. It's rather a lengthy section, but it won't hurt us to review what happened.

It's a beautiful picture. So, John chapter 21, beginning with verse 1. After this, Jesus rebuked himself again for the disciples by the suicide brief, and he rebuked himself in this way. There. Sam and Peter, Thomas called the twins, the Samuel of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together.

Sam and Peter said to them, I'm going fishing. They said to him, we'll go with you. They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. Just as day was breaking, Jesus was still on the beach, yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.

Jesus said to them, children, have you any fish? They answered him, no. He said, then cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will find some. So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in for the quantity of fish.

That disciple whom Jesus loved, said to Peter, is the Lord. When Sam and Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his clothes for his physical work and sprang into the sea. But the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, but about a hundred yards off.

When they got out on the land, they saw a charcoal fire there with fish lying on it and bread. Jesus said to them, bring some of the fish that you have just caught. So Sam and Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them.

And although there were so many, the net was not torn. Jesus said to them, come and have breakfast. Now, none of the disciples dared ask him, who are you? They knew it was the Lord. Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so was the fish.

This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead. When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Sam and Peter, Sam, son of John, do you love me more than me?

He said to him, yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him, keep my land. A second time he said to him, Sam, son of John, do you love me? He said to him, yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him, send my sheep.

He said to him the first time, Sam, son of John, do you love me? Peter was grieved because he said to him the first time, do you love me? Jesus said to him, Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you.

Jesus said to him, feed my sheep. So let's trace this Peter to his service. It occurs in several steps. The first of those we touched on this morning, before he ever fell, before he ever denied the Lord three times in the courtyard of the high priest, our Lord Jesus had prayed for him that his faith would not fail.

Christ's Prayer That Peter's Faith Would Not Fail

Let me repeat that point tonight. Jesus did not pray that he would not fall. He prayed that his faith would not fail. And the idea of faith not failing is the very point for which Satan wanted to sit these disciples.

Remember, our Lord had said in Luke's Gospel to those men, Satan has desired, or he has demanded to him that he may sit you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, Peter, that your faith may not fail. We're put into the sitting seat of Satan, and what Satan wanted to do is what he always wants to do with God's people, and that's destroy their confidence in God.

And as I trace the work of Satan through Christian, I'm convinced that his work is not primarily in the moral realm. Murder, adultery, theft, all the rest of it, we are perfectly capable of taking care of ourselves, and we do a good job of it.

Those things the Scriptures say come from the flesh. They come from my own heart. Satan has more important things to do than to incite us to commit murder or anything else. Where he works is in the spiritual realm of our relationship to God, to destroy our confidence in the living God.

That's where he works. He has all sorts of ways of doing it. Some of you may have felt his pressure as in the case of Job. God permitted Satan to afflict Job, and the whole idea that Satan was working on was to get Job to curse God, to give up his confidence in God or God.

And Satan destroyed all of Job's wealth, took it all away from him, destroyed his family, and finally destroyed his health. In those circumstances, Satan was trying to get Job to give up on God. Does it pay to serve God when this happens to you?

Satan was hoping Job would say, No, it isn't worth it. I am true with God. And some of you may have felt that attack of Satan, to give up on God because of your circumstances. I think Paul felt the same thing.

Paul's Thorn, or Stake, in the Flesh

After the Corinthians, he mentions that thorn in the flesh, as the Robert Anderson says, is a terrible translation. You can't imagine Paul talking about a thorn. But, of course, when you think of those long Near Eastern thorns, maybe it's something to fuss about.

But the idea of the word is a stake. And one of the cruel methods of execution in the Near East, practiced quite a bit by the ancient Assyrians and by other people after them, is to put a sharpened stake in the ground.

It's a pointed end up. And then you just took a live victim, one of the captives of the city, that you were trying to defeat. Then you just took that live individual and killed him alive on that stake and watched him writhe until he died.

And Paul talks about a stake, not a thorn, but a stake. It could be thorn, but I rather think it's the Robert Anderson's idea that Paul killed himself and killed on a stake. And that's what it is. And in those circumstances, which he called a messenger of Satan, the messenger delivers a message.

And Satan was trying to get a message through to Paul in those circumstances. And the message would be the same that he was trying to get through to Job. Quit! It's not worth it. After all you've given up for Jesus Christ, after all you've endured for Jesus Christ, this is what you get out of it.

Like a man impaled on a stake. Give up. In those same circumstances, God was trying to get a message through to Paul. My grace is sufficient for you. My strength is made perfect in weakness. And there was Paul in those circumstances listening to two messages.

What Satan was trying to do was to get him to give up. In Peter's case, Satan was using his sin, his denial of the Lord, the terrible shame that went with it. Give up his confidence in Jesus Christ. For as I see it in Scripture, what Satan is always trying to do is make us give up our confidence in our Lord Jesus.

And in those circumstances, our Lord says to Peter, I have prayed for you that your faith fail not. That you won't give up. And the fact that you have sinned is no reason for thinking Jesus Christ is through with you, or that you ought to be through with him.

I'll let you in on a little secret. If you may not have picked up this week, our Lord Jesus saved sinners. Any kind of servants our Lord Jesus has are sinners. If sin is the reason to give up on him, or for his giving up on us, then not one of us is going to make it.

But that's the message Satan tries to get through to us. You've grown as everything sin is through. If the first step in Peter's restoration is our Lord's prayer for him, I have prayed for you that your faith fail not.

The Risen Lord Sends Word to Peter

The second step in Peter's restoration occurred on Resurrection Morning. In fact, early in the morning, when those angels said to the women who came to the tomb, Go tell his disciples, and Peter. Why do you think they said go tell them?

Well, put yourself in Peter's shoes. Lord Jesus, need you have denied three times with oaths and curses? Oh, by the way, let me deliver Peter from the false side. There are some who feel that Peter acted like an immature and angry sailor.

No, oaths and curses do not mean that. They mean something worse than that. Peter was not foul-mouthed that night that he denied the Lord. He took a solemn oath before God that what he said was true, and that's a whole lot worse than the language that comes out of a drunken sailor's mouth.

He took a solemn oath and evoked God's curse on him if he were not going to be true. I do not know. Now, if you had done that, would you count yourself a disciple of the man you had denied? And when a message came from those angels to the women, to the disciples of our Lord Jesus, if you were Peter, would you count yourself a recipient of that message?

You were Peter. And so the Lord made sure that the angels said to those women, tell my disciples, I am Peter. Don't leave him out. So put yourself in the place of the disciples. Do you know how self-righteous we are and how hard we are on our brothers?

Suppose you were one of those that night who hadn't denied the Lord. You hear the story got around of what Peter had done in the courtyard of the high priest. How would you feel about Peter? At least ten of us, doesn't it?

To prevent that, our Lord gets the words to these men, I need to include Peter. That must have meant to Peter when the words came back to those women that morning, tell my disciples, and don't you dare leave out Peter.

How thoughtful our Lord is. How thoughtful. Go tell my disciples and Peter. I've just spent about eight weeks meeting twice a week with a man from India who was a Hindu, and he's been preparing Hinduism and Christianity.

As we have discussed Hinduism, it's been just as an attempt to remove yourself from the mundane of everyday existence, enjoying yourself without any emotions, whatever, to the great all in all. I can't tell you how refreshing it is to deal with the real God who comes down in the ordinary kitchens of everyday living.

Go tell my disciples and Peter. In the third step in Peter's restoration, you'll learn in 1 Corinthians chapter 15, when Paul is listing the witnesses to the fact that Jesus Christ was alive, not dead, that he had been raised from the dead, he appeared also unto Peter, the two of them, when our Lord had that private audience with Peter after his resurrection.

Jesus Restores Peter Over Breakfast

But that was the third step in Peter's restoration. The fourth step is here in John chapter 21, and I want to look at that in some detail. The circumstances we've already read. Seven of them had gone out fishing.

And remember, Peter was a professional fisherman. They had gone out that night. They had before fished all night. Hadn't caught a thing. And here they come back to the shore at dawn. In the first place, these men are tired.

They went out there fly casting all night. And I watched those fishing trawlers go up and down the coast of Carolina, just offshore. And I watched those nets go over. But those nets were hauled in by a diesel engine.

When these fishermen threw those nets over, they did it by hand. And when they pulled them in, they pulled them in by hand. And they may have been light enough when they were thrown over the first time dry, but they came in dripping wet.

And that went on all night, over the side of the boat, hauling in. Over the side of the boat, hauling in. Over the side of the boat, hauling in. All night long, they were dead tired. Besides which, they were thoroughly disturbed.

They hadn't caught a thing. For me, this was South Carolina years ago. I used to go fishing once in a while with a man who had that for his hobby. I was almost going to say his vocation rather than his avocation, but it was supposed to be his avocation.

I sometimes thought it was his vocation. And, of course, he always came back with loads of reports of what he had caught. Except when I went with him. Likes to come back with an empty trail. You should have heard the excuses.

Most of which is that I was living. Here are these experienced fishermen. They've worked all night, and all they've got are wet nets to show for it. And they're coming into shore empty-handed and thoroughly discouraged.

And if you've been out working all night, you sure are hungry, aren't you? Tired, discouraged, hungry. It has business to do with Peter. You see that boat telling you, hey, Peter, I want to talk to you.

And I don't know how he got the fish or where he got the bread, but he took time to build a fire, burn down the hot coals. The bread was not going to be smoked bread, and they weren't going to have smoked fish for breakfast.

It took time. Imagine this. This is the resurrected Lord now. He's talking about being a servant. He's in resurrection. Carefully building that fire, letting it burn down so there's nothing but hot coals, no smoke, hot coals.

And he's got the fish all clean, laid out over the fire, hot bread, and it's all ready for them when they come in. He's got something else for them. As they're coming into shore, he says, have you caught anything?

What an admission. If there's anything you don't want to ask a fisherman who's coming back empty-handed, did you catch anything? He says, did you catch anything? And they say, no. And they're not sure who this man is on the shore, and they don't know anything about the breakfast waiting for them.

But he says to them, put the net down on the right side of the boat. And they put it down, and they get a great catch of fish. And God's mind begins to work. Three and a half years later, they had been on this same sea of shallows.

They let down the net when they had caught nothing the night before. And they got such a big catch that it began to swamp the boat. Very important. Do you know who that is on the shore? If you read the resurrection accounts, the accounts of the encounters of the disciples with our Lord after his resurrection, there is very often a hesitancy about their identification with him.

Recognizing Jesus by His Character

It's not quite the same as it was before his death and resurrection. And if you look at the resurrection accounts, there's such tremendous changes in our Lord's whole physical constitution that it must have affected his appearance to some degree.

And they're not so ready with the identification that this is their beloved Jesus, their Lord and Christ. There were certain characteristics about him of attitudes and actions that never changed. Until he sat down at a table with them, and acting as the host, and I really don't think it was because they saw the nailed print in his hand, he acted as host and he gave thanks and broke the bread.

And each of us has a characteristic way of doing things, doesn't he? And I think it's the way he did it and the way that he prayed. No two of us pray exactly alike unless we're trying to imitate each other.

No two of us pray exactly alike. And there was something about the way he did it that suddenly they realized who he was. And there was something about what our Lord told them to do that clicked in their minds with what had happened three and a half years before when he had called Peter and James and John to be disciples.

That's when that miraculous draft first occurred. Here it is again. There's only one person we've ever known that could do something like that. That's got to be the Lord. Now that tells me something about recognition.

I remember when I began to see this several years ago when I went to a certain city in North Carolina to preach and I hadn't been there for 15 years, maybe more than that. And one thing astonished me was how much those people had aged in 15 years.

Of course, I'm sure they were thinking the same thing. But some people would come up to me after the service and say, you don't know me, do you? And I would look at the face and say, no, I don't. And then they would start to talk or they would give a certain gesture, oh yeah, I know who you are, I know who you are.

The pictures had changed in 15 to 20 years. But not the characteristics of speech and gesture. Not the mannerisms. And I recognized them not by the way they looked, but by the expressions of their personalities.

And you ask me, will we recognize each other in heaven? Well, as one brother says, I don't expect to be more stupid than I am now. I recognize you now, I expect to recognize you then. But the recognition of our Lord, I say this the same way, it's the characteristics of the nature of the man.

And that's how they knew who he was. It's got to be the Lord. Just like that. It's got to be the Lord. I shall know him by the prints of the nail on his hand? No, indeed. No, indeed. I don't think those are recognized.

No, indeed. Have you ever had anybody else that loves you the way he does? Have you ever had anybody else that has done for you what he has done for you? Have you ever had anybody else who is as characteristically forgiving and kind and helpful as he is, and you're going to need nail prints to recognize him?

No, you won't. You're not going to need those. That isn't how they recognize him, and that's not going to be how we recognize him. There's only going to be one man in the center, of course. I realize that.

But you're not going to need nail prints to know who he is. Not on your life. But tell them that. What has he done for us? Because they have been catching fish all night. They had to bring the nets through the water.

If they dropped the boat into the shore, they couldn't get it into the boat. That's how heavy it was. 153 fish. The only significance I know of the number is that Seth tells me somebody counted them. And they couldn't get that many into the boat, and they just carried it through the water.

He rewarded them. He took away that discouragement before ever he talked to people. Let's have some breakfast. While you fellers are eating the first course that I've already prepared, bring some of those fish over and I'll get the second course on you.

You're going to have seconds. And that's what he did. While they were eating the first round, they ate all these cookies. It could be a second round for them. Isn't that characteristic of him? When he said the multitudes, what do you mean?

They're all filled. Right? So he gave them seconds for breakfast. Now, can you think of anything more delightful than being alongside a lakeshore early in the morning, and as you come ashore, here is the smell of breakfast cookies.

All you have to do is sit down there beside that lovely sea with the water laughing at your feet, and be served breakfast, and be served by the Risen Lord. How would you feel at that point? You've just caught one of the biggest chances you've ever had in your life.

Your stomach is full with good food. You could eat another bite. You're relaxed. You're feeling good. Right? Then the Lord talks to Peter the Nun himself. Now, ladies, when you take your family car out, and you come back nine of December, or you get on to Gainesville, and there's a $50 hat in the window you just couldn't resist.

Well, I know you couldn't resist it, but let's say you didn't, you couldn't resist it, and you come home. And the old ogre is sitting in the living room waiting for you. You leave that hat box in the front of the car locked, and don't you say a word about that vendor.

You come in the house, and you fix him a good meal. Now, don't fix all his favorite dishes, or he's going to get suspicious, but fix him a good meal. And when he is content, and he's sitting back in the easy chair, and he's telling you what a wonderful cook you are, then you tell him you have something you want to talk to him about.

That's how to do it. Now, I know there's going to be some questions tomorrow when you start cooking supper for your husband, but anyhow. But when you're dealing with more serious questions than that, brethren, then a brother has fallen into sin, and you're going to restore him.

Restoring a Fallen Brother with Gentleness

That's the way the Lord did it. If you don't go barging in with the accusation that it's sin, I've discovered one thing in my own family, especially with my teenage kids. They're locking horns. The way I saw that is I said, hey, let's go have lunch together.

And we'll go out, and there's not a word about the conflict between us. And we'll sit down and have a good lunch. It may bust the budget for the week, but we'll sit down and have a good lunch just the two of us.

And then when we're satisfied and feeling good, then we get into the car and take a drive and start talking. Now, graciously, I'll understand him. But I'll say this. But I'll say this. He doesn't talk to me like I'm an angry bull in the Santa Claus.

I think the groundwork for this conversation is by himself. And it's obvious that he did, because after he was through, Peter turned around and saw John following and said, what shall this man do? Now, there's no way John could be following them unless they were walking.

And our Lord took Peter away from the rest of the disciples and started to walk along the lake shore with him. Isn't that a lovely setting to talk to me about restoration? Some arm in arm. But it's too often.

That does not mean he is not going to bring up the issues. That kind of a setting is to be forthright and hasty. But he said that night in Gethsemane, the Lord said to him, no comparison now. Lord, you know that I love you.

Now, I'm not going to play on those two words for a while. I think sometimes there are too many differences made between them, because there are too many passages in the New Testament where they are obviously synonymous.

So I'm not going to play on those two words. Three times our Lord questions Peter. Do you love me? Peter searches his own heart for that three-fold denial in the high priest's courtyard. Lord, you know all things.

You know that I love you. Do you see the effect of our Lord's prayer that his faith would not fail? Do you hear what Peter is saying? You know everything. And you know that I love you. I like that. Suppose our Lord had seen only the denial.

Would he know that Peter loved him? No. But Peter says you know everything. You know more than what I did in the courtyard of the high priest. What confidence in the Lord. He doesn't zero in on our sins to make clues of everything else.

God Knows the Whole Direction of a Believer's Life

I think that's what John means when he writes in that first epistle. If our hearts condemn us, God is greater than our hearts and knows all things. And when we are condemning ourselves, what are we zeroing in on?

The sin that we committed. And everything else is blotted out. The only thing we can see is what we've done. Vision is never that restricted. He sees all things. And he knows that Peter's denial was the exception, not the rule of Peter's life.

Nor is his vision that narrow. He sees the whole direction of our life. He knows what our criteria is. And he understands what Paul is talking about in Romans 7. The evil that I would not. And I do. But God sees that I would not.

Deep down in my heart, no Lord, I would never suit against you. But sometimes I am weak in the conflict and give in. But it's the evil that I would not. And he sees far more than Peter's denial. And Peter is clear as an answer that his faith failed not.

I know the kind of Savior you are. And I know that you can see past my denial. I know that you can see that I really love you. Peter's restoration is complete. Each time when our Lord questions Peter, he says, Tend my land or feed my sheep.

Do you see what our Lord is doing? He trusts Peter. The thing that Jesus Christ has on earth. He takes care of my sheep. Would you do that with a man like Peter? Well, you wouldn't if you were the Lord, because he knows all things.

Peter's Restoration Seen in His First Epistle

The restoration of how all this works out. We don't have time to read much in Peter's first epistle. But I want you to look at some passages. And by the way, perhaps tonight or some other time, you would like to read through 1 Peter, which I take to be an old man's reminiscence.

Read through 1 Peter in light of what has happened to him. And let's look at some expressions in 1 Peter chapter 1. And maybe we'll have time just to jump over to chapter 5 and take one or two expressions through.

We see the writing in verse 3. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. By his great mercy we have been born anew to a living hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.

That could be translated to a life of hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ has never been raised from the dead. The one who he really loved was in Pilate. He was in the palace of the high priest.

When having denied Jesus three times, now the Lord lives on. And that's the last time Peter will ever see. I repeat what I've been through. Giving him a life of hope through the resurrection of Jesus Christ.

That risen Christ who lived and restored him, that's the one who filled his life, not with despair but with hope. He talks about an inheritance in verse 4, which is imperishable, undefiled, and unfading.

Kept in heaven for you, who by God's power are kept through faith for a salvation ready to be revealed in the last time. Peter, I have prayed for you, that your faith fail not. Do you think Peter didn't know what he was writing about?

A little further down, he talks about the trial of faith in verse 6. Lord, did he know what the trial of faith was? In those long hours when Jesus Christ was still in the tomb, do you think he didn't know what the trial of faith was?

Much more precious than that of gold. Look at verse 8. Without having seen him, who loved him? Peter's response was in those hours when the body of Christ was still in the tomb. Did he love that Savior?

After those three and a half years, how could he do anything else? And though we do not see him now, we believe in him and rejoice with unutterable and exalted joy. Where do you get that? The resurrected Christ.

Now, there are a number of passages that touch me deeply in this epistle as I think about people who talked about suffering for Christ's sake, counting it happy if you were persecuted for Christ's sake.

That must have strung him bitterly as he wrote it, as he thought back in his own failure to suffer for Christ that night in the high priest's courtyard. But he writes that. But I want to come over to chapter 5.

Peter's Past Failure and His Pastoral Charge

Three elders among you as fellow elders and a witness of the sufferings of Christ as well as of the paper and the glory that is to be revealed. Tend the flock of God that is in your side, not by constraint but willingly, not for shameful gain but eagerly, not as domineering over those whom you think Peter could ever domineer again.

They all but not I. Do you think he could ever do that again? No. Not as domineering over those in your charge but being examples for the flock. And when the chief shepherd is manifested, you will obtain the unfading crown of glory.

Verse 6. Humble yourselves therefore unto the mighty hand of God, that in due time he may exalt you. Cast all your anxieties on him, for he cares about you. Do you think after that incident, those incidents of the resurrection, care that Jesus Christ took in reaching this man, that Peter could ever doubt that he cared about him?

Or as the paraphrase has it, you are his personal. Never doubt that. He was the Lord's personal. For being such a gentle, yet truthfully and righteously, yet so graciously, we bless you and praise you tonight and like Peter, we rejoice because your resurrection has filled our life with hope.