Wednesday Night Bible Study John 21

We're going to be in John chapter 21 tonight. This is, those of you who don't know, this is a, as of right now, a seven year project that we've done every

Wednesday night for the last seven years, starting in Genesis, going through chapter by chapter, all the way through, hey

Scott, and we have made it to John 21, the last chapter in the

Gospels. So next Wednesday, and next Wednesday we will be back, Witten, and we'll be in Acts chapter 1,

Theophilus. I just had, while we're waiting for everyone to get here,

I just had probably one of the most awesome things, I've never done this before,

I've done a lot of stuff, but I've never done this, I had a young man from our congregation who is being promoted to second lieutenant in the army, asked me to pin his insignia, rank insignia, on him at a ceremony next

Friday. And, I'll tell you what, that's pretty humbling. That's pretty humbling.

Hey Heather, hey mi hermano, Dios te bendiga, my brain's not working.

So yeah man, I'm going to get to do that, it meant a lot to me, I've known this young man for a long time now, and he is probably one of the finest young men

I have ever met, and it's truly an honor, it's a privilege, as far as I'm concerned, it's a privilege for me to be able to do that, so, looking forward to doing that.

Looking forward, can't wait to be back, yes ma 'am, it is Sean, to be sure, it is

Keith, you got it. You know and it's funny, this kid is the most,

I shouldn't say kid, it's hard for me, I still call him my 25 year old, all my 25, my 20 year olds and 30 year olds in my congregation,

I still call them kids, and they're not, but it's amazing, you know, there is some truth to the hyperbole of, you know, our generation now is massively different than the

World War II generation, and there is more entitlement, and there is more, to be sure, and, but I tell you what, when

I hear people say something like if God help us if we ever go to war again, because we'll lose, because this generation can't hack it,

I gotta take exception there. I got several young men who have returned from war in our congregation, and hopefully some not going back, but they have acquitted themselves with great honor, and it's a privilege to know them, it really is.

Hey Rebecca, Dios te bendiga, and the same to me, my brother.

Si, mi espanol es muy bueno, muy bueno. Yo quiero taco bello.

Alright, well, I have to write a note to call somebody.

All my little things, hey Carrie, all my little things, when

I get phone calls, and when I, not phone calls, screen texts, and whatever, they pop up here at the top of the screen, and I gotta write notes, because I'll never remember.

Alright, so, hey Sue, alright, so,

John 21, just a couple of things about reviewing, okay? Now we're gonna do, remember there's a difference between preaching and teaching, okay?

We're gonna do a little bit of preaching, but hopefully a lot of teaching tonight. Hey Brother Rodney, and I WD -40'd my chair, someone, actually two people said, man, your chair was squeaking.

Well, it's because I'm fat, and there's not really a, I called 1 -800 -JENNY, and they hadn't called me back, so I don't know what the deal is, but hey

Miss Linda, but we're gonna do hopefully a little bit more teaching today, and hopefully the chair won't be as distracting.

Me, the Brother Rodney. But here's the other thing

I wanted to do, I wanted to do just a little review. Remember that John is an anomaly.

The Gospels, the good news, are Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. John stands alone in the

Gospels, and that's why Matthew, Mark, and Luke are called synoptic, because they basically have kind of a symmetry about them, in talking about the ministry of Jesus Christ.

John is really different in the fact that it really hones in on, it really focuses on the deity of Jesus Christ, and so in its conclusion here,

Jesus has been crucified, he has died, he has risen again, and he's been appearing, and he had just got finished appearing to the disciples in the last part of chapter 20, and this is where Thomas makes that great declaration.

It actually says here in chapter 20, verse 28, it says,

Thomas responded him to my Lord and my God. People say, you know, doubting

Thomas, and I always kind of try to defend that, because I mean, name me a disciple who didn't doubt.

Thomas was just the one bold enough to say it. But you're going to see him demonstrate this again, and I want you to understand, this gives me such great peace as a believer, because guys,

I'm going to let you in on a secret. I'm a pastor, but man, I am such a jacktard sometimes.

I get so lost in the high grass sometimes. I really do.

Man, I get unfocused, and I get frustrated, or I'm out in left field not doing what

I'm supposed to be doing, or to quote Paul, why am I doing the things I know I should not do, and not doing the things

I know I need to do. Oh, wretched man that I am. But of course, that declaration in Romans 8, 1, there is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus.

Well, Thomas is the same way, and so is Peter, and so are the rest of the disciples, and we're going to see that.

Jesus just appeared to him. Thomas just touched his nail -scarred hands, and Jesus tells him, hey man,

I got some plans for you guys, and boof, he's gone. And then we open up in John chapter 21, verse 1, after this,

Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he revealed himself in this way.

So they had just seen the resurrected, glorified Son of the living

God. Just seen him, okay? Just seen him. And here's how they respond.

Jesus leaves in verse 2, Simon Peter, Thomas, Nathanael from Canaan and Galilee, Zebedee's sons, and two other disciples were together.

So you know, here are these guys, they're hanging out together, these disciples, they just had seen Jesus. They obviously know he raised from the dead, and this is what they do with that information.

Peter says, and of course he's the default leader because he's rash, Peter says, I'm going fishing.

I'm going fishing. Now, in our colloquial understanding of us here in the southern part of the

United States, when you say I'm going fishing, it's a leisure thing. For Peter, this is what he's really saying.

He's not going to fish to take his mind off of things. He's going back to his old life.

Peter is going back to be a fisherman again. He has seen the risen

God. He was told by Jesus that you are going to do this, you're going to be my witnesses, you're going to do this, you're going to do this, you're going to do this, you're going to do this.

Peter said, gotcha Lord. I'm going back to my old life. Have you ever done that,

Christian? Got fired up for Jesus, and you're going back to that old life, you know?

Puts us in good stead, not as an excuse, and don't use this as a validation to stay laying on the mat.

You take one on the chin, you mess up, you get up, and you get moving back. Peter and the rest of the boys, they're disillusioned, they don't know what's going on, but they know they've seen

Jesus, and their answer is, let's go back to our old life and go back fishing. Now, it wasn't just Peter, okay, it wasn't just Peter, we're coming with you, they said.

They went out and got into the boat, but that night, they caught nothing, okay? It's a set up, it's a set up, all right?

So verse four, when daybreak came, Jesus stood on the shore, however, the disciples did not know it was

Jesus. Really got the hiccups again.

So they went fishing, they didn't catch anything, they didn't catch anything. Now if you'll remember, at the beginning of the

Gospels, this had happened before, and Jesus said, hey guys, throw your nets on the other side.

They threw their nets, and they had a big haul. And then Jesus called them to be disciples.

So now it's three and a half years later, Jesus ascended, or hasn't ascended, I'm sorry, Jesus wasn't with them, he appeared to them, they went back to their old life,

Jesus shows up on the beach, all right? And hadn't caught anything, and they didn't recognize the guy on the beach.

And then Jesus, verse five, said, men, you don't have any fish, do you? And they said, no, we didn't catch anything today.

And verse six, well, cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you'll find some.

So they did, and they were unable to haul it in because of the large number of fish.

Someone just went ding, because you read there in verse seven, therefore the disciple, the one

Jesus loved, we're talking about John. Hold on one second,

Jeremiah. I'm sorry, guys,

I'm gonna drive y 'all crazy. Come here, man. I got the hiccups, man, I'm live on, will you give me some water?

Sorry, guys. I know I'm supposed to be all Mr. Professional Pastor and all that, but dude, I'm just Jeff, I got the hiccups, my boy's getting me some water.

So anyways, right, so they caught fish.

Now John, you need some peanut butter. That's old school.

So John said to Peter, it's the

Lord. John immediately, because he had, thanks, son, I love you. John had been there the first time this happened, and as soon as all the fish came up, he looks at Peter and goes, it's the

Lord. Then when Son and Peter heard it was the Lord, he tied his outer garment around him, for he was stripped and plunged into the sea.

But since they were not far from land, about a hundred yards away, the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish.

When they got on land, they saw a charcoal fire there with fish laying on it and bread. Only a -whittin', baby.

Done. All right, so here's a couple of things to note. John immediately, from the nostalgic memory of what transpired in the past, he turns to Peter and says, hey, it's the

Lord. Peter gets dressed, all right, now I want you to find the logic in this.

Now, especially in the King James, it's kind of funny, because it kind of says he was naked.

And what that means is he really had a breech cloth on. But notice Peter's intelligence.

He's fishing in his underwear, let's say, and then he puts his clothes on to jump in the lake.

You know what this means? It means he knows, he knows all of this is going on, and he is like, he doesn't know which way to go.

He doesn't know what to do. He feels guilty, because remember, man, you know, he's seen

Jesus, but they hadn't talked about him denying him three times, right? He feels guilty, he feels shame, he feels...

And when you're busted, you sometimes do that. You panic. Well, that's what

Peter's going through. He's going through a moment of panic. So he's fishing, and he gets dressed, and goes swimming.

But I also want you to notice this. It's a hundred yards away. Now, when

I was a young man, most of y 'all do not know this, but I was actually on a swim team, believe it or not.

I was on a swim team in Peachtree City, Georgia, the Peachtree City Pacers, I think is what they were called.

But I was a little feller, and I was a pretty good swimmer.

I really was. I learned to swim on a military base in the canal zone. But yeah,

I mean, I was a pretty powerful swimmer. In fact, one time when I was up in Michigan, I swam across a pretty large body of water.

I was a pretty powerful swimmer. But let me tell you something, a hundred yards isn't a joke, okay? A hundred yards, man, that'll tear you up.

That'll get you a little tired. Yeah, I'm not a Navy SEAL. A hundred yards is gonna be a pretty good swim.

Right now, it'd be death. But, you know, back then, it was still a pretty good swim. So Peter swims to the lake.

What do the rest of the disciples do? Well, they, you know, pull in the tack, get the fish, and they're gonna sail the boat in.

They're not gonna jump in the water. So they're sailing their boat in, Peter's swimming. He gets up on the shore, and he looks, and there's

Jesus. And this is what Jesus is doing. He's on a pulpit behind a podium with a

King James Bible in his hand and a finger like this, saying, Peter, you godless, heathen, scum -sucking pig, how could...

No. Peter gets to the shore, and Jesus is sitting there.

Small fire. And there's fish already cooking. Nothing said.

No damnation. No you're a loser. No you screwed up again.

I mean, because remember, this isn't Peter's first screw -up. Basically, Peter's three -year walk with Christ was one mess -up after another.

You see, there's grace on that beach, just like there's grace for me and you.

It's very special to me. But anyways. So, excuse me.

So verse 19. So Jesus said, bring some of the fish you just caught,

Jesus told him. So here's what... Now, Jesus is already cooking breakfast, okay?

He's already cooking breakfast, and he goes and tells Peter, hey, go get some more fish.

So what's Peter do? I guess, Lord, I'll call you George, you know, like the little dog in the cartoon.

Okay, okay, George, okay. And he runs over to the net. Now it's taking the boat and every other guy to get the fish up on the shore, but watch this.

Peter, verse 11. So Peter got up and hauled the net ashore full of large fish, 153 of them.

Even though they were so many, the net was not torn. Come and have breakfast,

Jesus told him. So here's Peter again. And once again, Christians, this gives us such hope and gives us such peace in knowing, first of all, that this isn't some, you know, hyperbole story book like Aesop's Fables.

You really see the human dynamic. I can see myself acting like this. Jesus says, hey,

Peter, go get some fish. Oh man, he's talking to me. Oh man, he's not yelling at me.

Okay, Lord. And Peter just runs over and grabs the whole net. Jesus wasn't,

Peter's like, man, he wants fish. I'm going to grab all 153 of them. I'm just going to bring the whole net up on shore.

I'm not going to go pick out two or three. I'm just going to bring them all. Because Jesus said, bring some of the fish.

So that means bring them all. And this is that impetuous nature that sometimes we have as believers that we see so much in Peter and the rest of the disciples.

So Peter gets some fish and then Jesus says to him, come and have breakfast.

Okay, so Jesus says, go get fish. And then

Peter brings the net up on shore. And you can just kind of see Jesus. And I don't know this.

Okay, this is, I want to make this clear. This is my supposition. Okay. This is purely a subjective idea.

It's not an objective fact as found in scripture. But I can almost see one of the dad smiles.

You know, Peter runs over the net instead of grabbing three or four fish.

He's dragging the whole thing up there. And you can see Jesus sitting there by the fire going, that's my boy.

That's my son. Peter, son, stop.

Come sit down, son. Eat some breakfast. So Peter goes over there.

Now, you know, his stomach is doing somersaults in his guts.

You know, he is absolutely one nervous puppy.

So the disciples come over. Peter comes over. They're all sitting around a fire.

And you want to talk about awkward silence. Okay, because they're busted.

They're busted. Jesus told them, this is what I need you to do. And they're out fishing.

Jesus didn't want them to go be fishers, right? He told them three years ago, put your nets down.

I'm going to make you fishers of men, not fishers of fish no more. You're done with that. Come and follow me.

He leaves. And because everything's, there's been changes. Oh, okay. Well, we got to go back to that old life.

We're afraid. We don't know what to do. So they go back. So now they're sitting around a fire on a beach.

And Jesus is sitting there. And you know, the only sound you're hearing is

Jesus eating. Because you know, them other guys, they're probably holding it. But they're not really probably that hungry at this point.

You can hear the waves probably lapping up on the beach a little bit. And it's dead silence because no one wanted to speak.

And of course it says that here. Jesus told them, come have breakfast. None of the disciples dare ask him, who are you?

Because they knew it was the Lord. So what they're pretending is they're pretending that they don't know that Jesus doesn't know that he knows that they know that it's him.

But they're pretending like it's not him. So that they don't have to come face to face with their own failures.

So they're living in plausible deniability with the king of kings and lord of lords and the sovereign

God who created everything. Yeah, Jesus was really fooled, right? That's why he was there.

So they're sitting there to not say anything. And then verse 13, Jesus came, took the bread and gave it to them.

He did this the same with the fish. So, you know, now Jesus, watch this.

Pastors, come here. Jesus is serving them again.

Christian, out of this two weeks or three weeks or, God, it's been longer than that, two months that we've been talking, if you take nothing away from anything

I've said, take it away from this. With all the disciples' failures, with all their cowardice, with all their backsliding,

Jesus is the risen king now, completed his duty, is still in the business of serving his children.

He serves them breakfast, serves them bread, and serves the fish. And it was not the fish they caught.

Jesus didn't have a microwave, okay? It was the fish he had already cooked. In other words, they didn't bring anything to the table again.

And Jesus provided everything. Welcome to grace. Welcome to grace.

And no matter how many times you falter or fall, no matter how many times you mess up, he'll still be there waiting, and he's still there to serve.

So, verse 14, this was now the third time, now read this carefully, the third time

Jesus had appeared to the disciples after he was raised from the dead. This wasn't the first time.

Now this, this, John is actually there, and he is actually writing about this years later, and he's indicting himself.

He's really indicting himself. Hey, Sammy. Hey, Kyle. Hey, Isha. Sorry, I'm not keeping up.

Hey, Tamara. Hey, baby. So, this is the third time.

Now, the reason John wrote this is to make it crystal clear how powerful God's grace is.

How powerful it is. I know some preachers say, well, this is the third time because Peter denied him.

That was a solo event. Peter denied Jesus three times. You got to remember the rest of the disciples there.

Why this is the third time is because he's already showed them twice, physically, that he was risen from the dead.

They should have been in the streets, right? I mean, that's what we think they should be doing.

They should be in the streets preaching Jesus Christ alive. What did they do? They went back. Hey, Casey.

How are you doing, baby? Don't say peachy.

Don't say peachy. I love you. Hang in there, sweetie.

So, John is writing this, and he's saying, hey, yeah, he had showed us twice already that he was alive, and what do we idiots do?

We go back and do the same stupid things we were doing before. Can any

Christian out there identify with that? I can.

I can. So, here we go. You ready? So, verse 15.

When they had eaten breakfast, Jesus asked Simon Peter, Simon, son of John.

I like King James better. Simon, son of Jonas. Do you love me more than these?

Peter answered, yes, Lord. You know that I love you. And he said, feed my lambs.

Second time he asked him, Simon, son of Jonah. Do you love me? Yes, Lord, he said to him.

You know that I love you. Shepherd my sheep. Are you really doing wonderful,

Casey, or did you just lie to your pastor? Because I'll excommunicate you tomorrow. Just, you're out of there.

Now, I want you to understand when he sits there and calls

Peter, he actually calls him, if you'll notice and look, he calls him Simon.

Now, remember what Simon was. Simon was Peter's old unconverted name.

He calls him Simon Peter, son of Jonas. He says, Simon, son of Jonas.

So, in other words, it's a dig. Yeah. Guys, remember this.

Grace is, and some of you people who are spying to be parents. Well, you hang in there,

Casey. Some of you people are spying to parents. Listen to me. Listen to me on this. I'm going to give you a parent lesson.

Walk hand in hand with a kick in the butt. Okay. People talk about disciplining your children.

Spankings are not disciplining your children. They are a tool of disciplining your children.

Disciplining your children means instilling within them the character and integrity to do what's right when you're not there.

That's what it means. And to do that, it is a consistent endeavor every hour of every day of every week.

And don't be one of those parents who comes and sits in my office in 20 years and go,

Pastor, I raised them up in church. God didn't tell you to raise them in church. God told you to raise them in the word of God.

If you're not living it, if you're not leading it, if you're not repeating it, they're not going to get it.

Okay. Jesus is now for the third time coming to them.

All right. And he has shown grace. There's no doubt about it. But God also says he chastens those.

He disciplines those whom he loves. And he's digging at Peter here a little bit. He's digging at Peter here a little bit.

Hey, scrub. Hey, third stringer. You're on the starting varsity team. Why'd you go back to the

JV squad? Because you were scared. Because you didn't want to hit. Because you didn't want to spend the hours.

You didn't want to do. You want to do what you wanted to do. So Simon, do you love me?

And then Simon Peter says, yes, Lord, you know I love you. And then Jesus responds.

He says, feed my lambs. And the second time Jesus asks Peter, hey, do you love me, son?

And Peter says, Lord, you know that I love you. And then he says this. He says, shepherd my sheep.

We'll get to that in a second. And then a third time. If you look over here, verse 17, he asked him a third time,

Simon, son of John, do you love me? And then it says this. Peter was grieved that he had asked him the third time.

Do you love me? He said, Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you.

All right. So now watch this. When Peter answered this time, there was a little bit of tension in his voice now.

There was a little bit of grief in his voice now. You could almost hear his voice cracking just a bit.

You could almost hear the guilt and the shame busting out on Peter.

Because, yeah, here in the solo act of Jesus addressing

Peter. Okay. Peter denied Jesus three times. Jesus turned around and asked

Peter three times, do you love him? Now, let's talk just for a second about Jesus' response when

Peter says, yes, Lord, you know I love you. Okay. I want you to note what

Jesus' response was when Peter said, I love you.

Okay. And I need you to wrap your head around this for a second. When someone says,

I love the Lord, and they say it because they are emotional or energetic because of a sermon or a song that has touched them, that is good, but it is childlike.

Okay. The mature Christian demonstrates love by obedience to the call of Jesus Christ.

Your maturity in Christian life cannot be measured by the fact that you don't have tattoos.

It can't be measured by the fact of your church attendance. Okay. You should be,

God's very clear when he says, do not forsake the assembling of yourselves together. He means you need to go be part of a church family.

Okay. There's no ifs, ands, or buts about that. And if you're one of them dumb rednecks who says,

I can worship God on the lake like I can in a building, you're an idiot. Okay. Because it's not about you worshiping

God. It's about you serving God's people. If you're one of those people that want to find a church, and the first thing you ask is, what can the church do for me?

How's y 'all's children's ministry? What's your youth program like? You are a very immature

Christian. The way you find a church is, this is how you find it. Not what suits you, but where is there a need for the kingdom of God, and what are you going to do to fill it?

That is the level of maturity that a Christian needs to obtain. But we're so wrapped up in polity, and politics, and what can you do for me lately?

I can't sing it. But anyways, you get my point. Every time Peter said, I love you,

Lord, Jesus says, what are you doing? Now, also, second thing, notice this.

Jesus didn't say, what are you doing for me? Jesus said, what are you doing for my people?

First, he says, lambs. Then he says, shepherd the flock. Then he says, feed the sheep.

Yes, Peter was going to be a pastor. Absolutely. Absolutely.

But guys, being a pastor and being a preacher are two completely different things, okay?

One of the greatest failures the church has had in the last couple of generations is we have failed to prepare people for real life.

We've taught them little Bible stories, you know, the little plastic

Noah's Ark with the giraffes and elephants sticking out at the top. You know, I just heard that a minute ago.

You know, we've told them about little David with his little sling, and you shouldn't lie.

You shouldn't steal, God. Be careful little eyes what you see. And then we're amazed because the maturity level of what we're teaching, and more importantly, the maturity level that we are exhibiting is not enough to prepare them when they're in high school and college.

Guys, we know that we lose people in the flock, in the congregation when they go to college.

You know why? Because we failed. We failed. We failed. You got to feed them.

You got to shepherd them, okay? And guys, there's just some realities about shepherding.

I mean, I'm writing a book about this, what a pastor as a shepherd should look like, what he should be doing.

And it ain't preaching. Preaching is part of it, a very small part of it.

Preaching is a very small job of being a pastor. If it's your main focus, if it's your main focus, you need to step your game up a little bit, okay?

Homiletics 101, 102, 103, 104 are great, and I'm glad you went to seminary and learned that.

But at the same time, there are Samaritans laying all over the road, and we're passing them by with our nose in the latest

Charles Spurgeon book or Danny Akin. Um, feed your sheep, feed them.

And you need to feed your sheep where they start developing muscle of their own, where they start developing the ability and the desire to feed other sheep.

And then when you do that, you actually start having a New Testament church, not of just wheat growing in a field that's going to be blown whichever way the wind's blowing.

But you're going to have roots, tree, oak trees that are generational in strength.

And if you have failed to do that, pastor, it's okay, because listen, listen to me. It's okay, because Jesus is still going to sit with you.

He's still going to feed you. He's still going to wash your feet so you can go watch somebody else's. The power of God's grace, the power of God's salvation isn't that I don't go to hell or I'm forgiven of my sin.

It's that I get to glorify God by serving his people. That's the greatest glory

I can give. People say, oh no, pastor, praise and worship. Listen to me. Do you actually think that your praise and worship as a sinful human being here on earth can equal the praise and worship of you at a glorified state in heaven?

If that's all God wanted was praise and worship, he'd just take us all home right now.

We are plan A for God to be glorified here on earth. We're plan A. There ain't no plan

B. We are plan A. People say, oh, well, the Holy Spirit. Hey, dork, where do you think the

Holy Spirit lives? In us. We are the vehicles in which the

Holy Spirit is taken to a lost and dying world. Quit playing church games. Quit playing religious games and start feeding some sheep.

All right. So, verse 18. Now, Peter tells, I mean,

Jesus now looks at Peter and he gives him a warning here. He says, I assure you, when you were young, you would tie your belt and walk wherever you wanted.

But when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands and someone else will tie you and carry you where you don't want to go.

He said this to signify by what kind of death he would glorify God. Glorify God, what we were just talking about.

After saying this, he told them, follow me. All right, we'll stop. We'll stop there for right now.

But let me tell you the rest of the story. What was that guy's name? Paul Harvey.

Now for the rest of the story. Some of you young guys have no idea. What's really cool about this is when

John was written, this hasn't transpired, I don't believe yet.

But anyways, long story short. Peter went out. Man, he started helping the church in Jerusalem and a few years later, man, he was traveling.

He was preaching. He and Paul kind of had some headbutt in there. But Peter eventually ended up in Rome.

No, he was not the first pope. Actually, it was a guy named

Linus, believe it or not. But anyways, Peter ends up in Rome.

He's a pastor in Rome and a great persecution breaks out.

It's the whole persecution after the fires of Nero, 64

AD. I'm going to nerd out and I don't want to. But 64

AD, the Roman Emperor Nero burnt Rome to the ground. Of course, that is some people call it speculative.

I believe it with all my heart. But anyways, to get out of it, he blamed the Christians. And he was brutal, man.

Brutal. But anyways, this persecution lasted for several years. Paul was killed in Rome around 66, 67

AD. Okay, well, Peter was killed along that same line. Now, the difference was

Peter was not in jail at this time. And church tradition, now this is not in Scripture, but church tradition tells us, and it could be wrong, but it tells us that the deacons and the leaders of the church grabbed

Peter, the pastor, and said, man, we got to get you out of town. And the story goes that as Peter was walking out, he made it out of the city and they were walking down the road and Peter stopped and says,

I can't do this. I can't do this. How am

I going to turn my back and walk away when Christ died for me? I can't do it. And Peter turned back around and went back into Rome.

He was subsequently arrested and was taken to a public arena.

And it's not the Colosseum. But anyways, taken to a public arena and they were killing

Christians wholesale. So they were crucifying him in this public arena. And Peter said, he actually said to the guards there, he said,

I'm not worthy to die in the same manner as my Lord. And so in a fit of macabre irony and attempted humor, they crucified

Peter upside down. They also killed Peter's wife, too. They crucified her as well.

He was actually shouting encouragement to her as they both were on the cross.

And he was preaching while he was hanging upside down on that cross. Jesus said, hey, when you were young, you could do what you wanted to do.

But I'm telling you, when you grow old, they're going to bind you up. They're going to stretch your arms out and you're going to give glory to God in this way through your death.

And Peter died. Now, I tell you that to say this.

I don't think I'm going to be a martyr for Jesus. I know some people are in bunkers right now with hand cranked radios and a bunch of ammunition and a

King James Bible thinking it's the end of the world as we know it. Yes, the song just went through my head.

I don't think we're in that time frame right now. I could be wrong, but I just I just don't believe it.

There's still too many things that prophetically, I think, need to happen. But I believe the time is very near.

And so I'm sitting here and I'm thinking to myself, you know, I'm probably not going to die a martyr's death in the

United States of America as a Christian. I think I think I'm going to die an old man or well, if I make it that long.

But let me tell you something about martyrdom. I believe to a certain degree it's it's a gift to die as a martyr.

Polycarp, if you if you let me recommend a book to you. Every Christian should read this book at least once a year.

It's called Fox's F -O -X -E -S Book of Martyrs.

Fox's Book of Martyrs. It was written, I think, in the 15th century. I could be wrong about that.

But it's basically the historical account of the martyrs from the time of Jesus.

Now they've abridged it. And I think it actually goes all the way through 1994.

Of course, it's not all of them. It's not an exhaustive list, of course, but it's it's a great, great, great encouragement.

Because what it did for me, if those people can endure that under pain of death, am

I really going to whine? Am I really going to have a bad attitude? Because I've got to go do this.

I got to serve on a committee. I've got to teach the children's department. I've got to go watch the nursery or whatever task you feel is so detrimental to your comfort.

It does inspire just a little bit. So maybe we will never go.

Maybe this generation will never be crucified or killed for our faith in the mass manner that they were.

I mean, obviously, they're and I'm talking within the United States, of course. But at the same time, there is a call.

I must decrease so that he can increase. There's an old

Japanese saying that says something like this. I taught it to my children and my students as well. Hey, Jonathan, and my students as well, is look for an opportunity to die every day.

Look for an opportunity to die. And of course, we have Luke 9. If anyone wishes to follow after me, let him deny himself, pick up his cross and follow me daily.

Guys, if you fail daily, grace still is available daily.

The question becomes, at what point are you willing to let go and let yourself die that Christ may be glorified through that death?

That's all right, Jonathan. I hope you were encouraged tonight and I look forward to talking to you again.

I hope this definitely encouraged you. I hope it gave you something to think about. And I ask that you take this and put it in your own words.

But use the word of God. Take this and share it with someone who might be struggling.

Share it with someone who might be defeated. Share it with someone who may feel that they've failed

God one too many times. My goodness. It's not so.

God's grace. Where sin abounds, grace abounds even more. I love you all very much and I'll see you all tomorrow night.