Salmon Ex Nihilo - [John 21:1-14]

He says, clearly effects have causes, right? You can't have an effect without something that caused that effect.

Then he says, second, the material universe, the cosmos, came into existence because sometime in the past, something happened to force it to come into existence.

He says, virtually everyone affirms this point because of the widespread, and listen to this, this is why

I'm not a huge Greg Kuchel fan, because the widespread, and I think, justified belief in the

Big Bang. Now if you go, if you Google, and don't do that right now, but if you Google Greg Kuchel, Google Greg Kuchel, you'll see him described as a

Christian apologist, right? And he reasons from philosophy and ultimately from the

Bible, but justified belief in the Big Bang. Anyway, he says, therefore, the material universe must have a cause.

Now those are pretty good arguments for the existence of God, right? They're logical, but here's a better argument.

The Bible declares God's existence. The Bible says God is, and today we're going to see the resurrected

Jesus demonstrate that God exists by being God. If you're in chapter 21,

I'm going to read from verses, or starting in verse 1, and I'm going to read all the way through verse 14.

When I told Patty I was going to do all this, she goes, that's a big chunk of it, and then she reads it, and she goes, oh yeah, you have to do that as one, and I'm like, thank you,

Patty. Thank you for agreeing with me. All right, verse 1.

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

Simon Peter, Thomas, called the twin, Nathanael of Cana and Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together.

Simon Peter said to them, I'm going fishing. And they said to him, we will go with you.

They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

Just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore. Yet the disciples did not know it was

Jesus. Jesus said to them, children, do you have any fish?

They answered him, no. He said to them, 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 because of the quantity of fish.

That disciple whom Jesus loved, therefore, said to Peter, it is the Lord. When Simon Peter heard that it was the

Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he was stripped for work and threw himself into the sea.

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 land, they saw a charcoal fire in place with fish laid out on it and bread.

Jesus said to them, bring some of the fish that you have just caught. So Simon 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 his 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 with the fish.

This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

Now, I stress this central truth over and over and over again in this gospel.

Jesus Christ is God of very God. Last week I said he was eternally generated.

Somebody asked me right before the service or said, you know, we were right with you until you started that whole eternal generation thing.

Then we were like, what in the world is he talking about? What does that mean? I'm not going to rehash the whole thing.

I'm just going to say this, that it's hard for us to understand this whole idea of eternal generation.

That is to say that there was never a time that Jesus did not exist, and yet he's eternally generated by the father.

What does that mean? Is he a creation? The answer is no. It means that he's eternally generated. But what does that mean?

That means outside of time, which is where God is, he's eternally generated by the father.

There was never a time where he didn't exist. Well, how can that be? Well, our problem is we're creatures.

We live in time. We think in time. The Holy Spirit is eternal.

Well, how can that be since it said that he is, he proceeds from the father and the son because our thoughts of God are too human.

Our thoughts of God are bound by what we know. They're bound by time. As was said in Sunday school, we try to comprehend the incomprehensible and some of it we just have to say,

I don't really get it. Okay. It's just true. It is because this is what the

Bible declares. But I go on to say this, that salvation is free and it's freely available to all who believe in Christ.

And I love to commend the gospel of John to believers, to especially to unbelievers.

In fact, I did that this week. I said, please read the gospel of John. Why? Because in it, you get to know

Jesus. You're getting, as I've said over and over again, kind of a guided tour through his life.

You don't learn everything about Jesus, but John has a singular purpose, his best friend, right?

Probably somebody he's known even longer than his ministry. We don't know that, but it's fair to say that he's known him for a long time and he considers himself to be

Jesus' best friend. And he says, I have a goal. I'm going to tell you about Jesus, but I have a goal.

My goal is to get you to understand that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God. I want believers, unbelievers, new believers.

I want everybody to read this book. Why? Because it's so focused on Jesus Christ and it points to the fact that he is the second person of the

Trinity and the only way by which men can be saved. John is theologically precise, but he also lets us see the tenderness of Christ.

You can't read through, for example, the upper room discourse where he's meeting with the disciples or even the night when he's tried and think this is a

God who does not care. Jesus cares about these men greatly. I think he suffers when he's betrayed by Judas Iscariot.

I think he suffers when Peter denies him. Jesus Christ is truly

God, truly man, truly loving, and truly holy. He's truly like us and he's truly transcendent.

Last Sunday, we looked at the second Sunday evening after the resurrection of Jesus Christ. On the first Sunday evening, resurrection day,

Easter Sunday, he entered a room in which the disciples were gathered.

It was that locked door. If you recall, Thomas wasn't there that first night. There were several people there, including the ten remaining disciples, but probably some others, the men from Emmaus that were on the road to Emmaus when

Jesus came and talked to them, the women who had witnessed the resurrected Jesus. They gathered together,

I think, probably to talk about this and to sort out what all this meant. Thomas wasn't there.

Probably later on that evening, throughout the week, they're telling him that Jesus has been raised, that they've all seen him.

And if you recall, Thomas set the bar really high. He said, you know what? Unless I can put my fingers in his hands, unless I can put my hand in his side, unless I see everything,

I'm not going to believe. And that second Sunday evening, Jesus entered again and he said, peace, as he did the first time, entered supernaturally as he did the first time.

And he focused directly on Thomas and met every demand that Thomas had made, demands that Jesus only could know about because he's omniscient, an attribute of God.

Then Thomas made his profound confession, my Lord and my God. And that's when

I started expanding on that and talking about what it meant that Jesus was both Lord and God, the

Messiah, the lamb sent to bear the punishment for all who would ever believe. But Jesus also truly

God, the creator and sustainer of all that is. And I talked about, if you recall, just the idea, you know, some people just want to have this little incomplete picture of Jesus or they're like me with jigsaw puzzles,

I said, you know, they just want to work on the outward frame and that's good enough for them. Or they want to just have a particular corner or maybe they, you know, part of his face or maybe his whole face, but they don't want the whole

Jesus. And I think we need to know the whole Jesus as much as we can know him.

Why? Well, first of all, I think it gives us comfort. Secondly, it encourages us when we are in evangelistic situations because we're equipped to deconstruct the falsehoods that people regularly give us, whether it's the cultist at our door or whether it's just an unbeliever who's just making up their own religion.

We want to be able to tell people the truth about Jesus, the Jesus who is not the

Jesus who people imagine is. This morning, as we look in John chapter 21,

I have four collective exhortations, I'm calling them from the disciples, where they all just kind of collectively,

I think, I guess I could say joint actions. I mean, this is something that they all just kind of do together, but I just put it in the frame of a, of a, of a saying that they all say, even though they don't say it.

So I'm just going to say that up front. Okay. The question here though, is how does this passage help us to understand that Jesus is the

Christ, the son of God, right? It's no accident that this is here. This is after Thomas's confession, after John is talking about the, the many signs that Jesus has performed that he's not included in the book.

And then he goes on and brings us chapter 21, but why? And if it doesn't underscore, if it doesn't undergird the fact that Jesus is the

Christ, the son of God, then it wouldn't be here. That's his purpose. Okay.

Our first collective exhortation, let's go fishing, right? When the going gets tough, the tough go fishing.

First I want you to notice this in verse one. When is this? When is this?

Because it's addressed right there in verse one after this. What does that mean?

It means we don't exactly know. There are a lot of things here, and I want to say this clearly, and I might say at a time or two during this, there are a lot of details that really aren't in this story.

A lot of things that are left out and you think, well, is that a problem? No. Because we have the information to understand what

John wants us to understand. It's like if you're reading a parable and you try to draw more information out of the parable than is there, you wind up with all kinds of bizarre interpretations.

And we don't want to do that here either. All we know is that this is after that night where Thomas makes that confession.

That's all we know. And it's obviously before the ascension of Jesus. So this is an historical incident.

It takes place after the resurrection, after that confession, but we don't know exactly when it takes place.

So we want to look at what we can know for sure, and that's what I hope to emphasize this morning. So first, when is this?

We don't know exactly. No, we just know it's after that confession. Secondly, who is there? Well, we know straight off Jesus is there.

Again, verse one, after this, Jesus, he's there. Says revealed himself again to the disciples by the sea of Tiberias.

And he revealed himself in this way. Now that verb revealed is also translated manifested.

He shows himself, right? And here the idea, Hendrickson helps us to understand, he says, to stress the idea that Jesus is no longer dwelling with men as he had before.

He suddenly appears upon the scene and just as suddenly he disappears again.

And if you think about it, as you read through the gospel of John, it makes a lot of sense, right? In the upper room or not the upper room, but in that first, what

I call the first church meeting and then the second church meeting, those Sunday evenings, he shows up, he comes in through a locked door, he just appears in the room and it,

John never describes how he leaves. Well, why is that? He never describes where he goes. Well, why is that?

Because he's not with them anymore. He's not living with them on a daily basis. He's just here.

He talks to them and then he's gone. John wants us to understand that there's nothing about this meeting here in the sea of Tiberias here that is normal.

It is a supernatural act that only God could perform. Again, his goal is to underscore the deity of Christ.

And in addition to Jesus, there are seven disciples. Look at verse two, Simon Peter, Thomas called the twin,

Nathaniel of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee and two others of his disciples were together.

Simon Peter is, I think, I think this is right. If I recall correctly, among the disciples, he's always mentioned first.

He's the leader and he's not always right, but generally he acts first among all the disciples.

He's going to do that today. We also have whom I'll now call the no longer doubting

Thomas, right? We like to call him doubting Thomas, but he's not doubting anymore. Nathaniel of Cana and you go, who's he?

Well, we'd have to go back to, I think, John chapter one or something to find him. But he, he comes out of the area where Jesus did his first two signs, right?

The wedding, he turns the water into wine and then he heals the child of a government official.

Both of those happen in Cana. Now the sons of Zebedee, many of you will know who they are,

James and John. But what's interesting is how John constantly, how does he refer to himself either as the disciple whom

Jesus loved, right? Or as a son of Zebedee, he never uses his own name.

We would gather from the gospel of Luke that James and John, the sons of Zebedee were

Peter's fishing partners. They were in business together and that becomes important here during this story.

The other two, the other two disciples are not named. And you know, I read a lot about who they are and you know, by process of elimination, some people even saying exactly who they were.

But let's just think about this. If it was important to the story, would John tell us who they are?

I think the answer is yes. So I'm just like, I'm not going to play, you know, who done it here this morning with them.

Two of the other 11 disciples are there. So we've got seven of the 11 altogether.

Whereas this Tiberius is another name for the sea of Galilee. So they're, they're up in home base, right?

Is it surprising that the disciples are there? The answer is no.

If you recall the morning of the resurrection, Mary Magdalene, Mary, the mother of James and Salome met an angel at the tomb the morning in that morning.

And in Mark 16, we would read this. The angel says to them, do not be alarmed.

You seek Jesus of Nazareth who was crucified. He has risen. He is not here. See the place where they laid him, but go tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee.

There you will see him just as he told you. Well, when did he tell him that he told him that in Mark 14, 28, he said,

I'll meet you in Galilee. Now who was it?

Who suggested fishing? Let's go fishing. What was

Peter? Of course, look at verse three, Simon, Peter said to them, I'm going fishing, right?

I'm going with her without you guys. Now could he do that by himself? No, but the others join him.

He's the leader. He figures, I'll say, I'm going to go do something and everybody will follow me. And they do. Verse three.

Again, they said to him, we will go with you. Now why, why did they go fishing?

This, this is something that's a little bit controversial among the commentators. Commentators are split.

Some say it's because they were led by Peter. They were dispirited. They were discouraged.

They were, um, determined to go back to their old way of life. You know what?

This Jesus is dead. He's raised from the dead now. He said, he's going to give us something to do.

We don't really know what it is and you know what I, I, it's going to be hard and I'd rather just go fishing. Let's just go make our living.

Let's go, you know, back to our old way of life maybe. And the fact that Peter, James and John, as I said, they're business partners and they all go out there together.

They know what they're doing. Let's go make some money. Well, lend some weight to that.

Others say it was basically something to do. In other words, while we're waiting for Jesus, let's do something productive.

I don't know. I think it was more likely that it was the latter, that it was something to do, something productive rather than just sitting around, but we don't really know.

But again, is that important to the story? And I think the answer is no, because that's not the point of the whole story. The point of the story isn't what did the disciples do?

It's what does Jesus ultimately do and who is Jesus? I mean, you could say, well, there are a lot of things you could say, but I'm, I'm done with that.

Now, how did the excursion, how did this fishing trip go? Well, it ended in abject failure.

You know, I sometimes talk to Mike Uber and I asked his forgiveness before I even preached this morning.

He's probably like, what are you asking my forgiveness for? Because of this, he'll go out ice fishing and I'm like, do you catch anything?

He's like, oh, you know, it's not about whether I catch anything. It's all about the experience. And I'm like, ice fishing.

Okay. All right. You know, then the next answer is what did you catch any ice?

I don't know what the point of ice fishing is, but you know, contemplate the meaning of life.

I don't know. But these guys, these are expert fishermen.

They made their living. You can't be bad at something and make your living, especially in the ancient world. You can't do that.

Right. But this ended badly. Look at verse three. Again, they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

Now one of the questions that came to me was, I was like, why fish at night? Right. I just watched several of my nephews go fishing yesterday.

I didn't watch it personally, but you know, via Facebook broad daylight.

I mean, they weren't going out at night, you know, and why would you go out at night? Well again, we're talking about a time where there's no refrigeration, right?

So you go out at night, you catch the fish and then you can bring them in and deliver them fresh for market.

You can sell them right away. So that lends itself again to the idea that maybe this was, you know, to make some money, whatever their ultimate purpose was, they wanted to make a little money.

But there's a lesson here for the disciples, a lesson that they're going to learn. See if this sounds familiar.

Apart from me, you can do nothing. Now, you're probably sitting there and you're thinking, well, it doesn't have to do with spiritual endeavors.

Yes. And I think, well, is it work to some extent or another, a spiritual endeavor?

In other words, if you're a fisherman, don't you want to be the best fisherman that you could be? If you're, I don't know, police officer, don't you want to be the best police officer you could be?

If you're a carpenter, don't you want to be the best carpenter you could be? Whatever you do, you do it to the glory of the Lord.

But these men were very good fishermen. They were experienced. They go out at night and I did look it up, the

Greek word. It means zip, zero, zilch, nada. That's what they got.

They got nothing. So their first collective exhortation, let's go fishing and it's a complete bust.

Second collective exhortation, let's do what he says. Let's do what he says. Let's go fishing.

Now they're going to do what he says. Jesus appears, verse four. In other words, he was coming, but this is the manifestation.

This is the display. Verse four, just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore, yet the disciples did not know that it was

Jesus. Now how do you suppose they're feeling after the end of the night?

These expert fishermen, right? If you're good at something and you go out and you do, and you're just like, well, you know what?

I don't know about this whole going in, being sent by Jesus the way that the father sent him, but I do know this, we can fish and you go out and you fish and you catch nothing.

So now they're discouraged. They're tired after working all night and they're hungry.

And in the early morning light, because this is the idea, the sun's just peeking up over the horizon, right?

They can see somebody on the shore, but they can't recognize who it is. Now there are several ideas here.

One is that they're supernaturally prevented from seeing Jesus. They can't recognize him.

There's another idea that maybe, you know, in the early morning, it's often the case that there's some kind of fog or mist that comes off off the lake.

So maybe they can't see him because of that. Maybe the sun's just enough in their eyes that they can't see him, or maybe there isn't enough sun to make him out.

We don't really know why. Here's what we know. Yet, the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.

That's all we know. But verse five,

Jesus said to them, children, do you have any fish?

Now you read that word children, it's kind of an odd way to greet a group of grown men out there fishing, right?

But I thought it was helpful. I was reading a lot of commentators and they said this, that it's, it's something akin to this guys, or, you know, for those of you from the

UK, lads, lads, do you have any fish? You know that?

No, no. If I could do that all the time, we'd like that. Do you have any fish lads still, no matter how you slice it, it does sound just a little bit condescending.

Right? I mean, you might even think maybe a little insulting, but it's not, and they sure don't take it that way.

They don't push back or anything. But the way it's, what's interesting is the way he asked that question anticipates no for an answer.

And that's the answer they give him. In other words, he's saying, basically, you don't have any fish, do you?

And they say, as a matter of fact, we don't. Okay. Verse six,

Jesus commands, he said to them, and this is an imperative, 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 because of the quantity of fish. Now again, details.

Why the right side of the boat? Commentators write, you know, in the ancient world, that was the lucky side of the boat.

Okay, maybe. Some naturalistic explanations. Jesus is on the shore.

He's looking out there on the sea and he goes, oh, I see those fish. They're over on the right side. That doesn't help.

That doesn't help at all. So why did they throw it out?

Why did they throw the net out? There's something in his voice. Maybe it's just because they hear it and they're, we don't really know, but maybe they're a little miffed at the way he calls them children, boys, lads, whatever.

Maybe they're just like, we'll show him and then we'll throw the net over there. Or what have we got to lose one last time tonight?

Let's throw it out there. Here's what, here's what we know for sure. We know it worked. We know that the net was so heavy that they couldn't do what they would normally do, which is drag it up on the boat.

They couldn't do it. How did that happen? Again, it's so important to keep in mind what

John is doing here. You know, if it was just Jesus sees, you know, this dark shadow and goes,

Oh, that looks like a pig, big, big group of fish over there. Maybe they should throw the net over there. How does that help us?

Doesn't. This is the

Lord of all creation, the sovereign God of the universe.

And he says, you know what? You throw your net over the right side. I'll fill it with fish.

You've got nothing all night. I'll give you everything that you can want. First collective exhortation.

Let's go fishing. Second, let's do what he says. Third collective exhortation.

Let's go meet the Lord. First John perceives, look at verse seven. That disciple whom

Jesus loved, therefore said to Peter, it is the Lord. Now, if you recall, when they went to the tomb, who was the first to realize what was going on?

It was John. It's always John who realizes what's going on. And then it's

Peter who takes action in the same thing here. Maybe the voice, if you ever had this experience where you hear a voice and it sounds familiar and then something the person says or something that happens makes you realize who it was.

I had that experience. I won't even describe who or what it was, but listening to Ben Roberts knows what

I'm talking about. Listening to something and I'm going, oh, yeah, OK, yeah, I get it now.

That can happen. So maybe it was the case where John is just like, OK, that voice, I know that voice.

Who is it? And then the fish all fill the net and he goes, it has to be the

Lord. It's the Lord. Why didn't I know this in the first place? But we don't know exactly how he knew.

He just knew. The Holy Spirit testified to his spirit. We don't know. But then we do know this.

Peter acts like a verse seven. When Simon Peter heard that it was the

Lord, he put on his outer garment for he was stripped for work and threw himself into the sea. Now, you know, my first thought when

I read that is, you know, he puts on all his clothes and then jumps in. That's a bad move. Well, it would be a bad move, except for it's pretty shallow water where they are right there only, as we'll see here in a moment, they're about 100 yards or 200 cubits away from the shoreline.

So in the Sea of Galilee, it's not super deep there. So he jumps in and he's kind of splashing along and jumping along and acting like a three year old, you know, the water and running towards the shore.

That's the idea. Now, why was he stripped? Because like it says there, he was working.

This isn't winter. This is a rather warm time of the year and they're doing hard labor.

They're constantly working all throughout the night. That's why they're so tired. So as it goes on, he's just like, you know, they're just getting more comfortable and trying to just stay cool and not be too hot.

Now it's interesting to think about this. What happened when Peter got to shore? What words were exchanged between him and Jesus?

Did they embrace? Did Peter say, what took you so long?

Here's the thing. We don't know. Which is completely to be expected because our author is where?

He's in the boat, right? He's in the boat and he's dealing with all these fish in this net and they're kind of trying to keep this net in and get the boat into shore.

And that's exactly what they're doing. The remaining six manage the catch. Look at verses eight and nine. The other disciples came in the boats, right?

Peter's splashing his way to the shore. And the other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish for they were not far from land, but about a hundred yards off, which is, as I said, is about 200 cubits cubit being, as we all know, from your wrist to your elbow, right?

It's about 18 inches. So about 200 cubits when they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire in place with fish laid out on it and bread.

So again, the water wasn't deep, but they're manhandling this full net and just trying to get the boat to the shore.

Why? Because once you get it to shore, it's kind of easier to deal with. And they're greeted by a burning fire with fish and bread.

Now I was thinking about it because this is what you do before you preach. I was thinking about everything last night and I'm just kind of running through it all in my head and picturing it.

And I just thought, okay, if that fire existed, when Jesus showed up, right?

If he built the fire, if everything was cooking and everything like that, what would they have said? What would

John have said? We saw the smoke from a fire. We saw a fire. That would be unusual.

It's not what he said. He said, we saw someone, we didn't know it was Jesus. But as John MacArthur said, when he preached this, when

Jesus fixed breakfast, he did so by creation. When he wanted to create the universe, what did he say?

You know, let there be light and there was light. MacArthur says, he said breakfast and there was breakfast.

That's right. That's why, you know, and I was telling somebody in the office, I go, that's why I named this message Salmon ex nihilo, why?

You know, what does ex nihilo mean? It means out of nothing, right? It's Latin for out of nothing.

God created everything out of nothing. He didn't reorganize existing things.

He created everything out of nothing. So I was like, okay, could Jesus, and the reason salmon, by the way, is because my wife orders salmon everywhere we go.

So I just thought salmon, true story. I started laughing while I was in bed because I just, it just made me laugh.

I knew Patty was going to be asking for a title, so I just threw that out there. And I, by the way,

I'm not saying it was salmon. I just liked the title. I'll have the salmon ex nihilo. Hendrickson said this, he said, in sharp contrast with their inability to provide food for themselves, there was here a charcoal fire on which the one on the shore had prepared a simple meal of bread and fish.

He just did it. Boom. As there is a singular fish and a singular loaf of bread, that's what's in the

Greek. He says, this is a miracle of multiplication. So three exhortations so far, three collective exhortations.

One, let's go fishing. Two, let's do what he says. Three, let's go meet the Lord. Four, let's be still.

And by that, what do I mean? Be still and know that he is Lord, right? First, they're counting the haul.

Verse 10, Jesus said to them, bring some of the fish that you have just caught. And you might think, well, he says, bring them so that they can cook them.

No, the breakfast is ready. And we see that here.

So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore full of fish, 153 of them.

And although there were so many, the net was not torn. There's no microwave, and fish in the microwave is nasty anyway.

He's not doing that. He wants them to appreciate exactly what has happened here.

Now, as a side note, I have to note this, that Peter hauls this net. Now, they've maneuvered the boat to the shoreline.

But he hauls the net up on the shore from the boat and counts the fish.

That's no small feat there to drag that big net and pull it in there.

This is a strong guy. But Jesus wants them to appreciate what he has done and to see and to be able to count.

And you think, well, what's the significance of 153? You would not believe some of the things that are said about this.

Like 100 represents the church, 50 represents Israel, 3 represents the Trinity. There's all kinds of stuff here.

Did you know, for example, that if you add all the numbers from 1 to 17, you get 153?

Write that down. Or if you create a triangle with 1 at the top, you wind up with 17 at the base and 153, you know, and it's, okay.

I think that's all rubbish, if I could just put it bluntly, rubbish. I think it's as simple as this.

They went out there probably to make some money. You got 153 fish that are large, by the way, they're probably smaller fish in there too, but 153 usable, large fish.

They're going to have to sort out who gets what or who gets paid what and they've got to do 153.

They went from 0 to 153 because Jesus told them what to do and they did it.

Look at their response, though, just basically sitting there in silence. I mean, you'd think they would be like 153.

Woohoo. I know what I'm doing. I'm going on vacation, you know, or whatever. Verse 12,

Jesus said to them, come and have breakfast. Now, none of the disciples dared ask him, who are you?

Right? I mean, if you just think about the, I'll just say chutzpah of Thomas, you know,

I'm not going to believe until I see this and that and the other thing. They're done with all that. They knew it was the

Lord. There was no doubt in their minds. Verse 13, Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them.

And so with the fish, I mean, it's like, have you ever been in a situation where everybody had some kind of question in their mind, but they were afraid to ask it because they didn't want to be the foolish one?

Well, this isn't really that one because they don't have any doubts. They're just quiet.

They're awestruck. Jesus had supernaturally directed those fish in there, and then he had supernaturally provided breakfast for them.

There's no indication that he ate with them. He just served them the meal. And what he did was feed them in such a miraculous way that none dared to ask who he was.

And John concludes it this way. He says, marking, marking the occasion, he says, now, this was the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples as a fool.

And he was revealed to them after he was raised from the dead. He started verse one, talking about revealed and revealed or manifested, manifested and hear the same verb, each of the two previous ones we've talked about in Jerusalem, and he had shown them his resurrected body and encourage them.

But something this time was different. He showed them his ability to control nature and to create matter.

Jesus was preparing these disciples for the seemingly impossible task before them.

And we're going to see that in concluding John next week. And I want to just conclude it this way.

You know, if you would have told Peter what was in front of him without knowing who

Jesus is, right? Without seeing these things, without having his faith buttressed by them,

I don't know if he could have done them. I mean, he was a what happened, even with all the miracles and everything he saw when

Jesus was arrested, Peter crumbled. But with God, all things are possible.

That has to do with, again, spiritual things, not non -spiritual things. If God is in something and Jesus is like,

I'm going to be with you, right? He will tell them shortly, even to the end of the age.

If Jesus is with us, who could be against us? Now, there are great philosophical arguments for the existence of God.

But as I said earlier, Bible doesn't make them. Moral argument, cosmological argument, even the ontological arguments.

If we imagine something greater of which there can't be, then none of those things.

Instead, what the Bible does over and over again, what John does over and over again, is show us the deity of Christ.

Show us that he is, in fact, the son of God. Even those seven men who were with Jesus on the beach as he made breakfast and served them, none dared ask him who he was.

Why not? Because they knew. They knew that he was their Lord and their God. Everything he had ever told them was true.

He was God come in the flesh, as John wrote in the beginning of the gospel. And the word became flesh and dwelt among us.

And we have seen his glory, right? It was revealed to them. Glory as the only son from the father, full of grace and truth.

They saw his glory. They saw his power. They also knew that he died for their sins, that he'd laid down his life for the sheep, that he'd been raised from the dead to demonstrate that his death was sufficient to pay the price for every sin every believer would ever commit.

Whether you're here in this room tonight, this morning, tonight, it feels like night. Whether you're in this room or whether you're watching online, here's what

I can tell you. That there is no sin that you have committed that God cannot forgive.

That's shocking because we live in a world where Christianity has devolved somehow into becoming a better person.

And I want people to get better. Don't get me wrong. But self -improvement is not

Christianity. Self -improvement is works righteousness. Self -improvement is not what's going to get you into heaven.

Every believer in Christ has his works and his worthiness, his perfections counted to them.

The only question this morning is, are you in Christ? Because if you are, you have everything you need and he has done everything that you need to do.

Right. In other words, see striving and know that he is God. Don't stop trying to improve yourself.

I'm not saying stop your process of sanctification.

I am saying, don't think I'm not good enough. I can't get into heaven because I'm not ready.

I'm not worthy. It's not about you. It's about Christ. Let's pray. Father, we thank you for the

Lord Jesus Christ for the finished work of salvation. That he would live a perfect life, die a sacrificial death, be raised on the third day.

Lord, we thank you even for this demonstration here today. How he's master over everything that is and how he's able to create things that aren't just out of nothing to create.

He is truly God of true God. We thank you and praise you that you have placed us in Christ Jesus.

And it's in his name we pray. Amen. Well, it is time to go to the

Lord's table. And because it's Independence Day, I do have one special message for Independence Day.

Really, I do. And it's in John chapter 8.

John chapter 8, verse 31. So Jesus said to the

Jews who had believed in him, believed him. If you abide in my word, you are truly my disciples.

And you will know the truth and the truth will set you free. They answered him.

We're offspring of Abraham and have never been enslaved to anyone. How is it that you say we will or you will become free?

Right. Here's this idea of pride and arrogance.

We're not even though they were obviously subjects of the

Roman Empire. They had this kind of vanity that somehow as sons of Abraham, they were above everyone else.

But Jesus told them that they were only free if they followed him.

Verse 34. Jesus answered them. Truly, truly, I say to you, everyone who practices sin is a slave to sin.

We talk sometimes about free will. The truth is that everybody is a sinner.

And those who have not been set free by Jesus Christ by being in him are what?

Enslaved to sin. They don't have free will. They have enslaved will.

You know, how about that one? You know, I thank you for enslaved will.

No, we thank God that we have our wills have been set free. We are no longer captive to sin.

He says the slave does not remain in the house forever. The son remains forever. So if the sun sets you free, you will be free.

Indeed, I know that you are offspring of Abraham. Yet you seek to kill me because my word finds no place in you.

I speak of what I have seen with my father and you do what you have heard from your father.

And then they get into this whole other discussion. But my point is this. If you are in Christ Jesus, you have been set free from the power of sin.

And one day, absolutely, you will be set free from every last vestige of sin.

One of the great truths of scripture is when we get to heaven, no more sin.

Right? No more sin. I mean, why do people want to go to heaven? I want to go to heaven to see the

Lord Jesus Christ. But I also want to go to heaven because I know that I will never offend him again.

I will never sin against him again. That is a thought that is too precious to even, you know, just kind of hold into myself because we want that.

We want to be free from sin. And one day we will no longer see sin. We will no longer think sin.

We will no longer do sin. What a blessed day that will be. Well, let's turn over to 1

Corinthians. And I'm going to read chapter 11.

You know, you get these study Bibles and they have all these bookmarks. And there just aren't enough.

So, 1 Corinthians chapter 11.

Paul writes this. He says, Let's take the bread together.

And I did try to, I did open it before we got going here today. As much as I want to use these things up,

I guess I just want to use them up. So, let's take the bread together. Paul continues.

In the same way, also he took the cup after supper saying,

This cup is the new covenant in my blood. Do this as often as you drink it in remembrance of me.

For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the Lord's death until he comes.

What a blessing it is to be able to proclaim his death, to think he died for my sins.

I no longer bear them. I will enter into his presence one day as his beloved child because of his work for me.

Let's take the cup together. It's mostly open.

Okay, maybe. I want to take a knife and just cut it open.

Okay, there we go. I think I can get enough of it out there. So, let's see. Had to squeeze it out, but we got it out.

Let's pray. Our great

God, who could conceive of this plan of redemption? Over and over again when men try, they lower you.

They reduce your standards. They make salvation something attainable by our works, by our efforts, or maybe even in cooperation with you.

Father, we know that when the Lord Jesus Christ said, it is finished, he meant our redemption.

From beginning to end, everything that we need to be forgiven of our sins, past, present, future.

And to enter into your presence blameless, not because of our good works, but because we've been wrapped, as it were, in the robes of Christ's righteousness.

What great truths. Father, we thank you. We praise you.