John 21 - Gone fishing

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Chapter 21 of John takes us right back to the beginning of Yahshua's ministry and also looks forward to the future of the church after he returns to the Father.

At the beginning of the chapter Yahshua appears to seven of the disciples, the third time that he has been with them since the resurrection. And does he find them busy with the work he left them to do? No! Instead of fishing for men, they have returned to fishing for fish (compare Luke 5:1-11). The problem is that they don't know what to do or how to do it. And the Holy Spirit, the Counsellor that was promised, is not yet with them to guide them and encourage them.

At first they don't even recognise him, he's just a man on the beach. But then he does something that reminds them of an earlier occasion when he first called some of them to follow him, he repeats much the same process that's recorded in Luke. There are minor differences, this time he is not in the boat with them, and the net doesn't break. Do you notice how they're still not quite sure who he is? They want to ask him but don't dare. They know in their hearts but it just doesn't add up. They saw Lazarus come out of the grave but this is different, Yahshua rose without anyone to command him to come out. To perform a miracle is one thing, to be a miracle with nobody to command it was weird. They are still troubled and confused, emotions that are mixed with their earlier delight and rejoicing.

After sharing a meal with them Yahshua has a very interesting conversation with Peter. I can imagine him pointing to the pile of fish and saying, 'Do you love me more than these?'. And what does Peter say? 'Yes Lord, I like you - you know that.'

In English translations it looks as if Yahshua and Peter both use the same word - 'love'. But that's misleading. English doesn't have the same richness as the Koine Greek used here. Yahshua uses 'agape' which has shades of meaning around brotherly love, affection, good will, and benevolence. Peter uses 'phileo' which is less intense and means like, approve, welcome, or befriend. Agape is a deep love from the heart, phileo is lighter, more liking than loving.

To this response Yahshua says, 'Feed my little lambs'.

Then he asks Peter the same question, 'Do you love me?', Peter answers, 'You know I like you', and Yahshua says, 'Feed my sheep'.

But the third time Yahshua asks, 'Do you like me?' Peter is hurt because now he realises how half-hearted he has been. Ouch! Peter, headstrong Peter, needs to face reality. Perhaps he was ashamed to say a real, strong agape 'I love you' because denying the Lord is still so fresh in his mind. But the Messiah doesn't call us to be strong for him, he calls us to come to him in weakness so that he can be our strength.

And this is the part of the chapter that looks forward. Yahshua is looking forward to the long years, decades, and eventually centuries and millenia that lie ahead. Times when he will not be here walking and talking and cooking fish on the beach. Times when the church aided by the comfort and guidance of the Holy Spirit will need to learn and grow and thrive. He was looking forward even to today, and all through those centuries we have had the task of shepherding one another. When I am lost and struggling I may depend on you to lead me to good pasture. When you are lost and struggling I must do the same for you. This is the church, the living bride of the Lamb. How many times had he told them, 'Love one another as I have loved you'?

You and I were born for a time such as this. We're here to support and encourage one another, and we're to reflect Yahshua's love, treating the world the way he treated it. Reaching the poor and the hungry and the lost by showing them his living love working in us. Let's get to it!

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Eaton Ford (day) - Kingdom loving

Today we discussed aspects of our lives and interests in connection with church life. Roger, for example, with his interest in model aircraft is in contact with a number of friends that he can share with and pray for. Paul is in touch with a variety of people, neighbours, ex-army mates and contacts through the Acorn group. We all agree that church is not just going to a place once a week but is about community in the place where we live.

Paul, Roger and I demonstrated Church of Two (CO2) for David. He could see the potential value right away and wanted to read more about it online.

David and Roger both have an interest in seeing living communities of faith growing in the Offords and we talked about this for a while. We also prayed together, partly for the hopes and needs that were expressed through CO2 and partly for the Offords. We know that Father has a plan for each of us and for our effectiveness in sharing Jesus' life with others. We can't do it ourselves - he must do it through us.

David referred to Bernard of Clairvaux's treatise 'On Loving God' in which he describes a 'ladder' of love. The steps are first 'loving self for self's sake', then 'loving God for self's sake', thirdly 'loving God for God's sake', and finally 'loving self for God's sake'. The Bishop of Huntingdon, David Thomson, wrote about this recently in his blog. The original passage from Bernard of Clairvaux's work is in Chapter XV.

We were all encouraged in sharing these things together.

John 20 - Seeing is believing

< John 19 | Index | John 21 >

Now we come to the greatest event of all time. John 20 records the resurrection of Yahshua the Messiah, the one who gave his life for us and could not be defeated by death. This is so unexpected and astonishing that the people who first saw him struggled with the idea. Let's look at their reactions.

Mary Magdalene - Mary was the first on the scene very early, it was still dark. She knew something had happened for she could see that the stone had been moved. She didn't go in but ran to Peter and John. Mary assumed that someone had taken the body.

By the time Peter and John left, Mary was in tears. She looked inside and saw two angels who asked her why she was crying. Her concern was for the body. Then she turned around, looked away from the tomb, and saw Yahshua who asked her the same question. She didn't recognise him until he spoke her name. He sent her to tell the disciples.

John - He was the first to look inside. He saw the linen strips. He didn't go in at first, but after Peter had done so he followed. John saw and believed.

Peter - Peter acted in character, he dashed right inside. He saw the linen and the head cloth.

The disciples - In the evening Yahshua appeared in the locked room where they were meeting. They rejoiced! They later told Thomas (who wasn't there when Yahshua was in the room).

Thomas - Seeing is believing! Thomas was unable to accept the news until he could see Yahshua with his own eyes. He had to wait a week. When he saw, he believed.

What about us? What about you? Are you like any of the people mentioned here?

It's easy to jump to conclusions like Mary. Once we've entertained an idea it can be hard to get beyond it. Mary had no reason to think the body had been taken, nor that she was talking to the gardener. It was an assumption. Even while she was standing with the risen Lord her mind was working on ways of finding his body! What assumptions do we make about him?

John saw that the tomb was empty and believed. This is not like Thomas who saw Yahshua and believed. John believed because of what he did not see. This is faith! Do we believe what we have not seen?

Peter didn't hesitate, but he did investigate by looking thoroughly. We need to look thoroughly at the things we read and have been told about the Lord. We need to investigate them for ourselves. Do they hold up to examination? John doesn't tell us what Peter concluded, just that he was thorough in looking.

The disciples in the locked room rejoiced when they saw him! We can't help but rejoice when we realise that the One who died for us is alive. Our lives as believers are now in him! If he is alive so are we, for ever. Now that is good news!

Thomas - When he saw the Lord he believed. 'Blessed are those who have not seen and yet have believed.' So, if you have believed, Yahshua himself says you are blessed. it doesn't come much clearer than that!

< John 19 | Index | John 21 >

Eaton Ford - seeing or experiencing?

Sean and I talked about our lives, the need for outreach, the value of CO2, and the potential usefulness of summarising what he's been showing us month by month.

Sean shared how he has been looking towards Jesus with an increasing desire to seek him and his kingdom, know his desire and leading, and find a way of doing it. He saw a picture in which the Spirit was moving and leaving a light trail of footprints. The footprints were not visible, they were spiritual footprints across the land. He said that he believes the Lord is trying to wake the United Kingdom up because it is sleeping and time is short.

We talked through a variety of topics and how they relate to the Lord and to church life. These included creation, evolution, fundamental particles, energy, and the sheer wonder of it all. How awesome is our Creator King! We also shared news about our families.

Jim arrived later after another meeting. We continued the conversation and considered the value of reading the Bible as well as some things concerning the work at Moggerhanger Park.

Jim shared a picture of a beautiful beach with only a couple of people on it, the sort of image you might see in a travel brochure. He said, 'But it's only a picture. Until you feel the sunshine on your skin and feel the sand between your toes you haven't really experienced it. Seeing it in a brochure or on the TV screen isn't the same - not even close! And it's the same with experiencing life in the Spirit.'

John 19 - See! Here's the man

< John 18 | Index | John 20 >

In John 19, Pilate's attempts to release Yahshua come to nothing. This chapter covers Pilate's final attempts to save his life, his eventual crucifixion, his death, and his burial in the rock-hewn tomb.

Pilate has Yahshua flogged and ridiculed, then shows him to the crowd again to demonstrate that he can find absolutely no reason to charge him with any offence requiring death. Perhaps he thought that this lesser punishment would satisfy them. But they shout and yell for crucifixion. Pilate retorts, 'Crucify him yourselves, I can't find any reason to do so.' But when they tell him that Yahsua had claimed to be the Son of the Almighty, Pilate is very afraid. The Lord actually helps him out at this point, he explains that Pilate's guilt is less than that of the Jewish leaders. And after that Pilate kept trying to release him but in the end was given little choice and handed him over to the execution squad.

It seems that Pilate continued to have some sympathy towards this extraordinary man who did not deserve to die. He wrote 'King of the Jews' on the sign over the cross and refused to change it. He gave permission for the body to be taken down and buried in a rich man's tomb.

There is very little I need write about this chapter, I suggest reading it again because it speaks for itself. In fact, I'd encourage everyone to read chapters 18 and 19 again right through as they really do belong together.

I hope that by focussing on Pilate's part in the events I will have helped you see afresh how very determined the Jewish leaders were to do away with Yahshua. They were extraordinarily angry with him, they were in such a frothing rage that that were competely unable to see the truth. And it was staring them in the face! They crucified the only man who had ever performed the three Messianic Miracles - curing a Jewish leper, casting out a demon from a dumb man, and healing a man blind from birth. By their own requirements he had to be the Messiah!

The question remains, what are we going to do with this man, Yahshua (Jesus)? We can reject him like the Jewish leaders. We can love him like Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. We can follow him like John, Peter, Nicodemus, and Joseph of Arimathea. We can think that perhaps he is right, certainly that he is innocent, yet like Pilate find it far too costly to abandon our responsibilities in order to follow him.

We must all make a choice. The one thing we cannot do with Yahshua of Nazareth, the King of Israel, is ignore him. Everything he claimed about himself is true! He demonstrated it beyond any doubt for those with open eyes, ears, and minds - then, and today.

And in the next chapter of John we read how he demonstrated it one more time, by rising from the grave and proving that even death could not hold him.

< John 18 | Index | John 20 >

John 18 - Interrogation at night

< John 17 | Index | John 19 >

In John 18 we read of Yahshua's arrest in the olive grove, how he is taken first to Annas, then to Caiaphas, and finally to Pilate. During the night, waiting to find out what will happen to him, Peter denies three times that he knows him or was with him. Another follower is braver (verses 15-16), was this Nicodemus? We don't know but it seems quite likely. Pilate interviews the prisoner, quickly finds him innocent, and tries to get him released.

Pilate treats his unwanted prisoner much better than the Jewish authorities do. They don't seem to care whether he is innocent or guilty, they have already decided he must die because he claimed to be the Son of the Most High and also because he uttered the Holy Name, Yahweh, I AM. They are offended because they do not believe him. According to Jewish law, the High Priest would speak the Name once a year inside the Holy of Holies. If they had understood that Yahshua was indeed the Highest of High Priests, and the Son, and the Messiah, and the sacrificial Lamb, they would not have sentenced him to death. But as the Lamb, it was necessary that he die for the sins of the world.

They didn't understand who he was although they had all the evidence they needed, so according to them he was guilty of blasphemy and should be stoned to death. However the Roman authorities had banned the death penalty under Jewish Law, so only the Romans were permitted to kill a prisoner. That's why the Jews involved Pontius Pilate.

But Pilate proved to be a fair man. He told the Jews to try him under their own law which would have carried a lesser penalty than death because of the Roman prohibition. But they'd have none of it. So Pilate interrogated Yahshua. Pilate asks, 'What is truth?' As a Roman provincial governor, 'truth' was whatever he chose to make it. If Pilate said so, it was so! So he went back to the Jewish crowd, pronounced Yahshua not guilty, and offered to release him according to the Jewish Passover custom. But they preferred the rebel, Bar Abbas, and called for his release!

Let's look at the conversations with Pilate in more detail. First, he asks the Jews what charges they are bringing. Instead of giving a straight answer they say that if he was innocent they wouldn't have handed him over. That was no more than an evasive non-answer.

Next Pilate tells them to apply Jewish law but they complain they can't apply the death penalty.

Pilate then decided to have a conversation with the prisoner himself, 'Are you the King of the Jews?'

Yahshua asks him if this is his own idea or whether the Jews have suggested it. And Pilate replies, 'Am I a Jew?' which effectively means, 'Of course they told me. How would I know?' He wants to find out what this man has done to so upset his own people. Yahshua replies that his Kingdom is not of this world but from another place. To a Roman, 'this world' would mean the Graeco-Roman world. Was the man saying he was from India, or Parthia, or somewhere else outside the Empire?

So far, Pilate might have been anxious only about the political issues and the danger of crowd trouble. But as we'll see in chapter 19, this is about to change.

His attitude up to this point seems entirely reasonable. The man is not guilty and should be released, so Pilate does his level best to do just that. However, the Jewish leadership and the crowds are combining to make this difficult to accomplish, and in the end the death of one man must have seemed less important to Pilate than the many deaths that would result from a riot in Jerusalem. Furthermore, King Herod and Caesar himself would regard civil unrest at a major religious festival as failure and he would not be prepared to push things so far as to provoke that. From Pilate's perspective preventing unrest was essential, saving this man's life was not.

But Pilate was not the only man in Jerusalem wanting to avoid trouble. By the time Yahshua and Pilate were in conversation Peter was feeling a very wretched failure. He had denied even knowing the Master. Peter was afraid of losing his own life and spoke out of that fear. Sometimes we speak out of fear too, it can freeze us into inaction or denial on the one hand, or send us into full-blown and headlong flight on the other.

What is the antidote to fear? Love. Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18). Later, the risen Lord would ask Peter, 'Do you love me?', as we shall see in chapter 21.

< John 17 | Index | John 19 >