Scripture Daily

Context No. 702 of 4322 · John

Context · Reflection

John 21:16-25: in context

16He said to him again a second time, “Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I have affection for you.” He said to him, “Tend my sheep.” 17He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of Jonah, do you have affection for me?” Peter was grieved because he asked him the third time, “Do you have affection for me?” He said to him, “Lord, you know everything. You know that I have affection for you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. 18Most certainly I tell you, when you were young, you dressed yourself and walked where you wanted to. But when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you don’t want to go.” 19Now he said this, signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God. When he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.” 20Then Peter, turning around, saw a disciple following. This was the disciple whom Jesus loved, the one who had also leaned on Jesus’ chest at the supper and asked, “Lord, who is going to betray you?” 21Peter, seeing him, said to Jesus, “Lord, what about this man?” 22Jesus said to him, “If I desire that he stay until I come, what is that to you? You follow me.” 23This saying therefore went out among the brothers that this disciple wouldn’t die. Yet Jesus didn’t say to him that he wouldn’t die, but, “If I desire that he stay until I come, what is that to you?” 24This is the disciple who testifies about these things, and wrote these things. We know that his witness is true. 25There are also many other things which Jesus did, which if they would all be written, I suppose that even the world itself wouldn’t have room for the books that would be written.

John's Gospel adds a last scene by the lake, and it belongs to Peter, who had denied Jesus three times on the night of the arrest. Three times now the risen Jesus asks him, Simon, do you love me, and three times, at each answer, gives him a charge: feed my lambs, tend my sheep, feed my sheep. By the third asking Peter is grieved, feeling the old wound reopened, but the threefold question is doing something: it is unmaking the threefold denial and handing him back his work. Then Jesus tells him plainly how it will end, that in his old age he will stretch out his hands and be taken where he does not want to go, and adds two words: follow me.

And Peter, freshly forgiven and freshly told he will die a hard death, immediately looks over his shoulder. He sees the beloved disciple following and asks, Lord, what about this man? Jesus will not take the question. If I want him to remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me. The call is not to audit anyone else's assignment. The Gospel closes by naming that disciple as the witness behind the book, and confessing that if everything Jesus did were written down, the world could not hold the books.

Peter, just given his own hard road, at once wanted to know how it compared with someone else's. Whose assignment am I measuring against mine, instead of getting on with my own follow me?

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