The Pastor's Priority; John 21:1-17
John 21:1 NASB After these things Jesus manifested Himself again to the disciples at the Sea of Tiberias, and He manifested {Himself} in this way.
In this chapter verses 15-17 is the commentary and explanation of what takes place in the first fourteen verses. The first 14 verses represent an event that took place on the shore of the Sea of Galilee, and these events took place in order to teach a spiritual reality that is explained in vv. 15-17. In verse 14 John tells us in one sense why he is explaining this episode. It has to do with the fact that John has been giving us witnesses to the resurrection. Now there is this appearance to the disciples at the Sea of Galilee. But there is a spiritual significance to what Jesus just did. He has just given them an object lesson, a physical act or visual aid to teach through a concrete example a spiritual principle. Jesus is going to bring that principle home to Peter in vv. 15-17. We can't divorce those first 14 verses from 15-17. The episode of the Sea of Galilee sets the context for understanding vv. 15-17 where we have a well-known and crucial passage.
John 21:15 NASB "So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon, {son} of John, do you love Me more than these?' He said to Him, 'Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.' He said to him, 'Tend My lambs'. [16] He said to him again a second time, 'Simon, {son} of John, do you love Me?' He said to Him, 'Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.' He said to him, 'Shepherd My sheep.' [17] He said to him the third time, 'Simon, {son} of John, do you love Me?' Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, 'Do you love Me?' And he said to Him, 'Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You.' Jesus said to him, 'Tend My sheep'."
This is a passage that illustrates the fact that you really can't understand all that is going on in a passage if you don't understand the context of a passage and if you don't understand the Greek that underlies the passage. The English does not do justice to what is taking place in the Greek. Whenever we look at a passage we have to make sure we interpret it in light of its context. There are two basic contexts here, one being the overall context of the Gospel of John and the other the immediate context. John wrote with two specific purposes in mind. He states the main purpose in John 20:30, 31. He is talking about life, and then He is going to talk about an additional level of life in John 10—to give life, new spiritual life, and to give life abundantly. So there he shows that he is not just talking about the acquisition of spiritual life but he is going on to talk about the sustenance of that life. What is important to sustain physical life is physical nourishment. We have to eat nourishing things if we are going to grow healthy. This is true in the spiritual realm. John says first that he brings these thing that they might have life by believing on His name, but in terms of that second goal that is stated in John chapter 10, that Jesus came to give life abundantly, that abundant life is related to nourishment.
Much of what John writes in the Gospel revolves around the signs, the seven secondary signs that demonstrate who Jesus is and His messianic credentials, and that is covered from chapter one through chapter twelve; the eighth sign is the sign of the resurrection. But chapters 13 through 17, the upper room discourse and the Lord's high-priestly prayer, is related to the spiritual life. John completely shifts gears at the end of chapter twelve. At the beginning of chapter 13 Jesus begins to focus on teaching the disciples spiritual life truth related to His departure. John 13:1 NASB "Now before the Feast of the Passover, Jesus knowing that His hour had come that He would depart out of this world to the Father, having loved His own who were in the world, He loved them to the end." That brings in the theme of chapters 13-17 which is the concept of love. One of the things we have to appreciate in terms of context is that the word "love" is used in John 13-16 but not in chapter 17 which is the high-priestly prayer. Why not? It is not used in chapter 18 or 19 or 20. Why not? The reason is that when Jesus gave the command in John 13 He said they were to love one another "as I have loved you." John 13-16 is going to explain how that takes place. It is based on confession of sin, fellowship, and the filling of the Holy Spirit. The second part of the command is the example part: "as I have loved you." What is the function of the high-priestly prayer? How I love you; I pray for you. Jesus Christ in His intercessory role as our high priest is praying for us. John 18 & 19 is the crucifixion, His sacrifice as a substitute for us. That is the "as I have loved you," the model. So we see the explanation for the mandate and the basis for living it out in our lives in 13-16, and then in John 17-20 we see the exemplification of what Jesus means by how He loves us.
The background is what John is teaching us from those chapters, and in there we see some interesting statistics on the word "love." When we come to John 21:15-17 Jesus engages in this interchange with Peter about Peter's love for the Lord and there is a shifting back and forth between synonyms using agapao [a)gapaw]and phileo [filew]. agapao is used 27 times in the Gospel of John, only 7 of which occur before chapter 13. That tells us that from chapter 13 on love is a major theme. It is not used at all in 17-20. agape, the noun, is used 7 times, but only once before chapter 13. phileo is used 13 times, only four of which occur before chapter 13, and philos, the noun, is used 6 times but only twice before chapter 13. He proportion tells us that love is a major subject in these last chapters of John, and we have to understand what they mean.
Notice what Jesus says about love: "If you love me you will keep my commandments." The measure for love, the way you know whether you are loving God is based on what I know, what the Scripture says. The Scripture says the criterion for love is obedience. John 14:21 NASB "He who has My commandments and keeps them is the one who loves Me; and he who loves Me will be loved by My Father, and I will love him and will disclose Myself to him…. [23] "… If anyone loves Me, he will keep My word; and My Father will love him, and We will come to him and make Our abode with him." That is talking about fellowship, abiding. [24] "He who does not love Me does not keep My words; and the word which you hear is not Mine, but the Father's who sent Me." John 15:10 NASB "If you keep My commandments, you will abide in My love; just as I have kept My Father's commandments and abide in His love." The biblical criterion for how much we love God is our obedience to His Word. That reminds us that love is based on knowledge. If we don't know anything about God we can't love God. We can't love whom we do not know.
The next thing we have to look at is not just the overall thrust of John and what Jesus has taught about love, but we have to look at the immediate context which is eating. Jesus is demonstrating through an object lesson the fact that He is supplying food for them. That is the analogy for the fact that they as apostles, and by application pastors, are to provide spiritual food for the sheep. He is the one who provides the food, the sustenance. First of all He had some fish on the shore, and secondly He told them where to put their net. This indicates that Jesus is the one who sets the priorities for the church and for the pastoral ministry. One of the greatest problems today is that people and pastors and churches have their priorities all backwards. Remember that Jesus said to Peter (Matthew 16), "Upon this rock I will build my church." He didn't say the pastor will build the church. Jesus Christ builds the church; the pastor feeds the sheep. Jesus says: I build the church; you feed the sheep. That is the measure of whether or not you love me. That is why He is reminding Peter of this. So the whole context of vv. 1-14 is to demonstrate the importance of spiritual nourishment and the importance of eating in the spiritual life. Eating is often used in the Scripture as a metaphor for the spiritual nourishment of feeding on God's Word.
Jeremiah 15:16 NASB "Your words were found and I ate them, And Your words became for me a joy and the delight of my heart; For I have been called by Your name, O LORD God of hosts." Here is the picture of the fact that when we hear the Word of God we accept it, we take it in. And just as we eat food we exercise our volition whether or not to eat it, chew it up and swallow it. Once we swallow it non-voluntary muscles take over and begin to break down the food and digest it, the nutrients are taken out and then the blood stream takes them out to feed and nourish all the cells in the body, etc. That is the same dynamic that takes place in spiritual growth. You come and you eat the Word. You make a volitional decision whether or not you are going to accept the Word and make it a part of your life, part of your thinking. Once you do that, then under the filling of the Holy Spirit the Holy Spirit is analogous to those involuntary muscles and is the one who takes that truth, breaks it down and makes it usable in the soul. That is called epignosis [e)pignwsij]. That is the difference between gnosis [gnwsij] which is academic knowledge and epignosis which is usable knowledge that has been converted by God the Holy Spirit. This is an important metaphor that is used again and again in the Scriptures in order to emphasise the fact that we need nourishment.
Peter learned the lesson. 1 Peter 2:2 "like newborn babies, long for the pure milk of the word, so that by it you may grow in respect to salvation." He understands that spiritual growth only takes place by feeding on the Word. Then he concludes his second epistle by saying, "but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." Growth is the result of learning and taking ion the Word of God so that it can transform the way we think about life. It is called renewing the mind in Romans 12:2.
But when Jesus comes to Peter here in John chapter 20 some people think that when Jesus engages in this conversation with Peter that this is the point of Peter's forgiveness and reinstatement. But he had already been forgiven. If he hadn't been forgiven he wouldn't have thrown himself our of the boat. And we know that Jesus had already appeared to Peter alone on the resurrection Sunday, and it was at that point that Peter realised his forgiveness for his betrayal. Now there is no sign of any embarrassment or shame or reticence to come into the Lord's presence, he just can't wait to get to Him and just throws himself out of the boat. So this is not talking about the reinstatement of Peter but is giving Peter the priorities for his apostle ministry, and by extension that will apply also to the pastor.
There is a prerequisite to this that the Lord is emphasising here for Peter, and that is that there has to be an orientation to grace to begin with. That produces genuine humility. Grace orientation is related to humility because in humility we realise that it is not up to us, it is up to God. The fact that Peter has already been forgiven is orienting him to humility. He is humble here; you don't see the arrogance that you see of Peter earlier. The Lord is subtly reminding Peter here of what he said: Matthew 26:33 NASB "But Peter said to Him, '{Even} though all may fall away because of You, I will never fall away'." So now Jesus says, "Do you love me more than anybody else?" (Remember how arrogant you were? Have you learned your lesson?) Humility came from his recognition of forgiveness.
John 21:15 NASB "So when they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, 'Simon, {son} of John, do you love [a)gapaw] Me more than these?' He said to Him, 'Yes, Lord; You know that I love [filew] You.' He said to him, 'Tend My lambs'." The distinction between the words for love in the Greek here is important. There are various synonyms used in this passage. Not only are there synonyms for love but there are also synonyms for knowledge. Peter says "You know [o)ida] that I love you." But in the next verse he is going to shift to ginosko [ginwskw]. Then Jesus is going to give him a command: "Tend my sheep [boskw]." The second time Jesus states this he says, "Shepherd my sheep," and he shifts to poimainw, the word for pastoring or shepherding, and then He is going to shift back to boskw. Here He calls the lambs arnion [a)rnion] and later He is going to call them adult sheep, propbation [probation], and so we see here a shifting back and forth between various synonyms.
Sometimes with synonyms you have one word that is a broad area and has a general meaning and then the second word is just a sub-set of that, a more specific meaning than the broader meaning. That is what we have with words like bosko and poinaino. bosko has a more specific meaning, to feed; poimaino covers the whole gamut of responsibilities that a shepherd might have. But if there are these two synonyms working like this, a general and a specific and they are used synonymously, then the more specific … [blank in tape] … when we see bosko twice used synonymously with poimaino you can't go to poimaino and say well, shepherding involves doing all these other activities that shepherds do; bosko defines the only area of shepherding that is analogous, and that is feeding, bringing nourishment to sheep. So when it uses the word shepherd it is using it in that same sense, the role of the shepherd in bringing nourishment. It is talking about one area of pastoral function, and this is feeding the sheep. So we have to look at these synonyms in order to interpret the passage.
There are four sets of synonyms here: agapao and phileo are the first ones. When Jesus says, "Do you love me," agapao has a broader sense of meaning than phileo does. phileo is more precise. For example, when phileo is used in John it represents an intensity and specificity of love. It talks about Jesus' love for His disciples. phileo is also used in Revelation chapter three in the context of the letter to Laodicea where Jesus says this is the church I love [filew]. Unbelievers are never the object of phileo love. phileo love has an intensity and an intimacy that is not necessarily present in agapao. When Jesus is asking Peter, "Do you love me?" the sub-text here is, "How do you know if you love the Lord?" You keep His commandments. Okay Peter, are you going to keep my commandments? Peter, showing his typical enthusiasm and that he had learned his lesson, goes a step further than what the Lord asks: "You know I phileo you, I've learned my lesson and I have an intense, intimate devotion to you now because I realise the extent of my forgiveness and what grace is all about." So this shows a change in Peter and that he has come to understand grace and the importance of humility. Then the Lord says, "Tend [boskw]", which means to feed, "my sheep." That is the priority. Here for the word "sheep" He uses the word arnia [a)rnia] which refers to baby lambs. So what is the role of the pastor toward the immature believer? Feed him, give him doctrine, teach him the truth of God's Word.
John 21:16 NASB "He said to him again a second time, 'Simon, {son} of John, do you love [a)gapaw] Me?' He said to Him, 'Yes, Lord; You know that I love [filew] You.' He said to him, 'Shepherd My sheep'." Here Jesus shifts the word to probation, adult sheep. This also involves the primary aspect of feeding. It is not only necessary to teach the young believer, but also advanced doctrine to the mature believers.
John 21:17 NASB "He said to him the third time, 'Simon, {son} of John, do you love [filew] Me?' Peter was grieved because He said to him the third time, 'Do you love Me?' And he said to Him, 'Lord, You know all things; You know that I love You.' Jesus said to him, 'Tend My sheep'." What is interesting here also is the shift in the words for knowledge. In Peter's response he first uses the word o)ida. He is appealing to Jesus' omniscience. Then he shifts to ginwskw—you know by experience.
As we go through this episode and as John emphasises these things he is emphasising the intensity of that knowledge. What John has done is move from general to specific. And then in this last and final interchange, the most specific in every synonym is used. We miss that in the English but what that drives home in the Greek is the intensity of this last interchange, that there is a resolution here. There seems to be this conflict going on in one and two where Jesus is saying, Do you love me, and Peter is getting a little bit aggravated with the Lord—You know I love you—and then at the end the Lord shifts to phileo and says, Do you love me? and all this is to emphasise that Peter has learned the lesson and the priority of feeding the sheep.
Then we come to a couple of important passages to show that Peter learned the lesson well. 2 Peter 3:18 NASB "but grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." This emphasises the fact that we can only grow by understanding grace and through the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ. It is based on understanding doctrine and that is why understanding doctrine has to be our highest priority. Christians will never grow to spiritual maturity until they understand that doctrine is a way of life, not just something else we do in life. The sum total of our reason for living is to learn the Word of God, to have our thinking transformed, so that the Holy Spirit can produce growth and fruit in our life so that we can glorify God. That is the reason we are here. Everything else is secondary.