Simon Peter answered him, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
Jesus asks if if we love him this morning. We say yes and he does not dispute it. But he does ask a second time and then a third.
He said to him the third time,
“Simon, son of John, do you love me?”
Peter was distressed that he had said to him a third time,
“Do you love me?” and he said to him,
“Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.”
We are distressed that he keeps asking. Is he suggesting that our answer is not true, that we do not in fact love him? No, he does not say that. He does not dispute our answer. But he keeps asking. Why? Perhaps he is trying to draw from us the full implications of our own responses.
Our love cannot be mere words. "Little children, let us not love in word or talk but in deed and in truth" (cf. 1 Joh. 3:18). These deeds are not separate from our love for Jesus. They are born from this love. They are the natural consequences of this love which Jesus himself draws from us. He asks us if we love him and these deeds are the responses we bring to lay before him.
Only love which is a response to Jesus can actually feed his sheep.
In this is love, not that we have loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another (cf. 1 Joh. 4:10-11).
Only love which is a personal answer to the question, "Do you love me?" will be strong enough that we can lay down our lives for his sake.
He said this signifying by what kind of death he would glorify God.
And when he had said this, he said to him, “Follow me.”
Everything Paul does a response to this love. He insists on making known that even though Jesus died he is now alive. Earthly powers do not intimidate him. Even waiting for the Emperor's decision about his case is just an opportunity to proclaim the risen LORD.
It is the power of the Spirit within us that responds to Jesus when he asks, "Do you love me?" We do not have the power on our own to say yes with our entire being. But Jesus himself gives us his own Holy Spirit so that we can say yes as completely as he does.
For the Son of God, Jesus Christ, whom we proclaimed among you, Silvanus and Timothy and I, was not Yes and No, but in him it is always Yes. For all the promises of God find their Yes in him (cf. 2 Cor. 1:19-20).
Jesus gives us his Spirit. Let us respond with all that we are!
Bless the LORD, O my soul;
and all my being, bless his holy name.
Bless the LORD, O my soul,
and forget not all his benefits.
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