Come, Serve With Us

Sermon for Nov. 14, 2021, Pentecost 25B

Audio is here.

Video will be available after the service at the YouTube channel of the Central Presbyterian Church, Fort Smith, AR. under the Tradtitional Services playlist

John 21:15-17

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.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my lambs.” A second time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Tend my sheep.” He said to him the third time, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter felt hurt because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” And he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep.

This story feels like a sad story because we can imagine being in Peter’s position.  Anytime someone you are close to asks if you love them, there is the inescapable implication that they doubt it.  

And to be asked repeatedly the same question feels hurtful.  In fact John’s Gospel tells us that Peter felt hurt.  So, what was Jesus doing?

Peter’s Redemption

This is Peter’s redemption story.  Just a few days earlier, Peter had denied Jesus three times.  He not only denied knowing him, but utterly failed to be there for him.  Peter, like all the disciples, threw Jesus under the bus.  

So we can imagine how awkward this moment was.  Jesus would have been completely justified in saying to Peter: “I’m so disappointed in you. I had such high hopes.  You showed such promise.  You had leadership potential.  I’m sorry, but you blew it; you will have to be replaced.”  

But instead, Jesus, by asking him three times if Peter loved him, gave him the chance to redeem each of those three denials.  So three times Peter says, 

“Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.”

Peter’s Commission

Peter’s expression of love for Jesus is answered by a three-fold commission.  Each time Peter says that he loves Jesus, Jesus commissions him saying, 

“Feed my lambs.”  “Tend my sheep.” “Feed my sheep.”  

You would think the church would get the message that this was to be their commission too.  But what happened?

After Jesus’ earthly life, the early Christians had a number of puzzling questions to work out.  The biggest was that they wanted to understand Jesus’ relationship with God.  

Different groups came up with different answers.  Clearly, Jesus had an intimate personal relationship with God;  he spent lengthy nights in prayer.  Jesus addressed God in intimate, familial ways.  Jesus, we would say, was a mystic.  He had gifts of healing.  People felt the presence of God when Jesus was present.  

So how did Jesus relate to God?  There were different opinions in the early years.  It took over three hundred years to come up with the Nicene Creed, but even that did not achieve a universal consensus.  

The important thing to notice is that this question is about what to think, not about what to do.  This question asks: what do you think about Jesus and God?   What do you believe the correct answer is?  

Having the correct theological answers was not what Jesus commissioned Peter to do.  Jesus did not say, “Peter do you love me?  Then get the creed right.  “Do you love me?  Then  start a theological academy.  Do you love me?  Then write a catechism.”  

Rather three times Jesus gave Peter a specific task.  Peter was to look around and see people, young and old as lambs and sheep.  His task was to look out for them. To feed them.  

To tend them.  The word “tend” is the verbal form of the word for shepherd.  Literally it means “to shepherd.”  Peter’s commission was to shepherd the people.  

Naming Peter Simon

There is an oddity in this story that we should notice, and it has to do with Peter’s name.  The writer calls Peter “Peter,” but in his story, Jesus three times calls Peter by his old name, Simon.  

Jesus, remember, is the one who gave him his new name back at the beginning when he first started following Jesus.  Peter means “rock.”  Rocks are solid.  You can build on them.  

But Simon turned soft under pressure.  He crumbled.  So now he is being called Simon again.

We do not know why his mother named him Simon.  Maybe it represented her hopes for her son’s role in their nation’s future.  Simon, after all was the name of the hero of the Maccabean revolt that had won independence for Israel one hundred years earlier.  

The Romans brought that period of freedom to an end in 63 BCE, but the glory days were still remembered.  Other mothers named their sons after Maccabean heroes too: Matthew, John, and Judas.  

But the Simon we meet in the gospels was not a great military leader; he was a humble fisherman.  Nevertheless, Jesus saw something in him, and gave him a new name; Peter, the Rock.  

Now, in this scene, Jesus returns to using his old name, to ask him those three questions.  “Simon, do you love me?”  And hearing those three affirmations of love, Jesus three times commissions him.  

In the beginning, when Jesus named him Peter, his job was simply to heed Jesus’ call: “Follow me.”  Now, after his redemption, he hears a new commission: be a shepherd to the vulnerable, defenseless sheep.  Lead them to green pastures and quiet waters.  Keep the wolves away.  Search out and find the lost ones and bring them home.  That is the rock-solid foundation to build on.  

That is the church’s calling; to shepherd God’s people.  To feed the hungry, to bring water to the thirsty, to clothe the naked, and to visit the prisoners, as Matthew 25 teaches.  How has the church done with that commission?

Our Track Record

The answer is mixed.  The church has, historically, fed a lot of people. Through the centuries the church has built clinics and hospitals, orphanages and nursing homes.  We have built schools and houses around the world.  

But we have also built opulent cathedrals and basilicas. And we have placed far too much emphasis on answering theological questions rather than doing the one thing Jesus commissioned Simon Peter to do: shepherd people.

The Church’s Redemption Story

The church, like Peter, needs a redemption story.  And today, in some circles, it is happening.  The church may be living in a period of redemption from past mistakes.  Today, the church is waking up to its calling to serve people as shepherds in a new way.  Things are changing. 

Phyllis Tickle taught that every 500 years the church goes through a great transition.  She quoted someone who called it a rummage sale.  About every 500 years the church has thrown out a lot of old ways of being that were no longer working, and headed in a new direction.  

We are 500 years after the great rummage sale of the Protestant Reformation.  Many accumulated habits and practices were thrown out and replaced by new ones in the Reformation.  

But now we are living in a new time of great transition.  Patterns of religions participation are changing.  Religious practices that had served generations of people are now being re-evaluated and, by many, especially younger people, rejected.  Religious institutions are under scrutiny.  Their very value is being questioned.  

Brian McLaren cites the statistic that says sixty-five million adults in the U.S. have dropped out of active religious attendance and about 2.7 million more are leaving every year. 

But it is not all bad news.  In this time of transition, new ways of being the church are emerging.  Over and over we see that in the new way of being the church, the emphasis is not on having the right answers to theological problems, nor is it on building monuments, but on service. 

These new worshiping communities understand that they, like Peter, have been commissioned to action on behalf of a hurting world.  Perhaps they are part of the redemption story of the church.

Being in Mission

We are here today to celebrate the ways in which Central Presbyterian Church is participating in that mission.  We have heard the call to be shepherds to our world, our community and to each other in many ways.  

We have a new poster that graphically illustrates the many ways we have responded to Jesus’ commission.  Let’s look at it together:

The image begins at the center with the words of Jesus to Peter,

“Feed my sheep.” 

How do the sheep need feeding?  In body, mind and heart, as the three circles in the middle indicate.  

Where do our ministries of shepherding happen?  As the concentric rings show, the shepherding takes place right here, among each other, (the orange ring), in the community of the River Valley (the green ring), and across the world (the blue ring).  

We gather as a church community to be renewed by worship through Word and Sacrament, then we scatter as emissaries of the kingdom of God in a great variety of ministries.  

Here are some examples.  Some of us are involved in literally feeding people, like in the Sack Lunch program that provides 3,800 lunches every month.  

Some volunteer at clinics.  Some work to provide solar power in developing nations, others work to address the climate crisis through the Citizens Climate Lobby.  

We have adult Christian education and we have a group that cares for grieving people.  We visit our shut ins and participate in Police and Community Engagement.  

We have a New Vision House dedicated to helping children and families and a Sweet House for the needs of LGBTQ young people and adults.  

This is just to name a few.  In all of these ways, we are tending to the needs  of the lambs and sheep around us, being the church commissioned by Jesus.

Always Reforming

So, yes, we are living in a time of change, but we are not afraid of it.  Change is in our DNA.  The Presbyterian Church is part of the Reformed family of Churches.  We trace our heritage back to the 16th century when the church went through massive changes.   

The Reformed churches adopted a motto: 

“The church that is reformed is always reforming, according to the Word of God and the call of the Spirit.”  

Again we find ourselves, 500 years later, in a time of great change.  No one knows what the future will have in store for us, any more than John Calvin or John Knox could have imagined would happen in their day.   

But we trust that we will be led by the Spirit.  We believe in the goodness of God who is always and everywhere luring us to a future with hope.  

We know who we are, as God’s beloved community, and we know our purpose: to respond faithfully to our commission: 

“Feed my lambs.”  

That is, “shepherd my people.”  Our call is not to come and agree with us about theology.  Our call is not to come and be converted to our perspective or help us build a monument.  Our call is “Come, serve with us” in this great commission.