John Chapter 21 (incomplete)

Jesus Appears to Seven Disciples

1 After this Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the Sea of Tiberias, and he revealed himself in this way.

Seventh appearance to 7 disciples

2 Simon Peter, Thomas (called the Twin), Nathanael of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two others of his disciples were together.

3 Simon Peter said to them, "I am going fishing." They said to him, "We will go with you." They went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing.

4 Just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore; yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus.

5 Jesus said to them, "Children, do you have any fish?" They answered him, "No."

6 He said to them, "Cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some." So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in, because of the quantity of fish.

The narrative greatly resembles their original call to be fishers of men (Lk. 5:1-11). In that instance, they caught nothing after fishing all night; Yeshua then told them to do something that normally would not make a difference, and they caught a multitude of fish. Similarly, the Messiah called them again into full-time ministry.

7 That disciple whom Jesus loved therefore said to Peter, "It is the Lord!" When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he was stripped for work, and threw himself into the sea.

8 The other disciples came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, but about a hundred yards off.

9 When they got out on land, they saw a charcoal fire in place, with fish laid out on it, and bread.

10 Jesus said to them, "Bring some of the fish that you have just caught."

11 So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore, full of large fish, 153 of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn.

12 Jesus said to them, "Come and have breakfast." Now none of the disciples dared ask him, "Who are you?" They knew it was the Lord.

13 Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so with the fish.

14 This was now the third time that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead.

Jesus and Peter converse

15 When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, "Simon, son of John, do you love [agapaó] me more than these?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love [phileo] you." He said to him, "Feed my lambs."

Jesus conversed privately with Peter, cancelling out the apostle’s threefold denial with a threefold affirmation of love (Jn. 21:15-17).

Note the use of two different Greek words, the first being phileó, an emotional love in response to attrac­tion, a love of friendship. The second Greek word is agapaó, the verbal form of the better-known noun agape.

The difference is that one is a love of the emotions and friendship, and the other is a love of the will. When the Bible com­mands the believer to love everyone, it does not say to phileó everyone. No one has that ability. Believers are commanded to agape everyone, exercising the will to seek the betterment of the person.

Yeshua asked the question this way because this was exactly what Peter claimed at the last Passover. When Yeshua prophesied that His disciples would abandon Him, Peter emphatically declared that even if all the others deserted Him, he would never leave Yeshua and was ready to die for Him. He thus claimed to have a superior agape love for Yeshua to that of the other apostles (Mt. 26:33; Mk. 14:29; Lk. 22:31-34). In light of Peter’s recent experience during the trial, Yeshua wanted to know if he really loved Him with this agape love and more than these. (CS)

16 He said to him a second time, "Simon, son of John, do you love [agapaó] me?" He said to him, "Yes, Lord; you know that I love [phileo] you." He said to him, "Tend my sheep."

Peter then received his second commission: the Greek word for tend is poimaino, and it means “to exercise oversight and authority. Peter fulfilled this commission, as recorded in the book of Acts (CS).

17 He said to him the third time, "Simon, son of John, do you love [phileo] me?" Peter was grieved 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 [phileo] you." Jesus said to him, "Feed my sheep.

Paraphrase: “Peter, you cannot affirm that you agapao Me more than the others; nor can you affirm that you agapao Me at all; but can you truly affirm that you at least phileo Me?”

This grieved Peter, confirming that while he could not affirm that he agapao Yeshua more than the others, nor that he agapao Him at all, he could truly affirm that he really did phileo Him. He was His friend.

Peter then received his third commission: word sheep refers to older believers who need to be fed with the meat of the Word of God. Peter fulfilled the third commission when he wrote 2 Peter, dealing with meaty doctrine for the more ma­ture believer.

With this, Peter’s earlier threefold denial was replaced by a threefold affirmation of love.

18 Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go."

19 (This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this he said to him, "Follow me."

In the future, he would give his own life on behalf of the Messiah. When Peter was martyred, he proved he had not only phileo, but also agape love.

Jesus and the Beloved Apostle

20 Peter turned and saw the disciple whom Jesus loved following them, the one who also had leaned back against him during the supper and had said, "Lord, who is it that is going to betray you?"

21 When Peter saw him, he said to Jesus, "Lord, what about this man?"

Peter basically asks, “I’m going to have to die for the faith, then what about John?”

22 Jesus said to him, "If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow me!"

The answer was that God’s will for another believer, in this instance John, was irrelevant to Peter.

23 So the saying spread abroad among the brothers that this disciple was not to die; yet Jesus did not say to him that he was not to die, but, "If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you?"

24 This is the disciple who is bearing witness about these things, and who has written these things, and we know that his testimony is true.

25 Now there are also many other things that Jesus did. Were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.