Keep your Bibles open there,
the passage Brother Wayne just read to us. It serves as our
text this morning. I've titled the message this
morning, Lovest Thou Me. Verse 15, so when they had died,
Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me
more than these? He saith unto him, yea, Lord,
thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, feed my lambs.
Lovest thou me? This is the most important question
that we can ask ourselves. Do I love the Lord Jesus Christ? The question is not, do I love
the preacher? The question is not, do I have
some fascination with the doctrine that I hear preached? The question
is not, do I love the other people of the church? It's not, do I
love doing something? I mean, I love doing something.
that makes me feel religious. That's not the question. The
question isn't, do I love a certain form of religion? The question
is not, do I love knowing something those other people don't? Or
do I love knowing something those Armenians don't know? That's
not the question. The question is, do I love Christ? Do I love the Lord Jesus Christ? Now there's some things I know
about loving Christ. I know this. That if we love
Him, it's only because He first loved us. We know that, don't
we? And if we love Christ, we will love the other people who
love Christ, too. We'll love them, too. But the
question is, do I love Christ? Now hold your finger there, look
over 1 Corinthians 16. I'll show you how important it
is, the answer to this question is. If we don't love Christ,
I'll tell you what it means. It means God hadn't saved us.
1 Corinthians 16, verse 22. If any man love not the Lord
Jesus Christ, let him be anathema maranatha. And that means let
him be cursed when Christ returns. If he does not love the Lord
Jesus Christ, So that's why I said this is the most important question
that we can ask ourselves. Do I love the Lord Jesus Christ? Do I love him? Now, everybody
here knows, and if you didn't know before you came in this
morning, you just heard Wayne read it, that the Lord posed this
question to Peter three times. I want us to look at these three
times that the Lord asked this question, and maybe he'll be
pleased to teach us something. Number one is this, the believers
Love for Christ is genuine. It is, it's genuine, isn't it?
But it is nothing to brag about. Verse 15 says, when they had
dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou
me more than these? He saith unto him, yea, Lord,
thou knowest that I love thee. He said unto him, feed my lambs.
Now, when the Lord asked this question is worth noting. The
Lord asked this question right after Peter tried to leave, lead
the other 10 out of the ministry. Up in verse three, Simon Peter
saith unto them, I go a fishing. They say unto him, we also go
with thee. Now Peter and these men, they
never fished for pleasure or recreation. When I was a teenager,
I did a good bit of fishing and did a little bit when Janet and
I were first married. Her mom and dad lived in Cherokee, North
Carolina. We were down there visiting one
time. One of the men from the church took me out fishing there
in Cherokee. We went out early morning, this
big lake, and set this little boat out on the lake. There was
still just a fog over the water. Beautiful morning. And we got
out on that water and looked up, and there was an eagle flying,
circling above us. And I thought, I don't care if
I catch a fish all day. This is so relaxing. I almost
hope I don't catch one. Just take all this. It's just so beautiful, just
relaxing. These men never fished like that
to just relax and pleasure. This was a business, an occupation
with these men. And what Peter was saying, I'm
going back to the occupation. Fishing I'm going back to where
it was that the Lord found me when I was cleaning those nets
out You know the Lord said come follow me. I'll make you fishers
of men. I'm going back to fishing That's how I'm going to supply
the the need for for me and my family more. I'm quitting the
ministry Going back to fishing Now Peter said that after the
Lord had already appeared two times to him After his death
he appeared and resurrected in his resurrected flesh at least
two times to Peter Peter had heard the risen Savior say, peace
be unto you. Look back at that chapter 20
of John, verse 19. Then the same day at evening,
being the first day of the week, when the doors were shut where
the disciples were assembled for fear of the Jews, came Jesus
and stood in the midst of them and saith unto them, peace be
unto you. And when he had so said, he showed
unto them his hands and his side, Then were the disciples glad
when they saw the Lord. Then said Jesus to them, again,
peace be unto you. As my Father has sent me, even
so I send you. And when he said this, he breathed
on them and saith unto them, receive ye the Holy Ghost. Now
Peter had heard the risen Savior say, peace be unto you. I'm sending you to go out and
preach the gospel. I'm sending you to go out into
all the world and preach me. And he breathed on Peter and
the other 10 and breathed on them the Holy Spirit. And after
that, Peter said, I'm quitting the ministry and going fishing.
That was the first time the Lord appeared. Look down at verse
26. Here's the second time. And after eight days again, his
disciples were within, and Thomas with them. Then came Jesus, the
doors being shut, and stood in the midst, and said, Peace be
unto you. Then saith he to Thomas, Reach
hither thy finger, and behold my hands. Reach hither thy hand,
and thrust it into my side, and be not faithless, but believing. And Thomas answered and said
unto him, My Lord and my God. Jesus saith unto him, Thomas,
Because thou hast seen me, thou hast believed. Blessed are they
that have not seen me, and yet have believed. And many other
signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which
are not written in this book. But these are written that you
might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God, and that
believing, you might have life through his name. Now Peter saw
and heard all these things that John says were written to give
us life and faith in Christ. Peter saw them. At least two
times, Peter saw the risen Savior appear to him and say, peace
be unto you. And Peter's love for Christ and
his faith in Christ was still so weak. He said, I'm quitting
the ministry. I'm going back to fishing. And
that's when the Lord appeared to Peter and said, Peter, do
you love me? Now the Lord could be asking,
we don't know for sure what the Lord was referring to here, but
the Lord could be saying, Peter, do you love me more than these
nets, more than these boats, more than this great haul of
fish that you just pulled in? Do you love me more than these
ways that you would use as an occupation to provide for your
flesh? Do you love me more than these,
these worldly things? Well, there sure wasn't much
evidence of it, was there? But Peter could appeal to the
Lord's knowledge of everything, the Lord's omniscience, and say,
Lord, you know that I love you. Lord, my friends may not know
it, but you know it. You know it. My actions make
it hard for me to boast about my love for you. My actions make
my friends think I don't love you. But Lord, you know I love
you. You know I have genuine love
for you because you're the one that put that love in my heart.
Now to have to admit that is humbling, isn't it? To admit
my actions don't show that I love you. My friends can't look at
me and say I love you. That's humbling. We just can't
brag about how much we love Christ, can we? Now it's genuine, but
we can't brag about how much we love Christ. The Lord could
also be asking Peter this, Peter, do you really love me more than
the other 10 love me? Peter, you were the one that
said, Lord, all these other fellows will forsake you, but I never
will. Lord, I'll die with you. These will forsake you, but I'll
die with you because I love you more than they do. Now, Peter,
do you really love me more than my other people love me? All
of you ran scared. All of you forsook me. But Peter,
you were the only one that denied me. Do you really love me more
than my other disciples love me? Here's a pretty good hint for
us. Let's never make love a competition. Let's never make love a competition.
But Peter's honest answer, same way we would have to answer,
is Lord, no I don't. No, I don't love you more than
your other people love you. But Lord, you know all things.
You know I love you. You know I have genuine love
for you in my heart, because Lord, you put it there. I mean,
this thing is a heart matter between me and God, not something
I'm supposed to make a big show of to you. But whichever way,
whichever way the Lord is asking this question, Peter had to be
humble, didn't he? Yes, my love is genuine, but
boy, nobody else can see it, because they can't see it in
my heart. That's just a humbling thing to admit. But if we're
honest, the same thing is true of us. The same thing is true
of every believer. Every believer, I don't care
where you find them, they genuinely love Christ. They do. Because
they've been born again with a nature that loves. They can't
do anything else. Our love for Christ is genuine,
But it's nothing to brag about, and we know it. I know it, and
you do too. So the only way we can honestly
answer this question is the same way Peter did. Lord, you know
all things. You know that I love you. As
weak and shameful as my love is, you know that I love you.
Well, then the Lord says something to Peter that he says to all
of his people, this is not just for Peter, this is for all of
us. He says, feed my lambs. Now I know that this is primarily
speaking to pastors and to teachers and preachers, but this is God's
commandment to every believer, feed my lambs. You know, I tell
you so often, every believer is in the ministry This is not
my ministry, it's our ministry. The Lord's put all of us in this
ministry. We all have a role to play in it. My role is to
preach, to teach, to lead, and so forth. But we're all in the
ministry. So we're all to feed God's lambs. And that word lambs, it means
the newest, the weakest of believers. It means God's little children,
the little children that need to be held and cuddled and coddled
and taught. These are the little lambs. The
ones who are the most unseen in the congregation. The ones
who are the quietest in the congregation. We're to feed those lambs. And that word feed, it means
to tend to and to nourish. We're to tend to one another.
We're to nourish one another. the very same way that we take
care of our gardens. Tend to one another diligently,
carefully, and tenderly. If you have a garden, you're
diligent about it. You're diligent to make sure
that it doesn't get overrun with weeds, aren't you? Because you
want fruit. You want to harvest it in the
fall. You're diligent to take care of those weeds. And you
tenderly care for your garden. If you're not tender with it,
you're going to tear up the plants right along with the weeds, aren't
you? That's the way we're to take care of each other. We're
to tenderly take care of each other and nourish one another
and be diligent about it. Be diligent about it. When we
see a weak believer act like there's no love in their heart,
there's no faith in their heart. Now don't write them off. Don't
just immediately go cutting them off. Remember how humiliated
we are about our lack of love and how little faith we have.
Instead of cutting them off, nourish them. Have compassion
on them. Remembering our love is nothing
to write home about either. You're the pastors to nourish
the lambs, to feed the lambs, and nourish the lambs by preaching
to them the word of truth, by constantly preaching By constantly
pointing them to Christ. By constantly taking the scriptures
and say, here's Christ. Do you see him? Do you believe
him? Do you love him? Here he is.
The pastor is to nourish the lambs by teaching them sound
doctrine. By teaching them the doctrine
of Christ. It's sound doctrine so they don't
ever have to come in and wonder, is what he's saying true? No,
because he's teaching sound doctrine. This is what the word of God
says. We teach the doctrine of Christ so that those lambs will
know Christ. So they'll trust him. So they
grow in faith and knowledge of Christ. And the rest of the flock
is to nourish those little lambs by not being harsh with them,
by being patient with them. Just like you're patient with
a little toddler that doesn't say things right, that doesn't
do things right, you know, you're patient with them. Be patient
with one another. You know, we learned from being
fed the word, the word preached. You cannot overstate the importance
of hearing the word preached. This is how God's sheep are fed.
This is how we're taught. This is how we're nourished.
This is how we grow. But we also grow and we also
learn by the example of other believers, especially older believers. You older believers, don't ever
mistake this. The younger ones are watching
you. Well, set a good example. Set a good example. That's how
you help nourish those little lambs. And like I said, don't
be too quick to write somebody off as an unbeliever just because
of an isolated act. Peter denied the Lord three times. But he did love him. He still
did love him. The rest of the disciples forsook
the Lord. They ran off like scared rabbits, but they still love
the Lord. So be careful, tenderly take
care of these little lambs. Don't crush the broken wreath.
Don't quench the smoking flax. But instead, if you can, strengthen
it, strengthen it, nourish it, and do it because you love Christ. I'm telling you, that's the best
motivation that we have. to tenderly take care of one
another is because we love Christ. You know, the example that I've
used in the past is a mother. I mean, mothers are amazing. I
mean, they just sacrifice of themselves. I mean, they stay
up with a sick little one. They'll not sleep for 48 hours
taking care of this sick little one and just doing everything
for this little one. Over the course of life, you
know, what a mother does to take care of them babies is just unbelievable. Just the constants. Why does she do that? She loves
them babies, that's why. Loves the best motivation. If
we love Christ, that's the best motivation that there is. To
take care, nourish, and take care tenderly of one another. All right, now here's the second
point, the second time the Lord asked Peter this question. Love
for Christ motivates us to love and serve one another. Verse
16. He saith to him again, the second
time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, yea,
Lord, thou knowest that I love thee. He said unto him, feed
my sheep. Now this is the second time the
Lord asked this question. Peter, do you love me? You know,
I said this is the most important question we can ask ourselves.
Do I love Christ? And it's a question that's so
important we ought to ask ourselves this question pretty frequently. Do I love Christ? Do I love Him? Is my love for Him genuine? And
Peter answers again the same way. It's the only way any believer
could answer this question. He appeals to the Lord's omniscience.
Lord, You know all things. You know that I love you. You're
the only one that knows it at the moment because you can see
in my heart what you can't see by my actions. But Lord, you
know that I love you. I'd have to admit that the second
time. Pretty humbling, isn't it? But, you know, it's one of
the things that we learn. Being humbled is pretty painful
to the flesh, but it's mighty necessary to the spirit. And
Lord's asking Peter here, and all of us, Peter, do you love
me? Do you love me? Do you love the
person of Christ? Do you love that the Lord Jesus
Christ is the only Savior, that he's the only righteousness,
that he's the only sanctification? Do you love that the Lord Jesus
Christ is the only way to God? You've got to come through him.
You can't come in yourself. What you do, what you don't do,
what you know, what you don't know, you can only come to God
and be accepted in Christ. Do you love the only way that
your sin can be forgiven is in the sacrifice of Christ? Do you
love the salvation and mercy and grace? That's Christ to give
and Christ to withhold. It's his to give freely because
of no merit in me, because of nothing I've ever done to deserve
it, that it's his to give and it's his to withhold. Do you
love everything that God's word says about the Lord Jesus Christ?
You don't want to just pick and choose and take this and not
like this. Do you love everything that the
word of God has to say about the Lord Jesus Christ? Do you
love that the Lord Jesus Christ has a people that were given
to him in eternity by his father and that he must save all of
those people. He must come and gather all of
those people so that there's one fold and one shepherd. Other
sheep I have which are not of this fold, them also I must bring. Do you love hearing him say that?
Do you love that he's the one that brings all of his people
to himself? I tell you, I love that Almighty God has an elect
people and that his son, the Lord Jesus Christ, has completely
and utterly saved those people from their sins so that there
is no chance that they can perish. I love that. The Lord's gonna
see to the salvation of his people. He's gonna see to the preservation
of his people. I love that. I love that he does
that for his people. I love that he is everything
for his people. Do you love that? That's what
the Lord's asking. Peter, do you love me? Do you
love Christ, who is our righteousness? Christ, our righteousness. We
just sung about it. Did you love that? Did you love
singing that? The Lord, our righteousness.
Think in the back of your mind, Jehovah Sid Kenu, the Lord, our
righteousness. Oh, I love he's my righteousness.
I love that righteousness is not a thing. I love that righteousness
is not a legal state before God, but it's a person. Oh, I love
him. I love that Christ is my holiness. I love Christ as my
security. I love that when I sin, I have
an advocate with the father. And that advocate is none other
than Jesus Christ, the righteous. I love that. If you love that,
if you love him in that way, what the Lord says is feed my
sheep. Now this word feed, it's a different
Greek word. This word feed means to rule.
and to govern. It means to supply necessity. It means to furnish with pasture
for food. And it means to cherish. Now
look at 1 Peter chapter 5. Many years later, Peter writes,
and I believe that you can tell from what he writes, he learned
a lesson that the Lord was teaching him there. This is primarily
speaking to pastors. I understand that. My job is
to rule. and to govern for the good of
the church. To rule and govern and preach
in such a manner that we can worship in peace. And do it cherishing
you. Understand that. That is the
job of the pastor. And Peter tells us how we do
that. 1 Peter 5 verse 1. The elders which are among you,
I exhort, whom also an elder and a witness of the sufferings
of Christ, and also a partaker of the glory that shall be revealed.
Feed the flock of God, which is among you, taking oversight
thereof, not by constraint, but willingly, not for filthy lucre,
but of a ready mind, neither as being lords over God's heritage,
not being the big important guy, but being examples to the flock. That's how the pastor is to feed
God's sheep. My job, is to furnish pasture,
is to supply necessity for God's people. Now what's the necessity? Is to hear of Christ, isn't it?
Look back at Acts chapter 20. I think everybody would agree
that If a man's saying something to his friends and he knows this
is the last time I'm ever gonna see you, what he says carries
some weight, doesn't it? Listen to what the Apostle Paul
tells the Ephesian elders in Acts 20 verse 28. Take heed therefore unto yourselves
and all the flock over which the Holy Ghost has made you overseers. You men feed the church of God,
which he hath purchased with his own blood. Now here's how
we feed the church of God. It's by preaching Christ to them,
by constantly pointing the sheep to Christ. We feed God's sheep
by feeding them Christ, the true bread from heaven. Oh, if you
eat of him, if you believe him, you'll never die. If you eat
of him, you believe on him, your soul will never hunger for anything
you need again. We feed the sheep of God, the
church of God, by giving them a drink of Christ, the living
water. If you drink of him, you'll never
thirst again. Now, I looked this word feed up, and I was kind
of surprised to see how many times, maybe most of the time
that this word is used, that it refers to feeding swine, feeding
swine. Now, I don't know a lot about
swine, but I do know this. You do not feed God sheep the
same way you feed a pig. No, you don't. Look back at our
text, John 21. You know, with a pig, you know,
you can just slop it out there. Whatever you've thrown in the
bucket of garbage all week, you know, husk of corn that don't
have any, you know, kernels of corn left on them. You know,
you can throw some leaves in there, some shucks of corn in
there. You can throw some whatever,
you know, you used to make it kind of liquefied, slop all up. You can just throw that down
in there, just, you know, the pig will eat it. You don't feed
sheep that way. The Lord gave us a real good
picture of this. Look at verse 12 of John 21. Jesus saith unto them, come and
dine. And none of the disciples durst
ask him, who art thou, knowing that it was the Lord, Jesus then
cometh and taketh bread, and giveth them, and fish likewise. Now the Lord had carefully prepared
a meal, and then he told his disciples, come and dine. They
never had bread and fish that tasted so good in all their life.
This is what the Lord prepared for them. And they came, and
the Lord took it and handed it to them. Now that's exactly how
we preach Christ. The pastors to work hard, to
prepare a meal, and then on Sundays and Wednesdays say, come and
dine. That all the sheep have to do
is come and dine. You just come and feed on Christ
and rejoice in Him. You don't have to pick through
and pick the gravels out. You don't have to come through
and pick out, you know, the sticks and the briars aren't any good.
This is providing pasture. for the sheep, just green grass. Now, come and dine. Come and feed on Christ. From what I see in scripture,
my job is to feed God's church, to do it that way, and to cherish
the sheep while I do it. To do it in love, in love for
you. I have to say the same thing
that Peter said, Lord, you know all things. You know I love this
people. I love this people. I preach
plainly to you, as plain as I can, because I love you. And since
I love you, this is what I want most for you. I want more than
anything for you to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ. And I'm
determined to keep preaching to him, and preaching to him,
and preaching, and pointing you to him, and telling you, look
and live. Telling you, lay hold on him. Telling you, come beg
him for mercy, until God makes you do it. I'm just determined
to do it. Feed God's sheep. Now, I know
this is primarily referring to the pastor, especially because
this word is talking about governing. But this applies to every believer. We're all in the ministry together.
And there's many of you thinking, I will never preach. I know this for sure. I'll never
stand in front of a group of people and preach. If Frank asked
me to do it, I just wouldn't show up. I'd just say, no, there's
no way I'm going to do that. But here's how you who don't
preach feed God's sheep. If you find a man, like the Lord
describes here, that loves Christ, God sent him out to preach God's
gospel. He does it in love for Christ.
In love for you, he preaches Christ so plainly and just says,
come and die. Just come feed in the green pastures
of God's word. If you find such a man, you listen
to him. I'm afraid they're getting more
and more and more rare. I'm afraid they are. You listen
to him. Even though you see him warts
and all. If you spend much time with me, you're gonna see a bunch
of warts. I mean, you just, you know, even though you seem warts and
all. Listen to him preach, because you know what? This ought to
encourage you. He's a sinner that's got to be saved by grace
the same way you are. You may not preach, but I'll
tell you what you can do. You can support the man who does.
You can give to supply for his physical needs in this life.
I'll tell you something else that's mighty important to him.
You can have his back. I mean, you can have his back.
You don't have to let people talk about him like this. Put
a stop to that stuff. You could hold him up in prayer.
Oh, how I beg of you. As you think of me through the
week, that you'd hold me up in prayer. I mean, what man is sufficient
for these things? My soul. You could hold him up
in prayer. Because this is what I'm telling
you about the man who's God's pastor. He has given his life
over. He's given his life over. This
is not a sideline. This is not something he does
when he's got nothing else to do. He's given his life over
to preaching Christ so that you'll know him, so that you'll be fed
the gospel, so that you'll grow in grace and knowledge of Christ.
He's given his life to it. Now do what you can. If you can't
do it for any other reason than selfishly, Do it so you'll be
fed. Do it so you'll hear some good
preaching. But if you love Christ, do it so others will be fed,
so that others will come to know him. Feed my sheep. That's what the Lord says. And
here's the third thing. If we love Christ, weak as it
may be, hidden in our heart so that only the Lord can see it,
if we love Christ, our sin is forgiven. Verse 17, he saith
unto him the third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?
Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time,
lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, thou
knowest all things. Thou knowest that I love thee.
Jesus saith unto him, feed my sheep. Now I know there are no
accidents with the Lord. There's no accident that the
Lord asked Peter three times, do you love me? I'm pretty confident
this has something to do with what happened a few days ago
when Peter denied the Lord three times. Peter remembered that
vividly. He couldn't get off his mind.
He couldn't just get it off of his heart and off his conscience.
He was so miserable. And you know, poor old Peter,
just, he kept making mistakes. He just said, fellas, I'm going
fishing. They said, we're, we're going with you. And look at verse
six, they'd been out there fishing. hadn't caught anything all night.
They saw the Lord on the shore, didn't know it was him yet, and
he said unto them, cast the net on the right side of the ship,
and you shall find. They cast therefore, and now
they're not able to draw it for the multitude of fishes. Therefore
that disciple whom Jesus loved, John, he saith unto Peter, I
recognize this situation, don't you? He said, it's the Lord.
Now when Simon Peter heard that, it was the Lord, he girt his
fisher's coat unto him, for he was naked, And he cast himself
into the sea. And the other disciples came
in a little ship, for they were not far from land. But as it
were, 200 cubits, dragging the net with the fishes. Peter heard
it was the Lord. And he abandoned his friends
and all them fishes they just caught. He couldn't wait to get
to the Lord. You know why? A sense of sin. His guilt. He felt so guilty.
It was the guilt of sin that drove Peter to the Lord. Isn't
the same thing true of us? It's the guilt of our sin that
draws us to the Savior. So I'm sure that the Lord asked
Peter, do you love me, three times, in connection to Peter
denying the Lord three times. And the Lord did this publicly
in front of the other ten. He's telling Peter, Peter, your
sin's forgiven. Your sin is forgiven. It ought
to be obvious your sins forgiven, because Peter, I'm sending you
out to feed my sheep. Peter, I'm sending you to feed,
to tend to, to take care of the most precious people in this
creation to me, my bride. The people that the Father gave
me to save. I love those people so much,
I suffered untold agony to save them. I suffered untold agony
to redeem them from their sin. Now, Peter, I'm telling you,
go out and tell them about me. I'm telling you to go out and
tell them about me. Now, that is both humbling and
it's overwhelming. I mean, it just, I mean, I've
gone over these notes, you know, for three days and it still takes
my breath. to think that the Lord sent somebody
like me to tell you about Christ. I mean, it's just scary. Now here's Peter. Poor old Peter,
he knew the Lord would be right to cut him off, didn't he? And
instead, he tells Peter, go feed my sheep. Now you'd think, boy,
old Peter ain't much, is he? I mean, he's not much. But that's
who the Lord sent. And the same thing's true of
every single one of God's preachers. I'm telling you this truth. I'm
not much. I mean, I'm not much. But this
is who the Lord sent to you. And I'm telling you there's no
better man to hear preach the forgiveness of sins in the blood
of Christ than a sinner that Christ has forgiven in that blood.
There's no better man. to hear preach the gospel of
God's grace than a sinful man who's tasted, oh, the Lord's
grace is sweet. The Lord's grace, let me tell
you about it. You know, God's true preachers, they're motivated
by love, by love for Christ and love for people. And I'm telling
you, if you're gonna do it right, you've got to be motivated by
love. The work's too hard. It's too
hard. It's impossible. There is not
a man ever who's been sufficient for it save the Savior himself. The work's too painful. I've shed more tears about the
ministry than I have anything else in my entire life. It's
too painful. There's too much opposition.
Opposition that comes especially from places you don't expect
it. Somebody might come and carry you away to a place you don't
want to go and crucify you upside down. That's what the Lord tells
Peter is going to happen to him. There's a constant burden for
souls that's too heavy to carry. I
mean, it's just too heavy. to carry. To think that someone
could hear me preach and die and hear the judge of all the
earth say, depart from me, I never knew you. And think about where their soul
is now. I can't think about it. I mean,
I consciously shove it away, can't think, it's too horrible. And knowing all that, you wouldn't
do anything else. You wouldn't do anything else
because you love Christ, because you love the gospel of grace,
and you love being fed Christ. Preachers are the happiest, most
depressed people on earth. That's a fact. And we try our best. And here,
you know, the big reason for the depression, post-pulpit depression,
is we try our best and everything's still a mess. I mean, everything's
still a mess. We're weak and sinful and stammering
and every single message I've ever preached, I sure would like
another shot at it because I think it's so many things I could have
said better. It's a mess. And the Lord blesses it anyway.
The Lord blesses it anyway. And I know you feel that too.
But let me tell you something, it won't always be that way.
Look at Revelations chapter seven and we'll close. Revelation chapter
seven. Verse 17. Well, look back at verse 15. Therefore, are they before the
throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple.
And he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them. They
shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, neither shall
the sun light on them, nor any heat. For the lamb, which is
in the midst of the throne, he shall feed them. And he shall
lead them under living fountains of waters. And God shall wipe
away all tears. from their eyes. When this thing
is over, Christ is going to be the one shepherding us. Christ
himself is going to be the one feeding us. Brother, that's glory. Glory is not streets of gold
and pearly gates. Glory is Christ the Lamb shepherding
us and feeding us, being with us face to face. But until that
glorious day lets us be about this business of feeding God's
sheep as much as he gives us the opportunity to do it. I hope
God will bless that to you. Let's bow together. Our Father, it's with humility and shame
that we have to say with our brother Peter, Lord, you know
all things. You know we love you. You know we trust you and
believe on you. As weak and shameful as it is,
Father, our faith in you is genuine. Our love for Christ is genuine.
Our love for one another is genuine. As weak and as poorly as we show
it, that love is genuine. Father, enable us, I pray, to
feed your sheep. Enable us to By the preaching
of the gospel in this place, exalt Christ the Savior. To preach Him in truth, in love,
in sincerity, in the power of your spirit. And Father, enable
us to live our daily lives, feeding God's sheep, watching out, tenderly
caring one for another, to help one another along the way. God,
help us to not be a stumbling block to one of our brethren,
but cause us to be a help and encouragement to one another.
Father, I pray you enable us to do this for Christ's sake. I have a love for Christ and
a care for his glory and a care for his people. And we don't
ask this great blessing, Father, so that we would get any recognition,
because certainly we never deserve it. But Father, for Christ's
sake, for the sake of his glory, the sake of the people that he
purchased with his own blood. Father, enable us to do it for
Christ's sake. Is it his precious name for his glory? We pray.
Amen. All right, Sean.