So when they had eaten breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me more than these?”
He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.”
He said to him, “Feed My lambs.”
16 He said to him again a second time, “Simon, son of Jonah, do you love Me?”
He said to Him, “Yes, Lord; You know that I love You.”
He said to him, “Tend My sheep.”
17 He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of Jonah, 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, “Feed My sheep.” ~ John 21:15-17
I had always wondered about this passage of scripture where the newly-risen Jesus admonished Peter repetitively to ‘Feed my sheep’. During bible meditation the other morning, I opened to Ezekiel Chapter 34. in the section of my bible entitled ‘God, The True Shepherd’, verses 13-15, the prophet states 3 times that the Lord GOD will feed His sheep. the risen-Jesus was stressing this feeding bit three times so that Jews who knew their bible would be able to draw the analogy from the Prophet Ezekiel to Jesus being the long-awaited Messiah: That Jesus is the Good Shepherd. This is very interesting because Jesus was always using the words of the law and the prophets to make his disciples understand His identity.
But what is even more interesting to me is that in this passage God clearly states:
I Myself will search for My sheep and seek them out….so will I seek out My sheep……I will seek what was lost ~Ezekiel 34: 11, 12, 16
Most of us know the short verse in the New Testament, Matthew 7:7: “Seek and ye shall find”, referring to God, but I don’t think most of us know that God is also seeking after us, harder than we are able to seek after Him, so
God seeks us as we seek Him
This isn’t a one-sided relationship, but if the relationship fails, it is always 100% because we dropped the ball. God isn’t just THERE for us, He is SEEKING AFTER us. Let that sink in. He isn’t passively waiting for us to find Him; He is always drawing us in and trying to make Himself known to us! I can look back on numerous times when I now know God was throwing me a lifeline but I refused to grab it.
I am frequently reminded by God that I try too hard, that I need to let Jesus do more of the heavy lifting. This is hard for an overachieving-type person like me. This passage is just another example that God is an active Presence in our lives, seeking us, calling us, drawing us to Him through His Son Jesus Christ.
Another afterthought I had about this NT passage in the book of John placed at the end of the gospel message is: I wonder why the risen-Jesus called Peter, Simon? Simon, son of Jonah was his identity before being appointed by Jesus as ‘Peter’, who would be the ‘rock’ (Peter means rock), or foundation, of his church. This, combined with the fact that none of the disciples at the sea recognized this risen-Jesus is confirmation to me that it really wasn’t Jesus, but a messenger sent by God to continue to spread the idea of the risen Christ. It was likely a fellow Essene who knew the mission of Jesus but did not know the intimate details of the inner group of disciples such that he did not realize Jesus had called Simon by a different name.
That the Jesus who walked on the earth after his death was not really Jesus has always been something I have known/believed, since I do not believe a dead body can literally rise up. At the tomb of Jesus, Mary originally called the apparition of Jesus the gardener….and in another instance, when the disciples were walking along the road, they did not recognize the Jesus figure behind them, walking with them. I believe that after Jesus’ crucifixion these figures were all Essenes who wanted to make sure to tie up any loose ends or questions regarding Jesus’ divinity, and to promulgate the purpose of Jesus’ life….and death. Men who would have been knowledgeable enough about The Way to spread its message, but not knowledgeable enough to be privy to the fact that Jesus had a new name for Simon.
God can do miracles, but He works those miracles within the natural realm He has already created. He is not a liar, there is no lie in Him. But He does work in mysterious ways. And we cannot understand Him, even if we think we do, as illustrated in the book of Job.
~Love & Light
~Song of Mary~ 