“The Case for Christ: Kingdom/God: ’Stuff’/Commitment” 

‘Simon, lovest thou Me more...?’, Jesus asked Peter. ‘Lovest thou Me more than these?’ 

It was a serious question!

It is the question we need to consider.

How committed are we to our commitment?

And of what ‘stuff’ is our commitment made?

These are the two points we will consider as we come to the last part of John 21 in which Jesus questioned and commissioned Peter.

Peter seemed to live in a sphere of self-aggrandizement -  of lacking in discernment and wisdom, of impatient and tempestuous choices, of a divided heart!  

There was the time when - just before His death - Jesus announced to the disciples that all of them would be offended because of Him. (Mt 26:31)

And it was Peter who spoke up and said: ‘Oh no, Lord! Even though every one else will be offended because of You, I never will!

Why, even ‘though I should die with thee, yet will I not deny Thee!’

‘Lord, I am ready to go with You, both into prison and to death!’

Peter made some very strong statements about his love and commitment to Jesus!

Oh, yes! We say we are committed - but, for many, it is mostly out from our mouths only!

But very fortunate for Peter - and for us - Jesus knew Peter’s make-up. He knew what it was that Peter was lacking.

Peter needed for Christ to move into every department of his heart to show Peter - and the world - that miracle of grace in the display of Christ’s transforming power!

Peter’s commitment to Jesus needed to go through a real, hard challenge so Peter could see just how committed he was to his commitment to Christ.

And he needed to actually see, feel, know, and understand the groundwork, the foundation, from which that commitment was to come. 

And so our Lord - in His gracious and loving way - said to Peter: 

‘Simon, I tell you that Satan has obtained permission to have all of you to sift as wheat is sifted; but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail, and you, when at last you have come back to your true self, must strengthen your brethren.’

We will see the outcome in John 21 of this sifting experience of Peter’s when we continue on in this study.

But, first, let us see why it is that Christ is so interested in what it is that makes up the stewards of His kingdom.

With that, we come to the second question I posed earlier: ‘Of what ‘stuff’ (and I use that word very carefully) - of what ‘stuff’ is our commitment made?’ 

That foundation is basic - it is absolutely essential - for faithful and true stewardship in the kingdom of God.

It is the ‘stake’ pounded next to every steward of Christ’s kingdom for effective service in it.

This is what I would like to address tonight first. 

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What, then, is it that is so needful above all else?		
The disciples, of course, were always interpreting things in the light of the physical world.

The idea of their commitment to Jesus was in a very earthy sense.

At the very least, it was probably viewed as a ‘three-year stint of duty’ since they were at a quandary about what was to come next.

Their commitment was not with the idea of a divine ownership that saturates the whole being with divine love in mind - not yet, anyway!

You see - the way we look at commitment is not the way Christ desires it - it is not the ‘mind of Christ’.

The mind of Christ sees each one as God’s possession under His governing love.

Christ has the idea of winning men unto Himself - of winning men unto Himself - of purifying unto Himself a peculiar people.’ (Titus 2:14)

The word ‘peculiar’ is in the sense of ‘belonging to’. The Revised Version translates it as a ‘people for God’s own possession.’

This is what Peter and the others were about to learn.

They did learn it - we do not know how and when - but it was Peter who did see this truth: look at 1 Peter 2:9.

He wrote there: ‘Ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people: that ye should show forth the praises of Him Who hath called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.’

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Yes - as I said earlier - the mind of Christ sees each one as God’s possession.

God had said it in Ezek 18:4: ‘All souls are mine’ - ‘Every living soul is Mine.’

There is a wonderful, special divine ownership in which the Lord’s portion is His people. They are people who hold onto God and who are held by God, a ‘peculiar’ people!

For - ‘It is He Who made us and not we ourselves; we are His - we are His people, and the sheep of His pasture.’ (Ps 100:3)

With this burned into our concepts, we see that God has the right of ownership and the right of possession by the very fact of having created us. 

When a potter goes through the process of creating a vessel on his potter’s wheel, that vessel belongs to the potter - it is his possession.

And the potter has the right to do with it as he pleases.

And since God created our being, that being is His property and is at His disposal. He has the right to do as He pleases with His creation. 

Now - human nature immediately rebels at that thought - at our being owned by someone else to do what he pleases with us.

Of course we would revolt at that thought alone!   

Yes - we would naturally recoil if we were facing an  irrational, capricious tyrant or at a slave-owner who both claim absolute rights over their subjects or slaves!

Yes - we would recoil as they do anything they wish with their subordinates since they ‘own’ them.

Of course we would react as they hold even the power of death or life over their subjects!

Under such conditions, we all would tremble before such masters.

But would these masters have willing allegiance from us? 

Are their subjects eager, keen, consenting participants in service to their masters? 

Of course not! 

Theirs is the kind of authority and ownership that tells the world: ‘this man is sick!’ 

It communicates only cruelty, harshness, and insensitivity that makes us shudder! 

But - but - that is not the ownership God has in mind for His creation! 

It is not how Christ looks upon conditions needful in the stewards of His kingdom!

That sort of ownership does not satisfy the heart of God!

It may satisfy the tyrant or the slave-owner.

But God could never be gratified and pleased with that kind of a possession!

Why not?

It is because His heart of love is not a possessive heart.

It is not a grasping, covetous, greedy, dominating heart!  

It is a heart of pure love - the only kind of love that can come from a divine heart for the kind of ownership that is His!

Does the slave-owner really ‘own’ the man when he whips the slave within inches of his life?

Does he really ‘own’ him when he intimidates him so much that the slave hardly dare speak or look at his master?

And, in the same vein, can God - in any sense that corresponds with the yearning of His infinite love - own those who serve Him only reluctantly or mechanically?

No - of course not!

Listen - the possession God has with those who serve Him has exceedingly considerate and very delicate ties attached to it.

It is a relationship formed with a reciprocal response in view, an interdependent relationship in mutual love.

The only way any one of us can [in quotes] ‘possess’  another is by a correspondence that is packaged in mutual love, mutual caring, and mutual communion.

In a mutual ownership, I cannot say to you ‘You belong to me’ if I do not, at the same time and with the same intensity, hear you say to me ‘I belong to you’!

No human heart ever gives itself away to another unless he is convinced that the heart to which it gave itself has given itself in return.

And that is because you cannot win a heart with anything less than giving your heart away in exchange!

A husband or wife ‘own’, each other when each of their hearts are joined to one another in this reciprocal love.

So how does God ‘own’ a person? And how do we ‘own’ God?

He does not capriciously ‘own’ as a despot does. 

Oh, no!

God ‘owns’ men by virtue of having given Himself, in Christ, to man.

Yes - that is what Titus wrote about ‘...the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ, Who gave Himself for us...that He might purify unto Himself people for a possession.’

And, in turn, our hearts have been ‘won’ by Christ: they are ‘fixed’ in Him and given to Him willingly and eagerly.

We are His - His own - and He is ours - ‘...Jesus Christ, our Lord, both theirs and ours’. (1 Cor 1:2)

We are His by His everlasting, all-encompassing love.

Do we have any idea what that love is like?

I dare say we can never fully know it. 

But - we know - it is love that falls upon our hearts, into our innermost beings - it is love that soaks right on into us!

I like to think of it as our hearts being dripping wet, drenched through and through, thoroughly permeated and saturated, with the pure, divine love of God - so soaked up that the heart could never dry out again!

And, in turn, there is a springing up in our hearts of a like and parallel love that replies to Christ’s question of: ‘lovest thou Me?’ with the answer: ‘Lord, You belong to us, and we belong to You! That is all we know but You know all things!’

So ‘God is mine’ and ‘I am God’s’: these are the two sides of this one truth of a ‘peculiar ownership’ that makes a steward of His kingdom a steward - that makes him want to give himself in service, to serve willingly!

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Do you realize God’s reciprocal ‘ownership’ is the most divine thing in the universe?

The heart of God pouring His love into human hearts and love pouring from our hearts back to Him is ‘divinity upon earth’.

It is the sanctuary of God in the world! He dwells there!

The heart of the steward of His kingdom must be this sanctuary: loving God - absorbed fully by and into Him - giving himself wholly to God as God’s possession in willing, eager, keen, consistent, steadfast, unwavering service.

Wisdom and divine truth, the love and the likeness of God are in the hearts of His ‘peculiar people’.

They are the hearts that attain - to some measure - a level of maturity and strength that is expedient in the service of God’s kingdom. 

They are hearts capable of heroism and a martyrdom of devotion to Christ as Peter proved in his own personal witness at the close of his life.

This is what Christ was after when He questioned Peter with ‘...lovest thou Me more...?’

This is the ‘stuff’ commitment is made of! 

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So, ‘lovest thou Me?’ may seem like a very simple question for Christ to ask Peter.

But - in reality - it is a searching question, as we shall see.

Regular ‘church-goers’ may be content with just attending services without knowing anything of the fervent love of God within their hearts and without a reciprocal love for the Person of Christ flowing back to Him.

They can never lay themselves open for Him to guide them ‘into’ and, then, ‘in’ the paths of righteousness for faithful stewardship in His kingdom.

Yes - we can know much, we can do much, we can profess much, talk much, work much, give much, and we can go through much, much sorrow and many trials - all for the sake of Christ, so we say!

Why - we can even make a show of our commitment to Him!

But - we can be dead, dead, dead before God because we are not saturated with His love in the heart.

We cannot even be animated toward faithful service in His kingdom. 

And why not? There is no life where there is not this saturation of reciprocal love! 

Without this vitality in our Christian life, we are no better than a lifeless statue consigned to the nearest alcove. 

We are like sounding brass and tinkling cymbals!

This, then, is the question: Does the love of our hearts toward Christ correspond to His love for us?

Of what ‘stuff’ is our commitment to Him made?

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I will close for tonight. I leave these things for us all to ponder this week.

May the Holy Spirit speak to our hearts and seal that commitment of stewardship that makes us God’s peculiar people on this foundation of mutual love. 

Amen. 

Let us pray.