“Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me?” – John 21:17
This is a pointed question, which demands a personal answer and should, therefore, stir up full and frequent self-examination. “Lovest thou me?” It is a probing question that is likely to excite much grief when pressed home to the sensitive, tender-hearted disciple, even as Peter was grieved because the Lord said unto him the third time, “Lovest thou me?” Yet it is a pleasing and profitable question to so many of us as can give a like solemn and satisfactory response to that of Simon Peter, “Lord, thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee.”
It is very necessary that all disciples, even the most privileged, the most talented, and the most famous, should often be asked the question, hear it in their souls, and feel its thrilling intensity, “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”
It must have been momentous indeed, or the Savior would not have repeated it to Peter three times at one interview. He tarried on earth but forty days after his resurrection. These opportunities for conference, therefore, with his disciples would be few. On what subjects, then, should he speak to them but those which appeared to him of the weightiest import? Of the times or the seasons that must presently transpire, he refrains to divulge a secret. With the fulfillment of ancient predictions that prompted the curiosity of the Jew, or the solution of metaphysical problems that harassed the minds of Gentile philosophers, he did not meddle. I neither find him interpreting obscure prophecy, nor expounding mystic doctrine; but instead thereof I do find him inculcating personal piety. The question he propounds is of such vital importance that all other questions may be set aside till this one question is positively settled, “Lovest thou me?”
Hence, beloved, I infer that it is of infinitely more consequence for me to know that I love Christ than it is to know the meaning of the little horn, or the ten toes, or the four great beasts. All Scripture is profitable to those who have grace to profit by it; but wouldest thou both save thyself and them that hear thee, thou must know him and love him to whom patriarchs, prophets, and apostles all bear witness that there is salvation in none other, and no other name given under heaven whereby we must be saved. You may whet your appetite for logic, but you cannot with your heart believe unto righteousness while you occupy your thoughts, your tongues, or your pens wrangling about Calvinism and Arminianism, sublapsarianism and supra-lapsarianism, or any of the endless controversies of the schoolmen and sectarians! “Lovest thou me?” that is the moot point. Canst thou give an affirmative answer? Will thy conscience, thy life, thy God, attest the verity of thy love to him? Then, though thou be no doctor of divinity, though thou canst not decipher the niceties of systematic theology, though thou art unable to rebut one in a thousand of the subtleties of the adversary, yet thou hast an unction from the Holy One; thy love approves thee; thy faith has saved thee; and he whom thy soul loveth will keep thee; for time and for eternity thou art blessed.
To my mind, I say, the gravity of the question is palpable from the time at which it was put. During the few days of our risen Lord’s sojourn, he would not have given it such distinct prominence had it not been in Peter’s case the evidence of his repentance, his restoration, and the full recognition he received. But, brethren, what question can more closely appeal to ourselves, to each one of us? Love is one of the most vital of the Christian graces. If faith be the eye of the soul, without which we cannot see our Lord savingly, surely love is the very heart of the soul, and there is no spiritual life if love be absent. I will not say that love is the first grace, for faith first discovers that Christ loves us and shall we love him because he first loved us. Love may be second in order, but it is not second in importance. I may say of faith and love, that these are like two roes that are twins; or rather of faith, and hope, and love, that these are three divine sisters, who mutually support one another; the health of one betokening the vigor of all, or the decline in one the weakness of all.
“Lovest thou me?” Why, the question means, Are you a Christian? Are you a disciple? Are you saved? For if any man love wife, or child, or house more than Christ, he is not worthy of him. Christ must have from every one of his disciples the heart’s warmest affection and where that is not freely accorded, depend upon it, there is no true faith, and consequently no salvation, no spiritual life. On thine answer to that question hangs thy present state. Dost thou love Jesus? If the verdict be “No,” then thou art still in the gall of bitterness and the bonds of iniquity.
But if the truthful answer of thy soul be, “Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee,” then, weak as thou art, thou art a saved soul and with all thy mourning and trembling, thy doubts and misgivings, the Spirit of God bears witness with thy spirit that thou art born from above. The sincerity of your love to Christ shows more plainly than aught beside the verity of your relation to him.
From “Do I Love the Lord or No?”
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