The Question He Keeps Asking
Day 9 — Headwind: John 21:15-19
Introduction
Yesterday we sat in the upper room. We named the wound — the specific quality of the trouble that comes when someone from the inner circle hands you over. We looked at the full scope of what Jesus absorbed: Judas, Peter, all of them. And we held up the thing He demonstrated — that forgiveness is not the erasure of the wound but the covering that allows it to heal.
That is true. And it is also incomplete until you answer the next question.
Because here is what the reader who has been betrayed is actually carrying into today: I understand that forgiveness is the right thing. I have been told that, and I believe it, and I have tried. But what do I do with the part that doesn’t stay forgiven? What do I do with the morning I wake up and the wound is fresh again, and I have to choose — again — whether to open or shut down?
Forgiveness as a single act is a beginning. Forgiveness as a practiced posture is a different thing entirely. It is not a decision you make once and are done with. It is more like sea legs — a continual adjustment, a returning, an ongoing choice to stay open on a deck that keeps moving.
Jesus knew that. He didn’t just teach it. He walked Peter through it, step by step, on a beach on the other side of the resurrection.
Scripture
When they had finished eating, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you love me more than these?” “Yes, Lord,” he said, “you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my lambs.” Again Jesus said, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” He answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Take care of my sheep.” The third time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?” Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, “Do you love me?” He said, “Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you.” Jesus said, “Feed my sheep. Very truly I tell you, when you were younger you dressed yourself and went where you wanted; but when you are old you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go.” Jesus said this to indicate the kind of death by which Peter would glorify God. Then he said to him, “Follow me!” — John 21:15-19 (NIV)
Reflection
What’s Happening in the Text
The setting matters. This is not a private conversation in a room — it is a beach at dawn, a charcoal fire, breakfast already laid. The charcoal fire is a detail John does not let you miss: the only other charcoal fire in his Gospel is the one in the courtyard of the high priest, where Peter stood warming himself the night he denied Jesus three times. John is placing you in the memory deliberately. Peter is standing at a fire again.
Jesus does not open with an accusation. He does not reference the denial. He does not ask Peter to explain himself or demonstrate remorse. He asks a question: Do you love me?
Three times. Once for each denial. The symmetry is precise and deliberate — Jesus is not rubbing the wound raw. He is covering it. He is reaching back into the exact shape of the failure and replacing it, one exchange at a time, with something new. The wound doesn’t disappear. But something is being laid over it — a restoration built to fit the specific contours of the break.
Peter is hurt by the third asking. That detail is pastoral gold. He is not hurt because Jesus doubts him — he is hurt because he understands what the three questions mean. He knows what they are counting. And in that moment, he stops performing and simply says: Lord, you know all things; you know that I love you. It is the most honest thing he has said since Gethsemane. The pretense is gone. What’s left is real.
Jesus says: Follow me.
Not: prove yourself. Not: earn your way back. Not: we’ll see. Follow me — the same two words He used the first time, on this same lake, before any of this happened. The call is renewed, not revised.
What This Means for the Reader
You may be on both sides of this passage at once — and most people who have been betrayed are.
There is the wound you are carrying from what was done to you. And there is the subtler, harder thing: the person you may have become in response to it. The version of yourself that pulled back. The trust you withheld from someone who didn’t deserve to pay for what someone else did. The wall that went up quietly and has been there long enough that you’ve stopped noticing it.
Jesus is on the beach with both of those. He is not asking you to perform forgiveness you don’t feel. He is not asking you to pretend the wound isn’t there. He is asking the same question He asked Peter — not once, but as many times as it takes, meeting the failure at its exact depth, offering restoration in the precise shape of the break.
And here is the cost: it requires you to stop explaining and simply answer. Do you love me? Not “here is my analysis of what happened and why I responded the way I did.” Not “here is my plan for how I will do better.” Just — do you love me? The answer to that question is the hinge everything else turns on. Forgiveness flows from it. The practiced posture of staying open flows from it. Sea legs in this particular wind begin here, at this fire, with this question.
The wound may always leave a scar. But the One asking the question has scars of His own — and He is not asking from a place of wholeness that has never been broken. He is asking from the other side of the cross. He knows the cost. He paid it first.
The posture that heals you is the same one that moves you toward the people you’ve been pulling away from.
Grace Note
Bear with each other and forgive one another if any of you has a grievance against someone. Forgive as the Lord forgave you. — Colossians 3:13 (NIV)
Forgive as the Lord forgave you — not as a standard to reach for, but as a source to draw from. You are not being asked to manufacture something from inside yourself that the wound has depleted. You are being invited to receive what was given to you, and let it move through you toward someone else. The supply is not yours. The well doesn’t run dry.
Prayer Prompt
Father, I want to be honest with You about where I am with this. I understand forgiveness as a concept. I have said the words, maybe more than once, about the person or the people this wind is pressing on. And then I woke up the next morning and had to say them again. And I am tired of saying them into what feels like nothing — no relief, no release, no sense that anything has actually shifted.
I think I’ve been trying to do this from the inside out — generating something from a place that the wound has already emptied. And I’m reading today that it doesn’t work that way. That You are the source, not the standard. That what You’re asking me to extend is what You’ve already extended to me, first, fully, at a cost I can’t calculate.
So I’m not going to try to feel it today. I’m just going to answer the question. You know all things. You know whether I love You, even when I can’t feel it clearly through the weather. Let that be enough to start. Let it be the hinge. And let what You have for me on the other side of this — the restoration, the renewed call, the Follow me — be what I’m moving toward, even when I can’t see it yet. Amen.
Response
1. The Three Questions (Contemplative): Find a quiet place and sit with John 21:15-19 for five minutes. Don’t analyze it — just let Jesus ask the question. Do you love me? Let it land as many times as it needs to. Notice what comes up. You don’t have to answer out loud. But don’t look away from the question either.
2. Name the Wall (Written): Yesterday you named the wound. Today, name the wall — the place where the wound has caused you to pull back from someone who may not have earned that distance. One sentence: This is where I have shut down in response to being hurt. You don’t have to fix it today. Just name it honestly.
3. Receive Before You Give (Verbal): Read Colossians 3:13 slowly, then say aloud: I have been forgiven. That is where this starts. Forgiveness extended from that place is different from forgiveness manufactured by will. Start at the source, not at the effort.
To read all the posts in this devotional series, visit: https://www.thisistheway.live/t/headwind
© Steve Peschke / This Is The Way