Follow ME

In this episode, we explore the powerful moment on the shore between Jesus Christ and Peter the Apostle in John 21—a passage marked by restoration, calling, and clarity.

After His resurrection, Jesus meets His disciples by the sea and shares a meal with them. In a deeply personal exchange, He asks Peter three times, “Do you love Me?”—mirroring Peter’s earlier denial and offering him a path to restoration. With each response, Jesus responds with purpose: “Feed My sheep,” reaffirming Peter’s role and calling.

The conversation culminates in a simple yet profound command: “Follow Me.” It is both an invitation and a challenge—one that calls for trust, obedience, and a willingness to let go of comparison. When Peter turns his attention to others, Jesus redirects him: “What is that to you? You follow Me.”

This episode unpacks the meaning of that call, exploring themes of grace after failure, renewed purpose, and the cost of true discipleship. John 21 reminds us that the call to follow is not based on perfection, but on a restored relationship and a willing heart.

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Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:00

Welcome to Woman in the Word, the podcast where we dive into scripture, ask real questions, and walk through the Bible together, one honest conversation at a time. I'm Felicia Parker, I'm your host, and I'm so glad you're here. So whether you're new to the Word or you've been studying for years, there's a seat at the table for all of us. So grab your coffee, open your journal, or put on your walking shoes, and let's get into it. Hey, welcome to the Woman in the Word podcast. I am so excited that you're joining me today. As always, I am looking forward to this conversation. This one has been on my mind for the last couple weeks. I actually had a dream about it, and I woke up thinking, oh my gosh, you know, let me dive deeper into this. And so studying more about it, I said, okay, I want to share this with the audience because it has truly blessed me. So today we are talking about follow me. Let's go. Have you ever heard the statement, oh, I will follow you into fire, I'll follow you anywhere? Have you ever heard something like that? I feel like I've heard it on a movie, I've heard it on TV shows, and people are basically professing their loyalty or their commitment to this individual that I will follow you wherever you go. And I find it so interesting because we say it out of our mouth, but is our heart really in alignment with it? And I find it so interesting that our topic for today is follow me, and Jesus is asking us to follow him. We're gonna go through some verses today, so roll with me. We're gonna pick up in Luke chapter 22, and this is where we find Peter, who has been a disciple of Jesus now for three years and has been following him as he heals, as he raises from the dead, as he restores, you know, life back to those that have been oppressed by demonic spirits. Peter has been there, and we see that Jesus lets him know before he even goes to be crucified, he says, Hey Peter, you're gonna deny me. And Peter said, Oh no, I won't do that. I and he basically says, I will walk through fire for you. I will do where I wherever you go, I'm going, whatever you do, I'm following it. I will not deny you. You are my everything. But then we see in Luke chapter 22, verse 54, it says, So they arrested him, who is Jesus, and led him to the high priest's house, and Peter followed at a distance. The guard lit a fire in the middle of the courtyard and sat around it, and Peter joined them there. A servant girl noticed him in the firelight and began staring at him. Finally, she said, This man was one of Jesus' followers. Verse 57, but Peter denied it. Woman, he said, I don't even know him. Let's just put a pause right there. That's the first denial. Then he goes on after that to deny him two more times, which is what Jesus had already let him know prior. You will deny me three times before the rooster crows. Basically letting him know, hey, you're going to deny me in this short span of time, and then this rooster is gonna crow, and it's gonna be a a reminder to you of the words that I spoke. And we actually see that if we look over at verse verse 61, at the moment the Lord turned and looked at him. Now, mind you, Peter is at a distance and he can still see Jesus, and Jesus can still see him. And it says, At that moment, after he had denied him the third time, the Lord turned and looked at Peter. Then Peter remembered that the Lord said, Before the rooster crows tomorrow morning, you will deny three times that you even know me. And Peter left the courtyard weeping bitterly. And I'm just gonna go right in. What is it that would cause you to say that you don't even know him? Because I will be honest with you, we all have something that if we gave it enough attention, it would cause us to turn our back, stay at a distance, and maybe even say, I don't know him. And if we if we really dive into the story behind this and and read the the full context of this story, we find that Peter became fearful. And even after Jesus' um death and resurrection, Jesus comes back to meet the disciples, and we find they are hiding in a house because they are afraid of the Jews. They're afraid of the people that kill Jesus, and so they're hiding. And my question to you is what would cause you to go from saying, I will walk through fire for you, I will do whatever it is, I will wherever you are, I will be. Whatever you do, I'll do wherever you go, I'll go, to being at a distance and saying, I don't even know that man. Would it be fear that would get you to say that? Would it be anxiety? Would it be doubt? Would it be overwhelm? Would it be a situation that looks so overwhelming that you say, This might be too big for for the God that I've been walking with, the the rabbi that I've been serving for the last three years, this is just too big? What would it be for you? Because for Peter, it was the fear that, oh my gosh, and this is just Felicia's thoughts, oh my gosh, what they're doing to my rabbi, they may do to me, and I'm afraid. So I'm going to distance myself, and then once I distance, I begin to deny. Hey, I just wanted to take a quick pause in our conversation and introduce you to uh the lover of your soul if you have yet to meet him. I would love to lead you in the prayer of salvation. So if you'd repeat after me, that'd be awesome. Dear God, I know that I am a sinner and I'm in need of a savior. I confess that Jesus is Lord and I want him to be the Lord of my life. I believe that you raised him from the dead to rule and reign for all of eternity. Forgive me of my sins and cleanse me with the precious blood of Jesus. I thank you, Lord, for dying on the cross just for me. In Jesus' name, amen. Hey, if you just prayed that prayer, I want to welcome you to the family of God and just say congratulations. What in your life would cause you to distance yourself and then eventually begin to deny? Deny the power, deny the faith that you have, deny the relationship that you have. What would cause you to do that so that you can protect yourself from whatever that thing is? And whatever that thing is, I would ask you to take it to Jesus and ask him to help you with that. Because again, like I said, we all have something. We all have something that would get us to at some point distance ourselves and then eventually begin to deny. You may not deny it publicly initially, but maybe in your mind you say, Oh, God won't heal this. Oh, God won't restore that, oh, God won't fix this. Oh, God won't answer this prayer. And you begin to deny it to yourself, and then eventually you get enough faith for it, you begin to deny it out of your mouth to other people, and you begin to, although we say, Oh, I'll never deny Jesus, we could look just like Peter, and I don't want us to think we are any better than him. He was a real human being with real human emotions that were put on display once he was put under the pressure cooker of life, of the situation, of the scenario he was facing. And every one of us can experience the same thing where that pressure of life comes in and we begin to deny the one person that we said that we would always stand by, that we would always follow, that he would we would always lean into, that we would always have faith in. We can find ourselves speaking in opposition to that, and then Jesus looks at us, and just like Peter, we say, Oh my gosh, I too have denied the one that is going to sacrifice his life for me. And we could go away weeping bitterly as well.

SPEAKER_00 8:06

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SPEAKER_01 8:34

I found it so interesting just doing research into it and studying this for the last few weeks. I found it so interesting that once Peter does the denial and he gets the reminder that, oh my gosh, Jesus told me I would do this, and I never thought I would. I have a childhood friend, and her mom would always say, never say never. Never say what you would never do because you don't know what you would do when you're put in that situation. Never say never because you think more highly of yourself than you really should. Never say never. Oh, I would never deny Jesus. Oh, I would never distance myself from him. Oh, I would never, you know, lose faith in this, or I would never not take him at his word. Let enough life start happening to you. Let enough pressure start coming. Let enough overwhelm. Let the walls start closing in on your life. I used to, as a kid, I used to think when her mom would say that, oh gosh, she doesn't know. We would never, we would never do this, we would never say that, we would never go there. And then as a as a young adult and and now an adult with children, I'm thinking, oh Lord Jesus, I will never say my kids would never do this, or I will never say about myself, there's nothing that I would never do. And that's why I think it's so important as we dive deeper into these um scriptures that we're gonna read is that we stay close to Jesus. If there is a never, the never in in regards to doing something only comes when we literally attach ourselves to God and his word and hold fast to it. Because I'm telling you, you step away from that word, you step out of that mirror even for a moment, and that never becomes a maybe. I don't know, possibly, because you have an adversary that it says he waited for an opportune time to come back and tempt Jesus. You don't think he's waiting for an opportune time to come and get you to distance you from Christ, to come and get you to deny, to come and get you to stand in the thing that you said you would never do. He is just waiting for that opportunity. And so don't think more highly of yourself as you ought, as the scriptures say, but think the most about the God that you serve and the power that you possess. The same power that raised Jesus from the dead lives on the inside of you. So whatever God says you can do with him, you can. But apart from him, you can do nothing. So let's make sure we're focusing on the fact that the only way we can be who we're called to be, do what we're called to do, and show a lost world who Christ is, is to follow him, is to be right by his side, not at a distance, not an earshot of him. No, standing right by his side, like you would tell your child as you're crossing the street, stand next to me and hold my hand and don't move. That's how we should be when it comes to our walk with the Lord. Stand right by my side, hold my hand and don't move. Because, like sheep, we will we will go astray without the voice of our shepherd. And it can happen more quickly than we think, and it can happen more often than we'd like to admit. So we've got to stay so close that we hear the next whisper from our shepherd and just follow him. What if your faith wasn't just surviving, but flourishing? Woman in the Word is for the woman who wants to grow deeper in scripture, walk boldly in purpose, and stay rooted even in dry seasons. This is more than just a book, it's a journey. Woman in the Word, flourish in your faith, walk in your purpose, and do it in your own style. Grab yours today on Bards and Noble, Amazon, or check the notes in the link below at woman.in the word. So after the denial and the resurrection of Jesus and Jesus coming to visit the disciples, we're gonna pick up in John chapter 21. So this is where the disciples have been hiding in the house, and in this chapter, Peter says, I'm going fishing. And it says the other other disciples said, Okay, we're gonna go with you. And it says verse 3, Simon Peter said, I'm going fishing. We'll come to, they all said. So they went out in the boat, but they caught nothing all night. And I don't know if you guys, let's just put a pen in it right there. That's the same thing Peter was doing when Jesus found him the first time and said, Follow me. You won't just be a fisherman anymore. I'm gonna make you a fisher of men. And that was his first encounter with Jesus. So here we go again. We're seeing the same situation of Peter has been toiling, has been working, has been trying to fish. He went back to what used to work because he said, Oh man, you know what? I messed up. I denied my my Lord and Savior. I can't believe I did that. I went away weeping bitterly. Let me go try to do something that I know worked. It says that he fished all night but caught nothing. Verse 4 At dawn, Jesus was standing on the beach, first thing in the morning, y'all. But the disciples couldn't see who it was. He called out, Fellows, have you caught any fish? No, they replied. Verse 6, then he said, Throw your net on the right side of the boat, and you'll get some. So they did, and they couldn't haul in the net because there was so many fish in it. And y'all, that's the same scenario that happened when he first met Peter. Peter's been toiling all night, and Jesus says, Cast your net on the other side. And Peter says, Well, I mean, okay, I've been doing this. Like I'm a fisherman, I know what I'm doing, but at your word, I'll do it. And when he did it, it said he caught a boat sinking catch. And the same scenario is happening here. And verse 7, it says, Then the disciple Jesus loved said to Peter, the disciple Jesus loved being John, said to Peter, It's the Lord. When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his tunic from which he had um taken off for work, jumped into the water, and headed to shore. He didn't wait for the boat to get back to shore. It says that the others did. They stayed in the boat and they waited and they brought the hall back. He left everything and jumped in that water and swam to where Jesus was. And I think in that moment, and this is just Felicia's opinion, I think in that moment he thought, okay, I have another opportunity. I have another opportunity to get it right. I have another opportunity to stay by his side and not at a distance. I have another opportunity to walk with him and not deny him. I'm not going to miss this opportunity. So he gets out, he swims to the shore, he goes back to where his rabbi is, where the Lord and Savior is standing on the shore. And if we jump down a few verses, it says, after breakfast, verse 15, Jesus asked Simon Peter, Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these? Basically, do you love me more than all of these people? And from the way Jesus was asking in my study and in my research, he wasn't asking as a do you love me as a friend, do you love me as a brother? He was asking, Do you love me with the agape love, with that unconditional, devoted love? Do you love me more than these? And Peter said, Yes, Lord, you know I love you. Then he says, Feed my lambs. Jesus repeated the question. Simon, son of John, do you love me? This is again asking from a from an agape love, from the unconditional devoted love. Peter said, Yes, Lord, you know I love you. Jesus said, Then take care of my sheep. A third time he asked, Simon, son of John, do you love me? Now this kind of love, Jesus was asking from a friendship kind of love, from a close friend type of love, so the Phileo type of love. Philadelphia, where we get the city of brotherly love. Do you love me? Peter was hurt that Jesus asked the question a third time. He said, Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you. And Jesus said, Then feed my sheep. And it goes on in verse 19. Jesus said to him, Follow me. The verse ends by him saying those two words to Peter. Follow me. Picture that. They're standing here on the shore. Jesus is asking Peter these questions, and then he looks him directly in his eyes and he says, Follow me. Don't follow me like you followed me before. Follow me like you just told me you would because you said you loved me. And I found it very interesting because Jesus in the first two questions was asking Peter, Do you love me with the agape kind of love, with the God kind of love, with the unconditional devoted kind of love? Peter responded, Yes, every three, all three responses were, Yes, I love you with the friendship type of love, with the phileo type of love. Probably not realizing the way in which Jesus was asking. But then Jesus leans in and says, If you love me that much, follow me. Wherever I go, you go. Whatever I tell you to say, say it. Whatever I tell you to do, do it. And then I find this so interesting. Verse 20, Peter turned around and saw behind them the disciple Jesus loved. Again, that's John, the one who had leaned over to Jesus during the Last Supper and asked, Lord, who will betray you? Peter asked Jesus, What about him, Lord? Jesus replied, If I want him to remain alive until I return, what is it to you? And y'all hear this. He said, As for you, follow me. He was letting Peter know, don't get caught up in what's around you. Don't get caught up in the people. Don't get caught up in what they're doing. Don't get caught up in what I've called them to do. As for you, follow me. And Jesus is saying the same thing to us today. Felicia, as for you, follow me. Don't worry about what your friends are doing, what your family's doing, what other women that have been called to ministry are doing. Don't follow anything else. Follow me. Pay attention to me and follow me. And I want you to know Jesus is saying the same thing to you today. He's saying, follow me. If you denied me, if you stayed at a distance, follow me now. With a wholehearted, devoted, agape love commitment. Follow me. He asked Peter three times, do you love me? Because Peter in earlier chapters denied him three times and said, I don't know him. And so he had to atone for Peter's sin with these statements of, Do you love me? Do you love me, Peter? Because before you said you didn't know me. Are you sure you love me, Peter? Then go do the will of my father and go feed my sheep. Go care for my people. Go serve them like I've called you to and make sure as you do it, you follow me. So wherever I tell you to go, you go. Whatever I tell you to do, you do. Whatever I tell you to say, you say, you follow me. And y'all, I want you to hear me. There is nothing in your past that has caused you to become distant from Christ or deny him that will disqualify you from Jesus reminding you that he loves you and he will send out the question of, do you love him? And that he will stare you in your eyes and say, Follow me. There is nothing that will get you to the point where Jesus says, Oh, sorry, you have disqualified yourself to the point where I'm not going to tell you to follow me anymore. Absolutely not. He will say, As for you, I need you to follow me. And if we could be honest with ourselves today, he might be saying that today. Hey, you've been distant. Hey, you you've been denying my power. You've been denying who I am. You've been denying the work of my hand in and through your life. Now I need you to follow me. I need you to follow me where I'm calling you to go. I need you to follow me in what I'm calling you to do. I need you to follow me in what I'm calling you to say. I need you to follow me in the way you rep the kingdom of heaven. I need you to follow me. And the question today is, will you let go of what was, not run back to what used to work? And will you just follow him? Will you follow him wherever he tells you to go? Will you follow him in whatever he tells you to say? Will you follow him when he tells you what to do? Or will you say, Oh, you know what, I messed up too big, I've denied you too much, the distance is too far. And will you find yourself sitting in a seat of comfort that really isn't that comfortable? Because the only place we find rest, we find peace, we find joy, we find strength, we find confidence is in him. And when we follow him, we are actually following the one who has written our story. So when we don't follow him, y'all, we miss out on why we were created. So I ask you today, if you are not following him like he asked Peter, would you? And if you are following him, my prayer is that you don't get wary in well-doing and you continue to follow him until the day of your glorious return home. Thanks for hanging out with me in the Word. I hope it encouraged your heart and gave you something to carry into the rest of the week. If it spoke to you, share this with someone who might need it too. And hey, don't forget to follow or to subscribe so you don't miss out on what's next. Until then, keep showing up. Keep listening and let his word lead the way.