Run Towards Reconciliation - Stand Alone

As humans, we all go through difficult seasons and struggles with one another. Relationships can face conflict, hurt, and tension. So how are we called to handle those moments?

Listen as Pastor Andrew Strand takes us through what the Bible says about reconciliation and how God can bring healing and restoration to our relationships.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Well, I'm excited for our summer series that we're going to be kicking off here in a couple weeks. Uh, for those of you who have been with us for the last several weeks, you know uh that we just wrapped up a series a few weeks ago. And so we are uh kind of in the middle of a time, really some of my favorite times of the year, where we can just kind of sense and lean into and preach into uh some things that we notice that's going on uh in our church and our community. And uh so this week I've been praying and asking the Lord to give us some guidance uh on what I need to lean into. And um uh it's not surprising that the Lord said, I want you uh to lean into the restoration of relationships, the reconciliation of relationships. And uh I I have noticed, and you have too, that there is uh a rise of technology going on. There is a a new revolution of AI that is coming. Uh, our our devices that are in our pockets are constantly dinging at us with notifications, and we are in a cultural moment that has found many of us at such a frenetic pace that this week I was just reminded of the need for healthy human relationships, of the need to sit across the table from people and have lunch with them, of the need to have real friends who actually know what's going on in your life, and of the need for us to have uh healthy growing families. We need each other now more than ever. Now more than ever. However, I have also noticed uh that it seems like now more than ever, many of us are living under the yoke of one and sometimes even more than one, uh really fractured relationships. And some of you are here today. Uh, you are living under that. You're living uh under a fractured relationship with one of your grown children. You're living under uh the weight of a fractured relationship in your family or in your office. And so today I want to preach a message uh from John chapter 21. If you have your Bible, you can open up there. And the title of today's message is Run Towards Reconciliation. Run Towards Reconciliation. Today, with our time, I want to uh look at a wounded relationship between Jesus and one of his closest friends and how it was healed uh when one of them took a step towards that relationship, and it ultimately brought reconciliation. So if you have your Bible, you can open up uh to John 21. Would you please stand with me for the reading of God's word? This is a long section of scripture, so bear with me. Here we go. Starting in verse 1, it says, After this, Jesus revealed himself again to the disciples by the sea of Tiberias. And he revealed himself in this way: Simon Peter, Thomas, called the twin, Nathaniel of Cana in Galilee, the sons of Zebedee, and two other of his disciples were together. Simon Peter said to them, I am going fishing. And they said to him, We will go with you. And they went out and got into the boat, but that night they caught nothing. And just as day was breaking, Jesus stood on the shore, yet the disciples did not know that it was Jesus. And Jesus said to them, Children, do you have any fish? And they answered him, No. And he said to them, Cast the night, uh cast the net on the right side of the boat, and you will find some. So they cast it, and now they were not able to haul it in because of the quantity of fish. That disciple, whom Jesus loved, therefore, said to Peter, It is the Lord. And when Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he put on his outer garment, for he had stripped it for work, and he threw himself into the sea. And the other disciple came in the boat, dragging the net full of fish, for they were not far from the land, but about a hundred yards off. And when they got out on the land, they saw a charcoal fire in place, with fish laid out on it, and bread. And Jesus said to them, Bring some of the fish that you just caught. So Simon Peter went aboard and hauled the net ashore full of large fish, a hundred and fifty-three of them. And although there were so many, the net was not torn. And Jesus said to them, Come and have breakfast. Now none of the disciples dared to ask him, Who are you? They knew that it was the Lord. Jesus came and took the bread and gave it to them, and so with the fish. And this was now the third time that the disciple uh that Jesus was revealed to the disciples after he was raised from the dead. Verse 15. When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon, Peter, Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these? And he said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him, Feed my lambs. He said to him a second time, Simon, son of John, do you love me? And he said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you. And he said to him, Tend to my sheep. He said to him a third time, Simon, son of John, do you love me? And Peter was grieved because he said to him a third time, Do you love me? And he said to him, Lord, you know everything. You know that I love you. And Jesus said to him, Feed my sheep. Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you uh you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go. This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. And after saying these things, he said to him, Follow me. This is the word of the Lord. You may be seated. You know, um, we live in a culture in a world of perpetual offense. There is offense every single day on our social media feeds and uh on the news stations that we watch. Uh, this country artist has beef with this country artist over here, and this NBA player over here has some sort of fraction in their relationship with this celebrity over here. And if you're like me, uh it's around us so much, it's become so commonplace that people have issues with each other, that people have fractures in their relationship that most of us we don't even pay attention anymore. We don't even notice it. Uh, but it hasn't always been this way, it hasn't always been uh such a situation where everybody is up in everybody else's business. This is true, is it not? And now we see it all the time, but you may not be aware uh that as we approach our 250-year celebration of our country, uh, you may not be aware that some of our founding fathers actually had an incredible fracture in their relationship. They had an unreconciled relationship between Thomas Jefferson and the man with the coolest haircut in the world, John Adams. We need to bring it back, don't we? You see, um, during the time of the American Revolution, these two founding fathers were actually great friends. And they worked together uh to bring independence to our country. And uh, as many of you know, or you may recall from a history class many, many moons ago, uh, Jefferson drafted the United States Declaration of Independence, and Adams strongly supported it in Congress. But it was ultimately politics that turned them into fierce enemies against each other. And by the 1790s, Adams and Jefferson uh were leading opposing factions of their political parties. Adams eventually became president in 1797, and because of a very strange rule uh that was written uh during that time, uh Jefferson actually became his vice president. And their disagreements began to grow over uh government power, over relationship between Britain and France and the US, and ultimately uh over the future of the country. And eventually the rift became deeply personal. And it kept growing. It got worse and worse and worse by the election of 1800. Uh, it became especially brutal. There were uh vicious accusations that were spread amongst the newspaper, and their friendship literally just completely collapsed. And for over a decade, they barely communicated with each other until 1812. Somebody with a little bit of brain power, somebody with a little bit of mutual friendship between the two finally got involved and said, Hey, one of y'all is gonna have to take a step towards reconciliation. If y'all are gonna be friends again, if y'all are gonna reconcile this relationship, one of y'all is gonna have to step out and take a step towards reconciliation. And it was Adams that finally wrote a letter that began a series of communications, some of the most famous series of correspondence throughout all of the world where there were 150 letters that were written between these two men, and it ultimately brought reconciliation. And see what often happens when there is a rift in uh a relationship is there are two people that have some sort of friendship, some sort of family relationship, and uh they often are spending time together until somebody says something or somebody does something and it goes downhill, and somebody gets offended, and somebody gets their feelings hurt, and then the rift begins to grow, and the rift begins to get worse and worse and worse. I'm gonna go ahead and get these off this so you can pay attention. You get the point, and what I found is in my 20 years of ministry that wounded relationships need reconciliation. This is a word for some of y'all today. Because you have a wounded relationship in your family, you have a wounded relationship with one of your adult kids, you have a wounded relationship uh in your office, and what it's gonna take is for somebody to take a step. But see, what often happens uh and why uh reconciliation doesn't often happen is because people aren't willing to run towards reconciliation. Instead, they choose to find themselves in the midst of a fractured relationship and they stay there for any number of reasons. And I'm just gonna give you a few of them. I think here's a few of the top reasons uh why people don't reconcile fractured relationships. The first one, let's just get frank and honest, is there's pride. They're the one who said it to me, they're the one who offended me, they're the ones who said that, and so I'm not gonna be that way. I'm not gonna go back and reconcile it. It's just pride. The second reason that I see that people often don't reconcile in uh a broken or fraction fractured relationship is pain. Whatever they said, whatever they did to me, it caused lots and lots of pain. And I am well aware that more often than not, this is a series of things that were done, and so there's gonna be a series of things that must be done to fix the relationship. Sometimes that pain eventually leads to anger. You know what I'm talking about? Some of you know exactly what I'm talking about. That person said this, that person did this over and over and over again, and so eventually that pain leads to anger and it leads to bitterness, and we don't know how to get out of it. Or sometimes, and I think this is the one that is most often, is we just simply don't know how to fix it. I don't know what to do, I don't know what to say. All I know is that our relationship is a mess right now. And maybe this is some of you today. Maybe uh you've found yourself in the middle of a situation and you simply don't know how to get out of it. All you know is there's anger and there's pain and there's all sorts of issues that have caused this relationship to be broken. Well, I want to encourage you today. The Bible gives us some very clear steps, and we'll get to those, the practical steps on how to reconcile a relationship at the end. But first, I want to look at this text again and look at what Jesus did and how he was the one who ultimately reconciled this relationship with Peter. Our text for today uh is found in the last chapter of John. Uh, this is known kind of as the story after the story. This is sort of the epilogue of uh the book of John. We find in this story the reconciliation and the restoration of Peter. This event probably takes place somewhere uh in the 40 days after Jesus has been resurrected from the grave, but before he ascends up into heaven. We don't know exactly if it was seven days or 21 days, but one thing that we do know for certain is that the disciples had not moved forward with their life. In fact, they probably were still very bewildered about what had happened, the events that had just happened over the last couple of months and time has certainly not healed all wounds, especially for Peter. You see, for Peter, reconciliation and restoration was needed. He had offended Jesus, he had uh he had denied even knowing Jesus, and I'm certain that he was filled with regret. I'm certain that he was filled with remorse. I'm certain that he felt disgrace, and I bet he felt all kinds of shame. I bet he would lay his dead his head down on the pillow at night and he would replay those events over and over again about the ways that he had turned his back on Jesus. I bet he would wake up in the middle of the night replaying those events over and over and over again. Some of you know exactly what I'm talking about. Because you replay that fight that you had, you replay those words that you wish you could take back over and over and over again. And so here we are, just days after Jesus had been resurrected, and the disciples have done exactly what Jesus told them to do. They've gone back up north to the region of Galilee. And the text tells us that Peter, always the leader, even if he's not leading right, he's leading people again. He's like, All right, guys, let's go. We're all gonna go out fishing. Anybody want to go with me? And they're like, sure, let's go fishing. And so on this particular night, they're out fishing, they've been fishing all night long, and they have caught a total of zero fish. Nada, Zilch. They've worked their tail off all night, and they have had nothing but failure. And once again, Peter had to be going, Are you serious? I mean, he had to just feel like he was flooded with failure. Flooded with failure. It's like everywhere he turns, it's like somebody kicked the dog, somebody spit in my drink, I walked outside, and my tire was flat. That's what he had to be feeling like. When out of nowhere, this mysterious stranger calls from the shore and begins to beckon these guys that are out on the boat. And at first they don't recognize him. The text tells us they they don't recognize him, and uh maybe it was still dark, I don't know. Uh maybe it was sort of like Mary at the tomb where she didn't recognize Jesus, whatever the case may be. Verse 5 says this Jesus said to them, Children, do you have any fish? And they answered him, No. He said to them, Cast the net on the right side of the boat and you will find some. So they cast it. And now they were not able to haul it in because of the quantity of fish. Now, once you just put yourself in uh the shoes of the disciples for just a moment, they've been out all night long, they've had no success at all. They have to feel just completely exhausted when this guy, a hundred yards away, yells at you. And you have to know that they they were like, What are you talking about? Like, okay, fine. So they throw it over on the other side, and it becomes obvious that this is no ordinary stranger. That this, in fact, must be somebody with some incredible knowledge. Certainly, in this moment, Peter had to recount what had happened to him earlier in his life when he was called into the ministry in Luke chapter 5. We see that at that time Peter had a similar experience. And in that moment, when they had been flooded with failure, when they had only been discouraged, when they had had this maybe a couple of interactions, the text tells us that they had had a couple of interactions with Jesus, but they were certainly still bewildered. All of a sudden, when they had this experience, they had to be flooded with faith. All of a sudden, they had had no hope, and uh and suddenly there were there had to have been this flood that began uh of hope that began to come back into their life. I was writing this message this week, and I began to sense that there are some of you that have felt like this relationship that needs reconciliation is dead. Like you don't even have any hope for it anymore. For some of us, uh it's been delayed for so long, it's gone on for months, it's gone on for years, and so we've literally just kind of given up on it. We don't even have hope for it anymore. And when it comes to fractures in relationships, I want you to hear this. Spiritual warfare is real. You see, so often, some of you need to hear this today, you have viewed that fracture in the relationship only through the natural. You haven't realized that there's a whole lot more going on. There's a whole lot of reasons and barriers to reconciliation, and they're not actually in the physical, they're actually in the spiritual. See, Ephesians 6 talks about this. In verse 12, it says, For our struggle, that's an important word in what we're talking about today, our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms. I want to tell you just um about an experience I had uh a little over a week ago. Uh, there was a situation that I had where there was uh sort of a fracture in a relationship, and um, it wasn't the end of the world, but it certainly wasn't great. And uh and and I found myself, I think it was last Wednesday or Thursday night, like a week and a half ago, uh I woke up about 2 a.m. and um I was you know how that that feeling when you wake up in the middle of the night and you're like kind of halfway conscious, that was me. Uh but I woke up in the middle of the night and all of a sudden I began to feel like accusation. And I wasn't even fully awake, I just knew something ain't right in the room. I began to like feel like a heaviness on me. I began to uh feel condemnation, and I remember kind of like kind of coming to going like what is going on? I felt this heaviness in my mind, and and it was like there was oppression coming against me. And so like I kind of you know shook my head, got up, went to the bathroom, and kind of realized what was going on. Like, oh, okay, this is about to go down. All right, and so I began to rebuke the devil. I began to say, get away from me, you have no power in this house. Some of y'all getting chill bumps right now, right? I began to tell the devil, you don't have power in my mind. I have the mind of Christ. And I began to say, You must leave in the name of Jesus right now. And I went to bed that night, and I remember thinking, Oh man, there's way more going on here than I realize. And I forgot to tell this part in first service, but I think it's just for y'all. I woke. Up the next morning, and a friend of mine, I woke up literally to a text message from a friend of mine, and it was this encouraging quote. And he went on to say, Hey, I think this is related to you. He's like, I think you need to hear this this morning. And I was like, Yes, I do. I was like, There's so much more going on. Not only is the devil coming against me, but God is bringing a friend, an encourager in the midst of that accusation, in the midst of all of that spiritual battery battle, he's also encouraging me. Some of you need some friends around you to speak life over the situation that you're walking in right now. You need some other people around you who are gonna encourage you with that really difficult relationship right now. That y'all can pray together for reconciliation of you and that child or you and that friend. It was timely. And there's often more going on than we can see. There's more at play when there is a fracture in a relationship. I can't even imagine the amount of spiritual warfare that was going on uh during Holy Week. And I think about that, and I think about how when Jesus uh was resurrected back from the grave, he had every right to shun those disciples. He had every right to turn his back on those who had turned their back on him, on those sinners, but of course Jesus is rich in mercy. As the one who had been offended, he chose to move towards them and not away. And I think this reminds me that for reconciliation to take place, both the offended and the offender must move towards each other. What often happens when there is a fracture in a relationship is people begin to move further and further away, like Jefferson and Adams did. They move further and further away, they don't talk, they don't even even interact. If you go to some father family gathering, you're like, I want to talk to you. And yet, at the moment where there could have been a continued rift, Jesus calls them friends. The ones who had who had abandoned him, the one who had disowned him, the one who had pretended not to not even know him, Jesus moves towards them. And did you notice uh what what John said? John said he knows exactly who the mysterious stranger is. He says, It is the Lord. And as soon as he says that, Peter, like a military kid that hasn't seen his mom or dad for eight to ten months, jumps into the water and begins to run towards Jesus. He runs towards reconciliation. You see, when we have been offended, or when we have offended somebody, we have a choice in what we're gonna do next. We can choose to run away from that reconciliation, or we can choose to run towards that reconciliation. And I feel like this is a word for some of you here today. It's not for everybody, although it may be for you in the future, but there's some of us who have lived, and this is, I think this is an important way to describe it, in delayed reconciliation. You've been living in delayed reconciliation, and Peter had a choice. He chose to run towards Jesus, the one whom he had betrayed. And Jesus chose to run towards the one who had offended him. He shows up on the beach. And did you notice, some of you astute Bible readers, you know this, uh, that there is a charcoal fire. There's a charcoal fire that Jesus has put together on the beach. And for those of you who have read the gospels many times, you'll know that there's only one other time where there is a note of a charcoal fire in the New Testament. It was on the night where Peter betrayed Jesus three times. I mean, I'm telling y'all, the Bible is full of all of these little hyperlinks all over the place. And here in front of another charcoal fire, Jesus restores Peter and he invites him back into the mission that he has for him three times. Peter denied Jesus, and three times Jesus asked him if he loves him. And I'm sure with each question that he asked, it felt like the cut got a little bit deeper. And yet that was actually the path to true healing. You see, true healing occurs when two people run towards restoration and reconciliation. It's just simply a movement towards each other. You may not have it figured out. In fact, I'm certain that there are some very, very complicated situations in this room. And it's not going to be figured out overnight. But I do believe that the Holy Spirit will give you wisdom and will bring people around you who will help you and give you wisdom on how to start the process of reconciliation. So let's uh as we finish up our time today, let me give you some very practical steps. This is from Matthew chapter 18. Jesus gives some very practical steps on how to move towards reconciliation. The first thing is this. This is what we see in Matthew chapter 18, verse 15. It says, Go to that person, him or her alone. Go have a meeting with them and let them know of an offense. Now, let me just pause here for just a moment because it this happens in church all the time is people are like, there's no offense. Yes, there is. There's an offense. So what do you do? If they if you're offended with somebody in your family, in your church, in your in your office, go to that person alone. Here's what uh Matthew 18, verse 15 says. Moreover, if your brother sins against you, go and tell him his fault between you and him alone. If he hears you, you have gained your brother. And here would be um the ultimate hope is that that's where it stops. That you can begin a conversation. You can say, Hey, you offended me. That person would say, I'm sorry, and you can begin the process of restoration. However, it doesn't always work that way, does it? So we find out that the next step that you take is take one or two others with you. This is what Matthew 18, verse 16 says, But if you, but if he will not hear you, take with you one or two more, that by the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established. Sometimes you got to get somebody else involved. And listen, this is important. Don't just bring somebody who's gonna take your side. Bring somebody who's gonna be wise, somebody who's gonna be prayed up, somebody who is going to be looking to help reconciliation, not stoke the fire. This is important. But if they won't listen, even then, he keeps going. This is in uh Matthew 7 or Matthew 18, 17. You're supposed to bring in the church. If he refuses to hear them, take it to the church. You may need to call a pastor or an elder into the situation and say, hey, how do we reconcile this? And then finally, if it still won't reconcile, we move on to our least favorite part, church discipline. Uh, verse 17 says, But if he refuses even to hear the church, let him be to you like a heathen and a tax collector. The goal of all of this is the reconciliation of relationships. And I know this is messy, and I know some of you in here have been deeply, deeply wounded. And I know that some of you in here have uh had awful things done to you. And I am very aware that often the process of reconciliation it is a process, it does not happen overnight. But I do believe that we serve a God of reconciliation. Second Corinthians talks about this, how God actually reconciled us to himself through the blood of Jesus on the cross. We serve a God who is a reconciling God. And I just sense that this is a pivotal day for some of you. That some of you will come back to May 17th, 2026 as the day that you came to church and the Holy Spirit began to speak to you about a particular relationship that needed healing. And for some of you, you may not even be the one who was the offender, but you may be the one who needs to take the step towards reconciliation. Some of you may not even know that you're offended with them. And so today I want to uh ask that you would take a step and that you would move towards bringing reconciliation, especially if you have been in a season of delayed reconciliation. I believe uh that God is a God of reconciliation. So as we prepare to finish our time together, would you stand with me? I want to take a moment and pray over us. That God would help us as we take a step in the same way that Jesus did. So, Father, I thank you for each and every one of these amazing people. God, thank you that you are the God of reconciliation. Father, that when we had offended you the most, it was ultimately you that took a step towards us. So, God, for those of us who uh find ourselves in the midst of a season or in the midst of a fracture in a relationship, God, we're asking uh that you would begin the process today. God, that you would give us wisdom and that you would give us hope. Father, that you would guide us by your Holy Spirit, Father, that you might bring some other people around us who would pray for us and give us counsel and give us wisdom, and ultimately that you would bring reconciliation to something that's been broken. We ask this today in the mighty name of Jesus. Amen.