“It is the Lord,” said John to Simon.
Peter answered nothing, but hastily drew on his fisher’s coat (for he was naked), and cast himself into the sea that he might be first on shore. The boat was scarcely two hundred cubits from the land and in a few moments the seven Disciples were about their Lord. And no one asked Him, “Who art thou?”—because they had recognized Him.
On the shore there were bread and a lighted brazier with fishes broiling on it, and Jesus said, “Bring of the fish which ye have now caught.”
And for the last time He broke the Bread and gave to them and the fish likewise. After they had finished eating Jesus turned to Simon and under His look the unhappy man, silent till then, turned pale: “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these?”
The man who had denied Him, when he heard this question full of tenderness, but for him so cruel, felt himself carried back to another place beside another brazier with other questions put to him, and he remembered the answer he had made then, and the look from Christ about to die and his own great lamentation in the night. And he dared not answer as he wished: “Yes” in his mouth would have been boasting and shamelessness: “No” would have been a shameful lie.
“Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee.”
He made no claim for himself but “thou knowest that I love thee,” Thou who knowest all and seest into the most hidden hearts. “I love thee”: but he had not the courage to add “more than these” in the presence of the others, who knew what he had done.
Christ said to him, “Feed my lambs.”
And for the second time He asked him: “Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me?”
And Peter in his trouble found no other answer than, “Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee.”