DO YOU LOVE ME?
They laughed together, but He wasn't frivolous. They relaxed together, but He didn't fritter away precious time. They ate together, but He wasn't gluttonous. Though they slept together, more often He relinquished sleep for prayer and fellowship with His Heavenly Father.
Yes, the apostles who traveled and ministered with Jesus must have heard Him teach the Scriptures to them as they walked, ate, relaxed. Jesus, being the Word, was full of the Word and wanted to instill in them as much as was possible of His fulfillment of the promises and prophesies in the Torah and other writings of Scripture: that He was who He was.
Yet, how dull of hearing they were. Following their experiencing of Jesus' glory on the Mount of Transfiguration, they walked the pathway arguing about which of them would sit on either side of Him in His kingdom. Their attention was directed to themselves, not to Jesus and His glory.
When the woman poured expensive nard on His head while He sat at Simon's table, Judas, cynical Judas, growled about the waste of such a valuable oil that could better have been sold and the money dropped into the coin bag he carried for the group. Sadly, the other disciples did not censure or silence him, but rather went along with Judas' harangue.
Look, then, at the time Jesus sent the men ahead of Himself in a boat while He mounted the hill to pray. Threatened by a storm at sea, the men argued at His quelling that perhaps the reason for their turbulence was because they hadn't brought any bread with them---after Jesus had just fed 5000 men plus women and children. Again, they worried about physical bread and their need to eat more than being made free from the leaven of the Pharisees which was self-aggrandizing pride. How dull was their understanding!
No, the apostles admired Jesus and loved Him as a friend and companion, but their lack of deep love for Jesus let them desert Him in the Garden and during His horrendous trial before Pilate and the Jews. We know that because we hear it in Jesus' examination of Peter on the beach after they had eaten fish together.
Do you love Me, Peter? Jesus used the Greek word agapao, that means to be fond of, to love dearly.
Almost insulted, Peter replied, Lord, you know I love you, but he used the Greek word phileo, which means to treat affectionately or kindly, to welcome, befriend. In more common vernacular, it means brotherly love.
Again, Jesus asked Peter essentially the same question two more times, three in total, numbering the times Peter had denied Him during the night of Jesus' kangaroo court trial. Each time Peter replied, he used the same phileo word for love.
The last time Jesus asked Peter, however, He did not use agapao. Instead, Jesus used phileo, also, thus asking Peter: do you love Me with brotherly love, rather than with God's love? Peter was upset by that change in Jesus' word for love. It was deliberate on Jesus' part, intended to convict Peter's heart about his need for something he lacked. Jesus was nailing home to Peter's heart why he had betrayed Jesus. His love was not Jesus' love, and immediately Peter must have seen his need for something more in his heart to make him faithful and strong in the face of the worst adversity.
Fast forward a few days to the Upper Room. Jesus had ascended to heaven, but before He left, He had instructed His followers, 120 in all, to go back to the Room and wait...and Acts tells us it was Peter who ran the meeting. He took charge and went about filling the empty seat Judas once occupied. Incorrect as Peter's action was, he knew they needed to obey Jesus' instruction. They needed more, and come He did in the Person of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost. And it was He who was the agapao love they needed but did not have for Jesus until that moment.
It was the precious Holy Spirit who brought to their remembramce all the things Jesus had said to them as they walked and lived together. It was He who was the harmony between personalities in the group as they preached in Jerusalem right after the resurrection of Jesus from the dead and His ascension into heaven.
It was also the Holy Spirit who worked with the apostles to resolve the difficlut merging of Jews and Gentiles under the New Covenant in Jesus' blood...the law and grace, pride versus humility.
And it is He, the third Person of the Trinity, who today must knit together those who profess to love Jesus in this present moment. Without Him, human effort is superficial, at best. It is tarnished with self, pride, all the soil and putrefaction of the old man that must die if He is to live in absolute dominion in the heart---the Upper Room experience! He is agapao.