Jesus Asked Peter About Love Before He Handed the Work Back

After a team member fails, the first question you ask sets what the relationship is built on, and the question Jesus asked Peter after his failure was about love. Picture the conversation on your calendar this week: someone key missed a commitment the client noticed, and you are deciding how to begin. John 21 records how Jesus handled His.

C.H.E.W. with Me

New here? What is CHEW? — a 30-second practice that grows into a day woven with God’s love.

C – Clarity: I Want to Restore Them Without Pretending It Didn’t Happen

Two instincts compete after someone on your team fails. One says to move on quickly and say nothing; the other says to keep the person at arm’s length until trust is rebuilt, and both feel responsible. The gap worth naming is the space between them: a way to be honest about what happened and still place real work back in the person’s hands.

H – Hear: Jesus Asks Peter About Love Three Times, Then Gives Him the Sheep

“When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, ‘Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?’ 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?’ He said to him, ‘Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.’ He said to him, ‘Tend my sheep.’ He said to him the third time, ‘Simon, son of John, do you love me?’ Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, ‘Do you love me’ and he said to him, ‘Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.’ Jesus said to him, ‘Feed my sheep.'” (John 21:15-17)

Peter had denied Jesus three times while warming himself at a charcoal fire in the high priest’s courtyard (John 18:18, 25-27). When the risen Jesus meets him on the shore, John mentions a charcoal fire again (21:9). The Greek word, anthrakia, appears only in these two places in the New Testament, so the echo is deliberate.

Three denials, three questions. Notice what Jesus does not ask for: no account of what went wrong, no probation. He asks about love, the root the work grows from, and each answer comes with an assignment. “Feed” (bosko) and “tend” (poimaino, to shepherd) name the care of the very people Jesus loves.

Christ’s love restored Peter beside a charcoal fire, the same kind of fire where Peter had denied Him, and handed him sheep to feed before Peter had proven a thing. A leader can notice the order: a question about the relationship, then real work.

E – Exchange: Trade “Prove It Again First” for a Question About Love and Real Work

The belief many leaders hold is that trust must be rebuilt in small, supervised steps before real work returns. Caution has its place, and Jesus does not hide the failure, since three questions mirror three denials. But the order He sets is a question about love, then meaningful work. Exchange probation as the default path back for a plain, honest conversation followed by an assignment that matters.

Because God’s love is willing to restore a person to meaningful work before they have proven anything new, how does that change how I open my next conversation with a teammate who failed?

W – Walk: Open the Conversation With Three Moves

Choose one person on your team, or someone you once supervised, with a failure still sitting between you. In the next ten minutes, write three lines: one sentence naming plainly what happened, one question about how they are (the relationship, not the report), and one specific piece of real work you can place back in their hands this week. Then schedule the conversation today. The same three moves work whether or not the person shares your faith.

Closing question: What would your team learn about your leadership if restoration began with a question about the relationship?