The Comeback

This is part one of an excerpt from Louie Giglio’s book The Comeback. When we start to head toward a comeback, we think we need to have our destination figured out. We’re not sure how it’s all going to play out, and we can’t figure it out. So we’re overwhelmed. Much stress is lifted from us when we come back to the starting place—the basic foundation of truth—trusting in God and doing good. People are going to scrutinize us by asking, “What are you going to do?” “Have you figured it all out yet?” The place to start is to answer, “I’ve decided to trust in the Lord and do good. I’m not 100 percent sure where all this is going to go, but I’ll tell you that I’m actively trusting in the Lord.” Trusting is never passive. When we trust, we don’t just sit back and chill. In the waiting mode, in the journey of heading toward a comeback, the invitation of God is to keep doing the very best at whatever God has put in front of us. This means we adopt the attitude of relying on a great and sovereign God to orchestrate the plans and purposes and direction of our lives. When our view of God expands so we can see him as he truly is—as a big and extraordinary God—we have less need for specifics. We’ve seen God act before. We trust him for how he’s going to act in the future. We’re not stressing out over what he can and can’t do. We know we’re loved by him and called by him and chosen by him and created by him. And if all those things are true, then God is going to lead us into his best purposes and plans. I love the story of the patriarch Abram. (That was his name before it was changed to Abraham.) He was faithful to God even before the cross, and his faithfulness was counted to him as righteousness. Abram lived with his family in a place called Haran. In Genesis 12, God said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you” (v. 1). That was God’s revealed plan for Abram. Period. Only that much. Just pack up and roll on out, and as you’re going, I’ll show you where we’re going to go. The leading wasn’t to the land I have shown you. It was go to the land I will show you. This is often the way God leads his people even today. Step out of the boat, and walk toward me on the water. I’ll show you what’s going to happen along the way. Abram’s call came with a promise too. God said, “I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed” (vv. 2–3). What if God came to you today and said the same thing? “You’re going to be a huge blessing. I’m going to make you into a great nation. And everybody’s going to be blessed through you.” What would you think? The honest answer I think a lot of people would give is, “I dunno. That’s not what I envisioned for my life. Is the way going to be hard? What’s it going to cost me? Are my friends going to come too?” And that’s okay, because that was Abram’s specific call, not yours or mine. But let’s get our minds around the bigger theme of that call to Abram. God was saying, “Here’s a big promise. I’m going to impact a lot of people in a good way through you.” That’s a promise most of us would take. And notice that Abram’s promise only came on the back side of God’s calling to him. The call was to first leave what was comfortable. It was to step forward in faith into the unknown with God. Only then would the blessing come. The Bible specifically notes that Abram was seventy-five years old when this all went down (v. 4). Seventy-five! Abram was no young man, and this blows up two myths: first, that a person needs to have life figured out when he or she is twenty, and second, that God doesn’t give great callings to people when they’re older and established in life. God never wants anybody to check out, no matter how old or young. God is looking for people to take steps based not on age but on how we’re gazing at his greatness. Up to the moment when we die at the end of our lives, everything else is fair game. God wants us to keep an open hand, to continually say to God, “I trust you to lead me.” We need to get on the track that says, “I only live once. I’m never going to retire from God’s plans for me.” Our lives are always safest, not when we have a good paying job or a big retirement account or when we live in the suburbs with a white picket fence, but when our lives are firmly placed in the hands of God. If you want to keep reading from The Comeback, click here to grab a copy of this special resource.

This is part one of an excerpt from Louie Giglio’s book The Comeback. Peter was going to be the cornerstone of the early church, and Jesus knew that about Peter. But Jesus also knew that Peter wasn’t ready for that responsibility until Peter knew that Jesus was the real cornerstone. Peter needed to be completely clear on that idea. As long as Peter believed it all depended on him, then Jesus couldn’t use him. Peter needed to depend on Jesus first. Here’s this same truth taught earlier in John’s gospel. Jesus said, Apart from me, you can do nothing. . . . If you abide in me, and my words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. (15:5–7) Peter had forgotten that. He’d tried to do things his way. He’d denied Jesus. He’d fished all night and caught nothing. But Jesus was teaching this same truth to Peter all over again. Jesus was saying, “You went out and did your thing, but that didn’t work. Yet if I just speak one word and point my finger in one direction, and you follow me and my timing and my ways and put the net down where I say put the net down, then look—the net is full of fish.”  News flash: this is our same invitation today. It’s when we fall on our knees and say, “Jesus, you’re the vine and we’re the branches. What do you want me to do? Where do you want me to put down the net? Where do you want me to go? How do you want me to speak? What do you want me to be a part of? Whatever you say, Lord, because that’s the good stuff. Apart from you, I can’t do anything. So am I fishing in the right place today, Jesus? Am I sowing the right seeds right? Am I investing in the right person? All I want to do is follow you, because apart from you, I can do nothing.” When the disciples landed on shore, they saw a fire with fish on it and some bread. Jesus already had breakfast going for them. Don’t you just love a campfire on a beach? It’s in this environment of gentle wood smoke and crackling warmth and relaxed vibrancy that Jesus began to speak to Peter. And what Jesus didn’t say was just as important as what he did. Jesus didn’t commend Peter on a fantastic swim from the boat. Jesus didn’t chew out Peter for denying him in the high priest’s courtyard. Jesus didn’t rebuke Peter in any way for failing him. Jesus simply invited Peter to breakfast. Whenever we’ve had a long night of nothing, that’s what Jesus does for us too. Jesus asks simply, “You guys want to eat?” There’s no lecture. No condemnation. No rebuke. There’s just acceptance. And provision. And a kind of familiarity that only Jesus can provide. “Anybody hungry?” Jesus asks. “Let’s eat.” That, my friends, is mercy and grace on display. It’s the gospel, and it’s the gospel repeated. It’s the gospel when we need it the first time, and it’s the gospel when we need it the second time, and it’s the gospel when we need it the fiftieth time and the three hundredth time and the ten thousandth time. Jesus serves us in our emptiness. Jesus feeds us after we’ve let ourselves and him down. Jesus welcomes us near and says, “Hello, you look tired and scared and bewildered and beat down and exhausted and burned out and like you’re about to go under. Would you like some breakfast?” And then Jesus served his disciples. He served them like he serves us. Can I tell you what this is all about? It’s about the disciples and you and me losing this idea that we are going to do anything for God. It’s about our receiving the idea that God does everything for us and through us. Jesus is alive and loves us and has a purpose and a plan for our lives, no matter what. After a long night of nothing, after we fail him, this is the sum total of what we’re going to hear from him: “Good morning. Come, have breakfast with me. I’ve got a fire going with some tasty barbecued fish and fresh warm bread, just like you like it. Come, sit down and eat with me, have fellowship with me. Let me feed you and provide for you what you need for this day to come. I am the breakfast for you, because I am life and strength for you. I’m grace for you. I’m power for you. I’m mercy for you. I’m everything you need. I’m here, and I’ve got it all prepared. Would you like some breakfast?” The story isn’t over yet. When Peter and Jesus finished breakfast, Jesus invited Peter for a walk and asked him some questions. Actually, Jesus had only one question for Peter. But he asked it three times. Do you love me? Jesus started by asking it slightly differently. He said, “Do you love me more than these?” (John 21:15). Some scholars think Jesus was referring to the boat and nets and Peter’s former way of living, but that’s not the most logical way to interpret the question. It’s more likely that Jesus was hitting Peter with a question Peter could well understand. You see, Peter was always trying to raise himself above the other disciples. Peter always wanted to be first. He always wanted to position himself as Jesus’ go-to guy. So Jesus was asking him, “When it comes to loving me, are you first?” Peter didn’t back down. He said, “Lord, you know I do.” And Jesus did. He knew that Peter truly did love him. He knew that Peter was a work in progress, and for all Peter’s mistakes, love was still there. Jesus knew that under all of Peter’s bold, brash proclamations, Peter really did love him wholeheartedly, mistakes and all. So why did Jesus ask the question three times? The more times Jesus asked the same question, the more frustrated Peter became. You see, Jesus didn’t want Peter to be confident in Peter and in the answers he gave. Jesus wanted Peter to be confident in God and in God’s presence within Peter. The second time Jesus asked Peter the question, Jesus told him to feed his sheep. And the final time Jesus asked Peter the question, he said the same thing, “Feed my sheep.” In other words, Jesus was telling Peter to build his church. Jesus was telling Peter that he wasn’t disqualified just because he blew it. Did you catch that? Because that’s what I want to say to Brandon, the disillusioned bread truck driver, and to myself and to all of us who’ve ever wondered if we’re ever going to have a comeback. We’re not out. We’re not out because the thing we need most is not to be perfect but to be in love with Jesus.  Oh, I can hear the objections already—and some of them are valid. Sure, there are consequences to our decisions, and Scripture says that whatever we sow, we’re going to reap. There are consequences for letting ourselves down and for letting Jesus down. Maybe you’ve made some terrible choices in your past, and now you’re living with the consequences of those choices. Those consequences are real and there is no magic eraser to remove them. Guess what? Grace is more powerful than consequences. Grace overwhelms consequences. Even with consequences, there is love and grace and the mercy of God in Christ. Jesus says to us, “I know you messed up, and I know there are consequences, but I want to walk with you through the consequences. I want to love you through the consequences. And I even want to use the consequences in this whole big story.” I don’t know the specifics of your story. Maybe your consequences will be miraculously removed or healed or pardoned or restored or smoothed over. Or maybe your story is that God will use you mightily to speak truth and life to people who are experiencing the same consequences as you. The good news is that those consequences don’t dictate your life. God is bigger than any consequences. Even if you’ve denied Christ, he will still serve you breakfast. He will still serve you mercy and love. He will still use you to build his church. I love how the Bible promises that God’s faithfulness is great and his mercies are new every morning (Lamentations 3:23). That means Jesus’ breakfast is served and served and served and served and served and served and served again and again. It doesn’t matter whatever your night of nothing was about, there is new mercy available every morning. And the meal comes first. Breakfast is served before any problems are sorted out. Mercy is served as the first course. Jesus is saying to all of us that nothing will ever divide us from his love. That includes our failures. The gospel of grace can feel absolutely scandalous. When we’re put face-to-face with the gospel of grace, it seems too good to be true. We think there must be some judgment or punishment or condemnation or court of law or fine we need to pay or ton of bricks to fall on our head. But there isn’t. All the condemnation already went on Jesus. All the penalties were removed by Christ. All that’s left is breakfast on the beach. Come and eat, my friends. Come and eat. If you want to keep reading from The Comeback, click here to grab a copy of this special resource.

This is an excerpt from Louie Giglio’s book The Comeback. We’ve all made big commitments to him that we haven’t kept. We’ve all let Jesus down, not once, but many times. We’ve all been in that moment when the rooster crowed and we came to our senses and realized that we just blew something big time. We can’t believe we put ourselves in a compromising position, said what we just did, acted the way we just acted, or crossed a line we swore we never would. That’s why the last chapter of John was written. It’s to show us that big foul-ups happen, but Jesus still wants to have breakfast with us. The last chapter of John opens on the shores of the Sea of Galilee. The disciples were all in a boat, and Jesus was on the beach, watching them fish. They weren’t in Jerusalem anymore. They were maybe seventy miles away. What’s significant about the location is that this was where Jesus had first met Peter three years earlier. But by the last chapter of John, Peter is no longer traveling with Jesus. Peter wasn’t helping Jesus feed the five thousand. Peter wasn’t helping Jesus heal people. Peter had gone back to the only job he knew. Catching fish. What was Peter really doing? When we fall out with Jesus, it opens a door for the Enemy to blast us to smithereens. Maybe we make a big promise, tell God what we’re going to do, tell our friends what we’re going to do, or somehow set ourselves up as being someone God can depend on. But at the end of the day, we fail and fall flat on our faces and make a huge mistake and do things we never thought we would do. That was Peter. By going fishing, Peter was saying that he was finished. He had had his chance at following Christ, but he blew it and denied him three times. We do the same. Whenever we fall down, it lessens our confidence in God. The Enemy comes in to attack and says, “You’ve let God and yourself down. Don’t even bother going back to God. Don’t pray about it. God’s fed up with you. He won’t listen. You’ve blown it for the last time.” And we believe those lies. The next thing we know, we find ourselves going back to the place we came from. Have you ever whispered to yourself anything like the following?   I’ll just go back to drinking again. I mean, I can’t turn to God. What else do I have? I’ll just go back to this bad relationship. I know this relationship is harmful to me, but God doesn’t love me. Where else could I go? I’ll just go back to my poor thoughts again. I can’t ever seem to get a handle on this problem. God’s tired of hearing my excuses by now. So I’ll dwell on these harmful thoughts like I always do. I’ll go back to those old friends, back to that old environment, back to the place I used to hang out and to the people I used to run around with. I’ll go back to all the harmful stuff I used to do. I’ll run to my favorite coping mechanism because that’s where I’ve always gone for fulfillment and satisfaction. That’s where I’ve always gone to feel better. And even though I never find fulfillment or satisfaction there, and even though I always feel worse there than before, at least it’s familiar territory. I’ll go back to what I know.   When Jesus showed up early in the morning by the shores of Galilee, the disciples had been fishing all night but catching nothing. Led by Peter, they’d gone back to what was comfortable. But at the end of a night of returning to their old ways, guess what? All they had was a long night of nothing. Have you ever been there? Our culture constantly tells us what we need to do to feel better: party harder, seek happiness in the wrong places, walk the harmful paths. Many of us have gone down that road only to find out it’s still not fulfilling in the end. But Jesus called out to them, “Do you have any fish?” That phrase as it’s translated unfortunately misses the impact of what Jesus was saying. The phrase is actually a negative. It’s a hypothetical question. The emphasis is placed on what isn’t there. A modern equivalent might be, “How’s that working for you?” Jesus already knew they hadn’t caught any fish—that returning to their old ways was fruitless. So he offered a solution. Jesus called out, “Throw your net on the right side of the boat, and you’ll find some.” To an experienced Galilean fisherman, this advice sounded elementary. I mean, fishermen are fishermen the world over, and if a fisherman isn’t catching fish, then he’s going to have some sort of excuse for it. The bait was wrong. The visibility was bad. There was cloud cover over the lake. The moon was out of position. The fish horoscope was bad. There’s always an excuse. You can picture these guys on the boat all night. They haven’t caught anything. They’ve undoubtedly tried the right side, the left side, the front side, the back side. They’ve already put the net everywhere! You can almost hear the sarcasm coming from the boat. “Oh, the right side! We didn’t think of that, did we?” Who knows their motivation for changing the position of their nets? Maybe they were desperate enough to try what sounded obvious. They listened to the voice, threw their net on the right side, and—boom! Greatest catch ever! They couldn’t haul the net in because of all the fish. Let’s stay on that point for a moment, because maybe you’ve been fishing for a long time and have a whole night of nothing. Jesus stands before you, and his message is, “I know where the fish are.” Meaning, “I know exactly what you’re looking for, and I know exactly where you can get it.”   Jesus says, if you’re looking for friendship, I know where that is. Jesus says, if you’re looking for acceptance, I know where that is. Jesus says, if you’re looking for meaning in life, I know where that is. Jesus says, if you’re looking for healing, I know where that is. Jesus says, if you’re looking for significance, I know where that is. Jesus says, if you’re looking for security, I know where that is. Jesus says, if you’re looking for satisfaction, I know where that is.   Right now, he’s asking you the same question he asked Peter and the disciples. Jesus is looking at your familiar patterns of living and asking, “How’s that working for you?” He’s not asking for any information from you. He already knows how it’s working out for you. He’s giving you the opportunity to form the words in your heart and mind that affirm the reality of what’s happening. Once we affirm that reality, then God is able to restore us. As long as we deny our situation and continue to think that what we’re doing is great and fun and satisfying and that we’re running the show, then we’re still under the power of the deceiver. The moment we speak the truth and answer to Jesus, “Actually, I don’t have any or “Actually, what I’m doing isn’t helping at all,” then Jesus says to us, “Put your net over there.” He says, “I know exactly what you’re looking for, and I know exactly where you can get it. You find what you’re looking for when you follow me.” I love what happens next in the story. When the disciples’ net was full of fish, John was the first to recognize that Jesus was on the shore. Peter, always the impulsive one, jumped into the water and swam to shore. The other disciples followed in the boat, towing the net of fish—it was so full they couldn’t heft it into the boat. Why did Peter want to get to shore ahead of all the others? He was still the hard-driving disciple trying to work his way back into the graces of Jesus. Peter was still following his old patterns. It’s like he was announcing to Jesus, “See those guys still in the boat? They’re not swimming to you, but I am! I’m still your guy, Jesus! You can count on me!” I wonder what Jesus was thinking. Maybe something like, “Man, Peter, do you still not get it? I can’t count on you. You told me you’d die for me, but you denied me. Three times! What I’m trying to help you understand is that I can’t count on you. But here’s the good news: you can count on me!” That’s the core of the gospel, isn’t it? Please, let’s all be blown away by this. It’s Jesus saying to Peter—and to us:   You’re not dependable, but I am. You’re not going to come through, but I am. You’re going to fail me, but I’m not going to fail you. Saving the world doesn’t rest on you. It rests on me. If you want to keep reading from The Comeback, click here to grab a copy of this special resource.

In this talk, Louie Giglio encourages us to fix our eyes on The Cross amid painful circumstances, when we feel like we cannot see because the cross is our ultimate comeback.

In this talk, Ben Stuart shares how we can love our enemies in light of the increasingly hostile world.

In this talk, Louie Giglio addresses the setbacks that often happen within our comeback stories. He encourages us that when we fix our eyes on Jesus, we will see victory in our comeback.

Continuing in our current collection of talks, The Comeback, Louie Giglio interviews Dana, Elise, Jarryd, and Courtney about their own comeback stories. Each of them shares about the trial or brokenness in their life and the beautiful story that God has written for them out of that pain.

In this talk, Brad Jones addresses Peter’s comeback story and what that means for our comeback stories. He describes how God’s grace covers our mistakes and failures and that’s the greatest comeback of all.

Louie Giglio talks about what we can do to find hope when difficult circumstances and challenges come.

Louie Giglio teaches us that every one of us needs a comeback and that comeback is preceded by God’s incredible love and grace.