Seeing Jesus in the Dark
John 21:7
“Therefore that disciple whom Jesus loved saith unto Peter, It is the Lord…”
In this week’s writing about John 21 and the prophetic revelation and strategy that it holds for this season, we pick up the story of Peter, John and some of the other disciples as they return from a long, cold and ultimately unfruitful fishing trip.
If you haven’t checked out the post from last week, I encourage you to check that out before continuing however for those that just want to dive in, remember that the story begins with the disciples that are still discouraged and in anguish. Even though they have seen an empty tomb and many of their friends have witnessed Jesus having risen, they are still broken from the trauma of what has taken place. Peter especially is going though it because regardless of whether Jesus has risen or not, he’s in the dog house in his own mind. If Jesus had not risen, his leader, friend and the only one that truly understood him was gone. If Jesus had indeed been resurrected, how could he face the one that he so adamantly and devoutly denied not once, not twice but three times? Rock and a hard place indeed. (You see what I did there? #biblicaldadjokes)
Peter and a few others, in the pressure cooker of an uncertain future and a less than stellar week, take to what is easily accessible and familiar…which produced NOTHING.
On their return trip from this exercise in futility is where we see another golden nugget of revelation come.
Discerning Jesus, and Your Breakthrough in the Dark Night of the Soul
It’s dark out, the disciples are cold, wet and miserable. While it is of their own doing, they have caught nothing. A man calls to them from the shore and asks them if they had caught anything. They tell the truth about their catch and say no, which for a fisherman to be wholly honest about his catch means things must be pretty bleak.
The figure tells them to put their nets on the right side of the boat. Wait a second, this sounds familiar. There was another time long ago when an upstart Rabbi asked them, after a fruitless night of fishing, to also cast their nets down.
4 And when he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, y“Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.” 5 And Simon answered, “Master, zwe toiled all night and took nothing! But at your word I will let down the nets.” 6 And when they had done this, athey enclosed a large number of fish, and atheir nets were breaking. Luke 5:4-6 ESV
I’m sure the disciples’ ears were perked at this, remembering the events from long ago. They cautiously place their nets in the water. Sure enough, just as before, their nets creak from the massive amount of fish in their nets. As they fight to hang on to the catch, John, the one who leaned his head on the chest of Jesus, gasps, “It is the Lord”
Hearing this, Peter leaps into the water and heads towards the man on the shore. They saw something familiar in the encounter they were currently in and that educated the way in which they should respond. That response, based on what Jesus had done with them years earlier, positioned them to be obedient in the moment of darkness and turn around their failure into a massive harvest.
Remember Your History with Jesus
In this moment, things are not going according to what many of us expected. We look back at our prophetic words and scratch our heads asking, “did I miss something?” These are the moments when we should take inventory of all that we have gone through in our prophetic journey with Jesus so far. Many of us think that we have this continually in the forefront of our minds, until we sit down with pen and paper and begin to list all the things we have walked with Jesus in just the last six months let alone years. When we do this, we become ultra sensitive to the whispers of the Holy Spirit beckoning us to realize we are in a divine moment.
A helpful activation is this:
List the top 5 things that God has spoken over your life.
Think of situations over the last 6 months where God has either confirmed or opened up opportunities in those 5 things. List them as sub-points under your main headings which are the 5 things.
Ask the Holy Spirit to illuminate situations and moments that you had not previously known were Him moving on your behalf in those 5 things. List them.
Allow God to show you how you responded and interacted with Him in those moments. Allow Him to teach you ways in which you could have been more aware or sensitive. Allow God to immerse you in this so you come to a whole new awareness of His hand on your life. Write this out in detail. Don’t remain on the surface, have the curiosity to ask the deeper questions and the courage to sit and hear the answer.
Go about your daily life with these now-heightened spiritual senses. Pay attention to all that happens and take note of how they confirm and open the way for those main themes that God has spoken over your life.
There is nothing especially unique or original about this activation, one simply needs to read about King David’s prayer life of meditating on the thoughts and words of God (Psalms 139:17) to know that this has been around for a long time. This practice which served the greatest King Israel would most certainly help all of us in recognizing Jesus in the midst of our dark season and serve as a light house to lead us to the other side.
