When I was a little boy, sometimes I would walk into a room where my parents were talking, and the conversation would abruptly stop, or continue in hushed tones. My ears burning, suspicions aroused, I would say, “What are you talking about?” They’d both give me that look, and my mother would simply tap her nose. This body language clearly communicated one message—Mind your own business!

My parents might have been talking about me, or one of my siblings, or some private matter that simply did not concern me; after all, children can sometimes be downright nosy. Of course, as adults, we have grown out of that—or have we?

My parents’ unsubtle lesson to mind my own business is one that all Christians—including pastors—need to be reminded of regularly, and it’s one that Jesus had to teach Peter in John 21:21–22: “When Peter saw [John], he said to Jesus, ‘Lord, what about this man?’ Jesus said to him, ‘If it is my will that he remain until I come, what is that to you? You follow Me.’”

The neglected Christian grace of minding your own business—especially in ministry contexts—is found in the interplay between these two simple questions in this last chapter of John’s Gospel: “What about this man?” and “What is that to you?”

What About This Man?

Here are two seminarians about to graduate from their three-year seminary program with Jesus, and, like most seminarians, Peter and John have much in common. They have been discipled by the Great Pastor of the sheep; they have completed their preaching trials; and they have had their triumphs and their falls along the way. And yet, Peter and John are two very different men.

The first part of this conversation in John 21 is probably the best known: Jesus restores Peter after his three scandalous denials and recommissions him for ministry. But we also see Peter’s future ministry, as Jesus makes a unique prediction about its climax: he was to be afforded the honor of a martyr’s death: “‘Most assuredly, I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish.’ This He spoke, signifying by what death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He said to him, ‘Follow Me’” (vv. 18–19).

Peter’s future ministry is going to involve great suffering, but in the meantime he would have a long life of fruitful ministry: the crown of martyrdom will be placed on his head “when you are old” (v. 18). “Follow Me” thus bids Peter to take up his cross like Jesus, and that should have been the last word in the conversation. But at this point, Peter interjects a somewhat inappropriate question: “But Lord, what about this man?” introducing John (v. 21).

What follows is a study in contrasts: If Peter could be caricatured in this text as “backslidden and restored,” John is “faithful and following.” He is called “the disciple whom Jesus loved…who also had leaned on His breast at the Supper” (v. 20). It was John who stayed in the courtyard of Caiaphas when Peter had dashed out, weeping bitterly. It was John who had been present at the cross when Peter had fled into hiding. It was John who had taken Jesus’s mother into his care at Golgotha. And while Peter’s ministry would culminate in a violent death, John’s, after the glorious visions of Revelation, would end in comparative peace on Patmos. And so here, when Peter turns and looks (v. 20), John is exactly where we’d expect: “following them.”

Perhaps it shouldn’t surprise us that Peter would then ask, “Lord, what about this man?” but it reveals something concerning about his heart. Jesus is dealing graciously with Peter: he’s recommissioning Peter and he’s discussing Peter’s future ministry, but Peter’s mind is elsewhere! He’s literally looking over his shoulder and saying, “Yes, but what about him?”—indulging the very subtle and common sin of self-comparison, which is really just a form of meddling. He needs to mind his own business! And we know it’s an unhealthy self-comparison because it elicits a gentle admonition from our Lord: “What is that to you? You follow Me!”

In C.S. Lewis’s allegory, The Horse and His Boy, Aravis asks Aslan about the fate of a maidservant, whom she had mistreated. “‘Child,’ said the Lion, ‘I am telling you your story, not hers. No one is told any story but their own.’” And so it is with us. In a seminary or congregational context, this text warns against an unhealthy preoccupation with others’ gifts and ministries, which distracts us from our own, and breeds jealousy, envy, pride, and a host of other ministry-destroying evils.

The fact is, there are many times in ministry and in congregational life where we are tempted to ask Peter’s question, “What about this man?” In order to avoid Jesus’s rebuke, we must discern when it is appropriate and when it is inappropriate to ask.

It’s appropriate to ask, “Lord, what about this man?” when a brother pastor is in real trouble. I remember a season of burnout in pastoral ministry when a colleague called me and expressed his concern about how I was doing. Here was a vigilant brother who asked, “Lord, what about this man?” and I’m so glad he did! He wasn’t meddling; he was caring. The result was rich encouragement and a period of brotherly accountability until I came through on the other side.

It’s appropriate to ask this question when a minister is charged with doctrinal error or moral failure. In a very real sense, church discipline is the church courts asking, “Lord, what about this man?” as it brings the censures to bear, in the hopes of repentance and restoration, like Peter.

It’s appropriate to ask this question when certain individuals pose genuine threats to the flock. The opposite sin of omission to the sin of ministerial meddling is the sin of ministerial neglect. Pastors are watchmen on the wall, and it is their duty to sound the trumpet at the first sign of a wolf.

But despite such exceptions to the rule, the sin of self-comparison and not minding your own business—especially in such ministry contexts—is revealed in all its mischief when we consider the second question of the text.

What Is That to You?

Jesus’s question to Peter contains an admonition. It is inappropriate to ask, “What about this man?” when it expresses an unhealthy preoccupation with brothers whose gifts may appear greater or whose ministry may be deemed more successful than our own. Arguably, Pastor John was blessed with a particularly close relationship with the Lord that Pastor Peter didn’t share. John’s pastoral track record was free from the kind of scandalous fall that marred Peter’s, and the prospects for his future ministry appeared comparatively rosy—a long life of ministry and being spared the violent death that would greet Peter and the other apostles.

Now, you will not have such premonitions about the fate of fellow Christians or ministry colleagues, but you may be tempted to discontentment and envy by what you perceive to be your own comparative lack of health, gifts, or opportunities, and forget that it is the Lord who sovereignly “distributes his goods” (Matt. 25:14–15). You may be a one-talent servant; you may be a five-talent servant, but it’s all His property! The wonder is that He should call any of us from our rebellion like Peter and say to us, “Do you love Me? Then feed my sheep!” (vv. 15–17). Maybe you’ll need to hear Jesus say to you, “If I will that…their churches flourish; their blogs proliferate; they get published by Crossway; their sermon downloads outstrip yours; their ministries multiply…what is that to you? You follow Me!”

We can develop an unhealthy preoccupation not only with successful pastors but also with fallen pastors. John might well have pointed back at the recently backslidden Peter and asked, “What about this man?” Church history past and present is littered with accounts of pastoral failure that we can read and self-righteously say, “What about this man or that man?”—joining the ranks of the scandalized. Again, Jesus may have to say to us, “What is that to you? You follow me!” Surely our Lord’s stinging question reminds us that we ourselves are not invulnerable to a fall. When you hear a report about a stumbling brother, your first instinct should not be to cry out, “Lord, what about this man?” but, “Lord, is it I?” (Matt. 26:22).

There is one final reason we may be tempted to inappropriately ask, “What about this man?” and that is an unhealthy desire to be in the loop. Our text warns us that this failure to mind our own business is how rumors start in the churches. Peter may have asked Jesus his question privately, but it evidently led to the broader Christian community asking the same question: “Then this saying went out among the brethren that this disciple [John] would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, ‘If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you?’” (v. 23). So widespread did this conjecture about John become that he felt compelled to set the record straight here at the end of his Gospel.

When we ask aloud, “What about this man?” it can encourage idle speculation about this man—perhaps in hushed voices, in private social media groups, in ministerial cliques—with devastating results to their reputation. When invited into such private chats, we would do well to adopt my mother’s practice and gently tap our noses.

So how should we address our tendency to such kinds of unhealthy preoccupation with others in the church? The answer is to instead become preoccupied with Jesus’s words, “You follow Me.” They are not only a rebuke for the sin of unhealthy comparisons, they are its cure, calling us to a renewed focus on Christ and on our own ministry received from His hand. In short, they call us to the Christian grace of minding our own business.

The more focused we are on Jesus, the less distracted we will be by what Jesus has called others to do. It’s not that we shouldn’t be aware of the broader work of the kingdom, or be informed so we can pray intelligently. But the more focused we are on the sphere of ministry Jesus called us to, the less distracted we will be by what Jesus has called others to do, and thus avoid unhealthy comparisons that breed envy, jealousy, or contempt.

Jonathan Edwards once wrote, “The spiritually proud person is apt to find fault with other saints…and to be quick to discern and take note of their deficiencies: but the eminently humble Christian has so much to do at home, and sees so much evil in his own heart, and is so concerned about it, that he is not apt to be very busy with others’ hearts.” How many of us are not faithfully and fruitfully plowing our own field because we’re too busy meddling in the field next door?

“Lord, what about this man? What is that to you? You follow Me!”