John 21:1-14

Easy-to-Read Version

Jesus Appears to Seven Followers

21 Later, Jesus appeared again to his followers by Lake Galilee.^[a] This is how it happened: ² Some of the followers were together—Simon Peter, Thomas (called Didymus), Nathanael from Cana in Galilee, the two sons of Zebedee, and two other followers. ³ Simon Peter said, “I am going out to fish.”

The other followers said, “We will go with you.” So all of them went out and got into the boat. They fished that night but caught nothing.

⁴ Early the next morning Jesus stood on the shore. But the followers did not know it was Jesus. ⁵ Then he said to them, “Friends, have you caught any fish?”

They answered, “No.”

⁶ He said, “Throw your net into the water on the right side of your boat. You will find some fish there.” So they did this. They caught so many fish that they could not pull the net back into the boat.

⁷ The follower Jesus loved very much said to Peter, “That man is the Lord!” When Peter heard him say it was the Lord, he wrapped his coat around himself. (He had taken his clothes off to work.) Then he jumped into the water. ⁸ The other followers went to shore in the boat. They pulled the net full of fish. They were not very far from shore, only about 100 yards.^{[b] 9} When they stepped out of the boat and onto the shore, they saw a fire of hot coals. There were fish on the fire and some bread there too. ¹⁰ Then Jesus said, “Bring some of the fish that you caught.”

¹¹ Simon Peter got into the boat and pulled the net to the shore. It was full of big fish—153 of them! But even with that many fish, the net did not tear. ¹² Jesus said to them, “Come and eat.” None of the followers would ask him, “Who are you?” They knew he was the Lord. ¹³ Jesus walked over to get the bread and gave it to them. He also gave them the fish.

¹⁴ This was now the third time Jesus appeared to his followers after he was raised from death.