Again, looking at the circumstances under which this charge is received by Peter, it either conveys that special and singular honour and power which we have here set forth, or _none at all_. For Peter had _already_ received the full Apostolic authority: he had heard together with the rest of the Apostles those words of power, "As My Father sent Me, I also send you," and the charge following, to bind and to loose. It could not therefore be this power which was given him, for he had it already. All which James and John, the sons of thunder, ever had given them, he also had before these words were uttered. Besides a power which was to be shared by James and John, and the rest of the Apostles, could not be given in terms which distinguished him from them, "lovest thou Me _more than these_?" It could not be the mere forgiveness of his denial, for not only did the Apostolate, since conferred, carry that, but when our Lord appeared to him first of all the Apostles after His resurrection, it was a token of such forgiveness. There remained nothing else to give him, but presidency over the Apostles themselves, the reward of superior love, as was prophesied and promised to him in reward for superior faith. For these two oracles of our Lord exactly correspond to each other as promise and performance. Their conditions and their terms shed a reciprocal light on each other. In the one there is the great confession, "Thou art the Christ the Son of the living God;" in the other as singular a declaration, "Lovest thou Me more than these? Yea, Lord." In the one there follows the reward, "And I say to thee, that thou art Peter," &c.: and in the other a like reward, "Feed My lambs, be shepherd over My sheep." The one is future, "I will build, I will give, thou shalt bind, thou shall loose:" the other present, "Feed and be shepherd." What concerns "the Church and the kingdom of heaven" in the one, concerns "the fold" in the other. And the promise and performance are singularly restricted to Peter--"I say unto thee, Thou art Peter"--"Simon, son of John, lovest thou Me more than these?"