“A third time He asked him, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?”

Many business leaders can’t understand why their messages and communications don’t stick with employees.  The level of frustration can be very high when messages either don’t get through or don’t stick.  Sometimes it is not the message, it is the continuity of the message.  Let’s face it, one of the major issues that any organization has is getting people to take accountability for communication. And, it’s not only the sending part but just as importantly, the receiving end.  It’s very easy for someone who was to have heard something to blame the sender for “poorly communicating”.  That’s why, as leaders or managers, we need to know what we want to say, say it, and then say it over and over until it sinks in.  A good lesson is that we shouldn’t stop saying the same thing until someone we really trust says, “Boss, we got it.”  It’s important to note that we really can’t over communicate and consistency of message is a positive, not a negative by any means.

Jesus was a great communicator and He used repetition many times in His communication. From many examples we can see that we as human beings have to be told over and over, questioned over and over, and repeated to before things will sink again.  The symbolism and impact of Jesus asking Peter three times if he loved Him paralleled the three times that Peter denied Jesus previously.  The Pastor of my church, http://Cornerstone-sf.org, recently taught on this and pointed out that Jesus was also using the three times of questioning to Peter to also help him work through his own self-doubts.  We could all stand to have Jesus ask us more than once if we love Him and to reaffirm to ourselves and Him that we do!  Let’s today ask ourselves what is it that we are communicating to others and ourselves over and over and what messages do we need to continue to reinforce to bring glory to God in the work we do?

Reference: John 21:17 (New Living Testament)