Series

[30] "I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "today--yes, tonight--before the rooster crows twice you yourself will disown me three times."

[31] But Peter insisted emphatically, "Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you." And all the others said the same.

Peter followed him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest. There he sat with the guards and warmed himself at the fire.

While Peter was below in the courtyard, one of the servant girls of the high priest came by. [67] When she saw Peter warming himself, she looked closely at him.

[68] But he denied it. "I don't know or understand what you're talking about," he said, and went out into the entryway.

[69] When the servant girl saw him there, she said again to those standing around, "This fellow is one of them." [70] Again he denied it.

After a little while, those standing near said to Peter, "Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean."

[71] He began to call down curses on himself, and he swore to them, "I don't know this man you're talking about."

[72] Immediately the rooster crowed the second time. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken to him: "Before the rooster crows twice you will disown me three times." And he broke down and wept.

I’m sure all of us have experienced broken promises that were made to us. Sometimes, they can really hurt. Here’s a story from a man named Manfred Schreyer about his experience[1]:

When I was five years old, my father had been sick for a long time and was also hearing impaired. I felt often alone. My mom worked in a factory from sunset to sundown to make ends meet. So, I did not have much communications with either one of my parents during the daytime until my mom came home and she read me old German tales.

But I remember on one occasion my aunt promised me to come and pick me up early in the morning and she told me that we would take her car (I was so excited) and we would go and watch television (we did not have one) and also would go shopping.

When she promised all these things I felt overwhelmed with joy and happiness and I could not wait until the day would arrive.

That morning I would stare out of the window from the second floor to see if I could spot her. I waited the whole morning because she never gave me a specific time when she would arrive.

I still remember my dad when he walked slowly over to a hanging wall clock, he wound it up and I saw the little finger of the clock on the three. He looked at me and he said: "She must have forgotten." I yelled my reply at him so he was able to hear me: "She would not forget, she promised me." I was still standing at the window and after another two ½ hours I saw an employee from the bakery store on the opposite side of the road leaving the store. It was time for her to go home. It was then I then realized that my aunt did forget me and she failed to keep her promise.

I saw my aunt much later and I asked her with tear balls behind my eyes: "Why did you not pick me up, like you promised?" And her reply was with a loud laugh as only my aunt could: "I must have forgotten." I ran out of the room, because my tears came rolling down my young face and I sat on the back porch for a long time and I cried and cried, because I was so hurt; and I felt that if she could forget me and break a promise then anyone could do the same.

I believe it was the first time that my heart was broken and it remained broken for a long time. …this event influenced me deeply in my life. I often was unable to trust others who gave me a promise... I was guarding myself from disappointment.

If you’ve ever received a promise that was important to you and then had it broken, you know the hurt, the disappointment, the disillusionment that comes from that. And at the core of it is a lack of trust. When someone breaks their promise to us, it damages their credibility, and we tend not to trust them in the future. That’s why the story of Peter’s denial of Jesus is all the more significant for us. Let’s look at it.

Jesus had met with His men in the Upper Room; He had transformed the Passover Supper into the Lord’s Supper; Judas had left to betray Him; and they had all gone out, across the Kidron Valley, to the Mount of Olives.

[30] "I tell you the truth," Jesus answered, "today--yes, tonight--before the rooster crows twice you yourself will disown me three times."

[31] But Peter insisted emphatically, "Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you."

There is something beautiful about Peter here. His faith is strong, and his love for Jesus is uppermost in his mind. He doesn’t know about the rest of his friends, but he knows he is completely sold out to Christ. He believes he loves Jesus even more than he loves his own life, and he makes a beautiful, eloquent profession of his love and commitment. It’s wonderful. It’s the sort of thing all of us would hope we would say.

And it is naïve. It is presumptuous. And therefore, it is foolish. Peter always was one to speak before thinking, and this time is no exception. He is offended by Jesus’ statement that they will all desert Him. He takes it as a personal insult against His love for Jesus, and immediately reacts with a strong denial. But in the end, he not only denied that Jesus spoke the truth, he denied that he ever knew Him.

I’m troubled by this conversation. I want to say this; I certainly love Jesus, and am committed to Him. I want to be able to profess undying love for Him, to shout boldly that I will always be faithful to Him. But I do not trust myself. I do not presume that I am strong enough to withstand this kind of pressure. I read recently of a woman who had been imprisoned and tortured multiple times, until she was tortured to death, rather than renounce her allegiance to Jesus Christ. And as I read that, I thought, Lord! Could I do that? I don’t think I am that strong. And as I consider the Christians I know, I think most of us are so soft, we have found it so easy to be a Christian here, that we have not been strengthened by testing, and therefore, I fear for any of us if we should be in that position.

The word Jesus used for “fall away” (skandalizo) comes from a root that means to trap, or trip up. In one sense, they would all be tripped up and desert Jesus, but it seems to apply to Peter in a particular way: he was blind to the trap that pride and presumption can create. He didn’t see the weaknesses in his own character, and really, in the character of every person, that cause us to stumble and fall in all sorts of ways. He was trapped by his own naiveté.

A wiser response on Peter’s part might have been to say, “I love You, Lord, and I will do everything in my power to remain faithful to you. I know I can’t do it alone; I’m not that strong. But by your grace, and with the help of Your Spirit, I will do my best.” We will be faithful to Him to the degree that we rely on His faithfulness to us. We are weak, but He is strong.

So Peter was foolish, and presumptuous, and naïve; but still, it was beautiful. We have to give him credit for his love for Jesus.[2] His heart was in the right place, even though he overestimated his own strength. Let’s not be presumptuous like he was, but let’s all do be as much in love with Jesus as he was. It is far better to be a Peter, with our hearts on fire for Christ, than to be a Judas, whose heart was cold.

Then Jesus instructed the disciples to stay there and pray while He went into the Garden of Gethsemane. He took Peter, James, and John with Him a little farther in to the garden, and then left them there, and went on to pray alone. Shortly thereafter He was arrested and taken to the High Priest’s house where He was interrogated and beaten.

Peter followed him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the High Priest. There he sat with the guards and warmed himself at the fire. While he was there, one of the servant girls came by. When she saw Peter warming himself, she looked closely at him and said, “You also were with that Nazarene, Jesus.” But he denied it and said, I don’t know what you’re talking about. A little later, the servant girl said to the others who were there, “He’s one of them,” but again, he denied it. Even though Peter probably hadn’t said much, so as not to draw attention to himself, apparently his accent was pretty obvious, because some of the others said, Mark 14:70, “Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean.” I guess people from Galilee had a very distinct and recognizable accent, much like people from Boston, or Texas. In any case, they could tell that he was from Galilee, and since Jesus was from Galilee, they naturally concluded that Peter was one of His disciples.

Mark 14:71, “He began to call down curses on himself, and he swore to them, ‘I don't know this man you're talking about.’” [72] Immediately the rooster crowed the second time. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken to him: ‘Before the rooster crows twice you will disown me three times.’ And he broke down and wept.”

Peter crumbled under the pressure and the danger to himself. This was not the kind of pressure we feel in a secular society that is sometimes hostile to our faith. I have been reading a book[3] about how the younger generation (ages 16-29) sees Christians, and it isn’t pretty. By and large, they see us as hypocritical because we pretend to be perfect when they know we are not; too focused on getting converts to really care about them as persons; bigoted against homosexuals; old fashioned, boring, and out of touch with reality; motivated by a political agenda; and unloving and judgmental. Given that kind of perception, we might expect not the warmest welcome if we were identified as being associated with Jesus. We might be ostracized from some social circles because we are followers of Christ; we might catch some derogatory comments; we might be the brunt of a joke. But there is no way it would be a dangerous situation for us. No one is going to arrest us, or burn our house or church down, or deny us a job, or kill us just because we are Christians.

Nonetheless, many of us do crumble under the light pressure we feel from our society. We know Christians are not well thought of, and we sometimes choose to act in ways that will not advertise our association with Jesus. We may say grace for our meals at home, but choose to quietly ignore that tradition when we are out. We may be in a conversation at school or work where someone attacks a well-known Christian figure, or a local pastor, and rather than identify ourselves as Christians, we just remain silent. We feel like others around us are smarter than we are, and we’re afraid they might ask us questions we can’t answer, so we choose to say nothing about our faith. The threats to us are minimal, but we feel them, and we crumble.

Peter failed, but he was under a lot more pressure than we are. The authorities had just arrested Jesus, and Peter could be pretty certain what was going to happen to Him. To be identified as one of Jesus’ disciples meant certain death. The threat for Peter was very real, and he felt it acutely, and he failed. And his failure was made more painful by his earlier protestations of faithfulness. He had insisted He loved Jesus more than the other disciples, but he failed. He had insisted he would die for Jesus, but he failed. No wonder when he heard the rooster crow for the second time, he went out and wept bitterly. He was so distraught, and still so fearful for his own life, that he didn’t even show up at the cross later that day. Alone of all the disciples, John was there when they crucified Jesus. Peter was nowhere to be seen.

This was all the more bitter for Peter, because of the new name Jesus had given him. His given Jewish name was Simon, but one day Jesus had said to him, Matthew 16:18, “I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.” The name Peter means rock in Greek, but Peter did not prove very rock-like there in the High Priest’s courtyard. In fact, he seemed more like a fragile fern that got crushed by the boot of fear and self-preservation.

But Peter was not a complete failure. Even in the midst of this situation on Thursday night, he demonstrated considerable courage. In the Garden of Gethsemane, he alone of all the disciples drew his sword, as if he would single-handedly defend Jesus against the entire armed guard the authorities had sent. And he didn’t just wave his sword around in false bravado—he struck out at someone, and cut off the ear of High Priest’s servant. Then, incredibly, he followed Jesus all the way back to the High Priest’s house and sought admission to the inner courtyard (John 18:16). Now, that took some courage! And he didn’t even leave when he was first accosted by the servant girl. Anybody else would have thought, O no! They’ve recognized me! I’ve got to get out of here! But Peter stayed. He stayed through the second time she identified him. And he even stayed after someone recognized his accent. So yes, he failed, but he showed quite a bit of courage even in the midst of that failure.

Tragic Peter—deeply and passionately in love with Jesus, but naïve, presumptuous, overestimating his own love and strength of commitment. Bold, courageous to the point of being foolhardy, then failing miserably. Certainly, all of us can identify with Peter here. We, too, love Jesus, and we would want to remain faithful to Him, no matter what. But we are weak, and none of us really knows what we would do under that kind of pressure. So we can learn from his naïve presumption not to make promises we cannot keep. And we can learn from his love and courage to be brave in the face of danger.

But this is not the end of this story, and we need to learn from the lesson Jesus taught Peter later. It’s the lesson of grace.

After the resurrection, Jesus appeared to His men on several different occasions in different settings. One of those was at the Sea of Galilee. Peter and six other disciples were out fishing all night, but they caught nothing. Early in the morning, as they were coming in, Jesus was standing on the beach and called out to them, “Have you caught anything?” They didn’t recognize Him, and said, No! Jesus told them to throw their nets on the other side of the boat and they would find some. They may have thought this was strange advice, but they did it, and when they did, they caught a huge load of fish. Then John probably looked a little more closely at the man on the beach, and recognized Jesus. As soon as he said, “It’s the Lord!” Peter dove overboard and began to swim in to meet Him. The rest of them towed the net full of fish in to the shore, and when they got there, they found that Jesus already had a fire going, with fish and bread cooking on it. They all sat around and had breakfast together.

When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Peter, Let’s go for a walk down the beach[4]. At this point, I can just imagine the blood rushing to Peter’s face, and him beginning to sweat. Because even though he had been in Jesus’ presence before, after the resurrection, it had always been with others around. This was the first time since he had denied Jesus that he and Jesus would have been alone, face to face, and I’m sure he thought he was in for it. This was going to be the time when Jesus lowered the boom and chewed him out for his failure.

But instead, Jesus said to him, John 21:15,17, “… ‘Simon son of John, do you truly love me more than these?’ Ouch! That had to hurt. He remembered that night before Jesus was arrested, when he had sworn he loved Jesus more than all the other disciples, but he had failed to keep his promise. Earlier in his life, Jesus had called him Peter, the Rock, but now Jesus called him Simon. That may have been a not-so-subtle way of saying, You weren’t acting like a rock back then.

Jesus said, ‘Feed my lambs.’ What? That’s a funny thing to say. Why did He tell me that?

Peter was hurt because Jesus asked him the third time, "Do you love me?" There is a certain amount of frustration in Peter’s heart now. He doesn’t know what else to say. He knows that his behavior did not show it, but he also knows that he does love Jesus. So all he can say is, "Lord, you know all things; you know that I love[5] you." I know that my words and my actions are inconsistent with each other; I know that makes me a hypocrite; but that’s all I can say. You know my heart; you know I love you. Jesus said, "Feed my sheep.”

Why do you think Jesus went through that little dialog three times? He certainly knew the truth when Peter said it the first time. I think it was because Peter denied Him three times. It’s as though Jesus is giving Peter a “do-over”. Your love failed three separate times; now you get to affirm your love three times. Your guilt is completely covered.

And what about this instruction to feed and take care of Jesus’ sheep? This is so powerful! Jesus is putting Peter in charge of the Church. Jesus is about to leave the earth and ascend to heaven, and the little flock of believers need a shepherd. The Greek word for shepherd (poimen) is the same as the word for pastor, and Jesus is installing Peter as the pastor of the very first Christian church.

But why Peter? Why not choose John, who was the “disciple Jesus loved”, who was the only disciple who loved Jesus enough to be at the cross when He died? Why choose Peter, who failed in his love and commitment? I think Jesus chose Peter precisely for that reason: Because Peter, having failed himself, would be a gentle and compassionate shepherd for the sheep, who also fail. Someone who had not failed might be harsh, and demanding, and critical of those who did not keep their commitments. But someone who had failed in such a stunning and obvious way would be more understanding of the human condition, and more compassionate for those who stumble and fall in their Christian walk.

Some of you really need to hear this today. You have failed—perhaps miserably, spectacularly, even intentionally—and you have thought that this failure has cut you off from God’s love, and disqualified you from service for the King. You have carried around your guilt and you have let it weigh you down to the point that you never feel like you can hold your head up in the presence of the Lord. You dread the day when you will have to face Jesus and hear Him scold you for your gross failure of love. You recall verses of Scripture that say things like this:

C John 14:21, “Whoever has my commands and obeys them, he is the one who loves me.” But you know you don’t always obey, so you must not love Him.

C John 13:17, “Now that you know these things, you will be blessed if you do them.” But you don’t always do what He said.

C James 1:22-24, “Do not merely listen to the word, and so deceive yourselves. Do what it says.” But you do sometimes just hear the Word and don’t do it.

You read those things, and they just pound you down into the ground. You know that you are a hypocrite, because you say you love God, but you don’t act like it; or there was one particular time when you really didn’t act like it.

But look! Listen to Jesus with Peter! Was your sin worse than his? Was your denial of the Lord worse than his? Three times he said he didn’t even know Jesus. The last time he swore an oath! He had sworn to Jesus that he would be faithful even if all the others didn’t, and he didn’t keep his word. Are you worse than that?

But look what Jesus did with him—raised him up out of his pity-party, out of the muck of his self-destructive guilt, and put him in charge of the church! He gave Peter a position of responsibility, and authority, and honor. Peter broke his promise and had proven that he was not trustworthy, but Jesus trusted him anyway.

Wow! What is Jesus saying to you today through this? If you have felt like your sin disqualified you from a position of responsibility in the kingdom of God, if you have felt worthless and excluded from God’s love and blessing, if you have broken your promises to God and feel like He’ll never trust you again, you need to hear Jesus say to you, “Feed my sheep. Take care of my lambs. Your sin is not the end of the story. Yes, your sin is what nailed me to the cross, but my cross can now free you from your guilt. You don’t have to be stuck in a dead end street. You are important to me, valuable to me, and I want to use you in my kingdom. Stop wallowing in your guilt; stop hiding in the shadows. Come out here in the light of my love and let me give you a job to do. I did it with Peter, and I can do it with you.”

We may not always keep our promises to God, but He always keeps his promises to us. He promises that if we confess our sins, He will be faithful to forgive us and to purify us from all unrighteousness (1 John 1:9). He promises to be with us forever, never to leave us (Heb 13:5). And He promises to give us His Spirit so that we will have power to be His witnesses wherever we go (Acts 1:8).

God, it is so good to know that your faithfulness is greater than ours. That even though we break our promises, you never do. Thank you. Thank you for your grace, your undeserved favor and blessing to us. Thank you that you still accept us, and you can still use us, even if we have failed you miserably. We feel like Peter: we know we haven’t shown it, but you know we do love you. Thank you for accepting our sincere apology, and for reinstating us in your love.

[1] “Promises, Promises, Promises” http://www.spiritrestoration.org/Sermons/Promises%20Promises%20Promises.htm. Accessed 2/19/08.

[2] This idea is from William Barclay, The Gospel of Mark (Philadelphia: Westminster Press, 1975), p.342.

[3] David Kinnaman, UnChristian (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2007), p.29,30.

[4] See v.20.

[5] Much has been made of the fact that Jesus uses agapao in His first two questions, and phileo in the third, and Peter consistently uses phileo throughout this conversation. Warren Wiersbe (Be Transformed (Wheaton, IL: Scripture Press/Victor Books, 1986), p.146) has some helpful comments suggesting that we should not make too much of this because:

1. John uses the two words interchangeably throughout his gospel. see John 3:16/16:27 (God’s love for man); John 3:35/5:20 (the Father’s love for the Son); and John 13:34/15:19 (man’s love for man).

2. This conversation was originally in Aramaic, which does not have this fine distinction between words for “love”, so we shouldn’t press the Greek distinction too far.