Sifted as Wheat ...

Do you sometimes wonder why people of faith seem to have lives struck by every bit as much tragedy as people who have no faith at all?  Why is that?  In fact, you could argue that people of faith seem to have even harder lives than people who have none. The question follows, if we are loved by God, why are we subjected to such sadness, and so much grief in the lives God gave us to live?  The answer is more compounded when we must bear witness to the grief of loved ones that we are unable to do anything about.  The more we love, the more we hurt when they hurt.  Should it be “we” who are the cause of this pain our loved ones must suffer from, a converted heart can hardly even stand it.  And most believers just right all this off, with catch phrases and sentiments like “this is life” or “what are you going to do” as if all we should even hope to do is bear it all and keep going.

But the paradoxically sad and happy choice is that love itself must always be chosen if it is to be real.  Free-will contains within it the choice to screw up.  And if we are to love God from the purest choice to do so, we must by nature be exposed to the choice not to love God.  Or as so many of us are intimately familiar with, to forget we love God, long enough to embrace some selfish choice that wreaks in its wake waves of pure destruction that reach out and destroy many.  When we remember our love for God, we come crawling back to Him on bended knee, begging for forgiveness, that even though granted, cannot change the truth of what we said or did, or offer healing to those we have wounded by word or deed.  Sometimes the destruction we cause must be born by those we claim most to love.  Wounds that cut deeply into the hearts and lives of others.  Pain that “our truth” is responsible for, for of a truth what we have chosen to say or do echoes on long past our forgiveness.  For it to be different, our truth must be different, or choice a better one.  For the pain we cause not to exist, the choice to avoid temptation itself would be the only pathway that might have been chosen.  But again, that was not the truth we chose.

And much of the suffering of our lives is caused and borne by our own selfish choices.  Whether that pain is known only to us, or whether we have made sure it would be shared by others we claim to love, our choice to love self, winds up coming at the expense of the happiness and joy of the ones we say we love.  And sometimes our choices take a long while to bear fruit.  Take for example the choices we make of how we manage our health.  We ingest things that will do us in.  Smoking, drinking, vaping, drugs whether recreational or even sometimes by prescription, the chemicals we take in do have an effect.  And we think these aggregate choices, even if they go bad, hurt only ourselves.  But tell that to the parent who must watch his or her child contend with the cancer that consumes their baby of any age.  Tell that to the wife who must become full-time caretaker of the husband whose health has collapsed so spectacularly he is now only one tenth the man he used to be.  Tell that to the baby who is born with so many complications that the first few years of their lives will be spent in agony, all for the sake of the “moderation” we thought would be fine to partake of while pregnant.  Small daily choices with our health that bear fruit over time, some of it very ugly fruit.

And we all blame God for the results of these things.  For it is easier to blame God than to take personal accountability for the choices we have made when confronted with temptation of any sort.  Jesus used to call this phenomenon “fall into temptation”.  Those words haunt our experience from Lucifer who fell in heaven along with a third of the angels at that time up to today with you and me.  Now Lucifer is called Satan.  And those “fallen” angels are referred to as demons.  Adam and Eve “fell” in the garden of Eden breaking trust with God, and condemning us to lives of slavery to evil, making evil our first choice instead of our last one.  And even when the most critical moments in the ministry of Jesus come along, he refers again to the sin that becomes our truth back to its earliest incarnation when it was still the temptation Jesus would wish us not to fall into. 

But there is another player in the story of our lives, he too is invisible to our natural sight, but ever since his own fall, he has done nothing but lay out stumbling blocks for each of us.  Satan puts in our path a series of stumbling temptations in order for us to fall so hard, and so often, we stop looking back to God to fix any of it.  We just reach a point where we start throwing out our own catch phrases like “this is life” and “what are you going to do”, having come to a point where we just accept sin in our hearts and lives without the hope of ever seeing it go away forever.  We accept the damage of sin as just being “natural” and start focusing so much on the sin, we begin to completely ignore that it all began in an earlier stage of temptation we might have avoided.  Jesus would have us avoid the temptation altogether.  It is what our prayers to God are all about (or supposed to be).  Jesus would have us pray to avoid temptation itself, rather than have to pray for the forgiveness we will need if confronted by temptation we so often fall into. 

Satan would sift us as wheat, trying to discard any signs of God in our hearts, and harden us only into the chaff that can be blown away by the wind, having little value to anyone else, ultimately even to ourselves.  Satan would not just encourage our selfishness, he will take active measures to make the “selfish choice” the “easy choice”, the “sensible or logical choice”, the “lesser of two evils choice”.  But to avoid falling in to any one of these temptations, our prayers should center on avoiding them altogether.  And while Satan may wish to sift us as wheat, Jesus has other plans for our faith.  For when we believe, we can begin to have trust.  And as our trust grows, we can submit and follow God, even when it makes no sense to us at all.  Follow even when it does not feel warm and fuzzy.  Follow, because we know that our Shepherd leads us to where we should be, a place always better than anything we could have imagined on our own.

Luke gives us a little context of these experiences in his gospel in the 22^nd chapter of his letter to his friend about what we believe and why.  For this section we will focus on Peter’s denial texts and come back to study the others in our next examination.  It begins in verse 31 saying … “And the Lord said, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan hath desired to have you, that he may sift you as wheat: [verse 32] But I have prayed for thee, that thy faith fail not: and when thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren.”  There is so much here to unpack.  First Satan wants us all.  Not because we are special to him, or mean anything to him.  He could care less about any of us.  We are however a means to an end.  Because Satan knows that God loves each of us like precious little children, when Satan can hurt or destroy us, ultimately it is God whose heart will suffer the most.  For each of us was created precious and unique for all of time and space, never to be repeated or replaced.  So when God must bear witness to our demise, God loses something that can never be replaced again.  A devastating loss of love rejected, but a choice our free-will demands if love is to ever be a real choice.  Still, the pain of that rejection will forever be keenly felt.  And the witness of our demise, long before the merciful fires of hell that forever put out our suffering will end it all; our torture having preceded all of that.  Torture brought on by the choices we make, the sins we embrace, and the selfishness we choose that spreads our pain around like ripples of water in a pond when you throw a large stone in the still waters.

Satan would sift us as wheat, and what is his first and perhaps only target – our faith.  For this is what Jesus prays for to counter the impact of satanic desires.  Jesus prays that Peter’s faith fails not.  Jesus does not pray for Peter’s perfection, have you ever wondered about that?  Why not just remove any desire Peter has to sin within him?  The answer; because Peter has not asked Him to.  And frankly, Peter does not even understand what a request like that would mean to every aspect of his life.  Peter does not trust enough for something like that.  He is not at that stage of his life or of his faith.  And something like that must be Peter’s choice.  Jesus even identifies all of this as He plainly states that Peter is still not converted.  What does that mean?  It means it is possible to “believe” in Jesus, as being our Savior, our Messiah, as the Son of God, and still remain unconverted as Peter clearly was from the point of view of Jesus.  What was still missing; a heart that understands its need.  Peter did not see himself this way.  Peter saw himself as strong enough to meet any temptation, and ready for anything that would come.  Peter was independent, not fully dependent, and that is how he saw himself, and what prevented him from being fully converted.  Peter still sees sin as a choice we can meet and choose the better of.  Most Christians still believe this is the case in their own lives.

Too many of us modern Christians still think we face sin as some sort of choice we can meet and make the right choice against.  We treat it like picking some sort of vegetables with our dinner.  Pick the potatoes and we have made the right choice, pick the Brussel sprouts and we have fallen into sin again.  Particularly easy choice for me, I hate Brussel sprouts.  But that is not what sin is like, or how it comes.  Sin is about selfishness, and we have 6000 years of selfishness ingrained in our very DNA.  You don’t put a tray of powered cocaine ready for ingestion in front of a cocaine addict and they just tell him to “say no”.  If the addict is going to “say no”, he needs to avoid that scene altogether.  He needs to be 200 miles away from that scene.  Ideally under the control of someone else.  Like say in your car, with you driving through the countryside, where there is no cocaine around for at least 200 miles.  That is avoiding temptation.  Not being there.  But because we see sin as nothing more than a choice between potatoes = good, and Brussel sprouts = bad, we treat it as if we have perfect control over the choice we will make and can avoid sin by shear force of will.  And so we keep God out of the process of sin avoidance, thinking just like Peter we can handle sin on our own, and then failing miserably to prove we could not.

Look closely at Peter’s response to Jesus as Luke continues in verse 33 saying … “And he said unto him, Lord, I am ready to go with thee, both into prison, and to death.”  Peter is proud.  Proud of his own faith.  Peter thinks he is ready to be the number two leader in this kingdom, superior to all the others, and not ashamed to show it out loud.  Peter makes this declaration fully believing it is true.  How sad.  We all know it is not.  His actions are about to prove that.  But Peter cannot be converted until his heart is completely broken on the anvil of God’s love.  While Peter thinks he can defeat sin with pride, he cannot defeat sin at all.  That is like handing an addict heroin in order to fight the cocaine addiction, wrong tool altogether.  And while distance and lack of opportunity may provide the addict no chance to screw up, they do nothing to free the addict from his base desire to get high.  To accomplish that – only Jesus can, only if we let Him, only if we trust Him to do that very thing recognizing our desperate need.  Even then, it still does not mean once freed we are ready to run right back into the drug house to go witness.  It does mean though that only Jesus can free us, nothing else can, and especially nothing in us in any way, least of all a belief we can simply choose our way out of sin.  While Peter thinks he can choose to be sin free, he is NOT READY to help his brethren.

Notice that Jesus says, only AFTER Peter is converted, for him to help his brethren.  The specific word Jesus uses is for Peter to “strengthen” his brethren.  How is he to do that.  Perhaps the same way Jesus is trying to strengthen Peter, by praying for him, by loving him, by pointing out the folly of self-reliance as it relates to the gospel.  It is the pride of Peter, even pride in his own faith and choices, that keeps Peter from being able to strengthen his brethren, and keeps Peter’s heart an unconverted one.  Still unconverted, even after performing miracles, and spreading the gospel, and being with Jesus every day personally for over three years.  If Peter could be unconverted after all this time, who are we to say we have long since been converted and are ready for anything that comes.  We forget.  Satan wishes to sift us as wheat, and only in our absolute dependence upon Jesus will we find a change in the addict’s heart and desires.  Not in the pride of what we might choose when faced with a temptation to fall into.

Jesus hands Peter a lesson in reality as Luke continues in verse 34 saying … “And he said, I tell thee, Peter, the cock shall not crow this day, before that thou shalt thrice deny that thou knowest me.”  Jesus reveals that the current day will not even end before Peter denies even knowing who Jesus is, not once, but three different times.  Imagine what a blow to Peter’s pride this declaration from Jesus must have been.  How humiliating this must have been to be so public, in front of all the other disciples.  But pride must be broken.  In all its forms pride remains a sin.  It is only a different drug of choice, not the absence of one, and certainly not a tool to use when combating other sins.  So to break it, Peter must suffer a series of crushing blows to it, until there is no pride left in him.

Skipping down to verse 54 (we will cover the other verses in our next examination), Luke tells us how the words of Jesus are fulfilled … “Then took they him, and led him, and brought him into the high priest's house. And Peter followed afar off. [verse 55] And when they had kindled a fire in the midst of the hall, and were set down together, Peter sat down among them. [verse 56] But a certain maid beheld him as he sat by the fire, and earnestly looked upon him, and said, This man was also with him. [verse 57] And he denied him, saying, Woman, I know him not. [verse 58] And after a little while another saw him, and said, Thou art also of them. And Peter said, Man, I am not. [verse 59] And about the space of one hour after another confidently affirmed, saying, Of a truth this fellow also was with him: for he is a Galilaean. [verse 60] And Peter said, Man, I know not what thou sayest. And immediately, while he yet spake, the cock crew. [verse 61] And the Lord turned, and looked upon Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said unto him, Before the cock crow, thou shalt deny me thrice. [verse 62] And Peter went out, and wept bitterly.”

Did Jesus force Peter into any of this?  No.  Did Jesus want Peter to have to suffer this crushing defeat?  No.  But Peter’s pride had to be broken, and Peter put himself on this path.  When confronted with the least temptation, to be identified as one of the group that was with Jesus, Peter denied that.  Peter denied even knowing Jesus while Jesus was undergoing the worst night of His life here on earth.  When Jesus most needed the love of those who followed Him, Peter was nowhere to be found, or rather, he was 20 yards away denying he even knew his Lord.  Upon realizing Peter had fallen, not once, but three times over a short space of time – Peter left weeping bitterly.  Those were not quiet tears.  That was public wailing.  That is not something men do, at any age.  Men are always trying to hide our pain.  When we reveal our pain, we make ourselves vulnerable, and our pain is usually only increased.  But here was Peter weeping and wailing as he carries himself staggering through the morning dawn over Jerusalem.  People looking upon this broken man, probably figuring him for drunk, or having a wife who left him.  But no wife could bring him comfort now.  In fact, his own wife, may have been already with Jesus following as close as any of the women were allowed to follow.  She may have been steadfast in her own faith, while her husband was broken from what he had done.

This was the sifting time.  All Satan need do is break the faith of Peter, instead of seeing God break the pride of Peter.  For in the mind of Peter they were one in the same.  But in the mind of God, they were not.  Faith was about not only the knowing of Jesus, or believing in Jesus, but in trusting Jesus with our salvation.  Allowing Jesus to remake us.  And following the very prayers of Jesus to see our faith strengthened and to avoid temptation altogether.  Satan wanted to blend pride into all of that.  Satan wanted Peter to see his own faith as one in the same as his pride as a Christian and a Jew.  Chosen people, chosen disciple, and proud to be both.  Proud to have gone to Temple.  Proud to have been so close to Christ.  So if pride were to be broken, Satan tempts Peter to just go ahead and throw faith right in there with it.  Is it any different today?  How many Christians who hold to conquering sin by choice finally one day reach a point where they see that just does not work.  No matter how hard they try, they still want things they should not want.  Pride and choice and self-reliance have done nothing to damper appetite for sin they cannot even explain.

And so upon reaching the realization that sin is still with us, the modern Christian just gives up on ever getting rid of sin.  We change our doctrine to allow for sin as if it just OK.  God forgives it, so why bother trying to get rid of it, we know that does not work anyway.  Since sin is impossible to get rid of, and God forgives, let’s just not worry about sin, go ahead and live our lives, and know God will forgive us in the end.  All of this might be true, except for the fact, that we are doing it wrong.  We, like Peter, are relying upon our pride, and our self-reliance, and our own choices to defeat sin.  We are like the addict staring at the tray of cocaine attempting to just say no.  That is not how sin gets defeated.  We must have our pride broken.  We must come to see sin as the addict/slavery relationship it is.  And we must learn to fully rely upon Jesus to remove the sin from us, as we trust Him, and allow Him to do so.  Our role is not a passive one.  We must actively choose to depend upon Jesus crying unto Him as a dying man might do in times of peril.  For it is deadly times of peril we are in.  We must separate our faith from our pride.  Having a fully dependent faith upon Jesus does not make faith weak, it makes it stronger than steel.  Having faith in ourselves is what is no stronger than rice paper.  We were not meant to defeat sin.  We were meant to cling to Jesus, following behind the only One who can defeat sin within us.

Jesus could have made that night go a completely different way for Peter.  But the pride of Peter would not allow Jesus to change what was bound to happen.  Pre-converted Peter still clung to his own pride.  Post-converted Peter was not too embarrassed to weep in the streets openly.  No pride was left in Peter post this horrible trauma of crisis of faith and pride.  Pride had to be killed.  But the prayers of Jesus prevailed in that the faith of Peter was preserved in spite of all of it.  Faith preserved in spite of the worst spiritual failure in the life of Peter.  Peter died upside down on the cross at his own request long after this knowing full well, the pain of a martyr’s death had nothing on the denial of his own Lord in Jesus’ greatest moment of need.  Nothing was worse than that.  And so the faith of Peter survived, while the pride of Peter was crushed.  Peter would still suffer from bouts of it later in life.  But every time pride reared its ugly head, Jesus was faithful to show Peter the error in his thinking, or in his loving of others.  That is how sin is meant to be defeated or avoided – in trusting to see Jesus work that transformation in us.

Satan may still desire to sift you as wheat.  Your life may have great pain in it, from choices you embraced, or from the choices of others.  But the prayers of Christ were not just for Peter, they remain for you.  To preserve your faith, to grow your trust, to crush your pride, to see you learn how to really love others.  This transformation of who you are, can only be done by Jesus.  And Jesus longs to bring it to you.  Will you let Him?  Will you place your life at Jesus’ feet, and give Him the “all” of who you are?  For it will never be your choice that defeats sin, but His transformation in you that sees the sin in you disappear, now and forever, until choosing Jesus, and choosing right, become simply natural to who you are, both here and in the world to come.

 

The Shattering of Pride ...

You are the hero of your own story … until you are its villain.  None of us imagine ourselves as a villain.  We can always point to many others who are worse than we are.  For instance, Hitler and Cruella DeVille were worse than we are (though if we have to go that far for our frame of reference, we may be in a bit of trouble).  Yet inevitably a choice is made that is less than ideal.  And before you know it, that choice leads to another, and a path is formed.  As decisions become easier, and as villainy becomes more tolerable, we find ourselves the frame of reference for others to cite as being worse than them. 

The villain disputes the charge of being the villain; how could they do otherwise, how could we.  But heroic actions become rare in our world for a reason, few remain on the path of a hero.  It takes self-sacrifice to be a hero.  So we would rather lower the bar for being a hero and just say everyone is a hero – effectively making no one a hero, and the term meaningless.  But we are far more reluctant to call out villains for being villains; and completely unwilling to call everyone a villain.  But it is easy to be something that requires no self-sacrifice.  In our age only political rivals dare to call each other villain.  And they are right.  But they have far too limited a looking glass.

We want to think of ourselves in a positive light.  Even spiritual or religious people, perhaps particularly those types of people, “want” to see themselves as somehow better than they were.  But in truth, it is far easier to rely on comparison, than on thorough self-analysis, to really see if we are truly better.  “I sin less” is an OK mantra; but nowhere near as nice as “I am done with sin”.  With exposure to religious things and thinking, over time a temptation is formed to believe … “my time with the Lord has made me a better person”.  Nearly all of us would say that.  And all of us would be wrong.  It is not our “time” with the Lord that ends the desire to sin in us, it is the power of transformation that Jesus alone accomplishes.

Jesus can transform in us, what we could never truly change.  And only Jesus can do it.  It does not happen because we spend some magic amount of time “being” a Christian.  It happens because we submit our will, our desires, even our thinking, to Jesus to do with whatever He wants.  We change because of that submission, and His love for us.  Not because we were called ourselves Christian for fifty years, or read the Bible 10 times, or prayed 20 hours a week for 10 years.  Numbers are not the thing.  Passion is the thing.  Passion for others, that only Jesus can truly give you.  Otherwise you see others just like you did yesterday; as obstacles to your happiness, things you can use to find happiness, or objects you could care less about.  Not exactly Christian.  And that is the point.

When we reach a point in our own story where we could care less about other people; “we” are the villain.  Maybe we treat family “decently”, and maybe friends “tolerably”, but strangers are nothing but cannon fodder in our minds in general.  We are quick to blame homeless, and poor folks, for being homeless and poor.  Get a job like everybody else.  Stop begging me for my hard earned money.  So I am not Hitler yet, but I am certainly not Mother Teresa either.  What I am generally is apathetic, not wanting to “waste time” on the needs of others I could care less about.  Stay out of my way, and everything is golden.  Except my heart. 

“That heart” is about as far from God’s as any untransformed heart could ever be.  I know.  Because when you get a taste of transformation, everybody else’s story can move you to tears.  It is overwhelming how much you want to get involved and help, to get up off your butt and do something.  Find a way to take action to make it better.  Not just for 5 minutes, or when it is convenient, but tirelessly.  It doesn’t matter if you have money or not, you find it, you give it, and you don’t think about it again.  If that sounds too good to be true; it is.  But it is also what the passion of Christ does, in a transformed heart that has learned to reflect it more thoroughly. 

You know what dies first in that scenario?  Pride.  Only the humble can gladly serve the least of these.  For the humble relish the idea of service, and the experience of it, even more.  Humility allows me to think of myself as lower than the low, yet still treasured by the God of the Highest.  My God gives me the precious opportunity to serve another.  My God gives me the precious opportunity to join with Him in His mission to redeem, simply to love someone else, no matter “who” they are. 

But my God cannot bring someone like that to me, while my heart just sits there waiting to demonstrate how little I care.  The name Christian, with all the pride of being a Christian for 40+ years, the Christian education, the membership in my church, the leadership roles of the past, the extensive study of His word … and the heart of a stone, never tasting a passion for anyone other than me.  My untransformed heart does His name and my faith a disservice.  I repel what I would attract, if I only loved it.  And I scream and I vent, that I cannot fake love when I have none, or lie about it when it’s not there.  Exactly.  Only Jesus can put love where no love exists.  For Jesus is Love.  And my pride is the death of love.  So pride must be shattered.

For Peter this would be a painful experience.  Peter had spent time with Jesus.  Peter knew Him, and what He could do.  But Peter still wanted what he believed scripture foretold, a seat of power, in an empire that ended Roman rule.  That was not to be.  And for Peter the whole world would watch his failure happen, and heap ridicule upon an already broken brow.  Everyone would judge Peter.  Everyone would condemn Peter.  He would have no religious pride left after this.  After this incident, it would be Peter who was the lowest of the low in any Christian faith.  For Peter would deny Jesus three times, just as foretold.  And we would read his story, and never look at it in our mirrors, or in our hearts.  A proud heart is content to never examine itself.

Imagine the embarrassment Peter must still withhold as he relays this incident to John Mark his friend, and ghost writer of his gospel.  Yes, Jesus forgave Peter, but Jesus did not kill the memory of this in the mind of Peter, nor the witness of it in others.  Everyone knew about this failure.  His sin was public, public in the worst way, a part of the gospel that would be retold over and over again.  For the Bible does not cover up the misdeeds of those who love God.  Rather it tells the truth of them, that we might all learn from them, though so few ever take the time to do so.  The gospel story includes the failures and frailty that come from the pride of men.

Peter begins his recollection to John Mark in his gospel in chapter fourteen picking up in verse 66 saying … “And as Peter was beneath in the palace, there cometh one of the maids of the high priest: [verse 67] And when she saw Peter warming himself, she looked upon him, and said, And thou also wast with Jesus of Nazareth.”  The first test.  But how quick we are to overlook one the players.  This was a maid in the home of the high priest.  But she recognized Peter as a disciple, and Jesus as his Master.  To do that she could not have just “heard” the story from others in casual conversation.  She had to be there herself.  She recognized Peter because she knew who they were, and likely what they said.

The maid has challenged Peter.  She does not call for Peter’s arrest, she merely challenges his identity as a follower of Christ, as a Christian.  Peter could have turned it around on her, simply using logic to point out that for her to know this, she must have been there as well.  Perhaps turning the attention of association with Jesus back on the maid, he might have escaped answering the question.  But he was not thinking that fast that night.  He was scared.  So Mark continues in verse 68 saying … “But he denied, saying, I know not, neither understand I what thou sayest. And he went out into the porch; and the cock crew.”

Peter’s response was “I don’t know what you’re talking about”.  Those who still today are content to deny Jesus in times of peril, must have not experienced what a transformation from Jesus does to your life.  After that, denying Jesus, is like denying oxygen.  And he left the place where he was standing and moved away further out onto the porch.  Leaving the comfort of the warmth of the fire was a calculated move.  Going outside where the night air was colder, was bound to keep away pesky strangers, and allow him to be alone in peace.  How like my heart.  I am all too comfortable in the coldness, away from the needs and conversations of pesky strangers.  I prefer it.  My apathy must prefer it.  Peter did too.  But then that awful sound, that rooster crows, and it cuts to the heart of Peter.  His vow is shattered before God, and soon will be his pride as well.  How the sound of that crowing echoes in my ears 2000 years later.

John Mark continues in verse 69 saying … “And a maid saw him again, and began to say to them that stood by, This is one of them.”  What is it with this maid already?  Is she stalking me?  Is she bent on my destruction?  Or, is she carrying the message of the gospel, selected by God Himself, as He has done so many times, with so many other women.  Mary was selected at the birth of Jesus, spoken to by angels, before any man’s ears would hear the good news.  A woman of Samaria was called and converted an entire region.  Mary the sister of Martha, was selected to witness the power of resurrection, and the strength of His love during His ministry.  Mary Magdalene was selected after the resurrection by Jesus Himself, to be the first carrier of the gospel, before any other disciples were chosen, even before He had ascended back to His Father.  Now perhaps this maid, is also selected by God to carry the word of the gospel, the challenge of God to Peter, in asking do you know me?  (and yet so many say women should not formally carry the gospel, arguing with the God they serve, it would seem).

Mark continues in verse 70 saying … “And he denied it again. And a little after, they that stood by said again to Peter, Surely thou art one of them: for thou art a Galilaean, and thy speech agreeth thereto.”  Peter gives another hasty denial.  There is not even the slightest hesitation, or consideration of the gravity of what he is doing, of the breaking of his vow unto death.  I guess, since he already denied it once, two sins are not much worse than one sin.  But then, the subtle infectious transforming power of Jesus is identified by those around him, who know how “fishermen” from Galilee speak.  They hear his tone, his lack of vulgarity, his lack of swearing and cursing, as the simple fishermen speak.  Instead they hear only clear words, spoken without malice, spoken in the same kinds of tones His Master uses.  While the maid may have a bad memory or bad vision, she is not responsible for how Peter speaks, only Jesus could do that.

Mark continues in verse 71 saying … “But he began to curse and to swear, saying, I know not this man of whom ye speak.”  To thwart his rapidly increasing risk of identification and association with Jesus, Peter must now revert to his old behavior.  Before was his subtle, seemingly unknowing transformation, Peter must now revert to gutter language spoken in hateful tones.  He adds all of this to his denial.  Peter throws away a victory over sin, he was unaware had even happened to him, until others pointed it out to him.  How like us.  The victories over sin in our lives have occurred subtly, they happen mysteriously, as since Jesus does them, we cannot figure out how or when He did it.  We only know it is different now.  Not comparatively different with other people, or even with our former selves, but just plain different.  Just plain better.  But Peter throws that away.  And He denies Jesus for the third time.

Mark continues in verse 72 saying … “And the second time the cock crew. And Peter called to mind the word that Jesus said unto him, Before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny me thrice. And when he thought thereon, he wept.”  Here is where it all comes crashing down.  Here is where the memory of a vow he made to follow Jesus unto death rings hollow in his own ears.  No one made him sin this sin.  No one put a gun to his head, or tempted him to do it.  He did it on his own.  Time with Jesus was no defense.  He even threw away a victory he did not notice Jesus had given him.  He commits this sin without excuse, without a way to try to make it better.  Just a naked, bold, in your face, kind of sin, that he alone did.

Then he remembers the words of Jesus.  He remembers the prophecy.  He remembers his protestations about how Jesus must be wrong.  But Jesus is never wrong.  Peter weeps.  In front of men still probing him for how much he may know, in front of the maid who kept asking him who he was, on his way out of the Temple, in full view of everyone, he runs and he weeps in full display.  Others who witness this chalk it up to another weird happening in a night full of weird events.  But Peter knows why he cries, and he no longer cares about who sees him weep in public.  The tears flow like Niagara.  His heart is rent in two, or perhaps three pieces, he no longer knows.  The epic center towards which his life has been building reaches its zenith only to find the worst failure he could possibly ever experience.  Public sin.  Sin told over and over for 2000 years, never forgotten by believers who will know his story.  He is not the hero right now; he is decidedly the villain.

Forgiveness is coming.  Restoration is coming.  Recreation is coming.  A heart that burns with a passion for others is coming.  But not on this day.  What must happen on this day, is the shattering of pride.  It must happen.  For no pride can remain, it must be obliterated.  If any seed of pride remains, he will be unfit to serve.  Any seed of pride will take root once again, grow once again, and smother the passion for others.  It must be shattered, as painful as that shattering will be for Peter.  How will it happen in your life?  Maybe it has already begun.  Maybe the painful events happening in your life or your career right now, are meant only to shatter your pride, and help you find a passion you have never known before.  It is never too late.  It is never without hope.  For our Savior is obsessed with your redemption, and giving you a life you cannot even imagine today, a love you cannot contain …