God that you are our good Father, God no matter what example of Father that we've seen throughout our lives or the lives of others God We know that you are always there to love us to guide us and to support us God Pray that you would help us throughout this week as we go about our lives to be able to learn more about you as well as Just experience your presence. You name every man Well, thank you. Welcome. We are in our third week of the series of passion.
It's a week that changed everything It's a week that kind of defines who we are as Christians. It's where we get the gospel from I mean, I know Jesus lived out the gospel all through his life But this is truly you get to see the essence of the gospel and so for those who haven't been here in the last couple weeks We've gone been going through just different events that have been going on during this week Jesus arrived on Sunday arrived in Jerusalem. It was a big cool rah first week We talked about was the last supper it was the supper that we got the word Communion comes from where Christ talks about you know the breaking of his it was like breaking of his body and the blood of Christ was the line and last week we talked of of Jesus's prayer in the time in Gethsemi and We ended it with the arrest and betrayal of Jesus And so you look at this of how it went from Sunday of Palm Sunday went was a super triumphal entry Everyone was hyped up. They were ready to go like it was it was like the Super Bowl everyone was pumped but then you started to get into The last supper and Gethsemi and you look and you watch Jesus get betrayed and Peter being Peter Tops off some guys here because he's like no, you're not taking Jesus and it's just like the disciples are starting to think okay This isn't this isn't how it's supposed to be this is not right and so tonight we're continuing The study in instead of looking at an event.
We're gonna look at an individual and it's an individual I love to look at I love this disciple because in so many ways I can relate to him I can relate to the ups and downs in his face the moment where he stepped out and was like yes I'm pulling and in the moments where you just kind of want to look shake him and just like dude get some common stance get it together and This disciple is none other than Peter and And as you will see tonight This story of his is a two-part story And we're gonna look at the first part is his failure and the second part We're looking at is his redemption and just how his failure had changed him and empowered him to move on to become one of the Great men of the faith for the church and so just to set the setting so we were in the garden Jesus was arrested massive proud right So we're in Jerusalem. It's the Middle East. It's desert. This is probably around Midnight no midnight would be Friday.
This is about 10 11 o'clock at night in Jerusalem So most people are probably sleeping but because it's cold and there's some people out there They need to get to warm so they're around these fires and they I mean they're probably no bigger than the body of that guitar I mean they're really small fires They were the main purpose was just to stay warm give you a little bit of light And so as these people are standing out there in this courtyard Surrounded by buildings and the entrance of the courtyard is is off ways a little bit off But they can still hear the commotion that's going on on the outside There's been talk that there's some dude got arrested in the garden and they're bringing him in here now to see the high priest Because high priest house was all lit up and not with black bulbs obviously with candles But at that time the high priest to them was their leader yes They were under Roman control But they tried to do everything they could to not be under Rome's control because they knew if something went wrong Rome could easily just smash them out and so they tried to do everything they could to say off a Rome's radar So they had this high priest and he was the one that was basically saying yay or nay for someone He was the judge jury and executioner basically for any person in the Jewish faith So this is why Jesus has got arrested and immediately comes to the high priest and they're doing it at night So they can be super quick they want to get this all done before Passover And so is worth you just imagine a standing here around a fire watching this commotion go on and you see the crowd come into the courtyard And you see Jesus in the middle of it getting the insults getting hurled at and all that and this he's already been beaten He's already been beat up a lot already and there's still more to come So he's already taken a toll already and yet behind him in a distance Peter Peter's walking behind him kind of going like looking to make sure he keeps an eye on Jesus But he's also checking us around things because he knows like they're going crazy trying to condemn Jesus Just imagine what they're trying to do to us the disciples and so at the time Peter was probably the only disciple left Everyone else had scattered. I mean, it's just like you turn on a light when you see cockroaches and they'll scatter It's kind of very similar But that's what's going on. So Peter is falling behind them in a distant. He's trying to keep an eye on Jesus He's trying to hear what's going on So when they get to this courtyard Peter does the only thing that he knows how to do he blends in he blends into this crowd And so this is where we pick up you open your Bibles or it's gonna be right here on the screen We're gonna pick up in Matthew 26 starting in verse 69 And says now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard and a servant girl came up to him and said you also were with Jesus the Galilean But he denied it before them all saying I do not know what you mean and when he went out to the entrance another servant girl Saw him and she said to the bystanders this man was with Jesus a nadarith nadarith And again, he denied it with an oath.
I do not know that man After a little while the bystanders came up and said to Peter certainly you two are one of them for your accent But trades you then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear I do not know the man Immediately the rooster crowed for 75 and Peter remembered the saying of Jesus before the rooster crows You will deny me three times he went out and went bitterly That's right family father We just thank you this time that we're able to gather and just learn from your word May you just speak through me? May these words be your words and may you just teach us what you want to teach us whatever it may be from the life of Peter during this time Amen, and so as you see Peter totally game-changer like it. This was a game changer for Peter Peter experienced so much in this one instant He went from being all on ready to tell him Jesus I got your back to excuse me aren't you the gentleman that was with Jesus? Nope wasn't me and you see this 180 what the crazy thing is?
Peter may have done that denying God, but sometime in our life We too have may have failed in some way some way in our faith We too may have failed or we may have failed in our job And so as we look at this story of Peter we're gonna look at these different things of what failure is and what it brings And so just like Peter what because you remember the words of Jesus that stems back from a few verses earlier when they're at the Last Supper and Jesus says to his disciples all of you are going to leave me and Peter bless his heart being Peter goes excuse me Jesus. You're wrong. I'm not gonna leave you I got your back well and Jesus in the only way Jesus could I see a picture just grab the shoulder and just as Peter I love you But you two are gonna leave me and the brings us to our first point is it failure is gonna happen no matter what? It's gonna happen Everywhere we go whatever we're doing it's bound to happen You can have the greatest intentions and the best idea.
I mean look at Fergie She had she wanted to do a great rendition of the national anthem for the NBA all-star game and bless her heart It was it was entertaining, but it was not that good and everyone laughed at it and it was pretty terrible She may not have thought it was a failure, you know or we're Alicia and I were talking about the show on NBC this is us it's a great show We've never even watched it, but we've just heard people talking about it And if you around the time of the Super Bowl they had this big hole or deal coming out that one of the episodes was revealing who Of the main characters are dying if you haven't seen the show or you don't you're trying to catch up I'm not gonna say who it was because it blew our minds but in the end It was a great idea But it was a backfire on NBC because it was a crockpot that caused a fire and through it Crockpot the company had to make an announcement that was like no your crockpot is not gonna fail It's not gonna catch your house on fire It is perfectly fine to leave it alone and leave it be you know It seems reasonable like there are failures are gonna happen when you come up with ideas It's gonna happen. You're gonna fail you have more more so phone for us. You come up with an idea for work It might work. It might not you have no idea But failure is going to happen and with Peter I can only imagine he knew it was gonna happen in the back of his head He knew it was gonna happen, but he was trying to do everything he could to make sure it didn't happen But unfortunately it does and it's hard and it stinks No one likes to fail.
I'm sorry if someone says they like to fail I would say pray for them because they're straight up lying to you because I've never met anyone that likes to fail because it's hard It's painful. You don't want to and then sometimes like Peter you tried to do everything you could To not fail that when you do fail The pain and the grief and the hurt it don't bearable and then so what happens? Failure is gonna happen and failure is gonna hurt it really does and I will be the first to attest to it I Hate failure if I fail you will know it because I am the person that I take it personally even if it wasn't my fault for the failure I still take it personally. I don't like it and I will do everything I can to replay it and figure out Okay, where did the failure come from?
How did it happen? What happened? And I'm sure as Peter was going through this knowing he was probably thinking same thing like what in the world like How did I do this? Like how did I end up failing?
What the crazy thing is is failure doesn't happen all at once you yes There is a crazy like out of nowhere catastrophic failures, but most failures it takes steps They build up on each other you look at Peter you go ahead and put the verses back up and you look at these verses and you see It built up his first denial says I don't know them. He tries to change the subject of I don't know what you're talking about Like moving on I'm gonna go out to you and he goes out to the entrance another servant girl says this man was just Jesus And what's your response with an oath? Promising I promise you I have no idea who that person is you guys are crazy I don't have anything to do with them in a little while later This might be around one or two o'clock in the morning Peter's out of it. Peter's tired.
It's an emotional roller coaster that they have been on in the last couple hours The same way we are right in times of failures. It's just you have no emotion life You just feel drained and so what's the last one he does? Where's it? He says invoke a curse on himself and to swear this isn't swearing like profanity like he's custom off of so on This is he's saying I have no idea what you're talking about.
I do not know that man You guys are crazy for thinking I have to do something with him. He's crazy. I'm saying I'm with you guys He's gonna don't let's go after him and if it does happen that I am with him Made the same punishment he get I get and that's this idea of the curse and swearing that he's putting on himself It's saying like whatever he gets put it on me And so as he's going through this you see how it takes that failure takes the steps and you see the hurt and the pain Because he now he's realizing he really can't go back and when you start to tell I you can't go back And you think about when you were a kid and you were trying to lie to your parents You say it once and then they come back and you're like oh no No, and you got to build on Paul not live and you got to keep going and there's no turning back Plays into why he went better. He went out and went bitterly But also there's another part to this in loop 21 or loop 22 verse 11 It says that at the moment the rooster crowed Jesus and Peter locked eyes They looked at each other and the Lord turned and looked at Peter and Peter remember the saying of the Lord and how he said to him before the Roster crows you will deny me and so he went out and went bitterly so you think Peter is literally staring at Jesus Looking at him all beaten all bruised bloody Everything and Jesus is looking straight back at him.
I too would be like Peter and going out and crying bitterly like I Just would feel absolutely crushed But what the crazy and cool thing about this is is the look that Jesus was giving him the look Was a look of disappointment saying yes You failed. I am disappointed you I had so much more in store for you But it was also a look of love and compassion He was showing him that look yes, you may have failed. Yes, you may have made a mistake But I still love you and I still forgive you and that what I'm going through now me going on to this cross Peter I'm doing it for you. I'm doing it for everyone that has failed and made a mistake And so it's that's this moment where he's weeping and going out and weeping bitterly Because just like this week this week of passion It's a week over redemption and redemption is this idea that God is redeeming us He's bringing us the people who are failures and mistakes back to himself And so there's a stop that will it's portrayed all the way through it And I'm normally put the main ideas and all encompassing sentence at the beginning But it fits so perfectly here because it splits the two stories and bring them together as one and it's this idea that though Will fail God God still forgives us and loves us and he's gonna use us in a powerful and my human way And he's gonna use that failure for the gospel and so just like Peter went out and went bitterly because he understood the gospel this is the moment that Peter understood what was going on he understood the gospel because the at that time and the Greek that weeping bitterly it was the Weeping in the sense that he was repentant he was asking for forgiveness.
He understood what he did wrong How crazy is this that this is an actual portrayal of the gospel in of itself in the gospel before Jesus I was that he was seeking the forgiveness of God for a mistake He did and God goes I love you and I forgive you now. I'm gonna go use you to do some mighty things and so this after this verse in verse 62 it's the last week here of Peter until His redemption there's nothing written about Peter on Friday when Jesus crucified Nothing about him on Saturday Nothing about him going to the tombs there's nothing and I can only imagine why because like me or anyone that may have experienced failure What do you do when you fail you try and hide you try and push away the world and you try and just focus and get with Yourself and you get with your thoughts and you get alone because you don't want to deal with anyone because it's a bear See it's humiliating humiliating to fail and it's not fun. It's not enjoyable You don't want to be around anyone. It just seems like your world has crashed down And so Peter did what only he could do or only sorry only what he felt comfortable doing and he went back The doing the one thing that he did when Christ called him to follow him.
He went fishing I'm not any good at fishing. I don't understand fishing I don't like fishing because I don't to sit there for hours. Hey, they if you like fishing more power to you But this is what Peter went to do and this is what he they think he was spending doing But I guess when we the story picks up in John 21 and this is after Jesus is resurrected He's appeared to some of the disciples and Peter says I'm going fishing Jesus is alive again. Let's go fishing like okay It's a Jesus goes out and meets them at a beach And so as they're out fishing all night long They see the disciples see this figure on the beach, but they don't know who it is and this is where it picks up in John 21 And it said in verse 15 it says when they finished breakfast Jesus said to Simon Peter Simon son of John Do you love me more than these?
He said to him yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him feed my lambs He said to him a second time this Jesus taking a Peter Simon son of John. Do you love me? He said to him yes, Lord.
You know that I love you. He said to him 10 to my sheep He said to him the third time Simon son of John. Do you love me? Peter was greed because he said to him the third time you love me and he said to him Lord, you know everything You know that I love you.
Jesus said to him Feed my sheep for truly truly I say to you when you were young You were you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted But when you were old you will stretch out your hands and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go In verse 19 this he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God and after saying this He said to Peter follow me and so I look at this and I think of how fitting is it that the first words to Peter was follow me and The last words to Peter was follow me. You see the idea is that Jesus was not telling them look I know you failed. I know you did but that's not who you are. It's not what defines you rather what defines you is What you do with a statement of follow me and so that's our third point is failure doesn't define you it doesn't It's not who you are.
It's not how God sees you no matter what the failure may have been It doesn't matter what it was that failure will not keep God from loving you and forgiving you and from Using you for the gospel because if you look when you get the chance this is not homework, but if you want to Look at the life of Peter study the life of Peter from the time he was first called The time he denied Christ and then look at his life from the time he denied Christ To the time he was he died in around I want it's like 60 or 70 AD So years after this and you will see a dramatic difference in the man of Peter Peter didn't change Peter say saying Peter, but what changed in him was what he did with follow me Before his then the denial he was kind of like okay. Yeah, like yeah, Jesus like I'm with you like cool Yeah, let's go do this and then he would say some stuff and you're just like oh my gosh Peter What are you doing? I mean you see it in the Bible there's a point that he makes a statement and Jesus commends him for it And then he makes a statement a few verses later and Jesus like someone goes get behind me saying like that's the drastic change You see in Peter's life at that before I mean it's not much But then you look at his life after he denied Christ You see a life full of faith a life full of courage a life that is on fire for the gospel You know and if you you chapters after John we get into the story of packs and this is when the church is born and becomes the church as we know it and The first person to speak and give the first sermon of the new church Peter You think about that? This is the man who denied Christ three times who sent an entire weekend wallowing and self-pity wallowing and self-doubt and Christ said no, I love you too much to let you destroy yourself in despair You have a choice to choose Follow me what you do with that is what defines you and so Peter's decided I'm gonna go I'm gonna follow Christ.
I'm following him to the end of my day And yes We look at the story of acts and it switches from Peter and the disciples to Paul and yeah Paul was a big component of the gospel spreading but so was Peter Peter Went full bore for the gospel like he straight up probably ran through some bloke walls Like a whole just he was that on fire for the gospel and you know that because he was one of the disciples martyred for his faith And the tradition says that he was going to face the same death and same punishment that Jesus face So Rome was gonna crucify him and he looked at Romans at excuse me I am not worthy to be crucified in the same manner as my Lord Can you crucify me upside down? And so that's how Peter died that was how nuts and crazy and how on fire for the gospel that Peter was was he felt that He was not worthy enough to die the same death that his Savior was But he understood that because of the gospel because the gospel became a part of who he was and just like Peter We too have that same choice. Are we gonna follow Jesus? Because I've been saying all through tonight that this idea of what passion and the gospel is about it's about redemption and You can't be redeemed if you're good.
Sorry if you have not failed So a failure comes redemption Peter could not step into who he was called to be without failure He had to go through those rough bumps those bump in his life To be redeemed to be brought back to the gospel to be brought back to a foundation of who he truly was and If you it wasn't in the universe is before the ones that I posted up there the people surrounding him It wasn't just Peter and Jesus at that moment talking the disciples were all around too So they're listening in on this conversation and they too are going. Can we really trust Peter? Is he gonna walk away from this again? Like they had their own doubts on this and so by Jesus walking through this and Asking Peter these questions of do you love me?
Are you willing to give up who you are for my sake and him saying yes and going on and going forth and saying yes? God I'm all in it not only was a reassurance that Peter of who he was But it gave strength and encouragement To the disciples that are around him because they needed it They needed each other for the trials and the tests that we're gonna come Because they needed each other to continue to push each other and build each other up for the gospel And so as we close tonight, I want to give you guys some encouragement Whatever it is you may be facing Whatever failure whatever it might be Take faith because you're not alone But no you have a choice before you you are at a crossroads This was one side of the story of that night. This was about Peter's failure But there's also a story of another disciple that failed. It's Judas and you look at the life of these two men They walked they had slept they ate they did everything with Jesus.
They heard the same gospel message That Jesus was presenting to everyone and yet you look at two different outcomes that they had that happened to him Judas let his failure Destroy him. He went into so much despair that it destroyed him that he went out and hung himself But you look at the life of Peter and you look at what he did with his failure He didn't not only did he let it encourage him because there is to do tradition believes and I me being a physical Historical person I love learning about tradition and the historical accuracy and I I could not find the firsthand account of it And I wish I would have so I could have told you exactly who said it but there is belief that Peter Through the rest of his life would always go out and pray at the hour. He denied Christ Not because he had to or he felt guilty But because he always wanted to remember what he was saved from what he was redeemed from That he was pulled from his failure to do some amazing works and we get to do the same too And whatever it might be as we go into the song and and we have this time of reflection You know we all in some way somehow have experienced a failure someone may have failed us and they might have hurt us But we may have done it to someone. Yeah, I just wanted to give you some encouragement for these three few different groups that I could think of It's a first group of maybe you're at that point where you're being tempted you feel like you're being pulled away from God You know the way the world is just on your shoulders Have encouragement Things happen to Peter Peter got pulled away.
He was tempted But just like that just like he fell he too was rescued He was pulled out and was able to be renewed or you might have fallen you know Whatever it might be maybe you you spoke some harsh words about someone or Or a moment when you should have spoken up for someone or your beliefs or whatever it might be or maybe you're you were in a Place or doing something that you shouldn't have been doing Don't is eating your life and you just can't bear it anymore Find encouragement in Peter Peter dealt with it Follow his example and turn the gods let God handle it for you God's got big enough shoulders and he can deal with it over us You know or maybe you fall into this last group if you're coming back to God you've made a mistake you you have Done something that is hurt and humiliated or embarrassed or you had it done to you and you're just in your mind Thinking of God. There's no way That you would want me in your family There's no way that you would want me in your house enough to carry your gospel again Look at the life of Peter He cart in that because you look at the love That Jesus showed to Peter when he redeemed him he never hold it against him He forgave him he accepted it and he loved him through that But on top of that he equipped he equipped him and empowered him to press on And to not look back at the past and not look back at a mistake that that was near and dear to his heart And that's what you get to do you get to lean on God as hard as it is God will still love you He will forgive you because that's the gospel. That's why we do this. That's why we're here That's why we're learning about this.
That's why Christ went to the cross That we are unworthy of his grace and undeserving of his love and God still wanted us He wanted to know that hey you messed up But you're not a failure because you were my son and you were my daughter And I am well pleased with you and I love you and I will use your life as a testimony to who I am and to the gospel and so as we say that you take some time and just You We got talked to him whatever you might be going to talk to him about it You know father we just thank you for this time. We just thank you for your love We thank you that we have an example Like Peter that we know that we don't have to get it right Well, it's okay for us to make mistakes. It's okay to rest of fail Because we know that you are there behind us Relentlessly pursuing us to the point that you will pick us up brush us off and Push us on It's a greater and grand of things Because you didn't call extraordinary people to do extraordinary things father. You called ordinary people Who make mistakes who mess up who sometimes get things wrong?
Who sometimes hurt other people To be the hands and feet in the message bearers of your good news And so father I pray that during this time That whatever we might be dealing with whatever failure or past mistake or hurt that you just Release it from us You we can understand the peace the love the comfort and the acceptance that Peter felt When he too made a grand mistake against you father. We were so grateful Your love and your willingness that even though we were still sinners that you sent your son to die on a cross To show us how much you love us and how much you want to forgive us But even more so to be how much you wanted us to be in your present time