When have you really enjoyed making a mess?
Making a mess in the kitchen is one thing. Making a mess of life is quite another. I can clean the kitchen to the point you’d never know I was in there. But when I make a mess of my life, I can’t just wipe away the evidence—or the consequences—with a good disinfectant.
Have you ever found yourself at rock bottom?
It may have been because of an inappropriate relationship, a string of lies, or a temptation or habit that seemed to gradually take over everything in life. At that moment, you stand at a crossroad. Do you continue down the road you’re on, continuing to repeat the mistakes because the pain of changing seems greater than the pain of remaining the same? Or do you look to Jesus for a way out?
Peter, one of Jesus’ closest disciples, knew what it meant to mess up. He failed in a big way. But Peter’s story also offers us encouragement and points us to the way out—a fresh start in Jesus Christ.
Let’s take a look at John 18:15-18, 25-27 from the CSB translation,
15 Simon Peter was following Jesus, as was another disciple. That disciple was an acquaintance of the high priest; so he went with Jesus into the high priest’s courtyard. 16 But Peter remained standing outside by the door. So the other disciple, the one known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the girl who was the doorkeeper and brought Peter in. 17 Then the servant girl who was the doorkeeper said to Peter, “You aren’t one of this man’s disciples too, are you?” “I am not,” he said. 18 Now the servants and the officials had made a charcoal fire, because it was cold. They were standing there warming themselves, and Peter was standing with them, warming himself. … 25 Now Simon Peter was standing and warming himself. They said to him, “You aren’t one of his disciples too, are you?” He denied it and said, “I am not.” 26 One of the high priest’s servants, a relative of the man whose ear Peter had cut off, said, “Didn’t I see you with him in the garden?” 27 Peter denied it again. Immediately a rooster crowed.
Peter had been through a lot on this particular evening:
- The last supper
- Failing Jesus by falling asleep in the Garden of Gethsemane
- Witnessing Judas’ betrayal
- Fighting the temple guards
- And watching Jesus allow Himself to be arrested and taken away
None of these events excuse Peter’s denials, but they do help us recognize that he was surely exhausted and confused. His whole world had been turned upside down. Still, after all the disciples initially ran away from Jesus’ arrest (see Matt. 26:55), Peter at least made an effort to get near enough to see and hear what was going on—as long as he could do it undetected.
Question: What emotions would you have experienced in Peter’s situation?
“The other disciple,” who is generally acknowledged to be John, was able to follow Jesus into the courtyard of the high priest. Peter stayed outside. Being neither a slave nor a member of the temple police, he must have stood out like a sore thumb. Not surprisingly, people immediately began connecting him with Jesus’ followers—and that’s when the denials started.
The Gospel of Luke adds another detail after the rooster’s famous crow: “Then the Lord turned and looked at Peter. So Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how he had said to him, ‘Before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times.’ And he went outside and wept bitterly” (Luke 22:61-62).
Many times we tend to see the men and women in Scripture as “bigger than life.”
Their encounters with God and their victories seem so far beyond what we experience today. We may view their failures as equally above our own—and more catastrophic. Consequently, we might be tempted to say: “I would never fail Jesus like that.”
In fact, that’s just what Peter said earlier that night. When Jesus shared one last meal with His disciples, He predicted Judas’s betrayal. When Peter declared that he would lay down his life for Jesus, the Lord predicted that he also would betray Him (see John 13:37-38).
This no doubt came as a shock to Peter. After all, he alone had walked on water with Jesus, and he was the first of the disciples to confess, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:16). Thus, Peter responded like many of us surely would: “I will never deny you!” (Matt. 26:35).
Maybe we’re not so different from Peter after all.
We’ve all been in circumstances where we gave in to fear or succumbed to the crowd. We may not have denied Jesus as overtly as Peter did, but we’ve had our own moments when we tried to hide our relationship with Him.
We’ve denied Him through our words and our actions. And whenever we choose to sin, we’re denying once again the One we say is Lord over our lives. Somewhere along the way, a rooster crows, and we’re hit with the full force of our denial. When that happens to you—not if, but when—what do you do?
What happens after you fail? Do you write yourself off as a failure? Do you just try to get on with your life as if nothing happened?
We’ll see from the life of Peter that a far better option awaits…
How do you typically respond after a failure or big mistake?
Check the statement (or statements) that apply, or write out your own. When I fail…
__ I get angry.
__ I become depressed.
__ I don’t let it bother me.
__ I try to make sure no one saw what happened.
__ I try to learn from what happened.
__ Other:
How has your relationship with Jesus helped you move on from failure in the past?
Want to Learn More?
This is an excerpt from the first session of a 6-session Bible study that I wrote for the Summer 2017 edition of Bible Studies for Life.
- Session 1 – A Fresh Start (John 18:15-18, 25-27; 21:15-19)
- Session 2 – Objections Overruled (Exodus 3:11-12; 4:10-17)
- Session 3 – The Gift of Grace (2 Corinthians 12:2-10)
- Session 4 – A Channel of Comfort (2 Corinthians 1:2-7)
- Session 5 – A Passion to Share the Gospel (2 Corinthians 5:11, 14-21)
- Session 6 – Right Here, Right Now (Mark 5:1-2, 8-15, 18-20)
Pick up your copy here.