Part 6: The Denial

And I want to welcome you to Twin Lakes Church. My name is René. I'm one of the pastors here. It's great to be back. I was in Israel for the last couple of weeks and Mark and Val subbed for me. They did a great job too. Let's thank them. It was wonderful to have them here and filling in. And I want to welcome everybody who's joining us live, everybody watching over in venue, joining us on Facebook live. Great to have you here.

And let me start with this. I am a Bookaholic. I just love to read. I have to have a book I'm engaged in at all times. Any other Bookaholics here, anybody else love to read? My people. And one of my favorite genres to read are biographies. Anybody else love to read biographies? And here's the kind I especially love. I love to read biographies of people who have become successes, but they had a string of failures and challenges that led up to that success.

I'll just show you three of my favorites. There was the politician who lost his first eight elections, failed in every single business venture that he tried. He had a severe nervous breakdown and then he struggled with depression for the rest of his life. Let me just recount it because I want to put those bullet points on screen for you. All right. He lost his first eight elections, failed in business, had a nervous breakdown, struggled with depression, and yet this person became the greatest president in our country's history, Abraham Lincoln. Wow.

So many examples of this. There was the person who dropped out of school when he was about 14 years old, went bankrupt in his first business, was fired because he was told he had no creativity. He also had a nervous breakdown and yet he went on to win 22 Oscars and change movie making. That was Walt Disney's story. Or there was the woman who recently told a Harvard graduating class in a speech, quote, "I had failed on an epic scale. My marriage imploded. I was jobless, a lone parent, as poor as it is possible to be in modern Britain. I was the biggest failure that I knew." And this woman went on to write the best-selling children's book series of all time as J.K. Rowling.

So I love these stories. They're inspirational, but I've got one that trumps all of those because the failure that we look at today was much, much worse than any of those. Those failures could all be overcome by sheer grit and talent. But what about if you have a moral failure? What about if you have a character failure? What about if you have in your life a complete spiritual shipwreck? What about if your failure is so bad that you feel if people knew that you had done this thing, even some of your loved ones might never speak to you again? So bad that it might ruin every relationship so bad that you feel like you would just die if anybody found out.

Well, that is the story of the man whose tale we tell today, the apostle Peter, who failed Jesus in the worst possible way. It's a colorful story. It's a riveting story and ultimately a very inspirational story. So grab the message notes that you got in your bulletins when you came in. "Light in the Darkness" is the name of our 40-day Lent series, "The Road to the Cross in the Gospel of Mark." This weekend, of course, it's Palm Sunday. We've been talking about this, and in this series we actually started with that, the triumphal entry six weeks ago.

And since then we've been looking at how did Jesus go from that on Sunday, crowds lauding him into town, to the crucifixion on Friday. How did that even happen? And we've been taking this last week of Christ's life almost one day at a time each week. And I just got to tell you, I'm so excited about how we're going to wrap up this series next weekend. We're going to be in the Gospel of Mark on Good Friday, then on Easter, talk about the resurrection.

And I want to chime in with what Yolanda said on video earlier, what Mark said. I want to ask you to do three things for next weekend. First, please be in prayer about the weekend services because I don't want it to just be about, "Oh, we have some cool music or something." I want God's Spirit to just supernaturally move and make it just a powerful, life-changing weekend. So would you please be in prayer? Raise your hand if you will. Please pray for me, at least starting today. Thank you, 80% of you. Good, I'm glad that you're behind me.

But secondly, please invite people. I guarantee you, if you look for ways to invite people and you've got that in the forefront of your mind, it's going to happen. I was at the pharmacy Friday and somehow got into a conversation with the pharmacist. How's your family? How many kids do you have? Well, I've got one son, he's three years old. And I said, "I bet he'd love our Easter services because we're going to have a live petting zoo featuring cuddly little bunny rabbits. And we're going to have free breakfast. And I'm going to preach, but he's not going to be into that." And she was like, "I'll be there." So I guarantee you, look for it. You'll find opportunities to invite people.

And third, please consider volunteering, especially for kids and cupcakes, as you've heard. It's going to be a ton of fun. Attend one service, volunteer at a second. It's just going to be a blast. Now, today, what I want to do is tell the story of the denial, the famous denial, as Jesus was on trial. Jesus is being falsely accused. He is being beaten nearly to death. He's going through agony on his way to the crucifixion. And yet his closest disciple, one of his best friends, Peter, denies Christ in his greatest hour of need.

And here is why we need to know Peter's story today, because we are imperfect people. Can I hear an amen on that? We're imperfect. We're imperfect people. We live in an imperfect world. And that means we are all going to fail in small ways and in big ways. And that means your loved ones, the people in your small group, the people in your family, they're all going to fail too, in big ways and small ways. So we need to hear about God's mercy when we mess up. And there's no better story for that than the one we look at today.

Now, what makes this story, this famous story of Peter denying Christ really fascinating is that it's probably told by Peter himself, because how else would anybody else know about it? Experts say that the Gospel of Mark contains the memories of St. Peter. Peter told his memories of his time with Jesus to Mark, who served as Peter's secretary and translator. Now, how do the experts know that? Well, all of the earliest Christian writers said that.

For example, there was a man named Papias who lived in the first century. And he said, quote, "Mark wrote accurately all that Peter remembered." And what's interesting is if you go through the Gospel of Mark with this in mind, you'll notice that nothing happens in the Gospel of Mark at which Peter was not present. And so these are Peter's memories as told to Mark. But what makes this riveting is it makes you ask the question, well, if these are Peter's memories, why in the world did Peter choose to tell this story? Because this is not a very flattering story to Peter.

And to put a sharper point on it, why would the new leader of the fledgling Jesus movement deliberately tell the story of his own complete crash and burn? I mean, wouldn't this detract from his credibility as a leader? Why is this even in the Bible? Well, experts theorize that the Gospel of Mark was probably written. It was the first Gospel probably written. And it was written during the rule of the brutal Roman Emperor Nero, who famously after a fire ravaged Rome blamed the Christians and the first official persecution of Christians began in 64 AD.

Now, many Christians were willing to go to their death. But you could be saved. You could be brought into the arena. And they always gave you a last chance. They said, you know, you don't have to be fed to lions or burned at the stake. If you just grab a pinch of incense and go over to that altar and just throw the incense into the fire on that altar and say, Caesar is Lord, not Jesus, then your life will be spared. And you won't die. Now, a lot of Christians said, no, Jesus is Lord, but many denied Christ in order to save their own skins, as you can imagine.

And there was a huge controversy, which you can read about in surviving writings from the first and second century over what do we do with these people now? Because these people survived and then maybe a week later, maybe some months later, they would come knocking on the door of the house church nearby and they'd say, oh, we're here to worship Jesus. Now you're opening the door to these traitors and some of your own family members got killed and they got out of it by denying Christ. You can see why there was a controversy, because a lot of Christians said, not a chance. They cannot come back in here.

And so the theory is that this story particularly was circulated by Peter to the Christians in those days to teach them how to show and receive grace. How to show grace when other people fall and how to receive grace when we fall. And again, we all are going to need to hear this over and over and over. Christians have said to me, I have disqualified myself because I've had such a failure in life. I've disqualified myself from ministry and maybe even from calling myself a Christian. And over and over I've heard and seen churches split and relationships fracture with this line. Do you realize what they did to me? Do you realize what they said to me? Do you realize the sin they got into? And there's a permanent break. And so we all need to hear about God's mercy for our mess ups.

There's two things I want to talk about as we go through Peter's story verse by verse. First, why we fall, why Peter even got into this mess in the first place, and then how to get back on track when we do fall. So let's dive in. Let's start in Mark 14:27 and let me set the stage here. Jesus and his friends have just finished the Last Supper and they're on their way to Gethsemane. Jesus has told them he is going to die. And it says on the way Jesus told them, you know, all of you will desert me. For the scriptures say God will strike the shepherd and the sheep will be scattered. But after I'm raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee and I will meet you there.

Now as I've studied what happened next in Peter's life, I really think the three reasons he failed are the three most common reasons we all fail. And these can really serve as a heads up to a lot of us here in this room right now who are going down the same road. So jot these down. Number one, number one reason I failed. I overestimate my own strength. I overestimate my strength just like Peter does here. Next verse, Peter said to Jesus, even if everyone else deserts you, I never will. Classic Peter.

And Jesus replied, I tell you the truth, Peter, this very night before the rooster crows twice, you will deny three times that you even know me. No, Peter declared emphatically, even if I have to die with you, I will never deny you and all the others vowed the same. I don't know about you, but so many times I have been just like Peter. God, I swear I will never ever do this again. I swear. And then I do it again. Because just like Peter, I overestimate my strength.

Listen, the truth is given the right set of circumstances, you have the potential to fall into any sin. Do you believe that? Because if you don't, you are setting yourself up for failure. In fact, if you ever hear the phrase past your lips that Peter said here, the phrase, that may be true of everybody else, but it's not true of me. Just watch it. Now, you might be sitting here going, well, I'd never say that. Do you realize how easy that is to say? If somebody comes up to you and they warn you or they have an observation about you or about, you know, your group like Jesus had about Peter and the disciples, how easy it is to say that may be true of everybody else is not true of me.

For example, let's say somebody comes up to you and says, you know, I'm not a Christian, but in my observation, I think American evangelicals have a problem with racial prejudice. And you say, no, that may be true of everybody else, but not me. I'm not prejudiced. See how easy that is? Or somebody comes up to you and says, you know, I'm starting to worry about us as Christians in America. We live in such a materialistic culture and I'm afraid that we as Christians are becoming materialistic, finding our value in the things we own and how we look. And you say, that may be true of a lot of people I know, but it's not true of me. Very easy.

Or, you know, one thing I'm concerned about with Christians these days, it used, legalism used to be the big problem with a lot of my friends. And now it seems like it's swung the other direction. It's about indulgence and people are drinking too much. And you say, that may be true of other people. It's not true of me. If you let that phrase come out of your mouth about anything somebody is raising an issue about, what you're doing is you're keeping yourself from growth. You're keeping yourself from some honest introspection. At least you can say, you know, that could be, let me do some soul searching about that.

Instead, we tend to get so defensive just like Peter did here. That's true of other people. Not me. Not me. Not me. You know, what's funny is if somebody comes up to you and they critique you about something that doesn't really matter, you don't get defensive, right? Like let's say somebody comes up to you and says, hey, but just as your friend, I gotta tell you, you got bad breath right now. You, nobody goes, no, I do not. That may be true of others, but not of me. Right? We value their observation. We go, oh, thank you so much for telling me. Do you have a mint?

But let them critique us about something that's not superficial and suddenly about something that might actually really matter morally. We get defensive. It doesn't make any sense. Don't be defensive. Don't boast in your own strength. Just go, thank you for the observation. Let me pray about it. Let me do some soul searching and see what God has to show me there. I overestimate my own strength. Then the second thing I see in Peter that causes failure, and this is so common, I fear disapproval. I fear disapproval. Man, this sets us up for failure again and again, fearing the disapproval of other people.

Because you fear the disapproval of people, you go along with the crowd even though you think they might be wrong. Because you fear the disapproval of people, you're a people pleaser. You make commitments that you can't keep. It just goes on and on. And one of the ironies in this story is that while Jesus is facing the intense interrogation of the Sanhedrin and the guards without compromise, Peter is intimidated by the questions of a servant girl. He just wilts.

Verse 66, "Meanwhile, Peter was in the courtyard below," below what? Below where Jesus was on a, this was a multi-level mansion, Caiaphas' house. Jesus is up on the second floor. Peter's down in the open courtyard below, and we discover from some of the other gospels, they can see each other. So do you get the geography of this? So Peter is in the courtyard below Jesus, and one of the servant girls who worked for the high priest came by and noticed Peter warming himself at the fire. And she looked at him closely and said, "You were one of those with Jesus of Nazareth, but Peter denied it. I don't know what you're talking about," he said, and he went out into the entryway, and just then a rooster crowed.

And when the servant girl saw him there, she began telling the others, "This man's definitely one of them," but Peter denied it again. Now, you can point a finger to Peter, but let me ask you this honestly in your life, whose opinion sometimes matters to you more than God's? Think about it. They have, in effect, become your God, and you end up letting their approval push you in directions. You don't really want to go, and like Peter, it can happen so fast, and before you know it, you're thinking, "How did I get way over here?" Well, you were people-pleasing your way and fearing other people's approval all the way into some weird place that you thought you'd never be, which is what happens to Peter.

And then the third reason Peter failed, and I fail, and you fail, and this one is so common. We do it almost every single day. This one can fracture churches, it can fracture marriages, it can fracture other relationships, and that's this. I speak from insecurity and exhaustion. Right? I speak from insecurity and exhaustion. When we're tired, we say things we don't really mean to say. They come out too sharp, and when we're insecure, we say things we don't really mean, and when we're angry, we say things we shouldn't say, and Peter was feeling all these things.

And so, verse 70, "A little later, some of the other bystanders confronted Peter and said, 'You must be one of them because you're a Galilean.'" He had some kind of a northern Galilean accent or something, and Peter swore, "A curse on me if I'm lying. I don't know this, this man you're talking about, and within eyesight of Jesus." He doesn't even say his name. "This, this, this man you're talking about. Don't know him." And immediately the rooster crowed the second time. Now, let me just stop there for a second because this is even worse than it seems.

The Greek word for "curse" there, I used to think, "Okay, Peter was a fisherman. I know fishermen, you know, they can have potty mouths sometimes, so, you know, he was under stress, and he talked, used a fisherman's vocabulary, right?" But it's not that. This is, the word that's used here is the root word of our English word, "anathematize," which means to damn someone. Probably the closest equivalent we have in English colloquially, and I hope this doesn't offend you, but I want you to see what is happening here. The closest phrase we have in English is the phrase, "Go to hell." You know in the NBA, in pro basketball, players can get technicals from the refs for swearing.

And I used to wonder, how is that even possible? Because this may be news to you if you haven't been to a basketball game, but many players, like when they get hurt, do not go, "Gimme Christmas! Golly, Wally, that hurts, right?" So how can they, how can they get fouls for swearing? Well, the rule is this, what crosses the line is if they curse someone. If they say blankety-blank, "You," that's what's called a technical foul. Do that twice in a game, you're ejected. So even in our culture, even in our secular culture, this is seen as kind of the worst kind of swearing. And do you see that that is what Peter is doing here? In fact, in the original Greek, the word order doesn't even have him say a curse on me, it just says, "He began to anathematize and to swear." So who is he anathematizing? It's kind of a controversy in biblical translation.

The most common understanding is this, he is saying, "May I be damned to hell if I am lying?" Which is bad enough because he's lying, okay? But other scholars I read this week argue, they've got complex arguments for this, but they argue that he's cursing Jesus to kind of prove himself to these people. That, I mean, think of this, your friend is up there on the terrace above you, you're down in the courtyard, and you point to him and you say, "No, not only do I not know this man, he can go to hell." Wow. Either way, this is really bad. Either way, for somebody who said a few hours before, "I'll die with you, Jesus," this is a pretty epic fail.

So here's my question, how does this guy who wilts under pressure in the worst way, with his friend, his friend who healed his own mother-in-law, his friend who rescued him from drowning, that friend is being tried and he's going to be put to death and you do this to him? My question is, how in the world does he come back from this? How do you come back from an epic fail? Hint, it has nothing to do with him and it has everything to do with the grace of Jesus Christ shown to him. But he does make some good choices early on and I want to look at these three key concepts for recovery in Peter's story because as I said, we will all fail, that's not in question, we will all fail, everybody in this room.

And so the key question is, what do you do when you fail? So that God can save you and restore you and redeem that failure. Well, there's three things Peter does here that I think we need to do as well when we fail and the first one is this, grieve. Grieve, you don't minimize the failure, you don't justify the failure, you don't rationalize the failure, you don't downplay, you just own it, you grieve. Verse 72, suddenly Jesus' words flash through Peter's mind, "before the rooster crows twice, you will deny three times that you even know me and he broke down and wept." He doesn't just weep, he breaks open, he falls apart, he breaks down, he grieves.

Now don't miss this because this is the beginning of Peter's healing. Because when it comes to any kind of failure or loss, to get past it, you have to go through it. And I mention this because in our culture right now, we're in a cultural moment where all you hear is, "you gotta feel good about yourself." And failing morally, especially, feels so bad that people want to minimize the pain, they want to take shortcuts, they want to bypass the grief, but grieving a failure or grieving a loss is actually very healthy. It sets you on the path toward healing.

You know, we get so impatient with our recovery, we're such a hurry to fix everything instantly. But as a very wise pastor said to me years ago, "René, you need to let godly sorrow do its work." Like Psalm 51 says, "The sacrifice God wants is a broken and contrite spirit." In recovery, they call this "hitting bottom." When you finally say, "God, I've been humbled by this, I don't think I can handle my life anymore. God, I'm not the person I thought I was. God, I don't have everything under control. God, I don't think I'm the general manager of the universe anymore. God, I'm out of control. God, please, I need help." Peter hit bottom, and this moment changed Peter.

From this moment on, he was different. If you look at him in the Gospels, up to now, Peter didn't get it. Every single time Peter says something, he thinks following Jesus is all about his own strength, right? "Yes, Lord, I have what it takes." "Yes, Lord, I'd like to raise my hand and say I'm stronger than all of them." "Yes, Lord, I commit myself to following you in all my fisherman strength." But in this moment, he realizes it's not about my strength, it's not about my promises, it's not about my vow to follow God to the end of the earth, it's about coming to God with empty hands and saying, "I'm so weak. I have nothing, and I throw myself on your grace." That's when you finally begin to change. You grieve.

Now, grief, if it lingers, can turn sour. It can become deadly. So how do you keep grief from going bad? Well, second key concept, you gather. You resist the urge to isolate, you resist the urge to insulate. Instead, you congregate. You let your friends support you. You let your small group support you. You let your family support you. And let me show you where Peter does this. Later in Mark, Mark 16:10, it says that Mary Magdalene went to the disciples who were together grieving and weeping. And she told them what had happened at the tomb. "Where are they? They're together. They're sharing their common failure. They're sharing their common loss. This is the genius of our recovery, 12-step groups here that meet Mondays and Thursdays at 7. This is the genius of our grief support group, the genius of any small group. This is why we talk about small groups here at TLC.

You grieve. You gather because your grief can go bad when it becomes just morbid introspection. But when you gather, it helps your ingrown eyeballs turn out, and you start to strengthen other people going through the same thing. Gathering keeps grief healthy. And then the third key word is one I just want to camp out on for the last few minutes here together, and it's grace. You soak in God's grace. Now I want to show you a verse here that has a little phrase that is so easy to overlook, but it demonstrates how even after Peter did this horrible thing, Jesus wants to reach out to him. Look at Mark 16:7. Tiny little detail that is so easy to miss, but I want to show it to you. Love this.

Jesus rises from the dead. Oops, spoiler. Hope I didn't just spoil Easter for you. Jesus makes it, but he rises from the dead, and angel appears to marry at the tomb, and he says he's alive. Watch this. But go tell his disciples and Peter. Don't you love that? Tell his disciples and Peter. Tell his disciples, make sure you don't miss Peter, especially don't leave out Peter, because the Lord knows Peter's disqualifying himself. Peter's put himself on the bench. Peter has taken himself out of the game. So he says, tell the disciples, and you got to make sure you include Peter. And if Peter's not there, go find Peter and tell Peter and the disciples Jesus is going ahead of you into Galilee, and there you will see him just as he told you.

And what happens in Galilee? In John 21, it tells the story on the shore of the Sea of Galilee. The disciples are fishing early one morning, and Jesus is fixing breakfast on the shore, and they don't recognize him at first. But when they do, Peter jumps into the water, and he swims to shore, and Jesus feeds them all because they haven't caught fish, and then he tells them, put your nets on the other side, and they catch all these fish. And these guys are just full of joy. Jesus is alive. But you can tell Peter's a little reserved, and Jesus takes Peter off to the side. And he does not scold him. He does not say, how could you? He doesn't say, come over here so I can just slap you once for every time you denied me. One, two, three.

No, once for every time you denied him, Jesus looks Peter in the eye, and he says, do you love me? Not, do you promise never ever to let me down again, but do you love me? Three times, once for every denial. And three times, Peter says, yes, Lord, I love you. Yes, Lord, I love you. Lord, Lord, you know I love you. Peter has stopped saying things like, I love you more than any of these. He stopped saying things like, why do you even need to ask? I'm awesome. He's humbled. And he says, I can't say much anymore, but I can say, I love you. I love you. And three times Jesus says to him, then feed my sheep. You know, I told you, you'd be the leader of this little group. And now here where I called you three years ago on the shore of this lake, I'm telling you, knowing all I know about you now, I'm calling you again.

Jesus reinstates Peter. Just days after this horrible failure, it's just almost incredible. No, no political party in the world would reinstate days later somebody who'd been a traitor to the cause. This is unprecedented. Frankly, there's no other religion in the world that has a story like this. We're the one guy who abandoned and damned the master, gets reinstated days later. And then just 50 days after, Peter has had his worst blowout, his most miserable night, the greatest shame of his life. 50 days later on the day of Pentecost, it is Peter. It's that guy. It's the biggest failure that God chooses to preach about grace on Pentecost and to start the Christian church. And 3000 people respond to his message and they're brought to faith and they are baptized that day.

And who does God use to preach that method of that message of grace? It's the man who knew it was true because he had failed so abjectly and that is the mercy of God. And then when the Gentiles start coming into the faith, it is Peter who stands up for them because he understands it's not about legalism, it's about God's grace. His concept of following God was never again, never again, about marshalling your strength to follow him with all your might. It was about following God because he had received grace.

See, all of Peter's so-called strength had just led to failure, but Peter's weakness, you know what that leads to? His humility. You know where that takes him? You know the kind of death Peter died? Toward the end of the Nero persecution, Peter is arrested. And when the soldiers come to crucify him, he says to them, "I don't deserve to die as my master did." And so they crucify him upside down. And that same guy who was so weak becomes a consistent witness all the way to death. And you know what that means? That means you can change too. That means God can change you in miraculous ways. That means by the power of God in you, you can do a complete 180.

And I really want you to hear this because I know some of you in this room feel like you're on plan Z because you made some huge mistake. You said the wrong thing, you did the wrong thing, you were stupid and you have had this thought to yourself, "My life will never be the same again." But don't you see this story is in the Bible to show you if you turn back to him and you plunge even your worst failures under the flood of his grace, he'll turn it all back to plan A. Because he uses our failures to the glory of his grace. Isn't that amazing? This is the key takeaway here. God rewrites plan A. Peter is not taken out of leadership. Peter becomes a better leader than ever because he has hit bottom and because at last he realizes how powerless he is over his weak human nature. That's grace.

So let me just close with this. I mentioned that last week I was in Israel with a group from TLC and I snapped a picture one day when we stood right on the shore of the Sea of Galilee where Jesus' reinstatement of Peter traditionally took place. And I did a little devotional for the group and I said, "I want you to take a moment to walk this shore in silence and as you listen to the waves lapping and the stones churning, I want you to listen hard for the whisper of Jesus. Address you about that sin, the one that wakes you up in the middle of the night, the one you wish you could travel back into time to change, that one. And I want you to hear him say, 'Do you love me? Then get back in the game.'

And I can't read minds but I got to tell you there were tears streaming down almost every cheek because they were thinking of that sin. And I want to give you a chance. We're not on the shores of Galilee here but I want you to in your mind's eye take yourself thousands of miles from here and two thousand years back into time and have a conversation with Jesus about that failure and receive his grace to you today. Let's pray together.

Just with our eyes closed and our heads bowed, just take a moment to hear Jesus say to you, "Do you love me? Do you love me? Do you love me? Well, have I got an adventure left for you?" Thank you, God, so much for this remarkable passage that shows that your blessing goes deeper than Peter's cursing. And we thank you that you do the same for us. You rewrite plan A. Help us grasp it. Help us lean into your grace. That through our lives you may be glorified forever because people see the miracle that you're doing in us in us weak vessels. Thank you, God, in Jesus' name, amen.