Try to picture the following scene in your mind: The newly written and copied Gospel of Mark is beginning to circulate among the first century churches. As was the pattern in those early days of the church, people have gathered in various house churches to hear the pastor or one of the Elders read the Gospel to the congregation. Imagine the excitement of these Christian who have perhaps heard the Apostles tell the stories of Jesus, but have never before heard the full Gospel read to them. We believe that Mark’s gospel was very likely the first official Gospel written and received by the early church—probably around the middle or last half of the first century. Imagine the excitement in the air as the gospel is read.
Imagine the excitement as the people hear the name of Peter. By the time the Gospel of Mark is written and distributed amongst the early Christian churches, he is known as the Apostle Peter. For decades he has been a key leader in the church. He preached the first Christian sermon, converting more than 3,000 people; and Jesus himself, gave him the name, Peter, which means the "Rock." Imagine what the first century churches scattered throughout Judea and the Roman empire must think when they hear of Peter’s failure——failure, utter failure of a key leader. What must they have thought?
What do we think today when we hear of key Christian leaders who fail? In my relatively short time in ministry, just under 20 years, I have known too many of my colleagues who have crashed and burned in their ministries. Moreover, I have read too many headlines about spectacular and tragic failures of church leaders, and so have you. It isn’t just leaders either. All sorts of Christians regularly fail in their devotion and commitment to Jesus. We fail in all sorts of ways, at all sorts of times.
But one of the things that makes Peter’s failure so tragic is that it isn’t just moral or ethical failure as is so often the case today. His failure goes to the heart of our faith. He denied Christ his Lord—denied that he even knew him. Now that’s failure. How could the people of Peter’s day understand such failure and how can we understand such failure?
Well, let’s go to the text. The text begins by showing us a sharp contrast. There is a full grown, respectable man warming himself by a fire. He is the Apostle Peter—the rock! There is also a young servant girl. She is simply a girl—a servant girl. The Greek word that Mark uses makes clear that she is still a girl, not yet a woman. Peter, on the other hand, is a full grown Jewish man. He is an independent self—employed fisherman from Galilee. Moreover and more lately, he has become known as one of the key disciples of a great miracle working, dead rising, authoritatively teaching, Rabbi. She is just a little girl, and she is a mere servant. In the social setting of the ancient Jewish world and even to our modern ears today, this girl has no power, but the man Peter has all kinds of power.
Nevertheless, this girl does have the power of observation. For she looks at Peter and thinks to herself, "I have seen this guy before." She looks closely at him and says, "You, also, were with that Nazarene, Jesus." With this simple statement she is both identifying Peter and Jesus. It is possible that there is a note of accusation and maybe even derision in the girl’s statement, but still it is just the simple statement of a simple servant girl.
If ever there was someone and some statement that Peter could have afforded to ignore, it was this girl and this statement. But when Peter hears these words he is so filled with—well, we don’t really know what he is filled with. We don’t know if it is fear, or arrogance, or anxiety. The text doesn’t tell us what Peter is feeling at all. We could speculate, and lots of sermons are filled with speculation about the intentions, thoughts and feelings of Peter. But we’ll try to focus on what we know from the text. What we know is that Peter is confronted by a "nobody". In the social context of that day he is confront by an insignificant nobody—and yet, the Rock crumbles.
Peter says, "I don’t know or understand what you are talking about." Now this is no simple denial. The words come from ancient Jewish rabbinical law. The words know and understand sound redundant in English, "I don’t know or understand." But the phrase Peter uses would have been understood by those of his day as the formal and even legal way for a Jewish man to deny something in the strongest possible legal terms. He is pleading "Not Guilty!" "I do not know him nor do I understand the charge," Peter says with these words. "It is absolutely false," Peter asserts. His words are exactly the words a person would use in the presence of a rabbi who was accusing him of sin. So, although it is a little girl, Peter uses the biggest denial he can think of.
But the diminutive servant girl has some chutzpah. The girl can still see Peter even as he tellingly moves away from the fire and out to the entryway. She isn’t intimidated by Peter’s pompous sounding, over—the—top denial. Perhaps the girl, in the words of Shakespeare, thinks he doest protest too much. So the little servant girl rallies the troops, so to speak. She says to those standing around, "This fellow is one of them." In response this time, Peter simply denies it. We aren’t told what words he uses exactly. We don’t know what he is feeling or thinking, we simply know that great big important Peter slinks around the entryway neither inside nor outside. He simply denies knowing his Lord.
Most of us do not, and probably never will, find ourselves in a situation just like Peter. But I think that many of us probably will find ourselves in situations somewhat similar. That is, there are times when we prefer to be incognito, to fly under the radar, to have no one around know about our faith in Jesus. Perhaps we simply want to fit in with the crowd and not draw attention to ourselves. Maybe we fear being ostracized by old friends or new potential friends if they know of our faith. It could be that everyone is fine with our faith in Jesus, just so long as we aren’t too outspoken about it. These are the times that we find ourselves like Peter, not wanting to be known as one of them —one of them Christians.
I remember a time when I was a teenager and was settling into a summer job as a pizza delivery guy. I was making some friends who would stand around with me in the kitchen while waiting for orders, chopping up vegetables, and making small talk. They were people outside of my normal Christian school and church crowd. I liked these people and they seemed to like me. I did not speak of my faith to them and they had never asked. Then, out of the blue, one of them said, "Paul, you’re different than the rest of us; you went to a Christian school didn’t you?" I was horrified. I didn’t want to be different; I wanted to blend in with the crowd. All my life I had been known as one of the seminarian’s kids, then one of the missionary’s kids, then one of the preacher’s kids. I was always one of them—one of the other people. Now I just wanted to blend in. In my teenage insecurity and desire to fit in, I didn’t want to be different. I quickly found a pizza to deliver and got out of there.
Well, Peter also just wanted to blend in. But the true words of the girl spoken in the midst of all the people standing around can not be overcome by Peter’s false words of denial. Soon those standing near Peter pick up the servant girl’s refrain saying, "Surely you are one of them, for you are a Galilean." Peter is different and all the people now know it. Perhaps, it is time for some bold words of truth from Peter. Perhaps it is time for a brave confession that, YES! he is one of the disciples, a follower of Jesus Christ, the Son of the Living God. Perhaps, I could have spoken bold words of my Christian faith in the back room of the pizza place. But I didn’t and Peter didn’t either.
Instead, Peter, who has previously used both formal, high sounding legal language and simple language in his denials, now uses the ugly, base and profane language of curses. He calls down curses upon himself and says, "I do not know this man you are talking about." The original Greek phraseology is a little bit difficult in this text, but it may be that his expression of not knowing "this man" is actually a way of calling curses down on Jesus as well. As I said, the Greek is ambiguous. But there is nothing ambiguous about Peter’s intent. In the harshest language possible he denies knowing his Master and Lord to whom he dismissively refers as "this man you are talking about." To put Peter’s denial in blunt language that we will recognize today, what Peter essentially says here is, "May I be damned if I know this man."
The worst part of Peter’s three—fold denial is that just hours earlier, while still in the upper room of the Passover Supper, Jesus had predicted that Peter would deny him three times before the rooster crowed twice. His denial had been predictable. It had been prophesied. Peter had been warned and still he blew it. After this third denial of Peter the rooster crows for the second time. Peter breaks down and weeps.
Peter stands self—condemned before God. He stands self—condemned before us and he stood self—condemned before the early church first hearing the Gospel of Mark read to them. Since we realize the seriousness of Peter’s crime, we want to avoid Peter’s failure and sin. So, when we read this text we think to ourselves, "I have to do better than Peter; I can not—must not—fail like he did." When we preachers preach this text we warn our congregations against the rather obvious sin of denying our Savior. We go on to expound upon the evils of being timid in our faith. We must be bold, courageous, and quick to tell others of our faith. We ought not be afraid. We ought to speak out boldly. We ought not be like Peter!
All of this earnest instruction is true, of course. But it isn’t particularly helpful. It isn’t helpful because most of us already know that we shouldn’t deny Jesus. This is not exactly a novel idea. Of course you can’t deny your Lord and Master, and yet Peter did. Peter did, even though Jesus’ warned him in advance, even though Jesus said "Watch and pray lest you fall into temptation," Peter still failed. So here is the question: If Peter failed even though he had been warned in advance, why do we think we will succeed? Do you catch my point, here? If great big bold courageous Peter—The Rock—could crumble, its pretty arrogant for us to think that we will succeed, isn’t it?
Moreover, even if we do not fail like Peter, all of us will have our weak spots. Maybe, like the people standing around Peter in our text, we enjoy pointing out the falsehood of others. It is worth noting that although the servant girl and the others were speaking the truth about Peter; their truth was no more redemptive than Peter’s falsehood. As Scripture reminds us, "All our righteous acts are like filthy rags" before the Lord, and "All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God."
So where does this leave us? Frankly, it leaves us with Peter and in this case that’s not a good place to be. Is there no hope, no grace? Well, the text doesn’t seem to offer much. In fact, the last words that Peter ever speaks in the Gospel of Mark are these words of a curse—filled denial of his Lord. Peter is only mentioned one more time by Mark and it is only a passing reference. The last words of Peter in Mark’s Gospel are words of accursed denial.
Yet, the last word of our text has not yet been heard. We should find some hope in the phrase, "Then Peter remembered the word that Jesus had spoken…" Now I know that at first this doesn’t sound like good news. After all, the word that Peter remembered was a word about his failure and denial. Nevertheless, Peter remembered the "word of Jesus." Again, although in the immediate context the word is one of implied condemnation, is Jesus’ word always or even primarily one of condemnation? No it isn’t; plus, not even this word is a word of condemnation.
What I am trying to get at here is that Jesus predicted Peter’s denial for a redemptive purpose. He did not predict Peter’s denial to humiliate and condemn him, instead he spoke his word to humble and redeem Peter. Only once Peter recognized that he could neither follow nor lead in his own power, was he ready to truly follow and lead. So yes, the text leaves Peter weeping bitterly in his sin, but it also leaves Peter newly humbled and dependant on the redemptive power of Jesus. That’s good news.
But there’s more. The word of the Gospel of Mark on the Apostle Peter does not end here. I know I said that the last word of Peter in the Gospel is one of accursed denial, but the last word on Peter is spoken on the day of Jesus’ resurrection. An angel gets the last word on the failed, broken and humbled disciple of Jesus. The word is simple and yet profound. The angel appears to the women at the tomb and tells them that Jesus has risen and then says "Go, tell (Jesus’) disciples and Peter, ‘He is going ahead of you into Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.’" Do you see the good news here? Peter, the humbled disciple of Jesus, is singled out as one of them who can remember the true words of Jesus. Yes, in the past Jesus’ true words predicted Peter’s failure, but now the angel calls for Peter and the others to remember Jesus’ true words that predicted the resurrection. When Peter remembered those words of resurrection, what joy must have filled his soul!?
People of God, my challenge to you today is for you to remember the words of Jesus. Yes, that will bring some pain and some honest recognition of personal failure. The words of Jesus will humble us. For example, try reading Mark 10:17—34. In the story, a rich young man asks Jesus what he should do to receive eternal life. Jesus responds that the man should sell all his possessions and follow him. This call for self—sacrificing discipleship is humbling. When the disciples first heard these words they were humbled by how far short they fell of Jesus’ model for discipleship. You too will be humbled by how far short you fall of Jesus’ model for his disciples. You can’t honestly hear the words of Jesus and let them truly speak to your heart, without honestly confronting you failure.
At the same time, you can’t honestly hear the words of Jesus and let them truly speak to your heart, without honestly confronting your Savior. Our Savior makes clear that salvation doesn’t come because we never fail. Salvation doesn’t come because of our great discipleship. Salvation comes when we leave our guilty fears behind, when we forsake all other claims on us, and come to our Savior.
So, with Peter today we fall on our knees and remember the words of Jesus. Yes, there will likely be some weeping. But ultimately the words of Jesus are words of resurrection and life. Remember the words of Jesus and live.
AMEN
Paul DeVries
Rev. Paul DeVries, most commonly referred to as “Pastor Paul”, is the Sr. Pastor of Brookside Christian Reformed Church in Grand Rapids, Michigan. He is married to Diane (nee Vanden Akker) and the father of four children. He graduated from Calvin Theological Seminary in 1989 and served for 12 years as the pastor of Unity Christian Reformed Church in Prospect Park, New Jersey. As a pastor his first love and greatest joy comes in the honor of bringing God’‘s Word to his congregation on a weekly basis through his preaching. He enjoys reading, camping with his family, watching his children’‘s sporting events, and working on home improvement projects - inside and outside his home.
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