The Faithfulness of Christ

As we dive in this morning, I want to make sure that I give credit where credit is due.

We have mentioned before that there is a group of pastors who meet here weekly to work on our sermons together.

We are all preaching through John, and some of the churches are a week ahead of us in the study.

That means that last week, Michael Worrall, who was here the Sunday Noah preached, preached this passage last week at Valley Bible Church.

As I looked over what Michael drew out of the text, I was struck by the way he divided the text.

I believe it is a God-honoring and powerful way of looking at the text, so I will be using some of concepts and outline that Michael developed.

The morning’s message is going to be a little different anyway today because the way John arranged the events he relayed here switches back and forth from scene to scene.

Because of that, we aren’t going to necessarily have three points like we often do.

Instead, we are going to try to develop both a warning and an encouragement from what John records.

Go ahead and open your Bibles to John 18:12-27, which is our text for today.

As you do, will you be honest with yourself as I ask a difficult question?

Here goes: What would it take for you to deny Jesus?

There are some of you who immediately said, “I would never deny Jesus. I have walked with him too long and know him too well.”

I sincerely hope that is true.

However, as we look at what is a familiar account for many people, I want you to heed this warning from Peter’s life: It is far easier to deny Jesus than you think it is.

We will get to the encouragement later, but let’s walk through the text a piece at a time to see just how easy it is to fall away from Christ.

Keep in mind what we have already seen so far.

Peter is the guy who has risen to the top of the twelve disciples Jesus called to himself.

He is one of the older guys in the group, and he is also one of the boldest.

He is the one who walked on the water with Jesus and wanted to build shelters for Jesus and Moses and Elijah when they met on the mountaintop.

Peter is the guy who declared that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God.

However, he is also the guy who sank in the waters because he took his eyes off Christ. He is the one who rebuked Jesus and told him there was no way Jesus would die.

He is the one who tried to take matters into his own hands by cutting off the high priest’s servant’s ear when they came to arrest Jesus.

He is also the one who swore he would even die for Jesus.

Remember back in John 13?

John 13:37–38 CSB

“Lord,” Peter asked, “why can’t I follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.” Jesus replied, “Will you lay down your life for me? Truly I tell you, a rooster will not crow until you have denied me three times.

Let’s think about this for a minute.

That conversation with Jesus was just a few hours before the events we are going to look at this morning.

If someone who has never been wrong before tells you something like that, don’t you think you are going to be on guard to make sure that you don’t do whatever he said you are going to?

You may make mistakes in a million different ways, but you aren’t going to do *that*, right?

Keep that in mind as we dive into the passage.

Pick up in verse 12-14.

After the encounter we looked at last week, we see that Jesus allows himself to be arrested and tied up.

He is taken to Annas first and then Caiaphas next. it is possible they lived in the same compound. Without getting too deep into it, Annas had been the high priest but was replaced by his son-in-law Caiaphas. However, he still exerted enough authority that he was still called the high priest since he was the man behind the man.

We will pick back up with Jesus in a bit, but John immediately shifts to Peter.

Start at verse 15-16, and let’s see something interesting.

Although the disciples scattered at the moment of Jesus’s arrest, Peter and one other disciple end up following him from a distance.

We can’t be certain, but this “other disciple” was likely John, the writer of this gospel. There are other passages where he clearly refers to himself as “the disciple Jesus loved” and things like that. He never refers to himself by name, so it is likely that his family had some connections with the high priest and he was able to get inside.

Here’s where things start to unwind for Peter.

Look at verse 17-18...

The servant guarding the door asks Peter, “You aren’t one of this man’s disciples too, are you?”

It is possible that she knew John was a disciple of Jesus, and since John was getting Peter in, she was suspicious.

The way her question is worded, though, she was expecting Peter to say no.

Unfortunately, seemingly without skipping a beat, Peter replies exactly like she thought he would — “I am not”.

Wait a second…think about who is asking this question.

As one of the greatest preachers in the early church, John Chrysostom points out, this wasn’t a soldier who asked Peter the question. It wasn’t one of the guards or even a member of the mob that arrested Jesus.

No, it is a low-status servant girl who has the unlucky job of watching the door on this cold and eventful night.

There isn’t a threat in her words, although Peter could have been afraid she might tell someone else.

Any way you cut it, Peter failed miserably on his first test.

The man who, hours before had sworn he would go with Jesus to the death finds himself denying him, likely out of fear.

John pans the camera away from Peter and goes on to tell us about Jesus’s trial before the high priest.

Where Peter has already failed his first trial, Jesus is doing an amazing job in his.

Pick up in verse 19-24.

The high priest starts questioning Jesus, trying to trap him in some statement that would give them a good reason to have him killed.

Jesus doesn’t take the bait, knowing exactly what is going on.

Instead, he points to the consistency of his teaching. He has taught publicly over and over again, so surely there are plenty of people who have heard him say whatever he should have said wrong.

One of the officials took it upon himself to defend the high priest’s honor, so he slapped Jesus for what he thought to be a rude response to Annas.

Jesus seems unfazed as he replies in verse 23, doesn’t he?

Isn’t this an interesting contrast with Peter?

Jesus is on trial for his life, and he is being accused of all kinds of things.

He has already been arrested and drug into a hearing in front of the deposed high priest who really shouldn’t have had any authority at all.

Now, he has been slapped by an official, and still, he doesn’t waver in the least.

Peter, who was so adamant in the Upper Room, has caved once under much less pressure.

This part of the story doesn’t get any better for him.

Look at verse 25.

Peter is still by the fire, warming himself and watching from a distance what all is happening with Jesus.

In the course of time, someone asks him the question again— “You aren’t one of his disciples too, are you?”

John records Peter’s reply in the same way he did the first time: “I am not.”

The other gospel writers give us more detail about what else Peter said, including Matthew telling us that Peter actually took an oath that he wasn’t one of disciples.

In just recording these words from Peter, John has made an interesting point.

What did Jesus say to the crowd that arrested him in response to the fact that they were seeking Jesus of Nazareth?

Remember it from last week? “I am.”

He invoked the divine name and gave a hint of his power as he spoke the words and knocked down the guards with the force of his voice.

What about Peter? Jesus is the I AM, the one true God. When questioned about being Jesus’s disciple, however, Peter makes it clear that he is not.

He is saying that out of pride and fear, wanting to preserve his own life or reputation more than wanting to honor Jesus, but he is more right than he realizes—he is not the I AM.

Maybe if he had been quicker to acknowledge that God is God and he is not, he wouldn’t have found himself in this predicament.

He is denying Jesus because he isn’t submitting himself to God’s plan. Instead, he is trying to work out his own as best he can, and that leads to him denying the one who is actually in control.

Peter isn’t finished yet, though, so let’s keep going.

Read verse 26-27...

Keep in mind that this was almost 2000 years before the invention of electric lights.

The sun hasn’t come up yet, so they are still standing around the fire and trying to watch what all is going on.

Over the course of the night, one of the servants starts to recognize Peter. He was actually related to Malchus, the one Peter tried to murder.

Finally, the servant calls him out on it--”Didn’t I see you with him in the garden?”

Once again, John simply says that Peter denied him.

Again, the other gospel writers give us more detail. Matthew and Mark both tell us that Peter actually pronounced a curse on himself and denied that he was there. That doesn’t mean he cussed; it means he literally took an oath that called down some curse upon himself if he was lying.

I was trying to think of a good way to say this without being offensive, so I thought of the movie Finding Nemo.

Do you remember the scene with the sharks in the recovery meeting?

One of the sharks says, “Hello, My name is Bruce. It has been three weeks since my last fish, on my honor, or may I be chopped up and made into soup.”

That’s a really silly example of what Peter did in this third denial of Jesus — he actually called a curse upon himself and swore that he was telling the truth.

You can’t get much farther from where he started in the Upper Room and where he was in the garden to where he is now.

He is actually swearing an oath and a curse that he wasn’t there!

In his understated way, John records these haunting words: “Immediately, a rooster crowed.”

Put yourself in Peter’s shoes. You haven’t gotten much sleep at all. Your leader has been arrested and you are scared.

You had promised you would stay with him until the end, but here you are, denying him three different times.

Suddenly, you hear the rooster crow, just like Jesus said it would.

Can you imagine the pain that went through Peter’s soul at that moment?

We’ve been there, haven’t we—the moment you knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that you had said or done the wrong thing, and it feels like your stomach weighs 1000 lbs.

The guilt and shame pile onto you and may even make it feel hard to breathe.

Luke captures some of this in his gospel:

Luke 22:60–62 CSB

But Peter said, “Man, I don’t know what you’re talking about!” Immediately, while he was still speaking, a rooster crowed. 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.

Can you imagine it? Can you imagine the piercing eyes of Jesus, who is in the middle of the trial for his life, turning and looking at you, right as you denied you knew him and failed him a third time?

I dare say he went outside and wept bitterly!

His heart was pierced because Jesus was right. He thought he was strong and he would never fail, but it turns out he was far weaker than he dared imagine.

Now, you may be looking at all this and saying, “Sean, it’s a great story, but what does this have to do with me?”

Because we are Peter in this story!

Every single one of us is absolutely capable of doing and saying things that would deny that we even know who Jesus is.

Don’t for a second think that any of us is immune to falling.

Let me give you an example.

Yesterday, my wife and I were in a store, and the clerks found out I was a pastor. Suddenly, in the middle of shopping, one of them starts talking to me about what they have been reading in their Bible. Another tells me that they were Roman Catholic, but they walked away because they serve an angry God.

I tried to talk with them about what they were saying, but honestly, it was a little awkward trying to engage with them. I was just trying to get what we needed and get out of there, but God was giving me an opportunity to show myself as one of his disciples.

Fast forward to the next store we go to. We are walking around, and I make eye contact with an older gentleman who is waiting for his wife.

We smile at each other, and as I walk past him, he holds out a tract to me and asks me if I know what the gospel is.

Turns out he is a member at a church in Vinton, and he was sharing the gospel with people while he was out shopping.

Perhaps we could have some discussions about the effectiveness of tracts, but you know what I walked away from that conversation with?

A clear sense that this man loved Jesus and wasn’t ashamed to tell other people about him.

Here I am, a pastor, finding myself uncomfortable with people who bring up Jesus without me having to really start the conversation, while this man is willing to walk up to complete strangers and tell them who Jesus is.

How easy is it for us to deny Christ with our words and our actions!

We laugh at the jokes we know we shouldn’t because we don’t want to be a prude.

We downplay the fact that we went to church yesterday because we don’t want folks to know we follow Jesus.

It’s easy to stand here on a Sunday morning and say, “I will never quit; I will never abandon Jesus,” but is is so much more difficult when we found ourselves standing in the dark around the fire without anyone around, isn’t it?

Peter’s failure is a warning to all of us.

How have you been denying Jesus? Do you talk about him? Do you live like he calls you to live, even when it makes you stand out and you don’t like it?

What do you need to change to live a life that honors him instead of denying him?

Now, I mentioned at the beginning that there was some encouragement for us in the middle of this warning.

Yes, Peter failed. He was human, imperfect, and not nearly all he thought himself to be.

Yes, we can do the exact same thing.

However, keep in mind that Peter isn’t the only one in this story.

We have seen little bits and pieces of Jesus’s story woven into Peter’s denials.

Where Peter failed, Jesus stayed steadfast.

In spite of fierce opposition, Jesus stayed true to the Father’s plan, even when that took him all the way to the cross.

He stayed true for the Father’s glory, and he stayed true to save us.

Through his sacrifice on the cross, God takes Peter’s sin and my sin and your sin and puts it on Jesus, and puts Jesus’s perfection on us in its place.

Because Jesus was faithful, we can be saved.

It isn’t because we are perfect or because we will always be what we should be; no—it is in spite of our unfaithfulness that Jesus is faithful to us.

As you think back to the shame of the times you and I have denied Christ, realize that he took that shame and faithfully bore it on the cross.

Surrender to him today, and as you do, you find forgiveness that takes away the guilt and shame that we carry for all our sin.

That’s what repentance is—it is allowing the weight of our guilt and shame to break our hearts and cause us to turn from those things and never do them again.

Repent; allow the weight of your sin, placed on your faithful Savior, to turn you from what you think you should to and toward him and him alone.

Yes, Peter denied Jesus that night, but Jesus never denied Peter, taking his sin and my sin and yours to the cross to die.

Be careful how you live, and make sure you aren’t denying Jesus in the way you act and speak.

As you do, rest in the one who was faithful for you.

By the way, as we will see in a few weeks, this isn’t the end of Peter’s story, and it doesn’t have to be the end of yours either.