I just want to say some introductory comments first. First, I want to say thank you to this church for your warmth and your generosity and your care and concern, not only for the past few months with the drastic change in our family's life, but since we've come here, since we've come to Calvin Church, I think about a year and a half ago, We have felt welcomed and warmed and encouraged. We are incredibly thankful for the love of Christ that is so plainly seen here. I cannot express that enough. The second thing I'm gonna do is ask a favor of you. I'm gonna ask that you be patient and you be merciful and you be kind, as this is my very first formal sermon or exhortation, whichever you prefer. I've been told I can say it either way. I'm less than halfway through. I feel like I'm defending myself here. I'm less than halfway through my first quarter of seminary, which means I have a lot to learn and a lot that I don't know. And I'm going to ask for your patience with me. That being said, I also encourage you and I want to encourage myself that this is God's word, right? If I was in a Baptist church, I'd say amen and everybody would say amen. I'm trying to lure the Scebas in into being the first ones to do that. But this is God's Word, right? I feel a lot of liberation in that. You should feel a lot of liberation in that because God controls His Word. He controls how it's preached. He controls the application of His Word to His people and those whom He will call. Right? And we can rest in that. God's Word tonight, as it goes forth, will not return to Him void, and we can take comfort in that. With that said, let's pray. Heavenly Father, again, we come before You, praising You for Your Word, Your holy Word, the Word that You inspire, the Word that You breathe out for the sake of Your people. And we ask tonight, Father, that You would give me clarity of speech, a sound mind has found in the Spirit that I would do diligence, be faithful to your word in as much as I understand. And I pray that from our hearts you remove any error that's said and you only apply those things which would be helpful to us. This we ask in Jesus' name. Amen. Well, our primary text for tonight is going to come out of 1 Peter, the book of 1 Peter, chapter 1, verse 1. So if you want to turn in your Bibles to the book of 1 Peter, chapter 1, we're going to be looking at, believe it or not, verse 1 tonight. And I will explain what the supplemental materials are for, so hang tight with that. But let's open our Bibles to 1 Peter 1.1. In the Pew Bibles, it's page 1014, I believe. And I believe I discussed with many of you, or some of you at least, that it's my intent, Lord willing, to spend the duration of my internship and my seminary stint working our way together through the book of 1 Peter, however long that may take. I tend to be on the slower side of things, and maybe some would say the deeper and slow-moving side of things. It's a book with, what, five chapters, I think. But given the preaching schedule, I think that it'll take maybe a couple years to get through, believe it or not. I do want to emphasize that I would like to journey through this together with you. This is us around our father's word. This is something that happens corporately together. I just happen to have more time to study it. but our hearts should be joined by His Word and by His Spirit. And both this sermon and the next sermon, so I think it's in two months from now, they're going to be introductory sermons. Tonight, we're going to focus on the main themes or theme of Peter. As you know, with the books of the Bible, there tend to be several themes. Usually, there's one or two overarching themes, though, right? One or two overarching themes that tie into the bigger narrative of Scripture, which is our salvation in Christ, God's covenant of grace, and each book of the Bible has one or two themes that we can really tie to the bigger picture, and that's really what we're going to focus on tonight. We're also going to focus on the author, Peter, the Apostle Peter. So, we're going to look at themes and the author tonight, and next time we're going to take a look at the audience. It's called the elect exiles of the dispersion, okay? So, with that, let's read the text. It's going to be very time-consuming to do this. 1 Peter 1, verse 1, Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, to those who are elect exiles of the dispersion in Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and Bithynia. That's as far as we're going to read from 1 Peter tonight. I do want to say before I get into our main objectives tonight, I do have three objectives. The supplemental material that you have, okay? There are commentaries that I'm going to be citing. There are other passages of Scripture that I'm going to be citing. To try to make it as efficient as possible, I put it on a handout for you, and it does go in chronological order. So, as I pass through the citations, the commentaries, and the biblical citations, you should be able to just look, go right in order down your citation sheet, okay? And we are going to spend, from a biblical perspective, we are going to spend most of our time in the gospel narratives, okay? But that being said, the intent here is to let those gospel narratives amplify our, what I'll call our secondary writer, Peter, right? Amplify his character, his experiences, but then also amplify some of the themes that we tie into 1 Peter. So we should be able to pick out some of the themes from the gospel narratives from this particular event in Peter's life, and then tie those back into the book of 1 Peter. And as we walk our way through that, I'll point that out. So, our objectives tonight, we have three objectives. First is to take us through the main, real high-level overview of the main themes of Peter with punctuating what I think is the main or the driving theme of Peter overall. Next, we're going to look at a particular event from Peter's life, and this is where we dig into the gospel narratives, and we're going to look at the thrice denial of Christ, or Maybe a more common way to say it is when Peter denies that he even knows Jesus three times. We're going to pick that apart. And then the third thing is going to kind of be wrapped into the second objective. And that's, like I said, we're going to pull some of the themes from that thrice denial, and we're going to reference them, right? We're going to see how they tie into the book of 1 Peter. And why we're doing this, believe it or not, the answer to how and why we can do this is found in our doctrine of inspiration. I know it sounds a little odd, but our doctrine of inspiration, that doctrine which teaches that it's God the Holy Spirit that is the primary and the single author of the Holy Scriptures. God writes the Bible, plain and simple. That being said, though, he uses secondary means to author his word, men, namely, prophets, apostles, he uses to write his word. Now, under that doctrine of inspiration, can you tell I'm learning from seminary just so everybody feels good about that? Under that doctrine of inspiration, there's the idea of how the divine author, God, and human authors interact and how they relate to one another and how that's useful for the edification of the church as a whole. And I'm going to go to the experts here, okay? First is a theologian by the name of Louis Burkhoff who teaches on biblical interpretation. Burkhoff says this, the writers often gave, that's the biblical writers, the human authors, often gave expression to their own experiences. It is perfectly evident, therefore, that the Holy Spirit employed writers of the Bible just as they were, and as He Himself had prepared them for the task, with their personal idiosyncrasies, their character and temperament, their talents and education, their likes and dislikes, without suppressing their personality. Simply stated, the Holy Spirit uses the human author's unique experiences and personalities to draw from in order to write the Scriptures. More poignantly, or hitting more directly at home, is Daniel Doriani, in his commentary on 1 Peter, about Peter, writes this, The unanimous tradition of the early church declares that the apostle Peter wrote his first epistle while living in Rome late in his life around AD 65. So that's just sort of settling a debate as to who the author is. But this is, for our purposes, more relevant. If that is correct, then Peter wrote from a lifetime of wisdom and conviction. He experienced everything, not least the trials and suffering he describes in his letter. He invites us to read his letter, the book of 1 Peter, through the lens of his experience as a disciple and as an apostle. So what we're saying here is that as we, yes, we're going to spend time in the narratives on the thrice denial, right? But we're also going to try to see or unfold or unpack how those experiences that Peter endured, he was using or the Spirit was using to encourage or edify these elect exiles and to encourage and edify us today as believers. So the main themes, I always want to say, does that make sense? But I'm preaching, not teaching, so I don't do that. Main themes, our first objective here. So I'm going to sum up the book of Peter. I'm going to give you what we'll call a working definition of the book of 1 Peter. What is it all about, okay? And I'm going to pull some of what I'll call the sub-themes. It's not that big picture theme, which we're going to get to in just a moment, but a compilation of all of the various themes that we find in 1 Peter. I'll give you, try to give you a very simple working definition. And I stress working because it might change as we go. But I would say that 1 Peter is about this. 1 Peter is a book that's about our strong and sure hope rooted in Christ that motivates us or prompts us to live holy lives that are characterized by humility, submission, and a willingness to suffer for the sake of the gospel. Say it one more time, 1 Peter is a book that's, if I can remember it again, here's that stumbling, right? 1 Peter is a book that's about our strong and sure hope rooted in Jesus Christ that prompts us or motivates us to live holy lives that are characterized by humility, submission, and a willingness to suffer for the sake of the gospel. And that last theme, that willingness to suffer for the sake of the gospel, is really that big-picture theme. 1 Peter, on the whole, is about suffering for a gospel and a Savior that saves us. It's about being so filled up with the love of God that we're willing to endure all of the pain and the potential suffering that that may cause so that others may be saved and that God may be glorified. In taking a look, I have some proof texts down there for you where we see this idea of suffering. The first is in 1 Peter 1, 6-8. In this you rejoice, though now for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith, more precious than gold that perishes, though it is tested by fire, may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen Him, you love Him. Though you do not now see Him, you believe in Him and rejoice with joy that's inexpressible and filled with glory." So we don't have suffer or suffering explicitly mentioned in that text like we do the subsequent ones, the ones that we'll come up to, right? But it's implied, right? We're talking about grieved by various trials. tested genuineness of your faith, tested by fire. The idea here is some level of pain, some level of suffering, right? More explicitly, 1 Peter 2, 19-23, for this is a gracious thing when, mindful of God, one endures sorrows while suffering unjustly. For what credit is it if, when you sin and are beaten for it, you endure? But if, when you do good and suffer for it, you endure, this is a gracious thing in the sight of God. For to this you have been called, because Christ also suffered for you, leaving you an example so that you might follow in His steps. He committed no sin, neither was deceit found in his mouth. When he was reviled, he did not revile in return. When he suffered, he did not threaten, but continued entrusting himself to Him who judges justly. 1 Peter 3.13-17, Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled. Pay attention to that. No fear of them, meaning man, or be troubled. Do not fear men. But in your hearts, honor Christ the Lord as holy, always being prepared to make a defense to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that's in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect, having a good conscience so that when you are slandered, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame. For it is better to suffer for doing good, if that should be God's will, than for doing evil. 1 Peter 5, 8-11. Be sober-minded, be watchful. Your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour. Let's pay attention to that. The devil is a roaring lion seeking to devour. Resist him, firm in your faith, knowing that the same kinds of suffering are being experienced by your brotherhood throughout the world. And after you have suffered a little while, the God of all grace, who has called you to his eternal glory in Christ, will himself restore, confirm, strengthen and establish you to him be the dominion forever and ever. Amen. So we see the pattern of suffering in first Peter. But again, I want you to keep in mind, when we bring up suffering, when we bring up something sufferable, it can be depressing. I've got to suffer. But keep in mind that thing which is holding up our suffering, which is the strength of the grace and the love of God in Christ. That is what motivates us to bear up under the trials, to bear up under the suffering. So be encouraged. We don't just want to hear suffering just exclusively in a bad way. We want to know why it is we're doing what it is that we're doing. So how are we going to link these? How are we going to sort of make our way, you know, back into the Gospels and then crosswalk that into the themes in 1 Peter? And I think a good thing to do, a helpful exercise, is to take a look at the two names that we have in front of us. Peter, in 1 Peter 1.1, I hope I don't have your heads all over the place, and you can give me feedback afterwards, I would welcome it. Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ, two names, Jesus Christ and Peter. You ever stop to think about what's in a name or what are in names, right? When we hear a particular name, we think of certain specific things, right? They tend to be around events. They tend to evoke certain emotions or sentiments. We might even think in moral terms, this person's good, this person's bad. So for example, if I say Ronald Reagan or Barack Obama, right? I can already feel some of you getting tense when I say either one of those, but that's my point, right? We say the names and something comes to mind. We're evoking an emotional response. From an event perspective with those two names, you might think of the fall of the Berlin Wall, right? Or the Affordable Care Act, right? Charismatic, well-spoken, feared, loved, weak, strong. Let's get a little bit more regional or local with it, and let's think about sports. We're in Southwestern Pennsylvania, let's talk about sports. Can we do that on Sunday? Just kidding. You can email me on that, I guess. So let's talk about Terry Bradshaw, Roberto Clemente, Sidney Crosby, right? Terry Bradshaw, we might think of the dynasty of the Steelers in the 70s, right? The dynasties in the 70s, okay. So we might think of that. Roberto Clemente, we might think of Forbes Field, we might think of great arm, right? We might think of tragic death, humanitarian cause to Puerto Rico, right? And Roberto Clemente's plane goes down in a crash. Sidney Crosby, 2009 Stanley Cup, 2016 Stanley Cup, Canada Gold Medals, heart, can you tell I'm partial to hockey here, right? Multiple heart trophies, right? Energetic, competitive, anticipatory. Let's bring it into the realm of the theological, right? What if I say R.C. Sproul or C.S. Lewis, Pastor Bob, right? We think holiness of God. We think deep thought, apologetics, C.S. Lewis. We think of Narnia and Aslan, right? And we think of Pastor Bob, right? warm, gentle, kind. I'm not sucking up there, I promise when I say that. Let's get even more local and talk about Calvin. Let's talk about Calvin Church, right? We look around to our left, to our right, we see certain faces, those faces have names, right? And we tend to associate those names with things. Morning worship, evening worship, American Heritage Girls, Men's Bible Study, Women's Bible Study, Calvin Cadets. And on it, we've got a lot going on here at Calvin Church, don't we? But we see these, you think of these names and we think encouraging, helpful, Right? Loving, gentle, faithful, great example. Right? Maybe sometimes we don't think as well. Maybe we're feeling contentious. Maybe we're feeling angry. Maybe we have a judgment to make. We are sinners after all. Well, tonight we have before us those two names, Jesus Christ and Peter. Jesus Christ, where do you start? The Alpha, the Omega. Right? The cross, birth, resurrection, mercy, compassion, kindness, justice. Jesus, the Logos, the Word of God, from the beginning, through Him all things are made. And we have Peter, bold, impetuous. not very thoughtful oftentimes. Peter's got a deficiency between his head and his heart sometimes. We might think of the Mount of Transfiguration. We might think of the doubtful experience for him as a fisherman. He's doubting that Jesus can bring these fish on board when he needs them to. But typically, we think of Peter in terms of denying, from a fall perspective, we think of him denying Christ three times and then weeping bitterly over it, the thrice denial of Peter. So which leads us into an explanation of the thrice denial itself. And we're going to look at this from three perspectives. We're going to look at the prediction of Jesus in Peter's denials. We're going to look at the denials themselves. And then we're going to look at Peter's restoration and empowerment. And why I want to do this is because I think that it's important to paint a big picture of what's going on here. It might take a little bit more time. Feel free to leave if you need to, I guess, but I think it's important to get the power of the message behind this and grasp the grace of Christ to match and exceed Peter's egregious fall into sin. We need to look at the whole story, okay? So we're going to take a look at the prediction, we're going to take a look at the denials themselves, and we're going to take a look at the restoration and the empowerment of Peter. So first, the prediction. We look at Luke 22, 31-34. We're pulling from the book of Luke to recount Jesus's prediction of Peter's fall. Luke 22, 31-34, Simon, Simon, behold, Satan has demanded permission to sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail and you, when once you have turned again, strengthen your brothers. But he said to him, Lord, with you I am ready to go both to prison and death. And he," that's Jesus, said, I say to you, Peter, the rooster will not crow today until you have denied three times that you know me. So let's take a look at this first in verse 31, Simon, Simon, behold, right? We have a Simon, Simon, repetitive language in the Bible, right? It denotes genuineness, sincerity, almost pleading, right? And behold is a word that says pay attention, listen up. Now, of course, generically, we want all of God's words to be listened to, and they should be. In this particular one, he's saying to Peter, behold, pay attention to this. And then he says, Satan demanded to have you that he may sift you like wheat. So the idea for demanded here, the Greek word is exiteo, which has the idea of to beg for power over another for the purpose of torture or punishment. This is not a little guy with a pitchfork and horns. This is somebody who wants to do violence. He wants to destroy Peter. This is the evil one saying to God, I demand this. I demand your child. to sift you light wheat. I think it's easily said by John Calvin. Calvin suggests that the idea here is to toss up and down violently. Do we get the picture? Do we understand what Jesus is saying? He's saying, Peter. He's saying, Simon, Simon. Pay attention. I have something urgent to tell you. It's important. It's about our enemy. It's about your enemy, Satan. This is what he's going to seek to do to you, Peter, and it's not something light. It's something serious. It's something heavy. It's something disturbing. This is what he's going to do to you, Peter. Now, does this sound familiar? 1 Peter 5.8, "...be sober-minded, be watchful, your adversary the devil prowls around like a roaring lion seeking someone to devour." Now, in the passage in 1 Peter, there's nothing about sifting like wheat, there's nothing about demanding, but the idea is the same, right? Satan is portrayed here as a roaring lion. He's not passive, right? He's not indecisive. He's roaring. He's threatening. He's out for blood, so to speak. He's salivating because he wants to devour. He wants to devour. He wants to destroy. And we'll come back to this a little bit later on when we talk about being sober-minded and being watchful. and your adversary, the devil." And Jesus goes on to say, but I prayed for you that your faith may not fail. Definitely, there's no doubt that Jesus is warning Peter, yes, but then He's seeking to comfort Peter. He's seeking to say, Peter, don't worry. I've prayed for you that your faith may not fail, and I prayed for you to such the extent that when you turn, when you turn, because you will turn, because I've prayed for you, you will be filled with such a love and a graciousness of mind that you will strengthen your brothers. You will strengthen the people of God. Sort of an aside and to pull into a little bit of a parking lot by way of application, maybe you're here tonight and maybe your soul, your mind is under the pressure of the devil. You're feeling like, I feel like something is after me. I'm trying, I'm wrestling with my flesh. My sin is bogging me down. I can't seem to obtain victory. believed, did you know that Jesus prayed for you in historical time? Typically, we think of Jesus as praying for us right now in his resurrected state, and indeed he is. He's interceding for us before the Father. There's no doubt about that, right? But John 17, verse 20 says, he's talking about his apostles, this is in his high priestly prayer. He's saying, I do not ask or pray for the disciples and the apostles only, but I also pray for those who will believe in me through their word. The testimony of the apostles, the Bible. We come to faith through the Bible, the words that are written down in the New Testament by the disciples and the apostles. These are the ones who Jesus prayed for in historical time. If you know Christ, I believe we can say that at that moment He prayed for you. Be encouraged by that if you're going through a difficult time. And he's praying that Peter's faith may not fail. He's praying that our faith may not fail. And the word for fail there is eklepo, which means to leave or to quit. It's a permanent suggestion. This is not a wrestling match, a little small battle that Satan is seeking to win. He's seeking to obliterate Peter's faith. The apostate type thing, right? Where it's not that we stumble and we may have besetting sins in our lives, right? Or we keep being picked up by the grace of God, but in thought, word, and deed, we keep stumbling over the same sins. That's not the idea. He's going after Peter for a complete annihilation, to reject Jesus in a permanent way. But Jesus is telling him, don't worry, I've prayed for you, you will turn. Your faith will not ultimately be destroyed, Peter. And of course, and when you have turned to strengthen your brothers, I think I already commented on that, the type of strengthening that Peter is going to receive is going to be such that allows him to strengthen his brothers who are going to go through the same sort of trials and struggles that he's enduring here. And what's Peter's response? I'll go to the death for you, Lord. I'll go to prison with you, I'll go to the death." He says it boldly, typical Peter fashion. Maybe, best case scenario, right-hearted but very wrong-minded. He's not thinking about what's going on. He's disputing the omniscient Son of God. Now, in a positive way, you could say that's an expression of Peter's loyalty to Jesus, and that's a good thing. But clearly, by Jesus' response, after Peter's response, he needs to drive home the point even harder. So Jesus has made the declaration that Peter is not getting it. He's not giving the right response here, right? He's being proud. He's being puffed up in his own strength. He's right-hearted, but wrong-minded. very confused in his thought, not humble. Let's look at 1 Peter 3.8. Finally, all of you have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and a humble mind. 1 Peter 5.8. Be sober-minded. Be clear in your thinking. Be watchful. Right? Watch out. Somebody's coming after you. Peter's not demonstrating that. He's not concerned in the slightest that Jesus just predicted that the devil is going to come after him. For your adversary, the devil, prowls around like a roaring lion, seeking someone to devour. And Jesus' response after that is more or less saying, let me be clear, because you're not getting it. I tell you the truth before the rooster crows today, before the end of the day, you're going to deny that you even know me three times, despite this glorious affection that you're proclaiming, right? You're going to deny that. It's kind of like, I think, so my mom lives in an apartment behind our house, and oftentimes the boys will run out of the house, and they'll kind of go back and forth, go back and forth, and it's been snowy, and it's been cold, and it's been icy lately, and it gets a little bit more dangerous, and Julie's constantly having to say, slow down, or my mom's constantly having to say, slow down. It's general, it's generic, right? And the beginning of the warning, Jesus is somewhat generic in a right way, right? He's saying, there's trouble on the horizon, the devil's out to get you, but don't worry, I prayed for you, I'm comforting you, right? You're going to turn. Peter's not getting it, so Jesus says, let me be poignantly clear. You're going to deny that you even know me three times by the end of the day. Right? So that's like tantamount in our example with our boys, right? Slow down, slow down, you're going to get hurt. Instead, we could say, you're going to slip on the ice, you're going to crack your head, you're going to break your skull open, you're going to have to go to the hospital and get stitches. Right? That's a little bit more poignant. And I think that's what's going on here. So let's flip to the denials. Let's take a look at the denial account, and I kind of combined two accounts, Matthew 26, 69 to 73, and Luke 22, 61 to 62. Pastor Bob, you can tell me if that's wrong to do or not. 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 of Nazareth. And again, he denied it with an oath. I do not know the man. After a little while, the bystanders came up and said to Peter, Certainly you too are one of them, for your accent betrays you. Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, I do not know the man. And immediately the rooster crowed, and this is picking up the account from Luke, and the Lord turned and looked at Peter, and Peter remembered the saying of the Lord, how he had said to him, before the rooster crows today, you will deny me three times. And he went out and wept bitterly. So let's take a look at the servant girl in verse 69. There's another one mentioned in verse 71. So Peter right here at the outset is afraid of a servant girl, right? Oftentimes it's said that he's a free man of some sorts, and this is a younger servant girl. Why would you even be afraid? So not really to belabor that point or go back and forth as to whether it's accurate or not, I'm sure it is accurate. But what I want to stress is that he denied it before them all. There were multiple people here, which means that Peter had to be convicted, he had to be convincing that he did not know Christ. He was incessantly defensive and insistent, I do not know Christ. You think about that. If you have to convince one person, you can be a little shaky and maybe still convince them. You see a crowd of all, especially ones in the back of your mind you think might hurt you, right? You're going to suffer the same fate as Jesus, who at this point has been arrested and taken away and on His way to trial and crucifixion, and I've got to convince these people that I don't know Him because I don't want to suffer the same fate. all. His fear of man and his defensiveness that he doesn't know Jesus is heightened at this point. And then he goes on to deny it with an oath. The footnote of the Reformation Study Bible on this says, he appealed to God to witness to something that was not true. In other words, he says, I swear to God He broke the commandment, now shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain. Exodus 20, verse seven. Think about Exodus, what's going on there? It has characteristics of the thunderings of God, the holiness of God, the mountains shaking, the smoke, all in that picture at the beginning of Exodus, right? And as it were, Peter's turning his back. It's as if God is opening his mouth in that commandment to Peter's conscience, And Peter's completely shutting him down, turning his back. And then there's the bystanders. Things are getting more intense. There's bystanders coming through. More people are now bearing down on Peter. He's got the servant girls, he's got the all, and then he's got the bystanders. The pressure's getting turned up. And then Peter decides to call down a curse on himself and insist, I do not know the man. invokes a curse on himself and to swear, I do not know the man. Calvin says this of that, not satisfied with swearing, he breaks out into cursing by which he abandons his body and soul to destruction for he prays that the curse of God may fall upon him if he knows Christ. It is as much as if he had said, may I perish miserably if I have anything in common with the salvation of God. Can you imagine saying that? I think we've all said it, maybe not to the extreme or the explicit nature that we have here in front of us, but we say that in a way every time you and I deny our Savior in disobedience and rejection. We are not bold to speak for the Savior. We're hesitant to say that we know Him. So I think it's safe to say here that Peter's fear of man far supersedes this gleaming loyalty that he's claiming to Jesus when Jesus predicts that he's going to deny Him three times. And then the eye contact, he denies Him three times. Peter and Jesus lock eyes. Can you imagine that? This is someone that has walked with Jesus Christ. who is love, who is faithfulness, who has never sinned, who has been patient with his disciples for three years, who have not gotten it at this point, and he continuously loves them. He prays for them. He warns them. And Peter is over here denying with curses and swearing. He's saying calling down an oath against the one who he's just locked eyes with who made that law, who issued that law. The text doesn't indicate what either one of them are thinking, but imagine that. Have you ever been in a situation where you love somebody intensely and then they're your best friend and you feel so warm around them and then you kind of go to a different circle of people and those people don't tend to like the person who you clearly have so much affection for and you kind of join in the bantering. You join in the gossip. Maybe you join in the slander around that person. And then that person walks up to the circle, standing behind your back and hearing you mock them when 20 minutes before, a day before, two months before, you were just saying how much you love them. I was just saying how much I love them. Heartbroken. Maybe you were that person. Maybe I was that person coming up to the circle being talked about, being denied, being rejected. That hurts. That hurts, and it's only amplified by the fact that this is the Son of God that's being denied by one of His best friends. So let's take a look at 1 Peter 3.13-15. Now who is there to harm you if you are zealous for what is good? But even if you should suffer for righteousness' sake, you will be blessed. Have no fear of them, nor be troubled. Don't fear man. is what Peter's telling his audience, don't fear, man. But in your heart's honor, Christ the Lord is holy, always being prepared to make a defense, be ready to defend the gospel, be ready to stand for Christ, to anyone who asks you for a reason for the hope that is in you, yet do it with gentleness and respect. Is Peter a hypocrite here? I don't understand. I'm seeing him in the gospels and he's denying Christ, right? But then he's writing to these believers and saying, hey, Don't do it. Don't deny Christ. Be willing to suffer. Don't fear man. But back in the Gospels, he's fearing man. I don't get it. Now, obviously, a significant amount of time have passed, right, between the Gospel accounts and the writing of 1 Peter. Just remember that. There's a change that's about to take place, an empowerment and a restoration, which allows Peter to faithfully, not perfectly, but faithfully live out the opposite of where he is now and encourage others to do the very same thing. So before we're too quick to judge Peter here, before we're too quick to get blown away, this is one of these moments where I want to say raise your hand to see if you identify, but I'll tell you I can identify here. Peter's not alone. I see myself in this text. I have been afraid of men. I am still afraid of men to a certain extent. Praise God, not to the extent that I once was, but I still struggle with this, right? There's a book by a guy named Ed Welch, right? He's a renowned figure in the biblical counseling world. He writes a book called, When People Are Big and God Is Small, which posits really at the core of the fear of man is idolatry. And what is idolatry? Idolatry is basically when we give our affections, when we give our heart, we give our time to anything else other than God at God's expense. And in that book, he posits four reasons for fearing man. One, people will see me. They can't see me. This is how I really am. It's going to happen if they see how I really am. They can't do that. Pictures are a great example of this. In our living room, we have a picture of Julie and I in the Outer Banks. If you've been there, if you've been to our living room, you might notice that. Julie's happily on my back and we look like a happy married couple. You would look at this thing and you would think, man, we could put this in a frame at Walmart. This thing looks great. This family is so happy. You want to know what was really happening? Our boys, two of them, were running towards the ocean at the Outer Banks, which just finished a hurricane. The waters were choppy. They shouldn't have been anywhere near it. But they're walking in their dress clothes. They're on deck. They're going to get their pictures next. They're running into choppy seas with horrible currents and tides. And then the other, Jameson's sitting there crying and whining because he wasn't as big as he is now. He was in the sand. He didn't want to be in the sand and he's crying. So our faces look all smiley in that picture. And they look nice and they should be in a frame. But what was happening is not good. I would not even venture to tell you what I was thinking in my brain at that moment. But it wasn't good. It's not a proper reflection of the picture. And that happens all the time. We can't let people see that we have a messy house. We can't let people see that we have broken hearts and broken lives. What if they knew that I'm going to have to cover some things? I'm going to have to lie about some things. Breaking the commandments of God who loves you to hide. Fear man. People will reject me is the second one. People will physically hurt me. I think those are obvious in our instances with Peter, right? We saw what it looks like to be afraid of rejection. And then Peter most likely is thinking physical harm here too, suffering the same fate of Jesus. Now in our lives, there might be other ways in which people reject us or physically hurt us. And I don't think we need to elaborate on that any further, but it causes us to fear men over and over again. and all the while Christ stands ready to heal us and willing to heal us. The last one is the world wants me to fear people. This is easiestly, is that a word? Easiestly seen in our celebrities, right? We gotta be like these celebrities. I was in Walmart the other day with Julie, and we're walking by, and I see this Us magazine, and I see, England gets a new king and queen. Queen Elizabeth steps down, and there's William and Kate posted on the cover, right? And I stop. I'm fascinated by this royal thing, right? I think that's really neat. I stop, and I'm like drawn into this. But I wonder, what if there's a Bible right next to it? There wasn't. At the time, I wasn't thinking about what if there was a Bible right next to it? Would my heart gravitate as much towards the scriptures as they would towards this Us magazine? I'm not saying there's anything wrong with Us. I'm not saying there's anything wrong with following the royal family. I'm just saying, comparatively speaking, where are my affections? And then the other celebrities, you take a look, everybody's glamorous. They dress well. They're all pretty. They look great. They have big houses. So we start sacrificing things. Time, money, talents, treasures. We're worried about keeping up with the standard that man sets. And all the while, we have very little concern about what God thinks. And all the while, we as men, we are not perfect, we are not blameless, and we have never hung on a cross and bore the wrath of God for each other. But we continuously want to fear men. Lastly, and I do apologize, I'm going over on time. This is where I ask for your patience. We're almost done. The restoration and empowerment. So if you're feeling a little weighty, if you're feeling a little pricked in your conscience, there's good news. Peter's restoration and empowerment. So we're going to take a look at, I believe it's Mark 16, 1 to 7. And then John 21, 15 to 19. So Mark 16, when the Sabbath was passed, Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of James and Salome brought spices so that they may go and anoint him. And very early on the first day of the week, when the sun had risen, they went to the tomb. And they were saying to one another, who will roll away the stone for us from the entrance of the tomb? And looking up, they saw that the stone had been rolled back. It was very large. And entering the tomb, they saw a young man sitting on the right side, dressed in a white robe, and they were alarmed. And he said to them, don't be alarmed. You see Jesus of Nazareth, who was crucified. He has risen. He's not here. See the place where they laid him." So this is post-crucifixion, post-resurrection. The women come to the tomb. Jesus is not there, okay? And the man's telling them, he's risen. He's not here. See the place where he laid him. Now here's what has to do with our sermon. But go tell his disciples and Peter, Notice that Peter separated out specially from the disciples, that he's going before you to Galilee. There you will see him just as he told you. And this is what Calvin says about that and Peter clause. Calvin says in Mark's account of it, they are expressly enjoined to carry this message to Peter, not because he was at the time higher in rank than the others, but because his crime, which was so disgraceful, needed peculiar consolation to ensure him. assure him that Christ had not cast him off. Though he had basely and wickedly fallen, Peter needed a special assurance." I wonder, and there's some other accounts in the Gospels that talk about this. Can we imagine what Peter's going through here? He went out and wept bitterly the last time we saw him. And there's other indications in the Gospel narratives that he's suffering in his conscience. He's still functioning. He's still moving on. Remember, there was some time here. Right? Was he in the state of David in Psalm 32 or Psalm 51 where his bones are crushed, where God has crushed him, where he's dried up of life, where his tears are incessantly ending, not ending, over his sin? Maybe our consciences are being fogged for whatever reason. Maybe we need a special assurance. Maybe we've fallen into a very egregious sin or have fallen in our past into egregious sins and still can't seem to find that assurance. And you need special assurance. Keep in mind it's a principle here that Jesus does this. He especially assured Peter, my grace is stronger than the wickedness of your sin. I love you. My grace is greater. Your sin abounded. My grace all the more abounds than your wicked sin. Let's take a look at John 21, 15-19. When they had finished breakfast, that's the disciples and Jesus, they saw Jesus off the shore of Galilee, they head back on, they have breakfast with Jesus. 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. And he said to him, Feed my lambs. He said to him a second time, Simon, son of John, do you love me? And he said to him, Yes, Lord, you know that I love you. He said to him, Tend my sheep. And he said to him the third time, Simon, son of John, do you love me? Peter was grieved. Because he said to him, the third time, do 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. Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go. This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God. After saying this, he said to him, follow me. So the thing I want to focus on here in the Restoration, and it's very, very common, is this three, right? You've got three denials, you've got Jesus asking Peter the question, do you love me, three times. Typically, this is understood, right, in terms of the language of the text, right? So a lot of people would say, and a lot of people would say that Jesus had to ask that third time to get Peter to realize the real love with which he loved Jesus, agape love. So the first two times Jesus used the word phileia, which is a brotherly affection, a Greek word for a brotherly affection or a deep and intimate feeling for Jesus. But the third one is agape love, that love which is divine. But there's a little bit of a different take from a commentator, Rick Phillips, and this is what he says. He says that it's not really in the language where we find really the thrust of the passage, because John throughout the book uses those two versions of love interchangeably. So one time he'll say that the apostle who Jesus loved, using phileo the term, and then the apostle Jesus loved using agape, right? So the language John uses interchangeably there, But here, Philip seems to think the emphasis needs to be on the incessant pressing on Peter. I need to press through to him to true, a point of true repentance, and so that he really gets how deep my grace and my love is to cover his sin. Philip says this, By inquiring about Peter's love three times, Jesus was not rubbing salt in his wounds, but doing the serious work of repentance. We can be sure that this was painful for Peter. We can imagine that with each question, his mind would have remembered each of the three times he had denied his Lord. The threefold denial needed to be obliterated by the threefold confession. Every black mark that had been scored deep on the page by that denial needed to be covered over with the gilding and bright coloring of the triple acknowledgement. And so Peter, thrice having said, I know him not, Jesus, with a gracious violence, forced him to say thrice, thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus is faithful to get us to a point of true repentance, to get us to a point where we truly understand His graciousness, we truly understand His love and His compassion that reaches past our deepest sins. And it hurts sometimes to get us to that point. Sometimes we don't understand why God's hand seems so heavy on particular sins in our life. He's faithful and He's pressing us through to a genuine repentance to see His love. And he turns to Peter and he tells him to feed his sheep. And he also prophesies that you will die in the process, right? But what we need to see here and what we're seeing in 1 Peter is a man that has been transformed by the grace of God, covering over his sin, such to the point where the Holy Spirit is using that graciousness to encourage the people of God. And so maybe you're here tonight and maybe you're feeling that's you, you're feeling you're Peter. Confess to the Lord, I confess to the Lord. Maybe he's still pressing. Maybe you just need to know, be assured he loves you. The devil can bring these things up to our mind when we're guilty and our sin keeps repetitively flogging us and flogging us and flogging us in our conscience. Keep in mind the introduction in our bulletin. What does Luther say to do? Admit to the devil, yes, I've sinned, what of it? I know one who has paid satisfaction on my behalf, Jesus Christ the righteous, and where he is, there also I will be. Remember that when our sins come to our mind. The second thing, if you're here tonight and you don't know the love of God in the way that I'm talking about, I urge you to turn to Christ in faith. None of us sitting here deserves the grace of God. That's why it's grace. I'm not any better. You aren't any better. In fact, oftentimes when we talk to each other and get to know each other, we'd be surprised about the sins that we've fallen into. We'd be shocked by those things. But we stand on the name of one who satisfied those sins, Jesus Christ. That's who we claim in this church is Jesus Christ. I urge you, if you don't know Him in that way, turn to Him. And you don't have to do anything special at this point. In your heart, you're sensing something. In your conscience, you're sensing something. Cry out to God. Say, God, simply forgive me, turn me to Christ. That's it. You don't have to say anything perfect. You don't have to be better. Think of the story of the prodigal son. When the son even shows the slightest resemblance of coming back home to the father, the father runs to the son. He doesn't wait for him to come and say anything perfect. He doesn't even wait for him to explain what's happened. The father runs to the son, and that's how it will be if you call on his name. If you don't understand that and you're still not sure, seek out someone in this church. Seek out an elder. Seek out a friend. Help them. Say, I need help. I don't understand what this is all about. Seek them out. So in conclusion, finally, and I am so sorry, I probably will never get a chance to speak in this church again. Thank you for staying awake. I appreciate that. Let's talk horizontally, right? Vertically, us to God. But what about horizontally? How do we take this message? How do we be encouraged by the grace of God in our lives and help one another? Right? Let's look at 2 Corinthians 1, 3-7. This is Paul talking. For as we share abundantly in Christ's suffering, so through Christ we share abundantly in comfort too. If we are afflicted, it is for your comfort and salvation, and if we are comforted, it is for your comfort, which you experience when you patiently endure the same sufferings that we suffer." This is Paul talking now, not Peter, right? Suffering and graciousness and the comfort of God is a universal Christian concept, not just a Peter thing. Our hope for you is unshaken, for we know that you share in our sufferings, you will also share in our comfort." Listen, this is what I'm saying horizontally. If we know our sin, and we know the comfort and the grace of God in our lives to cover over that sin, and we know a brother or sister who's struggling with a weakness or a sin, and maybe you do, maybe you don't, maybe it's the same sin, maybe it's not the same sin. Let's comfort them. Let's comfort each other with the comfort that we've been given. The nature of that comfort is that we give it away, not that we keep it and hoard it to ourselves, but that we come alongside one another and comfort each other with the same comfort God has comforted us. Amen? Ah, there we go. All right, Carissa. So, and as we do that, as we comfort one another, we're going to grow in our love together for our Savior, right? We're going to grow in our love together with the fairest Lord Jesus. Amen. Let's pray. Oh, Father in heaven, we are indeed sinners, but we are sinners saved by grace. We look up because you lift our head We can live our lives, not because we can live our lives, but because you have faced tomorrow. And all fear is gone as a result of that. We pray as we go our separate ways here that you would work in all of our hearts, that your spirit would give us to meditate on the word as we've had it tonight, and that we would be eager to comfort one another with the comfort that you have comforted us. In Jesus' name we pray.