It certainly is wonderful to be here with all of you today and
we thank you for the presence of all that have come to be with
us. As Dave mentioned, we have
several of our number that are missing.
Several have come in, but we have quite a few that are either
traveling or sick and our prayers are with them.
But we have a good crowd because you're here and I have enjoyed
worshiping with you so far and I am honored to be your speaker.
We have visitors that are among us today.
We want to say you are honored guest and thank you for coming
and welcome. We're continuing our series on
the 40 days from the time that Jesus rose from the dead until
he was resurrected or ascended into heaven.
In Acts chapter one, we are continuing that series.
And last time I said that in this lesson at the very
beginning, I want to talk about what is the significance of the
40 days. In fact, we look in Bible
history and we find that the number 40 or 40 days or 40 years
actually had a little bit of significance.
So we want to notice what those things are, the significance of
40 days. First of all, in general, 40
days or years in the Bible signified a period of testing,
trial, purification, and preparation leading to a new
beginning, transformation, or a significant divine action.
I guess we could sum it up like this. 40 days in the Bible
actually marked a period of time of change.
That isn't a general sense. And I got to tell you I actually
had heard from one or read from one.
It was actually brought to my attention that 40 days marked a
period of change. And I thought, you know what, I
want to look into that. There's got to be more to it
than just a general change. So we want to talk about some of
those significant things. First of all, let's talk about
some examples in the Bible regarding 40 days.
And I got to say this too, this is not an exhaustive search.
There are others, but I just want to notice a few.
And the first one goes all the way back to Genesis chapter 6
regarding the flood. In Genesis chapter 6, the Bible
says the thoughts of man's heart were ever evil continually.
Now, just a little side note, as I've said many times over the
years, when people think that the world is worse than it's
ever been, no, it's not. Because in Genesis chapter 6
says the thoughts of man's heart were ever evil continually.
And I look at the world today, and even though there's some
negative stuff and even though there are some bad things in the
world, I get it. We're not there yet.
We're not at that point. There's a lot of wonderful
people and a lot of wonderful things that are in the world.
What happened in Genesis chapter 6?
God had enough and God said, I'm going to destroy the world by
wave of flood. He said, I'm going to make it
rain. It had never rained before.
Precipitation had come up from the ground.
And now God said, I'm going to make it rain.
So he says, Noah, what you're going to do is you're going to
build an ark. And it took over 100 years to
build this great big boat. And during that period of time,
a preacher by the name of Noah, a preacher of righteousness, the
Bible describes him preaches to those that were disobedient, and
God gave him 100 years to repent, and they never did.
So God made it rain for 40 days, 40 days and nights.
Regarding the flood symbolized a period of judgment and the
beginning of a new world. Here's another one.
How about Moses on Mount Sinai? Moses spent 40 days receiving
the 10 commandments, and after 40 days after the golden calf
incident, indicating A crucial period of divine instruction and
reconciliation, here's another one that we all know about.
How about Jonah and Nineveh? God told Jonah, go to the people
of Nineveh and you're going to preach to them a sermon of
repentance and met. And Jonah says, no, I'm not
doing that. Fast forward to the story.
We know the story, right? Great big fish swallows him.
He prays. And finally when he's in the
belly of this great fish, he says, I will do whatever you ask
me to do. And then God spoke to the great
fish. He spat him out on dry ground.
And as an old preacher said one time Jonah hit the beach ready
to preach. He preaches.
A5 Hebrew word sermon 8 words in English.
You know what it is yet 40 days and Nineveh shall be overthrown.
God gave Nineveh 40 days to repent.
It was a period of judgment leading to a potential
deliverance. And by the way, universal
repentance had and God spared the people.
What about this? What about when our Lord was
tempted? After his baptism, Jesus fasted
and was tempted for 40 days in the wilderness, preparing him
for his public ministry. Again, a time of change.
And finally, in our series, the post Resurrection 40 Days, Jesus
appeared to his disciples during the 40 days after his
resurrection and before his ascension.
And it was a time of confirming his victory and equipping them
for their mission. All right, just a couple
examples there. What about the theological
significance of 40 days? When I'm talking about
theological significance, I'm talking about what is the actual
importance or meaning behind the concept.
From a theological standpoint, these periods marked a
significant transition of change from one state or task to
another and a preparation for new life or purpose.
OK, so here's my point or my question.
If all of these things, and that's the theological
significance of it, is there divine action or is it by
coincidence? Was there divine action and what
was it? Yes, there was divine action and
here it is. 40 day periods are often associated with direct
divine action or a major divine event such that the giving of
the law or the confirmation of the resurrection, God's divine
action. But I got to make this point,
OK? Don't put too much significance
or too much weight on the significance of a number in the
Bible. Give you an example.
There's a lot of people that spend a lot of time on
numerology, OK? And it's the idea if you take
certain numbers and you put them together, you put it together
with mathematical equations and you come up with numerology.
And numerology is supposed to represent specific outcomes
based on those numbers. What I'm saying is, is please
get this, Sometimes a number is just a number and there's no
significance at all in the specific number except what
happened during that period of time.
Give you an example, but numerology and too much
significance about numbers. You might remember this.
I was thinking about this this morning, early this morning in
my office looking over my lesson and I thought about Tina and I
were having our anniversary. We are we are anniversaries in
May. So this last May was would have
been nine years since this happened, but I remember there
was a man, you might have heard his name, his name was Harold
Camping and he was from Southern California.
And what he did by way of numerology or what he did by way
of the significance of numbers, he actually put together various
numbers from the Scriptures and he came up with an actual day
that Jesus was going to come back.
You know, what was going to happen nine years ago, still not
back. What does the Bible say?
The Bible says nobody knows that time.
Jesus says no one knows but my father only.
But this was a man that decided, you know what, I've got the
mathematical equation. It's going to happen on that
day. People sold their possessions,
well meaning, wonderful people misled, and they sold their
possessions. They went to a mountaintop and
you know what happened at the end of the day?
They walked back down and the Lord still hadn't come back.
You know what the man said? I was right, but I just missed a
couple of numbers. So here's the new date with the
new numbers. You know what happened?
He didn't come back where we are today.
The man's dead and the Lord still hasn't come back.
My point is this, don't put too much significance on the number
itself and trying to map out when things are going to happen
in the Bible or in life based upon a number.
Sometimes a number is just a number including the number 40.
So what is significant about 40 then all that's significant is
is God made the choice to choose this period of time to
accomplish a specific purpose in Bible history.
With that being said, as we know Jesus made 10 post resurrection
appearances in our series. I'm going to be brief about
this. Luke 24 is where it all began.
Jesus on the early on that morning.
On the resurrection morning, those two disciples are on the
road to a mess. Jesus joins them on that road to
a mess. They go to their house 7 miles
later after Jesus preaches A sermon from the Old Testament
about himself. They don't know who it is.
They don't know that it's Jesus. The Bible actually says in the
King James, their eyes were holding that they did not know
him. So there was something
miraculous there where Jesus did not reveal it was him, but he
preached the word from the Old Testament and they understood
about the resurrection from the Scriptures.
They get to Emmaus. Jesus acts as though he's going
to keep on going by. They compelled him to come into
their home. They invited Jesus into their
home. He reveals himself in the
breaking of bread to them and now they know it's Jesus.
What happens? Jesus vanishes from their sight,
He disappears, they get up immediately and they go back to
Jerusalem, 7 miles, and they meet with 10 disciples.
Why? Why 10?
There were 12 apostles. Judas is now dead, He hanged
himself and Thomas was not present.
What happened next? One week later he meets again in
Jerusalem. Jesus does, he appears and now
Thomas is present. And finally, the last time in
our series, Jesus, is there an unspecified amount of time
between this occurrence and this occurrence here.
All of a sudden, Peter and six others were on a fishing boat
and Jesus is on the shore and he calls out to them.
You got any fish? They've been out there all night
and they caught nothing, right? Remember, remember that lesson?
The net was on the left side. Jesus says put it on the right
side and they and they catch 153 fish.
When Peter recognizes Jesus, he puts on his outer garment
because his T-shirt didn't have T-shirts but his undergarment.
He didn't feel like it was appropriate to go meet the Lord
with only his undergarment. So he throws on his over garment
and he dives into the water and he swims 100 yards to shore.
They have breakfast at the sea, same setting.
And now we come to our lesson today where Jesus is going to
restore Peter. Before we get into the rest, the
restoration of Peter, though, let's talk about his denial.
Peter was very bold. And if you look at all the
Gospel accounts, there's a lot of detail.
And we're not going to get into the detail.
I'm going to give you 4 general things, or three actually three
general things here in the denial of Peter, when Peter
denied Jesus. But just remember, Peter was
very bold and he told Jesus, I don't care who will deny you, I
will never deny you. And Jesus, said Peter, before
the rooster crows, you'll deny me three times.
We all know that Peter is following Jesus from afar.
The King James says, the new King James says he followed
Jesus from a great distance. By the way, let me just kind of
slip this in as a little aside. It's dangerous to follow Jesus
from a distance. Jesus wants us to follow him
close up and not from afar. And yet a lot of times people
follow Jesus kind of on their own terms and from a distance.
It didn't work well with Peter, but I got to say this about
Peter, though. Let's give him a little credit.
At least Peter was the one guy that had enough love for the
Lord and concern from the Lord to at least follow in the
direction of the Lord when everybody else forsook him and
fled. He's already been arrested in
the garden and now all of a sudden here's Peter from a
distance. Jesus said you'll deny me.
Notice what happened to Peter? First there was a servant girl.
And by the way, He was ready to come and fight when he took out
the sword and he cut off Malchus's ear, and that was in
the garden when they came to arrest him.
He's ready for that one. But what about this little
servant girl here? She says to him.
She says the word. She says you were with Jesus of
Galilee. In other words, you are one of
them. Notice the progression of his
denials. You know what he says first
thing, I don't know what you're talking about.
I'm going to tell you something. If you think and you're all
honest with yourself and we're all all honest with ourself and
I think we can see the progression and the human side
and how this really could happen.
Maybe not necessarily with regards to the Lord, but maybe
with regards to telling the truth, maybe with regards to
holding things back, maybe with regards to not being having the
courage and the conviction to do what's right.
Sometimes we fall into this category.
We can. It's just a human thing.
The first thing he says is I don't know what you're talking
about. I don't know what you're saying.
The second time the Bible says there was another girl and now
he's in the gateway. Before he was outside in the
courtyard, still following from afar.
Now he's in the gateway and here comes another girl.
And the girl says you were with Jesus of Nazareth.
This one said you're a Jesus of Galilee.
This one says you're a Jesus of Nazareth.
And what does he say this time? He says with an oath, I do not
know the man. Wow.
My father taught me so many times, be careful of the man
that you want to be. You just might be it.
And #2 you got to decide in advance what your decision is
going to be in advance if you want to make the right choice.
Because when you're confronted with something that's difficult
and you're not prepared, you may make the wrong choice.
First one, I don't know what you're saying.
Second one, with an oath, I don't know the man.
Third time, here's another. Matthew's account says, but when
you put all the Gospel accounts together, you know what we find?
There was another guy, and he's a relative of the guy Malchus,
that Peter cut off his ear. He's a relative.
And you know what that person says?
Your speech betrays you. You are one of his.
They got him dead to rights and notice with cursing and
swearing, he says. I do not know the man.
Then the rooster crowed, and then the Lord took turned and
looked at Peter. I don't know what that was like,
but I'm setting something up here.
I'm setting something up that's very important.
Let me ask you a question. Don't you think that Peter,
right now, Right then the rooster crowed.
The Lord looked at Peter. Let me ask you, do you think he
was overcome with grief? Do you think he was overcome
with tremendous regret? The Bible says that's exactly
what happened in Matthew 26 and 7 and 75.
Notice and Peter remembered, You know what I thought about.
And by the way, we're all human, we all make mistakes.
We all have things in our life that sometimes we make the wrong
choice. I get it.
But sometimes isn't it true that we can kind of get ourselves
derailed and get off into something and we're not thinking
about the Lord? We're doing something we know is
not right, but the last thing we're thinking about is the
Lord. We're thinking about the
pleasure of the sin that we're involved in.
We're thinking about the decision that we're making.
We're thinking about the joys of it.
Whatever it is, you plug it in. We're just thinking about
something else. Then something happens and we
remember and we remember, and it's like we got hit in the face
with a ton of bricks. You ever have that happen?
I have. What did he remember?
The word of Jesus, who had said to him before the rooster crows,
You will deny me three times. What happened as a result?
He went out and he wept bitterly.
Please get this. This was genuine sorrow.
You know, the word wept in the Bible is found in a number of
different places. Sometimes weeping is described
in one way, like an outward sign or a wailing, like those
professional mourners that came when Lazarus was raised from the
dead and Jesus was disgusted with their hypocrisy.
It was the outward wailing. Some cultures do that when they
mourn, they wail out loud. Or how about the word wept?
The shortest verse in the Bible. Beautiful, beautiful verse.
And you know what's beautiful about it?
Jesus knew he was going to raise Lazarus from the dead all along.
And yet when you saw Mary and Martha weeping and in pain,
that's the friend of Jesus that we have.
By the way, Jesus wept that word.
Wept different word. It means to shed silent tears.
That was heartfelt tears. What about this one?
He wept bitterly. You ever do that?
Have you ever ugly cried? We were talking about that the
other night. Ugly cry.
You know what that means? When your face is distorted,
you're so overwrought. Sometimes there's no sound at
all. Just your face is distorted and
you're just crying and you're just in such agony and pain.
That's kind of how I picture this phrase.
He wept bitterly. Here's the point.
It was genuine sorrow. There's a difference between
genuine sorrow and not so genuine sorrow.
Let me show you what I mean. The apostle Paul said this
Second Corinthians 7 verse 10 for godly sorrow produces
repentance leading to salvation. That's beautiful.
And then he says, by the way, that kind of godly sorrow that
produces repentance that leads to salvation, it's not to be
regretted. You will never regret that kind
of sorrow. Godly sorrow, hold that thought.
We'll get to how you actually do.
Godly sorrow, hold that thought. But let's lose this one.
But the sorrow of the world produces death.
What is the sorrow of the world? I'm going to give you 2
examples. Both are referring, by the way,
whether it's godly sorrow or the sorrow of the world is referring
to the same thing, sin. So two things.
What is the soul of the world #1 when you're not really sorry,
you're just sorry. You got caught.
There was no other way out. You got, you're dead.
The rights, you kind of regret it, but you're sorry you got
caught. That's number one.
But #2 maybe you haven't thought of this one.
Number two, you have great regret for what you've done.
You're not just sorry you got caught.
You have tremendous regret, but you do nothing about it and
there is no repentance. Perfect example.
Judas Iscariot. You know the story.
I'm not going into it. What happened to Judas Iscariot?
Tremendous regret. He took the money back.
He said I can't take the money. I betrayed it and said blood.
You know what they said? That's your problem.
You see to it. Notice what happened.
It led to what it produced, death.
He went out and hung himself physically.
It produced spiritual death, which means, by the way, the
Bible says about Judas. Then he went to his own place.
That is figurative language, meaning he got exactly what was
coming to him. Why?
He had the sorrow of the world. He had regret, but he never
repented. OK flip side, here's the good
thing. God be sorrow is when you have
sorrow over your sin, when you realize you have sinned against
God. How about David when he sinned
with Bathsheba? How about the whole story of
David's sin? Remember what David says, he
prays to God and he says, Father, he says against you and
you only have I sinned and done evil in this, in your sight.
What happened to David? He repented.
It was godly sorrow. It led to salvation.
See the difference? Knowing that, let's Fast forward
from the denial to the morning of the resurrection.
I love this passage. Remember when those precious
women just couldn't stay away? The Sabbath was now over and
they went back early that Sunday morning to the sepulchre.
And when they became first hand eyewitness testimony of the
resurrection of Jesus, there is no that was on purpose.
God did that. They had no axe to grind.
They had no agenda. Those precious women, here they
come. It wasn't the men.
The men chickened out. They all forsook them and fled.
They had no clue what was going on.
But the women went back. Beautiful, right?
Do you remember when the Angel spoke to the women?
Mark 16 and 7. But go tell his disciples and
Peter, you know, I've heard this interpreted like this when I was
a kid, somebody said, well, what Jesus was doing is he was saying
go tell my disciples. And then and Peter, meaning
Peter wasn't one of the disciples anymore because of
what Peter did, That is not what he's doing.
Peter had denied the Lord three times.
Peter had gone and wept bitterly.
If Peter was overcome with the sin that he committed, if there
was anybody in the world that needed encouragement, it was
Peter. If there was anyone that needed
divine assurance, it was Peter. And that assurance, I think, is
threefold. Number one, that Peter, you are
not forgotten #2 you're still part of God's plan and #3 and
most importantly, you are forgiven.
I'm going to tell you something, folks.
Sometimes our guilt can be incapacitating and sometimes we
are so guilty about things that we do and we can't turn loose of
it that it actually stymies us or keeps us from moving forward
in a positive direction. You know what the Angel of the
Lord said? He said exactly what Jesus
wanted him to say on behalf of Jesus.
You go tell his disciples. And Peter.
Peter was mentioned specific. OK, but remember please, there's
a difference between forgiveness and reconciliation.
In Mark chapter 16 and verse 7 it shows that the Lord had
forgiven Peter. OK, he forgave him, but in John
chapter 1 Jesus restored his relationship with him.
Please notice. Remember Peter declared even
though others would deny Jesus, I never would.
He was the first one to do it. Jesus forgave him, but when
Peter was restored, notice how the Lord did it in John chapter
21 and verse 15. So when they had eaten
breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, Simon son of Jonah, do
you love me more than these? You love me more than these.
OK, By the way, what's these? Some scholars say that these
meant the other disciples, that Jesus is sitting there eating
the meal with them and they just got through eating all of a
sudden, hey Peter, do you love me more than these guys?
That's one interpretation. Second interpretation is that
Jesus was asking him, Peter, fisherman, big fisherman Peter
that just caught 153 fish, do you love me more than your
fishing business? That's another interpretation
about this. Lot of discussion about what
he's talking about regarding that and the reason for the
fishing business goes back to Matthew chapter 4, beginning in
verse 18. And Jesus walking by the Sea of
Galilee, saw two brothers. Simon called Peter, Andrew's
brother, casting a net into the sea, for they were fishermen.
Then he said, follow me and I will make you fishers of men.
What happened? They immediately left their Nets
and followed him. So the interpretation of this is
supported by the fact that they were fisherman, Peter was a
fisherman, they had just got through fishing all that, and he
wants to know, do you love me more than my fishing business?
And while that is included, I think there's a little bit more.
One scholar said it this way. We are sure from the structure
of the sentence, both in the English and in the Greek, that
the word these refers to the fishes and things of light
character. So in other words, Jesus was
asking Peter if he loved him more than he loved the things of
the flesh. That's pretty specific, isn't
it? I got to ask you, do you love
Jesus? Don't answer out loud, answer
inside, but by the demonstration of what you do in your life by
way of your choices. Let me just ask you one
question. Let me ask all of us this
question. Do you love the Lord more than
these, or is the Lord secondary? Is he third?
I remember a famous football coach, Bill Parcells.
He said, look, I understand that in people's lives there's three
things. Faith, family, football.
If you're a professional football player, he said, I
don't care what order that they're in, but football better
be one of the three. Here's what I'm saying.
I don't care what two and three are.
It doesn't matter. Actually.
Family needs to be #2 and then after that, I don't really care
what that is in your life, but #1 needs to be the Lord.
And that's demonstrated, and Jesus is going to prove it.
So in our passage, the question is asked, Peter, do you love me
more than the things of the flesh?
He said, yes, Lord, you know that I love you.
So that was a verbal profession of his love.
Here's the big point here. Peter professed his love for the
Lord three times equal to the number of times he denied the
Lord. That's not by happenstance or
that's not by coincidence, but the Lord gave three ways to
demonstrate it. So in other words, it wasn't
enough for him to say, I love you, Lord, He says, Jesus says
this, OK, He said to him, prove it, feed my lambs, OK?
Some commentators say that there's really not a significant
difference between lambs and sheep, but in my study of it, I
think that there is a little bit of a distinction.
Lambs seems to emphasize spiritual youth or the tender
ones of the flock, as one scholar put it.
In other words, he said, do you love me more than the things of
this world? Do you love me more than the
things of the flesh, which include your business?
He said, yes, Lord, you know that I love you.
He said, I'll tell you what you're going to do.
You're going to feed or teach my lamps, teach my little ones,
teach my new Christians, teach the spiritual youth or the
tender ones of the flock #2 He said to him a second time,
Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?
He said, yes, Lord, you know that I love you.
He said, tend my sheep. So what's the word tend mean?
What's it mean to tend the sheep?
From a spiritual perspective, Kaufman says it means taking
care of and nurturing the spiritual body of Christ.
In other words, he says, do you love me?
Prove it, feed my lambs, do you love me?
Prove it, tend my sheep. And #3 #3 He said to him a third
time, Simon, son of Jonah, do you love me?
And Peter was greed, because he said to him a third time, Do you
love me? And he said to him, Lord, you
know all things. You know that I love you.
And then Jesus says, feed my sheep.
I want to notice this phrase or this, these two words. 1/3 time.
We already talked about the significance 3 * 4 three times.
We get that Kauffman says it this way, though.
Grievous as this was for Peter, it wiped out all the guilt of
his denials, and the Savior's total forgiveness is implicit in
the threefold charge to care for the members of the Lord's
Kingdom. OK, now remember this, please.
When we sin, we don't sin against the list of rules.
We don't sin against the code. We sin against the Lord.
And when we sin, sin separates. It separates our relationship.
And the beauty of it is when it comes to sin and our
relationship with the Lord, it doesn't have to be permanent
when our relationship gets severed by way of sin.
Like David when he prayed against you and you only have I
sinned and done this evil in your sight.
His repentance made it made him be reconciled back to God in his
relationship. So when our relationship gets
severed with God because of sin, we need to be reconciled and
that requires repentance. Jesus wanted to assure him of
his full and complete forgiveness, but for that to
happen, Peter had to repent. Peter did repent.
So in summary, do you love me more than the things of the
flesh? He said yes, Lord, you know that
I love you. He says prove it, show me, teach
the youth of the flock. The spiritual youth asked a
second time, in general, do you love me?
He said, you know that I love you.
He said, show me, nurture the spiritual body of Christ, take
care of them. A third time in general, do you
love me? You know that I love you.
He says then teach the body, notice, teach the spiritual
youth, nurse the spiritual body, and teach the body of Christ.
He gave him three ways to demonstrate his love for him.
Three times Peter had denied the Master.
Three times the Master questioned his love.
Three times it gives him courage concerning his work.
The question was painful. Peter was grieved, but the grief
was wholesome, and Peter's subsequent life bore proof of
the discipline. His rashness was forever gone.
I love that. Now I'm going to tell you how
many times in our life now, let me just say it like this.
How many times in our life have we known someone that turned
their back on the Lord and stop following Jesus because life got
hard? I've known a lot of people
because life got difficult, so they decided to turn their back
on the only one that can help. I've seen that all my life.
Jesus had Peter confess his love for him.
Then he gave him a threefold responsibility, and then he said
this in the next verse. Please get this.
Most assuredly I say to you, when you were younger, you
girded yourself and walked where you wished.
In other words, there was a time when you were physically strong
and you know, no doubt Peter was strong and athletic.
Athletic prowess. By the way, remember when they
ran and sprinted back to the tomb?
Athletic guy, when you were younger, you did whatever you
wanted. And by the way, those of us that
are getting a little older, OK, I'm going to be 59 next month.
I am slower than I've ever been and they tell me all the ones
that have silver hair, it gets worse.
It's coming, I get it. But I remember when I was
younger, you do whatever you want, right?
With regards to Peter, what Jesus was saying is there was a
time when you were younger that you were willing to go and able
to go anywhere you wanted, even to the point of even defending
yourself. That's what your life was.
But there's coming a time when things are going to change.
Notice. But when you are old, you will
stretch out your hands. By the way, Greek writers and
early Christians all referred to that phrase stretching out your
hands as a form of crucifixion. That's what the verbiage
actually means. Now, I wasn't there, so I don't
know for sure, but I'm just going to say we all know what
tradition says. We all know that tradition holds
that during the reign of Nero that Peter was crucified, and
writings of ancients have written that he was crucified
headlong or head down or upside down.
Because he said I'm not worthy to be crucified like my Lord, so
crucify me upside down. Tradition tells us that.
Well, regardless of that or not, because that doesn't say in the
Scriptures. What we do know is this.
You will stretch out your hands. That's a form of crucifixion.
That's what that means. And another will gird you and
carry you where you do not wish. What's it mean?
This He spoke signifying what? Death.
He will glorify God. You're going to glorify God even
in your death. So when we think that maybe
we're going to have some hard stuff, Peter's told this is what
you're going to do. This is what you're going to
sacrifice. This is how you're going to
demonstrate your love for me. And by the way, when it's all
said and done, you're going to die of violent death for it, and
you're going to glorify God in that very fact.
Then he said this. The Lord said it doesn't matter,
follow me anyway. Follow me.
Anyway, let me ask you a question.
Do you love the Lord today, or do you just love the Lord when
things are going as you would like it to go?
Do you love the Lord even if he says no?
Do you love the Lord? When things in your life are not
the way that you have planned them out to be, and you are met
with catastrophe and you're met with hard times and you're met
with suffering, will you still love him?
You know what Jesus said? It doesn't matter all this
stuff, Peter, that's a command. Follow me.
I think the Lord's saying the same thing to us today too.
Even if you're persecuted, even if you suffer greatly, follow
me. It's kind of like the words that
were given to the persecuted church in Revelation 2 and verse
10. Smyrna, do not fear.
Jesus said any of the things that are about to suffer.
Indeed, the devil is about to throw some of you into prison,
that you may be tested and you will have tribulation 10 days.
But be faithful until death, and I will give you a crown of life.
And as you know, that phrase, be faithful until death means be
faithful even if it means your death.
That's what he was telling Peter.
Be faithful and follow me. It is going to mean your death,
but do it anyway. Oh, and I love it.
Peter wasn't perfect, but he never looked back.
This is often times called the second conversion of Peter.
And I'm going to tell you that's beautiful.
You know why? Because that shows me that it
doesn't matter what happens in your life.
You can turn it around. Anybody can turn it around.
He wasn't perfect, but he never stopped serving God.
And let me just say this to all of us and let this be an example
of encouragement for every one of us today, OK?
And I say this in in closing, it doesn't matter what you did in
the past. All that matters is what you do
now. That's it.
All that matters is what you do now.
And when you've been forgiven, you have a clean slate like it
never happened. So move forward.
And if God has forgiven you of something that you hold and you
still have guilt over, lay it down.
If the Lord's laid it down, you lay it down, and you move
forward and be better in the future than you've been in days
gone by. And if you've made some bad
choices, then use those choices to go talk to other people.
Use those examples from your life, and go help somebody else
be better, be better. All right, Finally, this is the
7th post resurrection appearance.
This was now over #8's coming in an unspecified amount of time
frame. Later it's going to happen back
in Galilee again, and Jesus will give the Great Commission.
That was the 8th post resurrection appearance.
Thank you so much for your kind listening today.
You've been a wonderful audience and I appreciate that so very
much. My hope and prayer is that
something was said that was edifying and encouraging to you
in some way. And I hope that we can leave and
courage realizing that, you know, sometimes in our life we
can really relate to Peter. Peter was a human being that
made a mistake. But when he was forgiven, the
Lord didn't hold it against him forever.
Again, he laid it aside. It was over.
I love that. Are you here today and you're
not a child of God? The steps to become a child of
God are very simple. We always extend an invitation
to someone that's not a Christian.
We never know the hearts and minds of those that are present.
The plan of salvation is simple. Romans 10/17 says you got to
hear the word of God. So then faith comes by hearing
and hearing by the word of God. Then we have a choice to make.
We got to believe with all your heart.
Hebrews 11 and 6. Without faith it's impossible to
please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and
that He is a rewarder of those who diligently seek Him.
Then what? Here's that word we talked about
today. You got to repent of your sins.
Make a change. I'm not going to follow the way
I'm going anymore. I'm going to turn to follow the
Lord. Truly these times of ignorance
God overlooked, but now commands all men everywhere to repent.
Then we must be willing to make the great confession that Jesus
Christ is the Son of God. Acts 837 that Philip said, if
you believe with all your heart, you may.
And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ is the
Son of God. All of these steps point towards
salvation, but the point of salvation is by being baptized
for the remission of sins. Mark 1616.
He who believes and is baptized will be saved, but he who does
not believe will be condemned. Finally, is it necessary?
First Peter 321 the like figure where the even baptism does also
now save us, not the putting away the filth of the flesh, but
the answer of a good conscience toward God by the resurrection
of Jesus Christ. If you've never taken those
steps of obedience, we would love to assist you in that
today. Maybe there is someone that has
taken those steps, but there's something that's on your heart,
something that's in your life that is not what it should be.
Then repent of that. Confess that we'll pray with you
and for you and God will forgive and restore.
If you want to be the class, come forward while we stand and
while we sing.