One of the servants of the high priest . . . said, "Did I not see you in the garden with Him?" Peter then denied again; and immediately a rooster crowed (John 18:26-27).
THEME
DEFEAT
Thinking about the muddled mess of mankind, Gordon DePree lamented in his book A TIME TO GROW, "People sometimes disappoint me, and there are times when I disappoint others. This hurts. Ideals fall. Dreams fade. The concepts of life I was carefully constructing suddenly crumble into a rubble-heap at my feet . . . and I sit in the ruins, wondering if there is anything right about life, or if I even care."
After Peter had denied Jesus three times, He knew that nothing was right about life. He had become a blundermouth beyond belief. With a few foolish words he had wrecked his life, becoming a heap of twisted metal at the feet of his fellow disciples. He had failed Jesus.
How Jesus dealt with Peter afterward is an example straight from God's body shop. Following the resurrection, Jesus reaffirmed His love for Peter. He evidently met with Peter alone (1 Corinthians 15:5) and later reminded him that He had a job for him--caring for God's children (John 21:17). No wonder Peter would later write that we can cast our cares upon Him because He really cares for us (1 Peter 5:7).
Even though we may be abandoned at the junkyard, Jesus is calling for a wrecker. He will lovingly restore us to mint condition.
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NOV 18
LUKE 22:31-34
"I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail" (Luke 22:32).
With cranberries, it's the bounce that counts. According to SCIENCE DIGEST, processing cranberries involves pouring freshly picked berries down a series of steplike boards. At each level, only those berries that bounce over an eight- to ten-inch barrier pass the test. Each berry gets eleven chances. Those that fail are discarded. Some fruits are judged by firmness and color, but the cranberry is distinguished by its ability to "bounce like a golf ball."
The strength of our faith can also be judged by our ability to bounce back after defeat. Although setbacks hurt, they allow us to show our underlying confidence in Christ. Our Lord's words to Simon Peter suggest this. Jesus knew Peter was about to trip over his own self-confidence and zeal. He knew that Peter, who said he was willing to die for his Lord, would soon deny Him. The beauty of Christ's response to Peter's denial was that He saw beyond it to the disciple's repentance. He assured Peter that He had prayed that his faith would not fail. In essence, He was saying, "You will bounce back after your fall."
This experience in Peter's life can encourage us. We have the advantage of Christ's work and prayers on our behalf, and this gives us the confidence that He Himself sustains us. We too can be useful again to Him, even after a hard fall. A spiritual reversal should not cause us to give up. It's the "bounce" of our faith and His forgiveness that are all-important.
--M.R.D.II
Defeat isn't bitter unless we swallow it.
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NOV 19
JOHN 21:15-19
And in those days Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples
(Acts 1:15).
Remorse deprives many Christians of the joy that should be theirs. A man in his middle years has withdrawn from the people in his church because he feels so bad about his past infidelity--a sin that broke up his home. An elderly woman needs counseling from time to time because she can't forget an affair she had more than fifty years ago. A young woman sees a psychiatrist because she can't forgive herself for having had an abortion. Each of these people is now a Christian, but each is paralyzed at times by remorse over the past.
If anyone ever had good reason for allowing the memory of a grievous sin to put him on the shelf, it was Peter. He had been such a coward. He had fled Gethsemane at Christ's arrest, and then denied three times that he knew the Lord Jesus. Later, he felt so bad that he wept bitterly. Yet he did not allow his remorse over past failures to make him ineffective in his service for Christ. He accepted the Lord's forgiveness, and he received new hope from Jesus' commission, "Feed my sheep." In Acts 1:15 we find him back in his role as the leader of the disciples. By taking Jesus' words of forgiveness to heart and by forgiving himself, he put the past under the blood of Christ.
As believers, when we confess our sin, we can leave it with Christ and forget it. Then we can move on to find a new way to serve Him. We need never let remorse remove our joy.
--H.V.L.
Christians should seek to erase from their memory the sins God has erased from their record.
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NOV 20
LUKE 22:54-62
Therefore let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall (1 Corinthians 10:12).
A frog placed in a pan of slowly heating water doesn't know he's being cooked. The body temperature of this little cold-blooded creature changes to correspond with the temperature of his surroundings, so he is unaware of his danger. Before he realizes that he's in boiling hot water, death overtakes him.
In much the same way, Peter's "spiritual crash" didn't just happen; it resulted from a gradual decline. The apostle yielded to circumstances that contributed to his downfall. In the upper room he was overconfident. Then, in the garden, he slept when he should have been praying. Failing to understand his Master's redemptive purpose, he resisted the idea that Jesus would have to suffer and die. As soldiers arrested Jesus, the apostle impulsively drew his sword and cut off the ear of the high priest's servant. Finally, gripped by fear when identified by a maid, he denied the Lord he loved.
We shouldn't regard Peter's dramatic denial of Christ as only a foreign, first-century failure. It reflects a trauma known all too well to those of us who have writhed in self-condemnation after being untrue to our Lord. And our failures, like Peter's, usually follow a gradual pattern of decline. That's why we must daily acknowledge our dependence on God and obey His Word. It's the only way to avoid the tragedy of a cold heart that gets us into hot water.
--M.R.D.II
Collapse in the Christian life is seldom a blowout; it is usually a slow leak.
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NOV 21
PHILIPPIANS 3:12-16
Forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward . . . , I press toward the goal (Philippians 3:13-14).
I am a twice-a-week golfer at most, so I don't play enough to perfect my swing or to master all the shots. In every round, I make mistakes. A drive goes astray. An iron shot splashes beautifully into the creek. Or a putt breaks left when I was sure it would break right.
For this reason, I like these words from THE TUMULT AND THE SHOUTING by Grantland Rice: "Because golf expresses the flaws of the human swing--a basically simple maneuver--it causes more self-torture than any game short of Russian roulette. The quicker the average golfer can forget the shot he has dubbed or knocked off line--and concentrate on the next shot--the sooner he begins to improve and enjoy golf. Little good comes from brooding about the mistakes we've made." Rice then commented, "The next shot, in golf or in life, is the big one."
In Philippians 3, the apostle Paul gave essentially the same advice. He said that the key to forward movement in the Christian life is to set our eyes on the goal and keep looking ahead. When we look back to our past sins or shortcomings, we open the door to discouragement.
When past sin gets us down, when we find ourselves brooding about it, or when we get discouraged because of some failure, we can confess it to God, claim His forgiveness, and put it behind us for good. In the Christian life, as in golf, the next shot is the big one.
--D.C.E.
We must never let defeat rob us of success.
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NOV 22
ROMANS 6:1-18
Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! (Romans 6:1-2).
Some Christians seem to give up trying to grow in difficult areas of their lives. They have suffered so many defeats that they think they will never make any progress. They react much like a city government that stands idle while blighted areas deteriorate.
Some cities are showing remarkable success in bringing new life and radical improvement to decayed sections. They label these areas "enterprise zones," a name that carries with it the idea of potential for vast upgrading through much time and effort. By looking at the problem through new eyes, they see it as an opportunity for constructive restoration rather than ongoing deterioration. This new attitude is bringing results.
Christians need a similar outlook. We too should begin to see our own areas of perennial failure as "enterprise zones," where focused prayer and concentrated effort can produce improvement. We need not live in spiritual defeat. No sin has the power to conquer us. Christ's death on the cross broke the stranglehold of sin, and it no longer has dominion over us (Ro 6:14).
When some sin has us in its destructive grasp, we should claim God's help, change our attitude about it, and turn our area of defeat into an "enterprise zone."
--D.C.E.
Don't let yesterday's failures hamper tomorrow's efforts.
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NOV 23
REVELATION 1:1-18
[Jesus] washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings (Revelation 1:5-6).
A picture of a gifted athlete sent to prison for using and selling illegal drugs made me sad. His friends said of him, "What a shame! Just think of the wealth and fame he could be enjoying if only he had kept himself clean!"
This man's failure to fulfill his potential pictures the whole human race. God made us in His image to obey Him, enjoy fellowship with Him, and rule over the earth for His glory. But because of our sinfulness, we don't obey Him as we should, enjoy Him as we ought, or rule over planet earth as we could. Immorality, crime, revolution, famine, international conflict, and potential nuclear holocaust continually remind us of our failure to live up to the potential the Lord built into us.
But thank God, that's not the whole story. He has provided a way to lift us individually from our moral failure and to elevate us to spiritual fulfillment. God became a member of the human family in the person of Jesus Christ, who lived a perfect life, died on the cross as our substitute, and rose from the grave. Now He forgives, accepts, and restores all who believe on Him. In fact, believers are now "kings," destined to rule with Christ (Rev 1:5-6).
When we suffer a shattering defeat we don't have to stay down. The gospel is good news. Through faith in Jesus, God gives us new life and begins to lift us from our failure to the fulfillment of His purpose for us.
--H.V.L.
Salvation makes useful saints out of useless sinners.
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NOV 24
GALATIANS 6:1-5
If a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one (Galatians 6:1).
A few years ago, an angry man rushed through the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam until he reached Rembrandt's famous painting "Nightwatch." Then he took out a knife and slashed it repeatedly before anyone could stop him. A short time later, a distraught, hostile man slipped into St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome with a hammer and began to smash Michelangelo's beautiful sculpture, The Pieta. Two cherished works of art were severely damaged. But what did officials do? Throw them out and forget about them? Absolutely not. Using the best experts, who worked with the utmost care and precision, they made every effort to restore the treasures.
Christians ought to have the same attitude toward believers whose testimony has been damaged by sin. When one of God's children falls into sin, our first and only thought should be to restore, not to condemn. Tenderly and compassionately we must pray and work to bring that one back to spiritual wholeness and fellowship within the body of Christ. The word RESTORE in Galatians 6:1 is the same word translated MEND in Matthew 4:21, where we read that James and John were mending their nets. It means "to make thoroughly fit." That should be the church's goal with any member overtaken in sin.
Condemning is easier than restoring. In disgust we may want to turn our backs on a sinning Christian. But the scriptural pattern is not for us to discard but to restore.
--D.C.E.
We can't expect others to see eye to eye with us if we look down on them.
