Lessons at the Feet of Failure

Chapter 22. If you have been
with us in the past several weeks, we have done some jumping around.
We won’t do quite as much today. I do have a couple of different
references, but you can trust your bulletin. We will be almost
exclusively in Luke’s Gospel chapter 22 this morning. The passage it will be considering
is there in the bulletin with plenty of place for notes. Several weeks ago, we read from
the book of Isaiah chapter 53, which verse frames a very appropriate
framework and commentary on these sections that we’re considering.
We come to Isaiah 53 as worshipers when we hear who has believed
our message and to whom is the arm of the Lord been revealed?
For he grew up before him like a tender shoot and like a root
out of parched ground. He has no stately form or majesty
that we should look upon him, nor appearance that we should
be attracted to him. He was despised. And forsaken
of men. A man of sorrows and acquainted
with grief. And like one from whom men hide
their faces. He was despised. And when we
read those verses, I would say that most of us assume that what
Isaiah was referring to there would be the rejection of God’s
people, Israel, the rejection of the Savior by him, despised
and forsaken. And certainly it would include
also those heathen soldiers And that heathen court system that
sentenced him to death and the heathen rulers, the godless rulers
that just treated him as a common criminal. But few, if any of
us would ever think that we would be in that mix. But I would say
that Peter is our representative. And Peter is our representative
there in the midst of this scene. despised and forsook the Lord
Jesus. In reality, that’s what happened.
And as we come to these verses, we struggle to even figure out
why they would be included. But they are included and they
have a lesson for us. If you would, I want to begin
in verse 54. Luke chapter 22. Having arrested him, they led
him away and brought him to the house of the high priest that
Peter was following at a distance. After they had kindled a fire
in the middle of the courtyard and had sat down together, Peter
was sitting among them. And a servant girl, seeing him
as he sat in the firelight and looking intently at him, said,
This man was with him, too. But he denied it, saying, Woman,
I do not know him. A little later, another saw him
and said, You are one of them, too. But Peter said, Man, I am
not. After about an hour had passed,
another man began to insist, saying, Certainly this man also
was with him, for he is a Galilean too. But Peter said, Man, I do
not know what you are talking about. And immediately while
he was still speaking, a rooster crowed. The Lord turned and looked
at Peter. And Peter remembered the word
the Lord The word of the Lord, how he had said to him before
a rooster crows today, you will deny me three times. And he went
out and wept bitterly. We struggle to find out why or
to think of why these verses of all would be included. Why
such a sad? Report. On such a difficult episode in
the life of even this. Struggling apostle, why would
this be included and not just Luke’s gospel, but all four gospels? All four gospels, and I don’t
think to repudiate Peter in any regard include this passage,
all four of them. One pastor writing about this
scene said, it is remarkable and significant that the story
of the denials should have been recorded at all. When the Gospels
were written, Peter was regarded as the leading apostle, the chief
man in the church. It would have been very natural
to pass over in silence this man’s fall from grace, but all
four Gospels included. They do not pardon me. They do
not do this by way of demoting Peter, for in due course, he
repented, was reinstated and continued in a position of leadership.
But the church knew that its leader was a fallible sinner,
like all others, and that he had a dreadful fall. The church
knew also that he had repented and by the grace of God had gone
on to greater things. When you stand back from any
passage of Scripture, you say, now, why would God have included
this? And like so much of the rest
of this gospel, we stand back and we see pretty quickly why
the Lord included it. These things were written for
our instruction. And Peter’s fall is, in a sense,
our fall. Had we been there, we would have
done likely the same thing if we had not already scattered
like the other apostles. Another set of this passage,
it is a passage which is deeply humbling to the pride of man
because Peter’s one of us, right? But it is singularly instructive
to true Christians. The fall of Peter has been a
beacon to the church. It is the warning to many of
similar calamity. It is a passage which supplies
strong proof that the Bible is inspired and Christianity is
from God. If Christianity had been the
invention of uninspired men, its first historians would have
never told us that one of the most prominent leaders had denied
his master, not once, but three times. Let’s go to the passage,
if we could. Well, first of all, we see Peter’s
shame And we pick it up in verse 54
of Luke’s Gospel, where he says, having arrested him, they led
him away and brought him to the house of the high priest and
Peter. But Peter was following at a distance. That word arrested is a violent
word. It implies violence and includes all that is implied
in taking someone into custody. They literally seized him. And
often was the case, even down to our day, the hands were bound
behind the back of the prisoner. Matthew says that when they had
seized the Lord Jesus, they led him away to Caiaphas. John’s
Gospel offers us some even greater detail, and for that, I’d like
you to turn briefly to John’s Gospel, chapter 18. Matthew tells us they took him
to Caiaphas’s house, Luke just says, to the house of the high
priest. And that needs some explaining.
It will take a moment to do that, because in John’s gospel, we
pick it up in verse 12. We get even some seemingly contrasting
detail. In verse 12, John records, so
the Roman cohort and the commander and officers of the Jews arrested
Jesus and bound him and led him to Annas first. For he was the
father-in-law of Caiaphas, who was high priest that year. Now,
the problem is this. Was it to Caiaphas or was it
to Annas or was it to the high priest? Now, literally speaking,
Caiaphas was the high priest that year. When the Romans would
come in and conquer a country, they would allow the existing
governmental structure often to stand. That allowed stability. But because of that, they would
have to very carefully exercise caution on especially the court
system and how things took place so that the government couldn’t
be destabilized by the courts in making contrasting decisions. So the Roman government allowed
this fairly good deal of latitude, but they decided that they wanted
to have their own players in place. Annas had been the high
priest, and he had been followed by a number of sons and others. And Rome, when they came in,
decided that no Caiaphas would be our servant. And even though
Caiaphas was the official high priest, Annas remained recognized
as such. One commentator detailed it like
this. Caiaphas was the son-in-law of
Annas who had long been the high priest himself and was succeeded
by five sons and this son-in-law. All of these were Sadducees.
All of them were greatly disliked by the Pharisees. Annas and Caiaphas
were both regarded as high priests. Annas still in the popular estimation
of the people as holding the office. But Caiaphas was the
only one recognized by the Romans. The character of Caiaphas, we’ll
come to see. We’ve seen glimpses of it reading
through the Gospel of John, a shrewd, self-seeking, selfish and unscrupulous
man. We’ll come back to Caiaphas shortly.
But this trial, as it begins to unfold, has several parts,
several scenes, if you will, There is a Jewish element to
the trials and there is the Roman element. Because while the Jews
would take care of all the little details, ultimately the death
penalty was in the hand of the Romans. The trials unfold like
this in the Gospels. First, the examination, and that
really is all that we can call what takes place before Annas,
is an informal examination. information gathering, if you
will, an interview that takes place in John 18 and elsewhere,
where we’ll get some detail and then the sentence of an informal
session of the Sanhedrin. This was all of the Jewish leaders
combined together that would issue forth an edict on the Lord
Jesus. But it was done at night and
those kinds of things were illegal if done at night. And so they
had to put a rubber stamp on it with an official gathering
of the Sanhedrin the next day. That takes place later on in
Luke’s gospel and also in Matthew’s. And then there are Roman trials,
as it were, as well. interspersed with these following
along. First is the examination before
Pilate, which Matthew includes in chapter 27, that he refers
Jesus to Herod in Luke 23. And then in the final scene,
we have him again before Pilate, which is really Jesus final pronouncement
to death. The problem is this. Jesus case
was difficult as one lays out. The Jews saw him as guilty of
a religious crime, but the Romans, who alone had the power to impose
the death sentence, would not recognize this as a crime. They could be induced to execute
Jesus only by a demonstration. That he had committed some serious
offense, and so the Jews literally need to trump up a charge against
the Lord. The Jewish authorities came to
condemn Jesus according to their own law. They brought a charge
before the Roman governor that was not the real grievance, but
one that would ultimately induce pilots to crucify the Lord. Ultimately, you see, Jesus was
condemned by the Sanhedrin because of his claim to be the son of
God. That’s what they that was their main concern, remember?
And he was condemned by the Roman authorities, namely Pilate, because
he claimed to be the king of the Jews. You see, the Jews had
to find some way to make this a capital offense. Even still, with all this creativeness,
there were all kinds of illegalities in this so-called court, these
trials that took place. They were to be held during the
day. These weren’t. They were to reach a verdict
during the daytime. That was not the case with these.
And in almost every angle, these courts are seen as illegitimate,
even according to their own laws. And so Jesus goes to court. Jesus
is hauled off, bound with his hands likely behind his back
to a so-called court. In verse 54 of Luke’s Gospel,
if you turn back there now, we pick up some additional detail
from Luke, where he begins to tie Peter into this story or
back into this story. The last we heard of Peter, he
was flailing his sword about, aiming at a soldier’s head. Perhaps
he glanced the helmet, perhaps he glanced the sword. Ultimately,
he cut off the ear of this soldier. Which Jesus quickly healed. And
then was arrested. In verse 54, Luke says, having
arrested him, they led him away and brought him to the house
of the high priest. But Peter. Sad words, disappointing
words. Because Peter had just as we
just read in John’s Gospel, Peter had just said that he was willing
to die with Christ. And when it says that they arrested
him and led him away and brought him into the house of the high
priest, the most logical thing in the world would be and Peter,
too, and the rest of the apostles as well. But it doesn’t say that
they wanted Christ. And Peter stood in the background
and followed them at a distance, partly through fear, partly through
shame, Having, in a sense, already begun to deny Christ, partly
through some kind of loyalty, it pressed him to follow on,
and partly, and this is saddest of all, through curiosity, as
we’ll see in a moment. He just wanted to see what really
was going to happen. Back, if you will, to John’s
Gospel, chapter 18, where John adds some interesting detail
about how Peter, of all people, How Peter would be admitted into
the court of the high priest. These courtyards were such that
the house was literally built around the courtyard, all of
the rooms, all of the the the windows faced the courtyard,
so that it was a kind of a garden in the midst of the house. But gaining entry was difficult
to these because there was usually one entrance. And it was a gated
entrance. And John gives us details to
how Peter, of all people, gained entrance into this courtyard,
the courtyard of the high priest. This is a palace in a very real
sense. We picked that part up in verse
15, where it says Simon Peter was following Jesus. And so is
another disciple. And if you know John’s gospel,
he’s referring to himself. Now that disciple, John, was
known to the high priest. We don’t know if they were friends.
We know that there was some kind of relationship. John, no doubt
a good and devout Jew at one point. He was known to the high
priest and he entered with Jesus into the court of the high priest.
But Peter was standing at the door outside, so the other disciple,
that is John, who was known to the high priest, went out and
spoke to the doorkeeper and brought Peter in. That’s how he got in.
Providential means. But now Peter is in. He’s in
this garden, this courtyard. And we resume now, if you would,
in Luke. And in Luke 55, it just records
a very simple scene. that after they had kindled a
fire in the middle of the courtyard and had sat down together, Peter
was sitting among them. I mean, imagine the scene. They
had just arrested this religious leader. Probably all of the Roman
officials had gone back to their quarters in the fortress of Antonia
near the end of the temple grounds. And now all it is is these Officials,
these officers of the high priests. Certainly not guests of the palace,
certainly not with sleeping quarters of their own at the palace, but
still on the ready since this arrest was fresh, still nearby,
still watchful. And they kindled the fire in
the cool spring in the middle of the courtyard, and they sat
down together And Peter was cold. And Peter gathered by the fire. But Matthew 26 tells us something
a little more disturbing about Peter’s persistence to not only
follow the Lord, even though at a distance, but to follow
even into the courtyard Matthew tells us why. Don’t turn. It’s
a brief statement. Matthew 26, 58 says that Peter
sat down with the officers to see the outcome. It was almost
just base curiosity that drew Peter in. He just wanted to see
what would happen. He wanted to see the end. He
wanted to see the result of the trial. What would happen to Jesus?
Part of that could be a healthy curiosity. Maybe he was interested. Maybe if he saw things going
badly, he could gather his band of men and rescue Christ. We’re
so eager to want to think the best of Peter. After all, he had initially shown,
not only verbally, such great courage. He would follow Jesus
even to death. He would never leave the Lord. And initially, he had shown a
great start in drawing his sword and beginning a battle. But to go into the high priest
dwelling, now he was on dangerous ground. But even Peter, Peter
was totally unprepared for the trial that awaited him. Peter
had no idea what was coming for him. In the meantime, While Peter
is warming himself in the company of these arresting officers,
Jesus is being questioned in the palace by the high priest.
And I just want to keep the scene before you. And for that, I want
you to turn to Matthew’s Gospel, Chapter 26. In Matthew, Chapter
26, we hear that while Peter is warming himself on the fire,
what was Jesus experiencing? And we pick that up in verse
59. And the scene couldn’t be any different. Here’s Peter out
by a warm and crackling fire catching some kind of physical
and earthly comfort while the Lord Jesus is being berated both
physically and verbally by the very forces of hell. Verse 59
picks up, Now the chief priests and the whole council kept trying
to obtain false testimony against Jesus, so that they might put
Him to death. You see, they’re scrambling.
They know they have cause. They know they want Him dead,
but they don’t have proof for the Romans. They did not find
any, even though many false witnesses came forward. But later on, two
came forward and said, this man stated, I am able to destroy
the temple of God and rebuild it in three days. The high priest
stood up and said to him, do you not answer? What is it that
these men are testifying against you? He was on to something.
He had something to pin on the Lord. Jesus said to him, you
have said it yourself. Nevertheless, I tell you hereafter,
you will see the son of man sitting at the right hand of power and
coming on the clouds of heaven. Then the high priest tore his
robes and said, he has blasphemed. What further need do we have
of witnesses? Behold, you have heard the blasphemy. What do you think? They answered,
he deserves death. They spat in his face and beat
him with their fists. Another slapped him and said,
prophesy to us, you Christ. Who is the one who hit you? Meanwhile,
Peter. is out by the fire. As one commentary accurately
portrayed it during the sad scene that was conducted in the hall
above. An almost sadder moral tragedy was unfolding in the
court below. There sat Peter actively denying
his Lord. And we come to a series of denials. Three, as Jesus prophesied. Three denials of the Lord, but
there were countless denials undergirding each of these. Pick
back up, if you would, in Luke’s Gospel in verse 56. where it records that Jesus was
maliciously accosted by a force so formidable that it made Peter
cower. Look at v. 56. And a servant girl seeing Him as
she sat in the firelight and looking intently at Him. said
this man was with him too. Notice, if you would, for a moment,
this formidable force was about as gentle a challenge as anybody
could have ever received. The crowd couldn’t have been
very large. It isn’t a man that approaches him, but a woman.
And it isn’t even a mature woman, but a girl, a little girl. And
it isn’t even just any girl, certainly not the daughter of
the high priest. This was a slave girl that would
be treated as almost nothing in this society. Because of that, it makes the
contrast that much greater. that this girl of all people
came up to Jesus and in all gentleness just said, this man was with
him too. It wasn’t Pilate. It wasn’t the
Sanhedrin. It wasn’t the soldiers. It wasn’t
any great force. It was a single girl that came
up and frightened this once self-confident apostle into denying his own
master and Lord. Verse 57 presents that he said
he denied it, saying, Woman, I do not know him. Matthew’s Gospel offers us a
bit more lengthy answer. Matthew says, I neither know
nor understand what you were talking about, huh? And he went on, went out rather
and onto the porch, he left the scene. pardon me, Mark’s version, Mark
1468. Mark’s version, it’s interesting,
can be taken and translated a number of different ways. I neither
know nor understand what you’re talking about. Or you can say,
I neither know him nor understand what you’re talking about. Or
you can say, I neither know nor understand. What are you saying?
What? But because of Luke’s clarity
here, it does clear up exactly what Mark records. The second
option is the best. I neither know him nor understand
what you’re even suggesting. Peter seeks refuge in this evasive
answer. Rather than an outright denial,
he just kind of shrugged his shoulders and says, huh, what?
I have loved our study. We all have in. The respectable sins. to see
the proclivity that we have towards these kinds of prevarications,
which are really just lies. The tendency that we have to
say, you know, some softer version or to just speak and not give
the whole truth. What you said was true insofar
as it went, but it wasn’t the whole truth. And that’s Peter. I neither know nor understand
what you’re talking about. I don’t know him and I don’t
know what you mean.” And he left the scene and went onto the porch.
Perhaps he was even looking for a way out of the courtyard at
this point. He sensed that he had been had, but there was a
second denial still in the offing. Look at verse 58. A little later,
another saw him. Mark 1469 just refers to this
person as the servant girl. Another one says it was another
servant girl. Likely the news was spreading.
So it doesn’t make one of the gospel writers incorrect. It just says the news was spreading.
Another saw him and said, you are one of them, too. But Peter
said, man, I am not. He denied the news again. He denied it. Matthew says with
an oath, I promise you, I do not know this man. Peter, at
this point, determines that his mere words, his own testimony
is not enough. And so he’s got a promise and
it will get worse. This first denial was really
just a declaration. I do not know him. Now it’s a
clear repudiation of Jesus. I do not know the man. But Peter’s not done. And there’s
a third denial, as you know, and for that we look at verse
59. After about an hour had passed, another man began to insist. Certainly, this man also was
with him, for he is a Galilean too. Mark says it’s the bystanders. John 18 points out that one of
the slaves of the high priest, and this is fascinating data.
One of the slaves of the high priest being a relative of the
one whose ear Peter cut off. Do you think he might have been
interested? Whether it’s his cousin or brother
or whatever, you cut off my cousin’s ear, right? This is not the guy
you want to meet in undercover of darkness. Here comes Peter’s last trial.
As one said, attention seems to have been roused by his strong
denial. All eyes were fixed upon him.
And the one who had seen him in the garden and marked him
as a leader among the disciples by using his sword presses home
this painful question. This man related to Malchus,
whose ear Peter had cut off, would have had a very special
interest in the one that had perpetrated this crime. And perhaps
it’s just that fear, the fear of being found out that really
makes Peter Pyle lie and lie and lie upon one another. We don’t know the reasons why
completely, but Peter ultimately said, man, I do not know what
you’re talking about. Matthew, again, adds more detail
when it says that Peter began to curse and swear. I mean, get
this scene. First, it starts with a little
girl persisted by another. Now, a relative of the one he
had carved up says, I do not know this. Rather, Peter answers
and says, I do not know this man with cursing and swearing. You see, he had to back up his
initial lie. This time he begins to curse
and swear Thinking that maybe if his answer is more vigorous,
more strident than the time before that he would convince his hearers,
this cursing. We have a tendency to think of,
you know, some of the words that are used in our own society.
And there certainly would have been some of those epithets and
maybe Peter was beginning to lose his cool, but it’s the swearing
that we’re drawn to. And by swearing, he isn’t talking
about bad words. Kids know, well, you’re not supposed
to swear and we know what we mean by that, but that’s not
what it’s referring to here. This swearing would have been
something like this. God forbid. May God do this to
me if it’s true or if I ever was a disciple of Jesus, that’s
the content. of this swearing. Now, there
were probably some epithets thrown in there as well out of frustration,
but it’s the swearing that really is the greater problem for Peter. Peter discovered here very quickly,
didn’t he? That to act properly in the midst
of small things is a lot easier than to brace yourself for a
single act of heroism, as one put it. He found out that one
small step often leads to many other steps in the opposite direction. Lies almost never stand on their
own. They have to be backed up and
constantly buffeted with additional lies. And that’s exactly where
Peter found himself. Luke’s gospel just says immediately
while he was still speaking, a rooster crowed. And Peter knew
it. Peter caught it. But Luke includes
something that none of the other gospel writers include. Look
at verse 61, it just picks up that. The Lord turned and looked
at Peter was through an upper room window. Were they in the
process of transporting Jesus to another so-called courtroom?
We don’t know. Luke doesn’t give us any more
detail other than that, all we know is their eyes met. It isn’t
just that the Lord turned and looked at Peter because Peter
saw the Lord looking at him. That’s the point. The Lord turned and looked at
Peter. And as one said, that glance of sorrow went straight
to the apostle’s heart, all that his Lord had said, all his repeated
warnings rushed back to his remembrance, he could contain himself no longer. Another pastor said it this way,
who can sound the depths of what passed in those moments in the
mind of the tortured prisoner and in the mind of the fallen
apostle? We know that unfathomable love and sympathy for his pardon
me, his delusion disciples spoke from his eyes. At this, in conjunction
with the crowning of the rooster, reminding Peter of Jesus warning,
it was all enough. Peter was overwhelmed with remorse
and fled outside where he wept bitter tears. That’s what Luke
records, that’s what all the gospel writers record, Peter
remembered the word of the Lord. How he had told him before a
rooster crows today, you will deny me three times. In verse
62, just caps it quite simply, he went out and wept bitterly. It’s an intensive word. It means
he went out, but he kept on crying. It denotes loud, constant wailing. And this remorse that Peter showed,
it’s a different kind of remorse than Judas showed because it
was really a different kind of rejection. Judas, out of the
wickedness of his heart, had literally betrayed the Savior,
turned him over to false authority. Peter, on the other hand, had
denied his Savior out of weakness, really. It wasn’t because he
didn’t love the Lord Jesus. It really just came down to the
fact that he was spiritually weak. And there was much said, much
spoken about these tears. Were they tears of repentance?
Were these genuine tears of repentance? Do all tears stack up to mean repentance?
And I would say, no, they don’t. And I would say from the information
we have in this passage as it stands, we still don’t know where
Peter’s heart is. Remember, if you’re reading John’s
gospel, it takes all the way to John chapter 21 before the
Lord Jesus goes and restores Peter. Peter cashed it all in
and went fishing. Not exactly a repentant heart.
Is there remorse? Absolutely. And remorse must
accompany true repentance. But to say tears alone. Tears
alone are not repentance. As you begin to stand back and
look at what transpired. We look at Peter’s transgression
and it really, if you look at it, It is comprised of two different
things. Number one, Peter thought that
his own affection, Peter’s affection for the Lord Jesus was enough
to carry him through any temptation. And it just isn’t. It wasn’t
for Peter and isn’t for you and me. We can say that we love the
Lord. We can say that we desire to
serve him. We can say that we would do anything and never deny
him. We love the Lord Jesus. He saved
our soul. And that’s true. But we can’t
love Him enough to be faithful to Him. We are absolutely desperate
for the grace of God. The second part of Peter’s mistake
was resorting to this falsehood, these lies, as a means of trying
to avoid either arrest or some kind of earthly trouble. John Calvin said of this whole
scene that the fall of Peter is a mirror of human infirmity. It is a memorable example of
God’s goodness and compassion. And we’ll see that ultimately.
Jeremiah 17 9 says this, the heart is more deceitful than
all else and is desperately sick. Who can understand it? We can’t
even understand it ourselves. Otherwise, wouldn’t Peter have
seen this coming? Peter thought it was just the
opposite. Peter thought that he loved the Lord enough that
would carry him through any difficulty. And it didn’t. Another said it this way, the
fall of Peter doubtless is intended to be a lesson to the whole Church
of Christ, every one of us. It is recorded for our learning
that we be kept from a similar and sorrowful overthrow It is
a beacon mercifully set up in Scripture to prevent others from
making shipwreck. Few know this lesson well. What do we get from Peter? What
do we take away from this? Number one, the danger of pride,
the utter danger of pride and this self-confidence This feeling
that it was Peter’s love for the Lord that was going to sustain
him, when it never is. That can call us to our knees.
But we have to cry out for grace to be sustained. It’s God that
will sustain us. It’s God that will uphold us
in the end, not us. J.C. Ryle said, the best and
highest saint is but a poor, weak creature even at his best
times. Whether he knows it or not, he
carries within him an almost boundless capacity for wickedness. However fair and decent his outward
conduct may seem, there is no enormity of sin into which he
may not run if he does not watch and pray and if the grace of
God does not uphold him. There’s your encouragement for
the day. There is no sin into which you cannot stumble. And
Peter’s first mistake was to think that he loved the Lord
enough that that alone would prevent him. Secondly, there
was the laziness that was manifested there in the garden where Jesus
told him to watch and to pray, and he didn’t. And we don’t. Not like we should. When Puritan
said it this way, the church in the world are sometimes shocked
by the sudden misconduct of some prominent Christian professor.
Believers are discouraged and stumbled by it. The enemies of
God rejoice and blaspheme. But if the truth could be known,
the explanation of such cases would generally be found to have
been in private departure from God. Men fall in private long
before they fall in public. He didn’t watch and pray, he
didn’t take Concern for his own soul. And then finally, not only
the danger of pride and self-confidence, which affects every one of us,
the danger of laziness, but finally, the painful influence of the
fear of man. Peter was watchful for his reputation. He was concerned what other people
think. From the time our kids were little, we tried to tell
them, don’t worry about what other people think. That is a
pitfall that will grab you. And it grabs adults as well,
doesn’t it? It isn’t just teenagers that succumb to peer pressure.
It’s adults as well. And it happened to Peter. Most are aware, said one, how
much more they fear the face of man whom they can see than
the eye of God whom they cannot see. That was Peter’s final straw. He was worried about what other
people thought. Let’s examine our own hearts
in prayer. Our God, you are so merciful
to include these delicate words of the fall of our friend. And
our representative there with you in the garden, Peter, who
is so much like us, we shudder. Lord God, grant us the grace
to examine our hearts to see whether we are truly seeking
your grace and desiring your help to stand firm, not trusting
in our own strength, but appealing to you is the great vine to which
we are attached. Lord God, we do pray that you
would keep us focused upon you, that we might glorify you in
all that we do. To Jesus name that we pray. Amen. We have a tradition in closing. When the world celebrates its
little celebrations, often they get it incorrect. And we’ve almost
since the I think it was our first year as a church, we wanted
to acknowledge not just the mothers in our midst, but What the Bible
presents to us is the crown of creation, the creation of woman. There were for the first time
in in those opening chapters, God declared his creation very
good. And so we call women the crown
of creation. But I need help. I would like
all the young men to come up, let’s do 17 and under. Let’s do 17 and under, come up.
The first flower has to go to your mom, and you gotta give
her a kiss and a hug. The rest of the flowers, though,
need to be passed out to all the girls, no matter how small,
all the ladies. Come on up, gentlemen. This is
your time. Do what? And Dottie’s in the
nursery. Make sure that Mrs. Mark gets a flower as well. It’s
pretty easy guys. You pull the flowers out one
at a time Take them to your mom with a hug and a kiss You don’t
have to kiss the rest of the girls Unless they want to kiss
you Michael I’m pretty sure you have
a mom here that needs a flower. I Do all the, now once you’ve gotten
your mom, you can grab more flowers and take them. Do all the girls
have flowers yet? Poor Alyssa still has no flowers. Let’s raise your hand. If you
don’t have a flower yet, Don, you’re not a girl. There’s one all the way in the
back, Zack, Zacky, all the way in the back. All right, we close. Ladies,
anybody else still missing one? Leanna still needs one and the
nursery. OK. Well, so you’ve taken one to
the nursery. She’s going to get about 10 flowers. Let’s pray real quick and party.
Father, thank you for the blessing you give to us in these women.
No matter how young, no matter how old, they are indeed the
crown of your creation. We thank you for them. We ask
your blessing on our day. In Jesus name. Amen.