June 18, 2001

Lessons for July 1

FAMILY BIBLE STUDY:
Challenges to faith don't come in the sanctuary
___ John 13:31-38; 18:15-18, 25-27
___By Bobby Dagnel
___First Baptist Church, Nederland
___It has been called the national pastime. Popular history traces its roots to the summer of 1839, to a place called Cooperstown and a man named Abner Doubleday, who sat down and drew up, on the spot, the rules for a brand new game and called it baseball.
___From empty lots, to prison yards, to stadiums costing hundreds of millions of dollars, baseball is played anywhere and everywhere. It's a game for all ages, from the 3-year-old playing T-ball to the Senior Men's Baseball league, created for the over-40 diehard fan who can still squat, throw, swing and offer some semblance of running.
___While each league may "tweak" the rules a bit depending on age and skill level, there is one rule of baseball that remains constant--three strikes and you're out. Even the criminal justice system has adopted the three-strike rule as a part of penal code. Three felony convictions and you are locked away for life. No more swings. No more chances. That's it. You're out.
___Though the game of baseball and life itself offer little in the way of grace, I'm grateful that within the redemptive purposes of God there is the opportunity for new beginnings. A classic example is found in this week's passage and the events surrounding Peter's denial of our Lord.
___During the Feast of the Passover, celebrated with the disciples in the upper room, Jesus, troubled in spirit, made the pronouncement of a coming betrayal. When Judas eventually left the table to go and perform his heinous deed, Jesus took the moment and explained to his disciples the unfolding of his Father's will and that they would be unable to go with him, (vv. 31-33).
___He also gives to them a new commandment, (vv. 34-35). This command to love one another as Jesus has loved them is to be a crucial, identifying characteristic in the life of God's people. "By this," Jesus says, "all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another."
___Note how Peter seemingly ignores Jesus' teaching about the priority of love and instead reverts back to Jesus' previous comments regarding a place the disciples cannot go (vv. 33, 36). Like most of us, Peter ignores the necessary for the novel, the most important for the more mysterious.
___Wanting to know why he can't go with Jesus, Peter makes the brash statement, "I will lay down my life for you" (v. 37). Though he would eventually lay down his life for Jesus, this proclamation of loyalty would come to haunt him in the hours ahead before the ultimate fulfillment years later.
___Peter must have been shocked into silence by Jesus' prediction that he would deny his Lord three times, because we don't hear from him again until 18:10. We are just as shocked. Peter, with his bold, demonstrative personality, is the last one we would expect to deny his Lord. It seems out of character. But people sometimes do act in quite unexpected ways.
___As we come to the testimony of Peter's denial (18:15-18, 25-27), we discover that it began in a very uneventful way. As Peter contemplated the predictions of Jesus, he may have very well galvanized and nerved himself in the anticipation of some stiff challenge to his faith, not an insignificant slave girl tending the door.
___Like Peter, we mistakenly think the challenges to our faith will come from some great orchestrated frontal assault, some God-hating communist, pressing a gun to our head, demanding we renounce the name of Jesus. That would be too easy. It happens in much more subtle forms.
___We laugh at the cruel and demeaning party joke told at the expense of some ethnic or gender group. We turn a blind eye to unethical business practices and methodologies that maximize profits but take advantage of the consumer and victimize lower- rung employees. We perpetuate unfounded gossip by our participation in the rumor mill. We cannot be too hard on Peter, for his betrayal creates within us a painful sense of shame and embarrassment at our own betrayals.
___The first two questions of inquiry regarding Peter's association with Jesus were asked in such a way that they expected a negative response. It provided a way of escape from an uncomfortable situation, and Peter seized the opportunity. Only the third question is asked expecting an affirmative answer, but Peter once again denied any affiliation with Jesus. John records nothing about Peter's reaction. Luke 22:62 says he "wept bitterly."
___For all the confidence he had in the upper room, this event proves Jesus knew Peter better than Peter knew himself. What happened to Peter is instructive for us all. It is much easier to make claims of loyalty and commitment in the upper room, in the sanctuary of kindred spirits than in the casual encounters of everyday life. Peter's use of the sword in the garden shows there were circumstances in which the apostle was ready to risk all for Christ. But he didn't have the courage when all was lost.
___Despite the three strikes Peter had against him, he wasn't out. John 21 (August 5 lesson) records the compassion of our Lord and the resurrection of new opportunities of service, even for those who feel they have struck out and failed miserably.

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