If Jesus went on trial today, and you were hanging around watching it happen from a distance, like Peter was, would anyone accuse you of being with Him? What I mean is, we latch onto Peter's failure to claim Jesus publicly, and that is what the story is about at it's biggest point. But, don't miss the fact that three strangers not only were watching Jesus, but the people who hung out with Him. They recognized Peter as one of Jesus' followers. He was outed by the fact that He was so tied to Jesus for three years. People knew him. They didn't know his name, or what he did. They simply knew he was one of Jesus' followers.
What about you and me? If we were at the trial today, would anyone recognize us as one of His? Or would we seamlessly blend into the crowd? You see, even at Peter's worst, he couldn't hide who he really was. But I fear that maybe we could. Maybe we are so good at hiding our identity, that we just blend in, and would never be accused of being with Jesus. Honestly, which is worse, to get pegged as Jesus' friend and try to deny it futilely, or never be recognized as His friend at all?
I've got to step up some, it seems, if I ever want to have the chance to fail at denying Jesus. Right now, I'm not sure how many people would even ask... wow....
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2 comments:
That's a great point. It's really easy to look at people's failures in the Bible and talk about how we'd never have fallen for that or whatever. But, most the time they failed so hard because they were at a level of maturity much higher than our own.
It makes me really consider our own attitudes toward failure. I think we could all agree denying Jesus was an epic fail, and I think that's why so many actively try to blend into the crowd. I know I don't want to deny Jesus, so it's almost safer to fail so often in the minor things that no one would know I was a Christian from the way I live, because then I'm never in a position to fail in the large areas because I never fly high enough to fall far.
Man, Trevor, thanks for the input. I agree with you completely. I really appreciate you taking time to weigh in. Please keep it up.
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