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Reading Matthew 26:69-75 where before a rooster crowed Peter denies three times that He knew Jesus, just as Jesus said he would do. Visit wwutt.com for all our videos!
Peter was so insistent that he would never deny Jesus. Even if they all fall away, I won't fall away, Peter said to Jesus. And yet he did deny him three times. When we understand the text.
This is when we understand the text, a daily Bible study in the word of Christ that men and women of God may be complete, equipped for every good work. Tell your friends about our ministry at www .utt .com.
Here's your teacher, Pastor Gabe.
Thank you, Becky. In our study of the gospel of Matthew, we are finishing up chapter 26 today with Peter denying Jesus three times. This is verses 69 to 75, which I'm reading from the Legacy Standard Bible.
Hear the word of the Lord. Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard and a servant girl came to him and said, you too were with Jesus the Galilean, but he denied it before them all, saying, I do not know what you were talking about.
And when he had gone out to the gateway, another servant girl saw him and said to those who were there this man was with Jesus of Nazareth. And again, he denied it with an oath. I do not know the man.
A little later, the bystanders came up and said to Peter, surely you are one of them for even the way you talk gives you away. Then he began to curse and swear. I do not know the man. And immediately a rooster crowed and Peter remembered the word which Jesus had said, before a rooster crows, you will deny me three times.
And he went out and cried bitterly. This is of course in fulfillment of what Jesus had said a few hours before, though Peter was so confident in himself saying that he would never deny him. And Jesus said, I tell you before a rooster crows, you'll deny me three times.
But Peter, as if he was calling Jesus a liar said, even if all these fall away, referring to the rest of the disciples, I will never fall away. And the rest of the disciples agreed with him. And yet when Jesus was arrested, they all scattered in fulfillment of the prophecy that was said when the shepherd is struck, the sheep will scatter.
And so we're gonna look at Peter's denial here. Of course, we have three denials and you'll notice that each time he denies Christ, that it gets more and more intense. A simple denial, then he denies with an oath and then he even curses and swears.
Remember what Jesus said to him and James and John, when they were in the garden and couldn't stay awake to pray with him. Jesus said, the spirit is willing, but the flesh is weak. And that's something we need to be aware of too.
We need to identify our own weaknesses lest we become as overly confident and then as careless as Peter was. But before getting to these three denials here, let me take you back a little bit and set this in context, a little more than I did with the passage yesterday.
So last week on Wednesday, the last thing that we read about in chapter 26 was the betrayal and the arrest of Jesus. Judas had led the mob to where Jesus and the disciples were praying in the garden. And Jesus made three addresses or he addressed three audiences we reviewed.
The first one was Judas who kissed Jesus and Jesus responded to him, friend, do what you have come out for. And by calling Judas friend, he more greatly emphasized the depth of Judas's betrayal. Next, Jesus addressed Peter who tried to fight for Jesus.
He drew his sword and he cut off the ear of the servant of the high priest. Jesus told him to put his sword away and said, do you not know that I can appeal to my father in heaven and he will at once put at my disposal more than 12 legions of angels.
But if I were to do this, how would the scriptures be fulfilled? And then after that, Jesus addressed the mob. I was sitting in the temple teaching, you never came to arrest me then, why not? You've come to arrest me now so that what was said in the prophecies would be fulfilled.
Jesus showing that the sovereign hand of God was in control was over this whole situation so that our sins might be forgiven. Jesus who was gonna go to the cross and die as an atoning sacrifice for sins.
All who believe in him will not perish under the judgment of God, but we are forgiven our sins and have everlasting life. After that, after we read about that, Jesus' betrayal and arrest in chapter 26, we see those three parties in reverse order.
So remember once again, Jesus addressed Judas, then Peter, and then the mob that was sent by the priest. Well, what have we been reading about here? First up, there's a trial and that's what we looked at yesterday.
And there was Caiaphas, the high priest, along with those who were there who had arrested Jesus and brought him before Caiaphas. And we saw this kangaroo trial that we read about yesterday, this completely illegitimate trial that they already decided the verdict before they even heard any witnesses or had any proof.
We are gonna put Jesus to death. We just have to find a reason. We have to find a cause. And then when he was asked if he was the Messiah, Jesus said that he was, and for them, that was it. Hey, he's committed blasphemy.
We can put him to death for that. Next, we're looking at Peter and there's Peter's denial of Jesus, which is the passage we're considering today, verses 69 to 75. What we get to tomorrow is Judas, who like Peter is also filled with grief, but rather than a grief that leads to repentance, he goes out and commits suicide.
We'll consider that tomorrow at the first portion of chapter 27. So once again, you see these three audiences that Jesus addressed earlier in chapter 26. We see these things playing out in reverse order.
Those that were sent by the high priest with the kangaroo trial, Peter's denials in verses 69 to 75, and then Judas going out and killing himself because he had betrayed the son of God. Let's come back to the scenario with Peter here in verse 69.
Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. A servant girl came to him and said, you two were with Jesus, the Galilean. Remember that Jesus has been taken in to be tried. And Peter was there. We read back in verse 58, Peter was following him at a distance as far as the courtyard of the high priest and entered in and sat down with the officers to see the outcome.
So he's watching this from a distance. He's not really part of the audience. He's not right in there with the rest of them, but close enough that he can kind of see what's going on and to see what's gonna happen as a result of this that's taking place.
Maybe Peter's still hopeful here. Maybe he believes that Jesus is going to show his strength and break out of his bonds. And maybe Jesus is gonna do what the disciples expected him to do, become that emancipator, sit on the throne of Israel and rule with a rod of iron.
Maybe that's what Peter's still hoping for. We know that John did go in. John had a connection with the family of the high priest. And so he was able to go in and observe the trial that's talked about in the gospel of John.
Peter would have been the next closest disciple and he's sitting out here in the courtyard, still wanting to know what's gonna happen, but at the same time, still being cowardly as well. So this servant girl recognizes him and says, you were with Jesus, the Galilean, but Peter denied it before them all saying, I do not know what you were talking about.
Now, as I said, we have three denials here and each one gets more intense. And the first one is just a simple denial. You're with Jesus, the Galilean. And he says, nope, don't know what you're talking about.
Sorry, wrong number. You got the wrong guy, that's not me. Why was Peter this way? Well, perhaps because he didn't wanna get arrested. He was seeing the way that things were going with Jesus and he didn't wanna end up in that same position.
At the time that Peter drew his sword, he had a different outlook on what he thought was going to be the outcome. Like how do we go from Peter drawing a sword and wanting to fight back the mob to here in the courtyard, he's not even willing to admit that he's one of Jesus's disciples.
How did we get such radically different men in a span of what's probably less than an hour here, a span of a few minutes, however long it takes to arrest Jesus and take him back into Jerusalem and get an audience before Caiaphas.
How long had it been? And we've gone from Peter drawing a sword and cutting off the ear of the servant of the high priest to now he's sitting out in the courtyard as a coward, trying to keep himself hidden, denying that he even knows Jesus who is in there being tried.
Well, again, it was probably because at the time that Jesus was being arrested or when this mob comes up against Jesus, Peter's got confidence to believe that, no, this is the King. This is the son of David.
This is the one who is the rightful heir to the throne. You think that you're gonna arrest him?
We'll show you.
And Peter grabs his sword and he's ready to go up, thinking that the power of Christ is gonna be behind him. And yet it's Jesus who rebukes him, says, if I really wanted to stop this, I would call angels to stop it.
You need to put your sword away. And suddenly it's dawning on Peter, this is not going like I thought it was gonna go. Remember earlier in chapter 16, Jesus had said to his disciples that he was going to be arrested.
He was going to be put to death, but to take heart because he's coming back again three days later. And what was Peter's response to that? It was like he didn't even hear Jesus say that he was gonna rise from the dead.
He rebuked Jesus. Far be it from you, Lord, to do this thing. I would never let this happen to you. And Jesus had to say to him, get behind me, Satan, for you are not thinking with the mind of God, but with the mind of a man.
So at the time, Peter had a lot of confidence in himself, believing that this was gonna be some sort of military campaign. We're gonna take up swords. We're gonna fight for the cause and we're gonna win.
But no, now here's Jesus being taken into trial and it's looking like we're about to lose. And so Peter is denying that he even knows him. So he goes out to the gateway. He gets a little further away from that crowd lest he be noticed and him thinking that perhaps I'm gonna get arrested and be dragged in there as well.
So he goes out to the gateway and while he's there warming himself by a fire, it doesn't say that in Matthew. It does in Mark though. Mark 14, 54, Peter followed at a distance right into the courtyard of the high priest and he was sitting with the officers and warming himself at the fire.
So that was where Peter had found himself. He goes out to the gateway and there's another servant girl who sees him and says, this man was with Jesus of Nazareth. And we don't know the motivation of any of these witnesses.
Like what did either of these servant girls intend? The first one who says, you too were with Jesus the Galilean. Like, did they want him to regale them with stories? Like, can you tell us what's going on?
Can you tell us about what it's like to be a follower of Jesus? We don't know what their motives were. And we don't fully know even what Peter's fear was, afraid of being arrested, afraid of being put to death himself.
We just assume that was the case. But here yet again, as he's being noticed and it's being said to those who were there that this is a follower of Jesus of Nazareth, again, he denied it. And this time, verse 72, he denied it with an oath.
I do not know the man. Now we don't know what the oath was. It doesn't tell us that, just the statement, I do not know the man. So this was accompanied by an oath. The first one was, I don't know what you're talking about.
The next one, the wording is different. So we might think that the answer is synonymous with an oath, I do not know the man. But the very next answer in verse 74 is the exact same wording. I do not know the man, but that time it says it's accompanied with curses and swearings.
So it had to have been that Peter accompanied this statement, I do not know the man, with an oath, like I swear on my mother's grave, or something to that effect. I don't know that they necessarily said that in first century Israel, but that's a common kind of a swearing that you might hear today of a scout's honor or something like that.
So something that Peter said was accompanied with some extra vow or oath. You remember what Jesus taught about this, right? Back in Matthew 5, verse 33. Again, you have heard that the ancients were told, you shall not make false vows, but shall fulfill your vows to the Lord.
But I say to you, make no oath at all, either by heaven, for it is the throne of God, or by the earth, for it is the footstool of his feet, or by Jerusalem, for it is the city of the great king. Nor shall you make an oath by your head, for you cannot make one hair white or black, but let your statement be yes, yes, or no, no.
Anything beyond these, Jesus said, is of the evil one. And so here is Peter, not reflecting the character of his Lord, but reflecting the character of Satan, who had, in fact, desired to sift Peter like wheat.
Now that's not a statement made in Matthew, that's made in Luke. It's Luke 22, 31. Simon, behold, Satan has demanded to sift all of you like wheat. But then Jesus saying of Peter, I will pray for you.
So here, Peter is kind of demonstrating that Satan is having his way with him. And again, he's thinking with the mind of a man and not with the mind of God. He's even going against what Jesus had preached about in the Sermon on the Mount.
He's making oaths and vows. He's swearing by the hairs on his own head. He's saying, I do not know the man. And we know that's a lie. And he's compounding it with the fact that he's even swearing upon something, as though that will make it more authentic that he doesn't know Jesus.
Verse 73, a little later, the bystanders came up and said to Peter, surely you two are one of them for even the way you talk gives you away. Remember the first servant girl said you are with Jesus, the Galilean.
So Peter speaks like a Galilean. You have to be one of his disciples. You speak like a Galilean. But Peter responds, verse 74, he begins to curse and swear. So he's even going beyond making an oath now.
He is swearing, curses coming out of his mouth and declaring even more loudly, I do not know the man. And then immediately after that third denial, a rooster crowed. You almost have to wonder as Peter was issuing that third denial and he goes, I do not know the man.
The rooster crows has that last words coming out of his mouth. And he gasps and he's suddenly aware of what he's done. It didn't come into his mind while he was doing it. All he was thinking about was himself.
But when the rooster crowed, he was suddenly aware. He remembered the words that Jesus said, before a rooster crows, you will deny me three times. And Peter was so insistent. I will never deny you. It's in the same chapter.
We're still in chapter 26, where Peter had refused and said, even though all may fall away because of you,.
I will never fall away.
That was back in verse 33. And here we are in verse 74. Jesus had said to him, truly, I say to you that this very night before a rooster crows, you will deny me three times. And Peter went on, even if I have to die with you, I will not deny you.
And all the disciples said the same, but here is Peter trying to save himself from that very fate. Trying to avoid the kind of trial that Jesus is in, seeing the lengths that the people are willing to go to to put this man to death.
And Peter is denying that he even knows him. And once he remembers Jesus' words, before a rooster crows, you will deny me three times, it says that he went out and he cried bitterly. How many of us are just as certain of ourselves that we would never deny Jesus?
I can't remember any time that I ever denied Christ except once. There was one time I was with a friend of mine in Walmart and we had actually just finished a debate. I was in junior college on a debate scholarship.
We had just finished up a debate. It might've been a Friday or a Saturday night. And so we're dressed in our suits. We're still wearing suits and ties because that was our attire for debate. And we had gone to Walmart to get something to eat.
And as we're standing there near the checkout line in our suits, we're the best dressed people in Walmart. As we're standing there in the checkout line, there was a drunk guy that came up to us. And he was quite intoxicated, quite inebriated.
You could smell it on him. He was one of the happier drunks, not trying to cause a problem, but not the best company either. And while we were talking and laughing and everything, it's like it dawns on him that we're standing there in suits and he's in a ratted out T-shirt and jeans that were not even appropriate to go anywhere.
And he stops and he looks at us and he goes, hey, you guys are not Christians, are you? And I said, no. Now I rationalized that in my mind later. Like I wasn't the kind of Christian that he was asking about.
Like he was thinking that we're out there, you know, proselytizing or something like that. And so I'm trying to say that, no, I'm not here to proselytize you. It's still a denial. I should have been there to proselytize to him.
I should have been sharing the gospel with him. But instead, when he asked me if I'm a Christian, I said, no, that's not the reason why we're wearing these suits, we're debaters. But that stuck with me.
I never forgot that. A night that I probably never would have given a second thought about. I can't even remember what we debated that night. I have no idea what we were debating that day. None of the resolutions that we went over in any of our debate rounds.
But I remember that night at Walmart, when a man asked me, are you a Christian? And I said, no. And that's stuck with me ever since. So as much as we would say of ourselves, I would never deny Jesus. It's really easy to do.
Because once again, the spirit is willing and the flesh is weak. It's really easy in the moment to think I can save face by saying I'm not a Christian or saying that I'm not a follower of Jesus. How do we protect ourselves from falling to that weakness?
We've got to store up the word of God in our hearts. We've got to regularly be in prayer. We've got to have the mind of Christ. Philippians 2 .5, these things we have to be regular in that we may be filled up with the things of God, that our minds would be consumed with Christ and not the ways of this world, that our fear would be of God and we don't fear anything else.
As what Charles Spurgeon said, fear God and nothing else. Remember the words that Jesus said to Peter, James and John in the garden, watch and pray that you may not fall into temptation. May we be devoted to this as well.
Now, maybe you have denied Jesus before just as Peter did. Maybe not on the level that Peter did. Maybe you did worse than Peter did. But remember that at the end of the gospel of John, Jesus reinstates Peter, forgives him that Peter denied him and tells him those three times to feed his sheep.
Three times he asked Peter, Peter, do you love me? Three times Peter says, Lord, you know that I love you. And those three times Jesus tells Peter to feed my sheep. So has Peter repeat back to Jesus that he loves Jesus and then Jesus telling Peter to get back on the mission field and do what you have been instructed to do, go and feed my lambs.
And so likewise, though you may have denied Christ, weep bitterly, have a genuine repentance in your heart as Peter did, knowing what it is that you have done. Cause the words of Christ earlier in Matthew have said, if you deny me before men, I will deny you before my father who is in heaven.
So you recognize what's at stake. You recognize the consequences of denying Christ. Go before him and ask for his forgiveness. And the promise is given that he will forgive you. And go and sin no more.
Heavenly father, we thank you for what we've read here. And I pray that it is humbling for us that we recognize our own weaknesses, our own sins, that we may come before you and be strengthened by your spirit.
For our spirits may be willing, but our flesh is certainly weak. And we need the Holy Spirit to fill us up and give us strength in these days. Give us courage, give us boldness for the cause of Christ.
It's in his name that we pray, amen.
Pastor Gabe is the author of several books and Bible studies available in paperback or for your e-reader. For titles and more information, visit our website at www .wutt .com. Join us again tomorrow as we grow together in God's word when we understand the text.