How Do You Compare to The Apostle Peter

This morning I would like to take a look at the apostle Peter. What I want you to do is see if you can draw some comparisons to yourself . When we first come across Peter he was casting nets with his brother Andrew for they were fishermen. You see young Peter was just a plain old regular fellow like all of us. He was not some great politician or leader of people he was just a fisherman. When Jesus said "come follow me and I will make you fishers of men ", Peter went.

WALKING ON WATER

Now were did Peter go? He went were ever Jesus went and He got to see sick people made well dead people made alive water turned to wine and many other miracles. Yet when he saw Jesus walking on the water what happened to Peter? Lets look and see. Turn to Matthew 14 :25-31 ( 25 And in the fourth watch of the night Jesus went unto them, walking on the sea. 26 And when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were troubled, saying , It is a spirit; and they cried for fear. 27 But straightway Jesus spake unto them, saying, Be of good cheer: it is I; be not afraid. 28 And Peter answered him, and said , Lord if it be thou, bid me come unto thee on the water. 29 And he said, Come. And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus. 30 But when he saw the wind Boisterous, he was afraid ; and, beginning to sink, he cried, saying Lord, save me. 31 And immediately Jesus stretched forth his hand, and caught him, and said unto him, O thou of little faith, wherefore didst thou doubt?)

You see Peter had great faith. Notice it doesn't say James or John went down out of the ship to walk to Jesus. It doesn't say that Andrew said wait and I will go with you. No young Peter was the only one to go down out of the ship and walk on the water. Peter had great faith, but as he was walking on the water Peter let doubt get in his mind . Wow the wind is sure howling what in the world was I thinking , I cant walk on water. And he started to sink. You see even with Peters great faith and after all the miracles that he had witnessed he still had doubts. The only reason Peter didn't drowned right there was he had his eyes on Jesus and cried out Lord save me. Remember this the next time you let doubt slip in to your life and make sure you cry out "Lord save me".

ON THIS ROCK

Next lets look at Matthew 16 : 13-18 ( 13 When Jesus came into the coasts of Cesarea Phillippi, he said his disciples, saying, Whom do men say that I, the Son of man, am ? 14 And they said, Some say that thou art John the Baptist; some, Elias; and others, Jeremias, or one of the prophets. 15 He saith unto them , But whom say ye that I am? 16 And Simon Peter answered and said, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God. 17 And Jesus answered and said unto him, Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-jona : for flesh and blood hath not reveled it to thee , but my Father which is in heaven. 18 And I say unto thee, That thou art Peter , and upon this rock I will build my church ; and the gates of Hades shall not prevail against it.

You see the words that Peter spoke are the same ones you said when you made the good confession of faith before you where baptized . And Jesus rewarded Peter's faith by saying upon this rock I will build my church . Now get your Bibles and turn to 1st Peter 2:5 I want to show you something that you have in common with Peter. ( 5 Ye also , as lively stones, are built up a spiritual house, an holy priesthood to God by Jesus Christ.) You see Peter is the rock or the foundation that the church is built on and we are the living stones that help to make up the rest of the spiritual house which is what the church is. Keep in mind this building is not the Church we who are Christians are the Church.

REBUKING JESUS

Now back to Matthew 16 : 21-23 ( 21 From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples , how that he must go unto Jerusalem , and suffer many things of the elders, and chief priests, and the scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day. 22 Then Peter took him, and began to rebuke him, saying, Be it far from thee, Lord ; this shall not be unto thee. 23 But he turned, and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me Satan ; thou art an offense unto me : for thou savourest not the things that be of God , but those that be of men. ) Peters failure here is that he spoke before he completely understood what was being said. Have you ever done that , I know I have .You see Peter was expecting Jesus to set up his Kingdom here on Earth and to rule over it as King . This was what the Jews of that day expected from the messiah and Peter had not yet learned how to accept this new idea. Now I want you to reflect on your own life for a minute. Have you ever had something explained to you in a new or different way than you had previously understood. Its not always easy to accept a new concept and that is what happened to Peter here.

PETERS DENIAL

My next stop with Peter is his denial of Christ. Christ said he would and low and behold Peter did three times and then the cock crowed. I'm not going to read the whole account as that would take a while. Most of you know the story. Peters faith was strong and Peter tried to defend the Lord when he was being betrayed but when he realized that Jesus was really going to allow all the bad things that he had foretold,to happen to him. Well Peter was sincere when he made his claim but his resolve gave way to denial in the face of the true test of Jesus . The test I'm talking about is Death. I will have more to say on this test later.

DO YOU LOVE ME

Now I would like you to turn to John 21: 15 Now this is after Peters denials and Christ death and resurrection. (15 So when they had dined, Jesus saith to Simon Peter, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me more than these? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He said unto him Feed my lambs. 16 He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep. 17 He saith unto him a third time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? Peter was grieved because he said unto him the third time, Lovest thou me? And he said unto him, Lord, Thou knowest all things; thou knowest that I love thee. Jesus saith unto him, Feed my sheep. 18 Verily , verily, I say unto thee, When thou wast young, thou girdest thyself, and walkedst whither thou wouldest: But when thou shalt be old, thou shalt stretch forth thee hands, and another shall gird thee, and carry thee wither thou wouldest not

Three times Peter denied Christ and three times now Christ has ask Peter do you love me. I'm confident that this fact did not escape Peters notice. And you remember that test I told you about earlier? Well before Peter was unwilling to face death with Jesus and now Jesus is telling Peter that He again will face that test. Peter failed the test the first time and went out and cried bitterly. Now Peter is told he will again face death on behalf of Jesus and Old Peter will face this test more than once. Peter never failed this test again.

PETER FEEDS THE SHEEP

Now Peters faith never failed him again and he did indeed feed the Lords sheep. As most of you know on the day of Pentacost Peter gave the first Gospel message and was asked by those in attendance "What must we do to be saved"? Acts 2-38( Then Peter said unto them , Repent and be baptized everyone of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and ye shall recieve the gift of the Holy Ghost.) About three thousand souls were added unto them. Peter continued on after this feeding of the Lords sheep and healing the lame and the sick all in the name of Jesus Christ.

THE MOST IMPORTANT

Now I want to change course for a minute. I want to ask you a question . What is the most important verse in the Bible? Think about it for a minute. The Bible has 66 books and I don't know how many verses. You might not agree with me and that's OK but I think Genesis 1-1 is the most important. ( In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth.) If you can believe that then the rest of the things in the Bible are easy to believe. You can believe that Peter walked on water you can believe that Christ went to the grave and died and then rose again on the third day. You can believe that Peter knew what he was talking about on the day of Pentecost.

There are some bad things going on in the world we live in today and these things are the same kinds of things that have been going on since the beginning . We have people committing murders for know more reason than that someone looked at them and didn't smile. We have people running other people off the road just because they felt someone changed lanes to close to them. The methods may have changed and the reasons might take a different form but murder is still murder. Thieves now are also called embezzlers but there still thieves. Nobody commits sin in our society they just do things without thinking, or have moments of indiscretion or weakness. The presidents wife said his indiscretion wasn't done with malice but rather because he heard his mother argue with his grandmother when he was 6 years old. This left him with a strong desire to please women. Now how's that going to go over on judgment day.

The problem that is most obvious to me is that most of the people have turned there back on God. Everybody is out to please there self with whatever or whoever they choice. They don't have anything to bring them back to reality. Most people have a conscience but they explain away there behavior by trying to be politically correct. If everybody else is doing it, it must be all right. Now this is were Peter separated his self from most of the people in his day. He found Jesus or rather Jesus found him, but when he said follow me Peter made the decision to go.

CONCLUSION

Tony Jude

obediance is the key

Love is the way

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