GOD’S SOVEREIGNTY OVER OUR FAILURES

Posted by Pastor Greg Allen on January 12, 2022 under AM Bible Study |

AM Bible Study Group: January 12, 2022 from Luke 22:31-34

Theme: Our frailties and failures cannot undo our Lord and Master’s sovereign plan for us.

(All Scripture is taken from The New King James Version, unless otherwise indicated).

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This morning, we come to a story that—at some level—can’t help but make us wince a little. In it, we find the confident assurance of the apostle Peter. But we can’t read his words without also remembering what happened shortly after he spoke them.

Luke tells us, in Luke 22:31-34;

And the Lord said, “Simon, Simon! Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat. But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.” But he said to Him, “Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and to death.” Then He said, “I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny three times that you know Me” (Luke 22:31-34).

I believe that Peter spoke those words with all of the sincerity of his heart; don’t you? He spoke them as sincerely as we probably would. But what our Lord then went on to say reminds us of one of the greatest ‘failures’ in the history of the Bible. The apostle Peter—the most prominent among the twelve, the man that Jesus called ‘the Rock’, a man who truly loved the Lord Jesus and followed Him as closely and devotedly as a human being could—folded in the heat of the moment. He denied that he even knew Jesus. He didn’t just do it once, but three times! And this, even after having just boasted that he would go so far as to follow Jesus to prison and to death! And the truth is that we wince, not only because of Peter’s dreadful failure, but also because we ourselves know that we have failed the Lord many times as well.

But Peter’s failure isn’t the end of the story. In fact, in this very passage, our Lord makes that clear to us. This same Peter—who had made this bold boast, and then tragically denied the Lord—went on, after our Lord’s resurrection and after Pentecost, to become the first great preacher and evangelist of the gospel. For the first half of the Book of Acts, he was the lead figure among the apostles—boldly proclaiming the resurrected Lord and performing great miracles in His name. God used this same Peter to give us two New Testament books that bear his name. Historians tell us that Mark’s Gospel—the Gospel that is considered the first of the four to be written—was John Mark’s efforts to faithfully record the message of the gospel as it was preached by Peter. And eventually, this same Peter would boldly and gloriously lay down his life for the Lord Jesus that he had once shamefully denied; and on—of all things—a cross.

This wasn’t because of Peter. Rather, it was because of the sovereign plan of our Lord for Peter. The Lord had prayed that his faith would not fail in the long term; and yet knew that he himself would fail in the short term. He knew that Peter would deny Him three times; and yet told him that, after he returned to Him, he should strengthen his brethren. What this teaches us is a very valuable and precious lesson; and that is that our frailties and failures cannot undo our Lord and Master’s sovereign plan for us. When we stumble and fall, we have great cause to rise back up and dust ourselves up and resume our walk with Jesus. We may fail in the short term; but His plan for us in the long term cannot.

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Now; let’s begin by noticing how this passage begins. In the New King James Version, it begins with the words, “And the Lord said …” In the broader context of this passage, our Lord was having His final meal with His disciples—the Passover meal—before He would be betrayed and arrested and crucified. In verses 28-30, He had told them;

“But you are those who have continued with Me in My trials. And I bestow upon you a kingdom, just as My Father bestowed one upon Me, that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom, and sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel” (vv. 28-30).

He was speaking to the disciples as a whole. And what a glorious future He was promising them! They had remained with Him up to that point; and they would reign with Him in the future glories of His kingdom. And so, when we come to the words, “And the Lord said …”, we get the impression that He is speaking to Peter about something somewhat different from that promise.

But in some of the older and more reliable ancient texts of the Gospel of Luke, those words “And the Lord said …” are not present. They aren’t found in the English Standard Version, or the New American Standard Version, or in the New International Version. In other words, rather than taking up a different subject, the Lord was continuing to speak of that glorious prospect that lay ahead for all the disciples. This becomes even more clear when we look in the original language and see that when the Lord told Peter, “Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat”, He was speaking in the plural—saying that Satan was asking for “you all”; that is, all the disciples.

But then, when our Lord spoke of Peter returning to Him, and of Peter then strengthening his brethren, He was speaking directly to Peter. Satan would desire to shift them all like wheat, because they would all be our Lord’s representatives—even though they would all abandon Him at the time of His arrest. But as our Lord promised, it would be Peter—the former denier of the Lord—who would later on be given the job of strengthening the others for their work.

Perhaps this explains the words that Peter wrote to his persecuted brothers and sisters in 1 Peter 5:8-11;

Be sober, be vigilant; because your adversary the devil walks about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour. Resist him, steadfast in the faith, knowing that the same sufferings are experienced by your brotherhood in the world. But may the God of all grace, who called us to His eternal glory by Christ Jesus, after you have suffered a while, perfect, establish, strengthen, and settle you. To Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen (1 Peter 5:8-11).

Could there have been anybody better suited to offer such words of encouragement to suffering Christians than Peter?—the former denier of our Lord?—but now the appointed restorer and encourager of our Lord’s fallible servants?

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So then; let’s look at this passage. First notice that, in our Lord’s words, we find that …

1. WE HAVE A FIERCE ENEMY (v. 21).

In verse 31, the Lord told Peter, “Simon, Simon! Indeed, Satan has asked for you, that he may sift you as wheat.” That our Lord spoke Peter’s name twice probably indicated to us that He really needed to capture Peter’s attention and cause him to think soberly. It may be that Peter’s chest was already beginning to swell at the thought that he and the others would be reigning with our Lord in His glorious kingdom. The Lord sobered Peter’s attitude by letting him know that the devil had been asking about him and the others.

Satan can do nothing against God’s people without the Lord’s permission. And when the Lord grants permission for the devil to do anything to us, it is so that even the devil himself would end up being used by the Lord to accomplish His good purposes for us. But notice what the devil was doing. The translation has it that he “asked” for the apostles; but as the word in the original language indicated, he was doing more than ‘asking’. He was actually demanding the apostles. He wanted to lay his hands on these appointed ambassadors of our Lord. And what he was demanding was that he be given the right to ‘sift’ them ‘like wheat’. When wheat was ‘sifted’, raw kernels of wheat were placed in a kind of netted basket or container which was held by both hands and thrashed back and forth violently. The purpose was to break away the husks of the kernels, and allow the husks to rise to the top and be blown away. In the devil’s plan then, he was demanding the right to violently thrash the apostles; but in God’s sovereign plan, all that would do would be to break away whatever needs to go from their lives so that they would be pure for His purpose.

But what a picture this gives us of the devil’s hatred for us as the followers of Jesus. The only thing close to what our Lord is describing would be how the devil demanded the right to attack Job in Job 1:9-12 and 2:4-6—which only resulted in Job being proven to be a man of God.

Let’s make no mistake about it. We have a hostile enemy. And in and of ourselves, we are vulnerable to his attacks because we are as weak and frail and failing as the apostles … and even as unreliable in our boasts as Peter.

But we go on to see that …

2. WE HAVE A COMPASSIONATE LORD (v. 32).

At this point, our Lord is not speaking to the apostles. He is speaking directly to—and specifically of—Peter. He said in verse 32, “But I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail; and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.”

First, notice that—in the light of the fact that the devil had asked to thresh them all—our Lord prayed for Peter. What a comfort that should be! He prayed, of course, for all of them on His last night with them. We’re told in John 17—in His prayer to the Father in the upper room;

“I do not pray that You should take them out of the world, but that You should keep them from the evil one. They are not of the world, just as I am not of the world. Sanctify them by Your truth. Your word is truth. As You sent Me into the world, I also have sent them into the world. And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth” (John 17:15-19).

This was a prayer that our Lord prayed specifically for the apostles, who would be His foundational witness-bearers to the world. But He also prayed for you and me; saying, “I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will believe in Me through their word …” (v. 20).

But in the passage before us, our Lord was praying specifically for Peter. He prayed that Peter’s faith would not fail—even though Peter himself would fail. This failure would not be permanent; but the reality of it was hinted at when our Lord said, “and when you have returned to Me, strengthen your brethren.” Our Lord was promising Peter—in advance—a gracious restoration and a future in the ministry of His service. What a good Master we serve. We can count on that restoration and future when we also fail—and when we also return to Him. As we’re told in 1 John 1:9;

“If we confess our sins, He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:9).

Now; this must have made Peter defensive. He? ‘Restored’? His faith ‘not fail’? That was when Peter spoke those regretful words in—what he thought to be—his own defense. He said in verse 33, “Lord, I am ready to go with You, both to prison and to death.” He was sure he would never fail or depart or need to be restored. How sadly wrong he was—and in just a short time.

But that’s when we learn that …

3. NOT EVEN OUR FAILURES CAN UNDO HIS PURPOSE FOR US (vv. 33-34).

We’re told, “Then He said, ‘I tell you, Peter, the rooster shall not crow this day before you will deny three times that you know Me’” (v. 34). Do you notice that our Lord called him—not Simon—but Peter? That was the name that our Lord gave him back in Matthew 16:18—back when he first testified, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (v. 16). But this ‘rock-solid’ man Peter would very shortly deny that he even knew the Lord.

And yet, our Lord—knowing that Peter would deny Him—nevertheless gave Peter the promise that he would be restored to the Lord, and would be put into the Lord’s service once again. What an illustration this is to us that our sovereign Lord knows it when we fail—and even knows in advance that we will fail—and yet He welcomes us, loves us, forgives us, and restores us, and puts us once again in His service.

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Consider the end of the story for Peter. After our Lord rose from the dead—and Peter was restored to Him—the Lord told him to get to work and feed His sheep. Then, He told him;

“Most assuredly, I say to you, when you were younger, you girded yourself and walked where you wished; but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will gird you and carry you where you do not wish.” This He spoke, signifying by what death he would glorify God. And when He had spoken this, He said to him, “Follow Me” (John 21:18-19).

So; Peter’s words may make us wince. But let’s not wince too long. Peter was made faithful in the end. This is because—as Peter’s own story shows us—his and our frailties and failures absolutely cannot undo our Lord and Master’s sovereign plan for those He loves.

AE