HOPE THROUGH HUMILIATION

I must confess that I am ashamed of myself. Even though I know that all blessings come from the Lord and that I am helpless without Him, I have been commencing my sermons without prayer. Why? I can only think of one reason. To my shame, I have grown confident in myself.

Jesus' Apostles had also grown confident in themselves. Even after Jesus had warned them that they would all abandon Him, they insisted that they would not! Peter went even further, insisting that he would stand alone for Jesus, even if all the others abandoned Him:

• But Peter answered and said unto him, "If all shall be offended in thee, I will never be offended."

However, Jesus corrected him, saying that Peter would be the worst offender, denying Jesus three times. But Peter corrected Him again:

• "Even if I must die with thee, yet will I not deny thee." Likewise also said all the disciples. (Matthew 26:33, 35 ASV)

However, Peter fell in the most humiliating way. He denied the Lord, just as Jesus had prophesied, and "wept bitterly."

But in spite of his humiliating betrayal, a remarkably encouraging thing took place. The resurrected Jesus came to His Apostles as they were fishing in the Sea of Galilee and designated the disgraced Peter to feed His sheep. 

We tend to rate spiritual qualifications in terms of spiritual habits and behaviors. However, Peter now was qualified by virtue of his brokenness and self-despair - necessary qualifications for service. 

During his discouraging 40 years as a shepherd tending the sheep of his father-in-law in the desert, Moses became the most humble man in all the earth. This became his  all-important quality. He would now be situated to regard God's Word above his own.

To reinforce the lesson Peter's humiliation, Jesus reminded him of his betrayal. Simulating this betrayal, He asked Peter, three times, "Do you love me?" 

I think Peter now understood that he could no longer rely on himself. Christ alone would have to be his strength. Later Peter confessed the all-sufficiently of his Savior:

• Through him [we] are believers in God, that raised him from the dead, and gave him glory; so that your faith and hope might be in God. (1 Peter 1:21)

Our faith and hope must be in God alone. I am ashamed that I often lapse into self-trust. Nevertheless, I am grateful that the Lord hasn't humiliated me in a painful and public way. But I am even more grateful about something else - that He is working all of our failures for good to conform us into the likeness of His blessed Son.