4 Things to Learn from Simon Peter’s Fall by Greg Laurie for Harvest
A while back there was a story was in the news about Marius Els, a South African farmer who had a hippo as his pet. He adopted the hippo as a 5-month-old calf and named him Humphrey. He said, “Humphrey’s like a son to me, he’s just like a human. . . . [People] think you can only have a relationship with dogs, cats and domestic animals. But I have a relationship with the most dangerous animal in Africa.”
You can probably imagine how the story ended. Tragically, Humphrey the hippo turned on his owner and killed him.
Sometimes we treat sin in our lives the same way. We may think that we have control of it and that it never will overtake us. Then one day it does. But if you mess up and learn from your mistakes, that’s what I would call failing forward.
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The Bible tells the story of a man who probably never realized that one thing would lead to another, and he fell away from God. He was a full-fledged apostle of Jesus Christ, and his name was Simon Peter.
Jesus had given Simon a new name, Peter, which means “rock.” I think the other disciples might have had a little bit of a chuckle at that, because he was sort of vacillating and impulsive at times. But Jesus knew that Simon Peter would grow into his new name with time.
Of course, we don’t see the potential in our lives that God sees. We see a lump of clay. God sees a beautiful vase. We see a blank canvas. God sees the finished painting. We see a piece of coal. God sees a refined diamond. We see problems. God sees solutions. We see failure. God sees potential. We see an end. God sees a new beginning.
Peter’s 4 Steps Down
On the night Judas Iscariot betrayed Him, Jesus told the disciples, “All of you will desert me. For the Scriptures say, ‘God will strike the Shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ But after I am raised from the dead, I will go ahead of you to Galilee and meet you there” (Mark 14:27–28 NLT).
