SERIES: The Gospel of John
The Amazing Transformation of Rocky Johnson
SPEAKER: Michael P. Andrus
Introduction: I would like to preach another biographical message today—this one about a character named Rocky Johnson. Of all the characters in the NT, other than Jesus, he is probably the best known. His Jewish name was Simon Barjona. That last name simply means “son of John,” for “bar” means “son” as in “Bar mitzvah” (Son of the Law). If he were Scandinavian, his last name would have been John’s Son or “Johnson.”
His first name was Simon, at least until Jesus got hold of him. Then he was renamed “Petros.” We have transliterated his name as Peter, but if we were to translate it into English it would be “Rocky,” a handle meant to convey manhood, strength, ruggedness, and stability.
Unfortunately, people don’t always live up to their names. If you need proof of that, the name Michael means, “who is like God.” I think you get my point. It was Shakespeare who said, “What’s in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.” That’s not quite true. One of the most popular and tasty fish on the market today is Orange Roughy, but it did not become popular until some marketing expert gave it a new name. It was originally known as “Slimehead.” That just didn’t look too attractive on a French restaurant’s menu.
In the first century names almost always conveyed something important about the person. I think we can be sure that was the case when Jesus did the naming. Yet it took many years before it was clear that Jesus didn’t make a mistake in naming Simon “Rocky.” There were many times when the name “Sandy” seemed more appropriate to describe this shifty, unstable disciple. But eventually he did live up to his name.
I want us to trace the sojourn of the Apostle Peter this morning, beginning with the 3-year training period during which Peter, a mere pebble, became a Rock.
A pebble becomes a rock.
Peter reminds me of an oak tree. Though an oak can become a giant of a tree, it always starts out small and insignificant as an acorn.
Chosen out of obscurity (Mark 1:16-17). Mark 1:16-17 is one of several NT passages which tell us that Peter was a fisherman. Fishing was not a lucrative industry in those days. It was a long, hard way for an uneducated man to eke out an existence. The fishing docks is definitely not the place most of us would go to find a handful of men to turn the world upside down. But then Jesus never did things the way the rest of us would do them. He picked Peter, not because of what he was, but because of what he could become.
Appointed as an Apostle (Mark 3:13-16). Not all of Jesus’ disciples became apostles. But 12 of them did, and Peter was one of them. As an apostle, Peter became a personal ambassador of Jesus, one with the authority to represent Him, speak for Him, and act in His behalf.
But Peter was not just one of the Twelve; he was also one of the inner circle of three, along with James and John. You see, Jesus was very realistic about the number of people He could touch in an in-depth way. He would minister to the multitudes, but He spent more time with the 70, far more with the Twelve, and the most with Peter, James, and John.
Again and again the Gospels tell us that Jesus took along Peter, James and John when He had special assignments from the Father. These three were the only ones present when Jesus healed Jairus’ daughter, when He was transfigured on the mountain, and when He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane.
Peter was not only one of the Twelve and one of the Three; he was also the most prominent of the Three. Just as Judas appears dead last in every list of the Apostles, so Peter appears first in each of those lists, which indicates that even the other Apostles recognized his prominence.
The road to becoming a Rock instead of a pebble was not all smooth, however.
Rebuked and chastised. (Luke 9:28-35; Mark 8:29-33; John 13:6-9) One of a number of times Peter was rebuked was on the Mount of Transfiguration. Perhaps you would like to turn to Luke’s account of it in Luke 9:28ff:
“About eight days after Jesus said this, he took Peter, John and James with him and went up onto a mountain to pray. As he was praying, the appearance of his face changed, and his clothes became as bright as a flash of lightning. Two men, Moses and Elijah, appeared in glorious splendor, talking with Jesus. They spoke about his departure, which he was about to bring to fulfillment at Jerusalem. Peter and his companions were very sleepy, but when they became fully awake, they saw his glory and the two men standing with him. As the men were leaving Jesus, Peter said to him, ‘Master, it is good for us to be here. Let us put up three shelters—one for you, one for Moses and one for Elijah.’ (He did not know what he was saying.)
While he was speaking, a cloud appeared and enveloped them, and they were afraid as they entered the cloud. A voice came from the cloud, saying, ‘This is my Son, whom I have chosen; listen to him.’”
Peter was excited to meet Moses and Elijah. He couldn’t quit babbling: “Wow, it’s great to be here! Let’s build shrines to honor Moses and Elijah, and oh yes, one for Jesus, too.” But God spoke out of a cloud: “This is my Son! Listen to Him! Peter shut up! Don’t you know that Moses and Elijah are not here to be honored, but to honor?”
Another occasion when Peter had to be rebuked is recorded in Mark 8. In verse 29 of that chapter Jesus asks His disciples, “Who do you say I am?” And Peter speaks first, making his great confession, “You are the Christ.” Then just two verses later we read,
“Jesus then began to teach them that the Son of Man must suffer many things and be rejected by the elders, chief priests and teachers of the law, and that he must be killed and after three days rise again. He spoke plainly about this, and Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him.”
Isn’t that incredible? Here’s Peter, who has just acknowledged that Jesus is the Messiah, the Son of God, and now he’s rebuking Jesus! So, Jesus has to rebuke him. We read, “But when Jesus turned and looked at his disciples, he rebuked Peter, ‘Get behind me, Satan!’ he said. ‘You do not have in mind the things of God, but the things of men.”
Then you perhaps recall the account of the Last Supper from John 13, when Jesus got up from dinner and began to wash the disciples’ feet. When He came to Peter the response was, “No, you shall never wash my feet.” And Jesus quietly put him in his place by saying, “Peter, unless I wash you, you have no part with me.”
These incidents certainly were not pleasant for Peter, but they were necessary for the Pebble to become a Rock. And I’m sure he felt he had just about arrived and had lived up to his name when he is promised preeminence by Jesus in Matthew 16:
Promised preeminence. (Matt. 16:16ff) Turn please to that difficult passage. The setting is immediately following Peter’s great confession of faith and just prior to Jesus telling Peter to “Get behind me, Satan!” Let’s read starting in verse 15:
“’What about you?’ Jesus asked. ‘Who do you say I am?’ Simon Peter answered, ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ Jesus replied, ‘Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.’”
I think Protestants have generally cheated in their interpretation of this passage in order to distance themselves from the Roman Catholic interpretation. But I personally don’t know how we can get around the fact that Jesus here gives to Peter a preeminent position among the Apostles, plus a very prominent place in the establishment of the Church. We can and should argue about whether Peter’s position was passed on to his successors, but we cannot legitimately challenge the fact that Jesus personally elevated him to a place of prominence in the early church. And the book of Acts bears it out historically.
So far the evidence we have seen indicates that this poor, uneducated fisherman has become, first of all, a disciple, then an Apostle, then a privileged member of the inner circle, and finally, despite being rebuked and chastised a number of times, he is promised preeminence in the Church that Jesus Christ said He was going to build. One might conclude that Rocky Johnson has really arrived and has earned his name. But if one concluded that, it would be because he hadn’t read the rest of the story. For on the night before the crucifixion of Christ, the Rock is crushed. This proud, self-assured, preeminent Apostle went down the tubes in terrible disgrace, denying three times that he even knew who Jesus was.
Was this tragedy simply a momentary lapse, a spur-of-the-moment mistake easily excused due to the passion of the moment? I don’t think so. I believe there were at least five steps that led to Peter’s defection. Dr. Howard Hendricks, who was my prof in seminary, pointed out four of these and I have added a fifth:
He boasts too much.
He prays too little.
He acts too soon.
He follows too far (behind).
He thinks too late.
The Rock crumbles
He boasts too much. (Mark 14:27-31) We have seen Peter’s tendency to boast earlier in our study of John, but I want you to look at Mark 14:27. In fact, all five of these steps are found in Mark 14. The previous verse indicates that after the Last Supper the disciples and Jesus sang a hymn and headed for the Mount of Olives and the Garden of Gethsemane. Verse 27 reads:
“You will all fall away,” Jesus told them, “for it is written: “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep will be scattered.’ But after I have risen, I will go ahead of you into Galilee.” Peter declared, “Even if all fall away, I will not.” “I tell you the truth,” Jesus answered, “today–yes, tonight–before the rooster crows twice you yourself will disown me three times.” But Peter insisted emphatically, “Even if I have to die with you, I will never disown you.”
Oh, how easy it is for us to become overconfident! If 1 Cor. 10:12 has Judas’ name written on it, it also has Peters: “Let him who thinks he stands take heed lest he fall.” I’m always troubled when I hear someone say, “That’s one sin I would never commit.” Or, “That’s a habit I’d never start.” I’ve just seen too many cases, my own life included, where things which seemed totally beyond a person’s character actually happened. I think Satan must work overtime trying to trip up self-confident Christians. He certainly did with Peter.
He prays too little. (Mark 14:37-38) It shouldn’t be surprising to find overconfidence and prayerlessness in the same person. A person’s confidence cannot lie in himself and in Christ at the same time. We see the evidence of this in Peter as Jesus prays in the Garden of Gethsemane. He tells His disciples in Mark 14:34 to “stay here and keep watch.” But in verse 37 we read, “Then he returned to his disciples and found them sleeping. ‘Simon,’ he said to Peter, are you asleep? Could you not keep watch for one hour? Watch and pray so that you will not fall into temptation. The spirit is willing, but the body is weak.'”
Twice more Jesus went off to pray alone and twice more He returned to find Peter and the other two asleep. Imagine! They whiled away their last hours with Christ by sleeping! Of course, before we point any fingers, perhaps we ought to ask how often we’ve fallen asleep while praying or, worse yet, fallen asleep without praying. Or ask how often we’ve passed the hour in church, merely daydreaming. Someone has suggested that Mark 4:37 ought to be placed at the front of every church: “Could you not keep watch for one hour?”
He acts too soon. (Mark 14:47; John 18:10-11) You will recall from several weeks ago that Judas soon arrived with soldiers and religious leaders to betray Jesus. When Judas kissed Him, the soldiers seized Jesus and arrested Him. But Mark 14:47 tells us that “one of those standing near drew his sword and struck the servant of the high priest, cutting off his ear.” We might always wonder who this was except for the fact that John alone, of the four Gospel writers, gives us the details. He adds in John 18:10: “Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it and struck the high priest’s servant, cutting off his right ear. (The servant’s name was Malchus.)”
Now frankly I admire Peter’s courage here. Faced with several hundred soldiers, armed to the teeth, Peter pulls out a little sword and attempts to split the Roman helmet of the soldier nearest him, who happened to be the slave of the high priest. Being a fisherman rather than a swordsman, however, he missed the seam in the helmet and instead cut Malchus’ ear off. Courage to spare! But not much thought.
In fact, Jesus turns to Peter and says, “Put your sword away! Shall I not drink the cup the Father has given me?” Actually there’s a bit more to the story. Luke tells us that Jesus put the ear back on Malchus and healed it while Matthew records the following exhortation to Peter: “All who draw the sword will die by the sword. Do you think I cannot call on my Father, and he will at once put at my disposal more than twelve legions of angels? But how then would the Scriptures be fulfilled that say it must happen in this way?” Jesus wasn’t helpless! Seven thousand angels are instantaneously at His disposal, yet Peter decides to take things into his own hands.
Have you gotten impatient and tried to fight God’s battles for Him lately? Are you constantly running ahead of Him? It could spell disaster. Peter, however, wasn’t always running ahead of the Lord; sometimes he lagged behind, significantly behind. We see this in the fourth step to Peter’s defection:
He follows too far (behind). (Mark 14:54, 66-71) Back in Mark 14 and verse 53 we read that “they took Jesus to the high priest, and all the chief priests, elders and teachers of the law came together. Peter followed him at a distance, right into the courtyard of the high priest. There he sat with the guards and warmed himself at the fire.” He wanted to know what was happening, but he didn’t want to be known. He followed behind at a safe distance.
There are many like Peter today. They legitimately and sincerely follow Jesus, but they follow afar off. They do not want to become too “fanatical” or “lose touch” with the world that surrounds them. Moreover, they think they are safe at a distance, though they are actually in greater danger. When Jesus calls a person to follow Him, He calls him to follow in His footsteps.
Surely you have had the experience of walking on the sand, following someone else’s footsteps. If so, you are aware that your ability to follow those steps is generally in direct proportion to how close you are to the one who made the footprints. The farther back in space or time, the more likely the footsteps are to be blurred by the shifting winds or the waves of the sea. Yet many hold back, feeling that the closer they are to Jesus the greater their danger will be. Although their exposure is greater, the danger is less. The place to be really safe, though in the midst of the battle, is always next to Jesus.
But Peter follows too far behind, and you know the rest of the story. A little slave-girl watching the door to the courtyard thinks she recognizes Peter as one of Jesus’ disciples, but he denies it. He answers, according to Mark, “I don’t know or understand what you’re talking about,” and he moves into the shadows of the entryway.
A few minutes later he is standing and warming himself by the fire when he is identified again by the servant girl, and again he denies having anything to do with Jesus. Shortly one of the relatives of Malchus (according to John 18:26) asks him, “Didn’t I see you with him in the olive grove?” And this time he begins to curse and swear. All the vocabulary of his fishing days came back to him as he denounced his questioners, “I do not know this man of whom you speak.”
We see the last step to Peter’s defection in Mark 14:72: “Immediately the rooster crowed the second time. Then Peter remembered the word Jesus had spoken to him: ‘Before the rooster crows twice you will disown me three times.’ And he broke down and wept.”
He thinks too late. (Mark 14:72) “Then Peter remembered.” O that we could remember what our parents have taught us, what our Sunday School teachers have tried to build into our lives, what we have read in God’s Word, what we have seen in other people’s lives—oh that we could remember before it’s too late!
The Rock has been crushed. Most of us, if we were Jesus, would have thrown out the pieces. After all, just think of the tremendous investment of time and effort that went into Peter, and all Jesus got in return was for Peter to deny he even knew Him. Well, Jesus does consider the time and effort, and because of that and because of His great love, He decides that rather than throw the broken rock away He would put it into the tumbler.
The Rock goes into the tumbler.
For Christmas my son Andy got a rock tumbler from his grandma Annie. It came with a little bag of ugly rocks, which he put into the tumbler, along with sand and some course abrasives called grit. After a solid month of tumbling and periodic changes to finer and finer grit, the rough edges were worn off and the rocks became smooth and polished. I’m sure if those rocks could talk, they would complain about the painful experience of the tumbler. But now that they are set in a ring or on a chain around the neck, their story would be different. I’d like to share with you briefly three kinds of grit Peter experienced before he came out polished.
The grit of shame and sorrow (Luke 22:61-62). If ever a look melted a person, I’m sure the look Jesus gave Peter at the time of his betrayal did just that. In Luke 22:61 we read that just as Peter was denying Christ the third time, “The Lord turned and looked straight at Peter.” The shame he felt caused him to go outside and weep bitterly. Strangely Peter is not mentioned again in any of the Gospels until after the resurrection. This is probably the longest period of silence—three days—known in the life of Peter. I feel certain that part of the reason is that the next several days until Jesus rose from the dead and appeared to Peter on Sunday morning were probably the most painful and sorrowful days any man on earth has ever endured. His best friend experienced an excruciating death after he turned his back on Him.
The grit of persecution (Acts 4:5, 12). We don’t have time to follow Peter’s career in the early church, except to note that in Acts 4, shortly after the day of Pentecost, Peter finds himself arrested and accused of sedition and blasphemy. This time he is released unharmed. But in Acts 5 he back in jail again. This time an angel releases him, and when he is recaptured, he is flogged and released. Then in Acts 12 we find him in prison again and again released by an angel. Those of us who have never been in jail have no appreciation for the suffering it entails. And these weren’t American jails either, the worst of which would be a palace compared to the Roman prisons of the first century. But God was using the grit of persecution to polish the Rock.
The grit of reproof (John 21, Acts 10, Gal. 2). Peter took not only emotional beatings and physical beatings but also verbal ones, and usually he deserved them. I have time to only mention two. In Acts 10 God speaks to Peter by means of an angel to teach him the tough lesson that racial prejudice is thoroughly godless. That was a tough lesson for a pure-blooded Jew, but the grit of reproof does its job.
We have Peter’s own testimony following the incident in Acts 10:34: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show favoritism but accepts men from every nation who fear him and do what is right.” The other example is found in Gal. 2 where Peter and Paul got into a real donnybrook over legalism. Here’s Paul’s account, beginning in verse 11:
“When Peter came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he was clearly in the wrong. Before certain men came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But when they arrived, he began to draw back and separate himself from the Gentiles because he was afraid of those who belonged to the circumcision group. The other Jews joined him in his hypocrisy, so that by their hypocrisy even Barnabas was led astray.”
These were painful experiences for Peter, but they were necessary if the Rock was to emerge from the tumbler polished and useful. It did, and what we find in the rest of the NT is that his excesses are channeled into usefulness and his liabilities are converted into assets.
The Rock emerges polished
His excesses are channeled into usefulness. One of Peter’s excesses was his outspokenness. Whenever the disciples were together, he was invariably the first one to speak. Someone has said that Peter had the original hoof-in-mouth disease. But by the time we come to the book of Acts, we find Peter’s outspokenness channeled to the point that he has become a great and fearless spokesman for Christ.
Another of his excesses was what we might call activism—the tendency to act before he thought—jumping into the lake when he saw Jesus walking on the water, chopping off ears, etc. Later, however, we find that activism channeled into powerful and visionary leadership.
His liabilities are converted to assets. The cowardly Peter a few hours before the crucifixion is converted into a bold preacher afterwards, one who could stand up to governmental and church leaders and say, “You are God-killers and you must repent.” (Acts 2)
The self-confident Peter the night before the crucifixion is converted into one whose confidence is squarely in Christ. In the first chapter of his first epistle he prays “that our faith and hope may be in God.”
The prayerless Peter who preferred sleep to watchfulness is converted into one who knew the necessity fervency in prayer. In 1 Peter 4:7 he wrote, “The end of all things is near. Therefore be clear minded and self-controlled so that you can pray.”
And finally, this disciple whom Jesus called “Satan” is converted into a holy man who warned others about “the devil who prowls around seeking whom he may devour.” (1 Peter 5:8)
Conclusion: Three weeks ago we spoke about Judas. There are some startling similarities between Judas and Peter. Both were disciples, both were apostles, both held privileged positions, both sinned grievously by turning their backs upon Jesus. But there is also a major difference between them. Judas felt remorse and went out and hanged himself, entering into a Christless eternity because there was no substance to his faith. He was a phony disciple, playing religious games but possessing no personal relationship with Jesus.
Peter, on the other hand, repented of his heinous sin, sought the forgiveness of God, and went forward to demonstrate the reality of his faith in a powerful way. When preaching on Judas I appealed to those who were phony Christians, just playing religious games, to turn their hearts to Christ before death makes their hypocrisy final. Today I ask those true Christians who have sinned grievously, who haven’t lived up to that glorious name “Christian,” to turn to Christ for forgiveness and dedicate yourself anew to a life of true discipleship. God in His grace is able to restore you to a place of usefulness and to work into your life the same kind of amazing transformation He did for Rocky Johnson.
One of our great hymns has words that confirm the message this morning:
O to grace how great a debtor
Daily I’m constrained to be.
Let Thy goodness like a fetter
Bind my wandering heart to Thee.
Prone to wander, Lord, I feel it
Prone to leave the God I love
Here’s my heart, O take and seal it.
Seal it for Thy courts above.
Benediction: 2 Peter 3:17-18
DATE: March 13, 1994
Tags:
Peter
Shame
Persecution