Mark 14:66-72

Find a way to separate yourself from whatever’s going on around you so you can fully enter into today’s passage. if you haven’t read the introduction to Mark’s Gospel, read it here.

Read Mark 14:66-72 imagining what Peter is thinking and feeling.

He is the one among the disciples who spoke up and identified Jesus as the Messiah, and he is the one who passionately blurted out his undying allegiance to Jesus in the upper room, but now he denies that he ever knew Jesus. At least he is still here when the others have fled. At least he followed when Jesus was arrested.

But Peter’s devotion to Jesus needs to be purified. He has been a fanatical supporter of Jesus - full of passion for action. Now he learns the limits of his own ability to follow.

Read Mark 14:66-72 again trying to discern the hard lesson Peter is learning through this experience.

When everything is going well, it’s easy to declare that we will follow Jesus wherever he leads. But when circumstances turn out differently than we had hoped and imagined, we can often either become angry with God or beat up on ourselves believing we could have done something differently to avoid the disappointment and difficulty. Both responses indicate that we, like Peter, are relying on ourselves and our desires rather than on Jesus.

Followers of Jesus do just that – follow him. Wherever he leads and however strange the circumstances he leads them through, true followers stay the course. But not in their own strength. If it is fanaticism that fuels our devotion to Jesus, we will run out of gas when his way is different than we expected. But if our devotion is based on the knowledge that he is our way, our truth and our life, then we will continue to depend on him and trust him even when we don’t understand where he leads us.

How could Peter’s experience in the courtyard help him to become a true follower rather than a fanatical one?

Has Jesus ever led you somewhere that you didn’t understand? How did you react?

Take a few moments and talk all of this over with Jesus. Try to identify both thoughts and feelings and share them with Jesus.

It may be that Jesus is inviting you into a deeper level of dependence on him. Take a moment or two to be silent and listen. If you sense that Jesus is nudging you toward an action, make a plan for following through.

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