Spiritual Warfare – The Transforming Power of the Gospel: Seen in the Disciples – Peter
We ended last week with 1 Thess. 5:23-24 May God himself, the God of peace, sanctify you through and through. May your whole spirit, soul and body be kept blameless at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. The One Who calls you is faithful and He will do it!
The whole person – personality, character, spirituality, emotions, mentality, bodily (love the Lord with your whole …). The gospel is for the whole person, not just a ticket to heaven!
The process is Discipleship. ‘Disciple’ is better understood as ‘apprenticeship’! And the Gospel records show us how this worked in the lives of the Twelve during their 3 year apprenticeship with Jesus. It’s incidental to the main message and focus which is on Jesus, of course. But nevertheless, it is there, and it is there for our encouragement!
One often-missed point is that a disciple is someone who is in relationship with his teacher. It’s not just a question of passing on information or skills. The apprentice’s greatest desire should be to become like his master. Historically, an apprentice went to live with his teacher, as in Bible times with Rabbis and their talmidim. Our challenge is, how do we replicate that environment for discipleship today?
Discipleship should transform our values, beliefs, attitudes. As we’ll see in the Twelve Disciples, God takes the most unlikely people to do His work, so that all the glory goes to Him! He doesn’t call the equipped, He equips those He calls! Although that equipping may take place before the call – example of Paul – transformed from Saul the Jewish oppressor to Paul the apostle to the Gentiles! God used his knowledge of the OT (see Acts 9:20; 17:3; 18:28) and arguably, his education and intellect, but the old attitudes had to go and be replaced by new beliefs, values and priorities (Phil. 3:4-11).
Mark 3:13-14 – Jesus chose those He Himself wanted, appointed to be with Him, that He might send them out to preach, and to have power – just like Jesus! And He has chosen us. We often think of the Gospel as us choosing Christ and accepting Him, but when we do ‘choose Christ’, we find that He actually chose us and accepted us before ever we were looking for Him!
So He knows who and what we are, and what He plans to do, and what He is able to do, with and through us, if we abide in Him. (Picture of baby in womb – nourished and growing from what the mother provides with no conscious self-effort).
Simon Peter.
Look at gospel records
| Matt. 4:18/10:2 | Always first in the lists of disciples |
| John 1:42 | Jesus named Simon “the Listener”, Cephas/Peter “the stone/boulder” before he showed any potential!(Matt.16:18) |
| Matt 14:28 | Brave? Impetuous? Spur of the moment? |
| Matt. 15:15 | Dull? Spokesman? |
| Matt. 16:16-17 | Revelation from heaven! |
| Matt. 16:22-23 | Ideas from Satan! Gets His Master’s mission all wrong. Rejecting thought of suffering? Standing up for Jesus? Standing up to Jesus? |
| Matt. 17:4-5 | Wants to honour Jesus, but puts Him on same level as Moses and Elijah |
| Matt. 17:24-26 | Defending Jesus’ honour, but gets it wrong |
| Matt. 18:21 | Magnanimous! But gets it wrong – again! |
| Matt. 19:27 | The martyr – we have given up everything. What will there be for us? |
| Matt. 26:33 | Self confident, to Jesus’ sorrow |
| Matt. 26:40 | Sleeping while His Master is praying |
| Matt. 26:51 | Resisting when His Master was submitting |
| Matt. 26:69-75 | Warming his hands with His Master’s enemies; Denying while his Master was on trial; Completely broken |
| John 20:2-6 | Straight into the Tomb! But didn’t understand (Mark 16:7 Tell His disciples and Peter) |
| John 21:2 | I’m going fishing! Finished, all over, back to normal |
| John 21:15-17 | Restored, but even then v.21 What shall this man do? |
See him changing:
| Acts 2 | the Spokesman again, but now empowered by the Holy Spirit, insight into Scripture |
| Acts 3-8 | takes the lead |
| Acts 10 | bring the gospel to the Gentiles |
| Acts 15 | defends that to the Jerusalem Council |
Later travelled across Turkey and ended up at Rome, where he was crucified upside down as he didn’t consider himself worthy to be crucified in the same manner as His Master.
Look at his epistles – who he became:
| 1 Peter | |
| 1 Pet. 1:6 | rejoicing in trials, looking forward to the results – no gain without pain! |
| 1 Pet. 1:22 | love one another deeply |
| 1 Pet. 2:9-10 | encouragement and inclusion |
| 1 Pet. 2:13 | submission to authority |
| 1 Pet. 2:19-21 | suffering patiently for doing good |
| 1 Pet. 3:8-9 | humility, not retaliating |
| 1 Pet. 3:15 | answer with gentleness and respect |
| 1 Pet. 4:13 | rejoice in suffering for Christ (cf. Acts 5:41) |
| 1 Pet. 5:1-3 | fellow-elder, not stressing his authority, but stresses humble shepherding |
| 1 Pet. 5:5-6 | humility |
| 2 Peter | |
| 2 Pet. 1:4-7 | encouragement to patient endurance, based on exceedingly great and precious promises |
| 2 Pet. 1:12 | reminding and encouraging |
| 2 Pet. 3:15-16 | ‘our beloved brother Paul’ (cf. Gal. 2); acknowledges the wisdom given to him and his writings as Scripture |
| 2 Pet. 3:18 | grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ. |