Denial in Triplicate: Matthew 26:69-75 (Sermon)
Introduction
Thank you, worship team.
Have you ever done something so wrong that you were embarrassed? I have.
Do you have regrets? I do.
Have you ever cried because of your sin or wept thinking of God’s grace? You are looking at someone who has.
As we turn to God’s Word, we see a man who was both a saint and a sinner. He was like us. His particular sin of dishonesty and subsequent remorse are an example for us today. Let’s learn a bit about the follower of Jesus named Peter.
TEXT
We are continuing our series in Matthew. The book is about following the promised king into his kingdom. Jesus is the king that God had promised. You may recall that in chapter 26, Jesus was on trial. Turn in your Bibles to chapter 26, starting at verse 69. Please stand with me if you are able. I am going to have P.K. read for us this morning.
Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. And a servant girl came up to him and said, “You also were with Jesus the Galilean.” But he denied it before them all, saying, “I do not know what you mean.” And when he went out to the entrance, another servant girl saw him, and she said to the bystanders, “This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.” And again he denied it with an oath: “I do not know the man.” After a little while the bystanders came up and said to Peter, “Certainly you too are one of them, for your accent betrays you.” Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, “I do not know the man.” And immediately the rooster crowed. And Peter remembered the saying of Jesus, “Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly. (Matthew 26:69–75, ESV)
PRAYER
As Pastor Joe has been working with us, let us say, “Thanks be to God” after I say, “The Word of the Lord.” The Word of the Lord. [Thanks be to God]. Let’s pray. Dear God, thank you for your Word. It is true. This is a familiar passage; however, it reminds us of what you suffered. We need your help to follow you. In Jesus’s name, we pray, amen. You may be seated.
CONTEXT
It was Passover week, and it was early Friday morning. In the dead of the dark, The disciples had run away at Jesus’s arrest. Peter boldly said he would never do such a thing, but he did. Not only that, though we saw him move closer to Jesus in some of the verses before this, he was moving further and further away.
STRUCTURE:
The passage has an organization of three denials and a reaction:
Denial 1 (Verses 69–70)
Denial 2 (Verses 71–72)
Denial 3 (Verses 73–74a)
Reaction = Rooster / Remembrance / Remorse (Verses 74b–75)
Once more, Jesus’s prediction proved true, demonstrating Christ’s power to predict the future. The result was contrition after his rebellion, which gave us both negative and positive examples. Let’s work through the details. Look back at verse 69 of chapter 26.
DENIAL 1
Now Peter was sitting outside in the courtyard. And a servant girl came up to him and said, “You also were with Jesus the Galilean.” But he denied it before them all, saying, “I do not know what you mean.” (Matthew 26:69–70, ESV)
Peter was bold. In chapter 4, he was the first to follow Jesus. He left his business to follow him for three years. This short-term mission trip cost him comfort, income, and, eventually, his life. He was in Jesus’s inner circle.
In Matthew chapter 16, Peter was the one to whom God revealed that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God.
And Peter was the one who said no one was going to kill.
In Matthew 17, Peter, James, and John were the only ones who saw Moses and Elijah back from the dead and Jesus in a heavenly state.
In Matthew 26, Peter was the one who said he would never deny or abandon him.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus invited only Peter, James, and John to pray with him just before his betrayal.
Peter was the one who attacked Malachus, seeking to arrest Jesus.
Peter was bold as a lion. Yet, Peter was the one whom Jesus confronted repeatedly.
In Matthew 16, Jesus rebuked Peter as Satan tempted him.
In Matthew 26, Jesus corrected Peter about never denying or abandoning him.
He challenged Peter when sleeping in their prayer meeting.
He also confronted him about cutting off Malchus’s ear, and then Jesus healed Malchus.
Jesus was right about Peter. He ran away with everyone else. He left Jesus high and dry, stranded with his enemies. Yet, he came back. Last Sunday, we read that he was back in the high priest’s home. He watched the farce of a trial. He heard Caiaphas ask Jesus if he was the Son of the living God: the Christ. Peter knew he was. He said as much. But when a slave girl asked Peter if he was with Jesus, he lied. He said he didn’t know what she meant. Perhaps he justified his denial by thinking, “What did she mean by ‘with?’ Does she know how ‘with’ I am?” She had no idea. Maybe Peter rationalized his lie, “If I avoid directly denying it, it is not a lie. I am not in the wrong. I want to stick around. I can help if I am here. A little lie won’t hurt anyone. It is not that bad. Everyone does it.” We don’t know what he was thinking.
MOTIVATION OF DECEPTION
What motivates a person to lie? Peter considered Jesus the Messiah, and he saw him heal the sick, cast out demons, walk on water, calm the storms, miraculously feed thousands, and raise the dead. Why not be open about these facts? Why would someone not want to stand up for a friend suffering persecution? Why would a person not identify with the truth? Maybe because of fear. Fear of what? Recall that Jesus’s opponents wanted him dead. They came in the middle of the night with swords and clubs. Peter likely didn’t want to be next in line. So what did he do? He ran. And in our passage, he lied. Peter was making his own path, relying on his own insight of what would be best, not God’s. He was expressing trust in himself, not the Lord. This was the first denial. The second was worse.
DENIAL 2
And when he went out to the entrance, another servant girl saw him, and she said to the bystanders, “This man was with Jesus of Nazareth.” And again he denied it with an oath: “I do not know the man.” (Matthew 26:71–72, ESV)
Note: he went out to the entrance. He moved further away from Jesus physically and spiritually. Jesus told Thomas days before that he was the “Way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). Peter was embracing a lie and leaving the Jesus-way. Jesus taught not to make an oath but to let one’s yes be yes and no be no. Peter forgot or ignored this. He denied his relationship again, but this time with an oath. He promised that he was telling the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. But that was a lie. Like Pinocchio, his metaphorical nose was getting longer and longer. His lies were growing like a fish tale from hell.
LIES
Have you ever lied? Most of us can recall a time we did. I am a terrible liar. My conscience gets the best of me and my face. Generally, I have to change the subject if I don’t want to be forthright or share. We can lie by exaggeration, omission, and half-truths. J.I. Packer once said, “A half-truth masquerading as the whole truth becomes a complete untruth.” Lies are all around us. Politicians lie, companies lie, and the news lies. Educators, writers, and students pretend to produce their own material but plagiarize someone else’s work. Who can we trust?
Amid the temptation to lie, we can forget about the consequences. Lies hurt. God tells us not to lie in his top ten rules. The ninth commandment is Thou shalt not bear false witness. The innocent go to prison, as in the case of Jesus, and the guilty can get off scot-free. God is the God of truth, and Satan is the father of lies. God wants us to speak truth in love to one another. If a person is lying, he or she tends to say more lies to get out of them. They don’t promote intimacy, transparency, or trust. Peter seemed blind to this. Matthew was not. He included this historical account for a reason. It paints Jesus as the hero and Peter as evidence. Jesus was the one who was able to face death without capitulation and predict the future. Peter couldn’t. He gave in to cutting a corner here and there. So, as the church grew, the one we put on a pedestal was not a saint but a Savior.
DENIAL 3
Return to Matthew chapter 26 and Peter’s third and last denial. Look at verse 73.
After a little while the bystanders came up and said to Peter, “Certainly you too are one of them, for your accent betrays you.” Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, “I do not know the man.” (Matthew 26:73–74a, ESV)
Peter now had to face more people who would connect him to Jesus just by his accent. It was a shibboleth. What? A shibboleth. Can you say the word shibboleth with me? Shibboleth. Good job. There was shibboleth before there were two-step authentication, captcha images, and strong passwords. The word comes from a story in the Old Testament where Judge Jephthah had led an army from Gilead to kill some of the tribe of Ephraim. Ephramites were escaping over the river Jordan. When the army encountered people, they gave them a test of pronouncing the word shibboleth. If they said the word wrong, it betrayed their tribe, and they killed them. Accents betray us. Peter had a Galilean accent. “You are one of them,” said the bystander.
CAR TOP CARRIER
Say these words:
BAG
SNOW
ABOUT
You are saying it all wrong. It is
BAG
SNOW
ABOUT
This reminds me of my first car top carrier. I called a guy from Facebook in St. Joe who was selling it. We talked, and I noticed that he had an accent like mine. He was elongating his “O’s.” I asked him where he was from. I said I was from Minnesota. He grew up in the UP. Those who live by Lake Superior, Minnesota, and Wisconsin tend to talk alike. We were chatting, and if I remember the story correctly, he eventually gave me the top car carrier for free. When I was in Wheaton last week, another parent dropping off his kid could tell from my accent that I was from Minnesota. We tend to have different accents if you are from Boston or down south with a southern drawl. Peter spoke like a Galilean. But that fact didn’t trigger honesty.
CURSES AND SWEAR WORDS
Peter went from, “I don’t know what you mean,” to an oath, “I promise I don’t know the man,” to a curse and swear like, “Cursed be upon my mother’s grave if I am lying to you.” We don’t know precisely the nature of this promising, cursing, and swearing, but his denial was getting more emphatic. He also moved from inside the trial to outside the courtyard, the entrance, and finally to the outside. He was moving away from Jesus. Look at verse 74b.
RESULT
And immediately the rooster crowed. And Peter remembered the saying of Jesus, “Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly. (Matthew 26:74b–75, ESV)
Now, he was out. He remembered what Jesus had said at the sound of the rooster. Jesus predicted what happened. In Matthew, we see Jesus knew:
His purpose:
To fulfill the Law (Matthew 5:17)
To call the sinner (Matthew 9:13)
To serve
To give his life as a ransom for many (20:28)
Himself
that he needed to be baptized by John the Baptist (3:15)
that he needed God’s Word more than daily bread (4:4)
he would make his disciples fishers of men (4:19)
He knew he had the power to heal and forgive sin (9:6)
He was greater than the temple (12:6)
He was the Son of Man (12:7)
He was the Lord of the Sabbath (12:7)
He was greater than Jonah (12:11)
He was greater than Solomon (12:12)
He was Christ, Son of the living God (16:15–20)
He was and is the Lord (24:42).
He knew that only the Father knows the day and hour of the judgment day (Matthew 24:36)
Others hearts
Of the prophets of old wanted (13:17)
of the centurion (8:10)
of the Canaanite woman (15:27)
Of the people (15:7)
Of the disciple and their rewards (Matthew 5:3–11)
The kingdom of heaven
the kingdom of heaven was at hand (4:17; 10:7)
knew the impact of obedience and disobedience of his followers (5:13–16).
He knew how to live righteously (Matthew 5:21–7:20)
He knew the results of those who follow him (7:21–27)
God the Father
And the future
He knew the harvest is plentiful (9:36)
He knew his disciples would suffer persecution for their faith (10:16–19; 21–25)
He knew that the Holy Spirit would speak through his disciples (10:20)
Jesus knew that he would be betrayed, beaten, handed over to Rome, killed, and raised (16, 17, 20, 26).
Jesus knew there was a colt and donkey and a willing lender.
He knew what to say to the lender to get him the use of the animals for his triumphal entry.
He knew his words would not pass away (Matthew 24:35).
He knew that Judas would betray him (Matthew 26:21–25).
He knew everyone would fall away from him (Matthew 26:31).
He knew Peter would betray him (26:34).
He knew and knows because he was and is the godman, the Son of the living God. And the rooster cried, and Peter remembered and was remorseful. He wept bitterly. Have you done that? I have. Crying isn’t necessarily a sign of weakness. The shortest verse in the Bible is John 11:35. It documents that Jesus wept. He was the manliest man in all of history. We can weep for various reasons. Weeping for loss is appropriate. Weeping for sin is good. This was the proper response from Peter. Jesus said, blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted. Peter was sad because he sinned against a friend who was more than a man. He was the godman suffering for sinners like him.
WORLDLY REPENTANCE
The challenge is that not everyone who expresses sorrow does it for the right reason. Have you ever met a person who appears to be remorseful, but \only for optics. 2 Corinthians says:
“Godly grief produces a repentance that leads to salvation without regret, whereas worldly grief produces death” (2 Corinthians 7:10, ESV).
Peter wept bitterly. He was sorrowful. I think he had godly grief. Why? He wasn’t putting on a show. There was no audience. God knew his heart. How do we know that Peter had godly grief? His life was the proving ground for his faith. His life produced repentance. What was that? He moved away from a rejection of Jesus to a following of Jesus.
Jesus would reconcile with him and give him a pastoral call.
He would end up evangelizing and preaching publicly about Jesus,
He led the church,
He authored letters in the Bible,
And then he suffered and died for his faith.
He was that beatitude disciple: poor in spirit, mourning his sin, and hungering for rightness with God and his ways.
DENIAL BEFORE THE FATHER
This came up in our pastor’s meeting. What do we do with Jesus’s words from Matthew 10 about denial? Matthew chapter 10, verse 31 states:
Fear not, therefore; you are of more value than many sparrows. So everyone who acknowledges me before men, I also will acknowledge before my Father who is in heaven, but whoever denies me before men, I also will deny before my Father who is in heaven. (Matthew 10:31–33, ESV)
Peter denied Jesus before men and women. It is the same Greek word in chapter 26. Did Jesus deny Peter before the Father, despite the remorse and repentance? We need to zoom out and see what else Jesus said about forgiveness. Jump to Matthew chapter 12, verse 31.
Therefore I tell you, every sin and blasphemy will be forgiven people, but the blasphemy against the Spirit will not be forgiven. And whoever speaks a word against the Son of Man will be forgiven, but whoever speaks against the Holy Spirit will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come. (Matthew 12:31–32, ESV)
So, Jesus was talking about forgiving every sin. A person could even speak against him and find forgiveness. Even the sin of lying and denying Jesus is not short of the arm of God’s grace, mercy, and love. Yes, but what do we do with his statement in chapter 10 and this blaspheming of the Holy Spirit? Some call this the “unforgivable sin”. What is that? I remember working for the Billy Graham Crusade and manning a phone at Wheaton. At least once, I got a call from someone who thought they committed an unpardonable sin. This was part of Billy Graham’s response to the question:
It seems to me, negatively, that no one has committed this sin who continues to be under the disturbing, convicting, and drawing power of the Holy Spirit. So long as the Spirit strives with a person, he or she has not committed the unpardonable sin. But when a person has so resisted the Holy Spirit that he strives with him or her no more, then there is eternal danger. In other words, the unpardonable sin involves the total and irrevocable rejection of Jesus Christ. Resisting the Spirit is a sin committed by unbelievers. But it is a sin that, when carried on long enough, leads to eternal doom. Only certain judgment remains for those who resist the Spirit. - Billy Graham
Let me repeat:
No one has committed this sin who continues to be under the disturbing, convicting, and drawing power of the Holy Spirit…. The unpardonable sin involves the total and irrevocable rejection of Jesus Christ. - Billy Graham
So, the question for us is: did Peter keep on sinning in a way that continually resisted the work of the Holy Spirit? No. In 1 John, we read:
“No one who abides in him keeps on sinning; no one who keeps on sinning has either seen him or known him” (1 John 3:6, ESV).
Notice the words “Abide” and “Keeps on sinning.” Like Billy Graham, John wrote about persistent resistance to the Holy Spirit. It is resting to the point of death. Friends, God is just and good. Some people will raise their fist at God or pretend he doesn’t exist until their very last breath. They will suffer the consequences of such a rejection. Others will turn away from this denial before it is too late. God is the ultimate judge. John wrote:
“If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness” (1 John 1:8–9, ESV).
Friends, we all have sinned. None of us are perfect. Are we leaning toward God’s direction? Are we trusting in his overwhelming grace found in Jesus’s blood shed for us or our own strength? Are we clinging to his kindness or trying to find love in all the wrong places? Those who always give into sin and follow their own way are not following Jesus. As we look at Peter’s response, we see that not only did he weep, but he also repented, which means he changed. In a short time, he would stand up for his faith at the cost of his life. Peter was genuinely open to receiving Jesus’s forgiveness, grace, peace, and power.
APPLICATION
Here are some applications as we look at Peter as an example of what not to do and what to do:
Are we honest with ourselves and others? What does it look like to be a person of our word?
Are we willing to follow Jesus wherever he leads us? What holds us back from following him? Can we share our perspective about Jesus with people? Or do we hide that part of our lives? Why is that?
Are we moving toward Jesus or away from him? What steps can we take this week to move toward him?
PRAYER
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