Remembering Christ After Choosing Sin

“Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail. And when you have turned again, strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:31-32).

One verse that strikes me every time I think of it is Luke 22:61. Jesus stands before His accusers when Peter, lost in the crowd, denies being His close friend and follower. Immediately, Jesus "turned and looked at Peter." Heartbreak.

We're given no description of the expression on Jesus's face, but that look reminds Paul of what Jesus told him only a few verses earlier. It reminds him of his subsequent promise to never leave Jesus, even in the face of opposition or unpopularity. It reminds him of his inability to keep that promise for even one day.

And he runs out, weeping bitterly.

It is in our nature to run from the wrong that we do, from the ones we have wronged, and especially from those that have the authority to give us the consequences. Peter's consequence was a look from Christ reminding him of their conversation.

We make similar claims. We feel in the moment that we will always hold fast to the One we call Lord. Then the moment changes and what was once only a dark improbability has become the inescapable reality. And it's so much more difficult than we thought it'd be. 

We conjecture that no pain will be too great to cause us to doubt His care, that no disappointment will be too complete to cause us to question His wisdom, or that no hardship will last long enough to wear us down to a point of losing hope. But then it's here and a hundred of your emotions are at the surface and yet nonexistent at the same time. All your previous thoughts seem so foolish and so prideful and so useless, and like maybe this is it, maybe this is what will finally make you walk away or make Him give up on you. Lost in yourself with a whole crowd of people huddled around you, watching your reactions and trying to measure you up against some arbitrary standard.

You give in to despair or boredom or anger. You give up on the fight for holiness. 

And then He looks at you and you remember everything He's ever said to you, everything He's promised you. And there's pity and there's justice and there's hope and there's peace and there's comfort in the light of His face.

In brokenness, you are strengthened. In repentance, you are renewed. Because of He Who looked at you, Who reminded you that you are not on your own, that He has already prayed for you, that He is still praying for you.

He is with you. He is in you. He prepares the way before you and stands guard behind you. He gives life to the weary and the downcast. 

And His is not an arbitrary standard. When He looks at you in your disobedience, He not only knows your sinfulness completely and still holds on to you; He also knows your choices, having faced them Himself, "tempted in every way," yet every time choosing to do what was pure and righteous and good (Hebrews 4:15).

When He looked at Peter, it was not yet from a position of the conquering warrior but the submissive sacrifice, with immense suffering still looming imminently before Him. He knew Peter's denial. He knew Peter's betrayal. And still He put Himself into the violent hands of those who hated Him. 

Peter didn't just need an Example; He needed a substitute. We all do. When we reject God in order to please ourselves, we need one Who rejected Himself in order to please God. It is only in His power, by His prayers, that we can turn around and do differently and see differently. Jesus didn't put His hope in Peter, that he would decide to turn again after thrice choosing disobedience. Jesus put His hope in God, that He would "cause [Peter] to be born again into a living hope" (1 Peter 1:3). Peter's return was assured by the God from and through Whom salvation comes, for "no purpose of [His] can be thwarted" (Job 42:2). 

Peter saw himself finally as the Lord had seen him all along and he "wept bitterly" because of it. But he didn't give himself over to that feeling forever. Jesus had prayed for him, that his "faith would not fail" and that he would "turn again" to "strengthen the brothers."

It was this prayer on his behalf and the knowledge that Jesus was able to look at him and still love him-- with full knowledge of his past and future failings-- that strengthened his faith and encouraged him to stand and continue.

This truth and those prayers stand firm throughout the ages to meet us here today. Because Jesus did conquer death, "He is able also to save forever those who draw near to God through Him, since He always lives to make intercession for them" (Hebrews 7:25).

There is no power which can take us from His might, no disobedience which can cause Him to reconsider His promise of salvation to us, because "'when we are faithless, He remains faithful' for He cannot deny Himself" (2 Timothy 2:13).

He is just, and He is merciful, and through Christ He is able to be both at once, saving forever those who still mess up despite a great salvation. He has redeemed us. He is making us new.

He will keep us until the day we are taken to His side, where finally "we shall be like Him, because we shall see Him as He is" (1 John 3:2).