Peter, James and John: the troubled three.

Let me just start by saying I know this lesson is long. But, if you notice, it is mainly scripture references. I tried to condense as much as possible and I skipped many references but there are many more that could have been added to this list.

Almost every time a disciple is called by name it is either Peter, James or John. The only exceptions are when the twelve were called originally and near the death of Jesus. That's when we learn a little about Thomas and some of the others. In some cases the Bible may say a couple of the disciples did this or that but if they are called by name it is almost always these three. Why? I personally believe that these three struggled with their faith more than the others. James and John were brothers but so were Andrew and Peter. And strangely Andrew is almost never mentioned. Andrew is the one who found Jesus and brought Peter to see Him. Maybe Andrew's faith was stronger than his brother's from the beginning and Peter's had to grow a little. I think we often suppose that the disciples dropped everything the first time they saw Jesus and never questioned who He was again. That simply is not true. In fact, all of them struggled with their faith. Here are three examples: the first one was shortly after Jesus had called them to follow Him, the second only a few days before His arrest and the third was only minutes before His arrest.

Mark 4:38-41

³⁸Jesus Himself was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke Him and said to Him, "Teacher, do You not care that we are perishing?" ³⁹And He got up and rebuked the wind and said to the sea, "Hush, be still." And the wind died down and it became perfectly calm. ⁴⁰And He said to them, "Why are you afraid? Do you still have no faith?" ⁴¹They became very much afraid and said to one another, "Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey Him?" 

Jesus clearly questions their faith and they are afraid. Afraid of what? Jesus? They then begin to wonder who Jesus is. They obviously did not know Him to be exactly who He was.

John 14:1-9 

¹"Do not let your heart be troubled; believe in God, believe also in Me. ²"In My Father's house are many dwelling places; if it were not so, I would have told you; for I go to prepare a place for you.  ³"If I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again and receive you to Myself, that where I am, there you may be also. ⁴"And you know the way where I am going." ⁵Thomas said to Him, "Lord, we do not know where You are going, how do we know the way?" ⁶Jesus said to him, "I am the way, and the truth, and the life; no one comes to the Father but through Me. ⁷"If you had known Me, you would have known My Father also; from now on you know Him, and have seen Him." ⁸Philip said to Him, "Lord, show us the Father, and it is enough for us." ⁹Jesus said to him, "Have I been so long with you, and yet you have not come to know Me, Philip? He who has seen Me has seen the Father; how can you say, 'Show us the Father'?

Jesus is clearly frustrated or disappointed that the disciples still did not know who He was.

John 16:30-31 

³⁰"Now we know that You know all things, and have no need for anyone to question You; by this we believe that You came from God." ³¹Jesus answered them, "Do you now believe?

Jesus basically says, Do you finally believe?

  If the disciples struggled with their faith why should we be surprised when we struggle with our faith? After all, they walked every day with Jesus. Actually it is a little harder for us. Surprised? Jesus told the disciples that very thing in John 20:29.
 ²⁹Jesus said to him, "Because you have seen Me, have you believed? Blessed are they who did not see, and yet believed."

We are more blessed than the disciples if we believe that Jesus is Messiah the son of God because we have not seen Him with our eyes but believed with our hearts.

Let's do a little digging and look at these three disciples, Peter, James and John a little closer and their struggle with their faith. We are going to be looking at several passages but that is the only way to get the full picture. Last time we looked at a couple of the examples of how these three were singled out. Now let's look at several more and how much patience Jesus had with their unbelief and struggles.


In Matthew 16:16-23 we have two stories that we all are very familiar with. But have you ever noticed that they are connected? Jesus has just asked the disciples, "who do the people say that I am?" Peter gives his response in verse 16. Jesus responds by telling Peter He will build His church on this rock. And then we have the story of Jesus telling Peter, "get behind me Satan." How can these be connected? Is Peter the rock on which Christ will build His church or is he Satan?


¹⁶Simon Peter answered, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God."
 ¹⁷And Jesus said to him, "Blessed are you, Simon Barjona, because flesh and blood did not reveal this to you, but My Father who is in heaven. 

What did God reveal to Peter? That Jesus is the Christ. Only God working in our lives can reveal to us that Jesus is the Christ. Until a person comes to this realization they can not be saved. This is the basis for salvation. First we must realize that we are a sinner. A sinner who is not worthy of heaven and has no way to appease the God of the universe. Unless, we believe that Jesus is the son of God, and died in our place to make that appeasement. Only God can reveal to us that Jesus is the Christ. That is what Jesus tells Simon Peter. God reveals it to us and then we must accept or reject it. Each person has to make that decision.

 

¹⁸"I also say to you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build My church; and the gates of Hades will not overpower it. 

We have to be careful with this story because it can easily be misinterpreted. In fact, I believe the Roman Catholic church has read this wrong for many years. They believe that the interpretation of this passage is that Peter was the foundation stone of the church, that he was more important than the other apostles, that he became Bishop of Rome, and that his preeminence was passed on to his successors, the popes. First of all to suggest that Jesus put any of the disciples ahead of the others goes against His own teaching. It was Jesus who said the first should be last and the last shall be first in Matthew 19:30 and Mark 10:31 among other places. It was also Jesus who washed the disciples feet and told them to do like wise, to serve one another. And talking to the disciples, Jesus said in Matthew 20:26-27 that whoever wishes to be great among them shall be a servant and whoever wishes to be first shall be your slave. So obviously Jesus did not encourage the disciples to strive to be greater than one another. To promote one above the others would not fit with his teachings. So first lets look at the play on words here. Peter, in the Greek is Petros, meaning "a rock" or pebble and the word that was used for "rock" in this story where it said "on this rock" is petra meaning bed rock. So the way this verse actually reads is, I say to you that you are a rock and upon the bedrock I will build My church. So what is the bedrock? The bedrock is the base or the foundation and Jesus just told us in verse 16 what the basis for salvation actually is. That is, God revealing to each of us that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God. When we realize this we have to act on it and then we are saved. Even Satan and his demons know who Jesus is but they are not saved. Realizing and acting on it are two different things. Romans 10:9-10 That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved; for with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation. 


Some say that Jesus is the foundation and I believe they are only partially correct. It is the believing in Him that is the foundation. He is not the foundation but the cornerstone. Ephesians 2:20 tells us that the prophets and the disciples were the first to believe and that Jesus is the cornerstone. Having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus Himself being the corner stone, 

Also the work that was started by Christ as the corner stone and built up on the apostles and prophets continues to be built up on Christians today. But those that refuse to believe that Christ is the Messiah they will see Him as the rock of judgment. 1 Peter 2:4-8

¹⁹"I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatever you bind on earth shall have been bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall have been loosed in heaven." 

This verse also has to be looked at closely. First of all, Peter is not given the keys to do whatever in heaven. Instead he will be given (future tense) the keys to understand how heaven works. When we understand how heaven works we know that we do not have authority on earth except that which is given to us from the King in heaven. What Jesus says here is, when you bind or loose something on earth you will only be able to do so when it was so decided in heaven first.

 ²⁰Then He warned the disciples that they should tell no one that He was the Christ. 


At this point the disciples are not ready in their faith for what is about to happen. Jesus begins to explain to them what is going to happen and takes the next few months to do so. It is not until His death, for some not until His resurrection and for a few others not until even later before they really understand what it means to believe in Jesus being the Christ.


 ²¹From that time Jesus began to show His disciples that He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things from the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised up on the third day.  ²²Peter took Him aside and began to rebuke Him, saying, "God forbid it, Lord! This shall never happen to You." 


Obviously Peter did not fully grasp the thing that he had confessed just a few verses before. If Jesus is the Christ and He is the son of God then God is in control, knows the future and knows what must be done. But Peter actually rebukes Jesus and tells Him He must be wrong. God would never let this happen. By Peter's own words he does not really believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God. He doubts here that Jesus is correct in saying that He must die. Could he say this and actually be saved? We don't know. He may have been saved when he was called. He may have been saved when he confessed that Jesus was the Christ a few verses earlier.  Or it may be that Peter still does not completely get it and may not until much later. We will look at that possibility next time.


 ²³But He turned and said to Peter, "Get behind Me, Satan! You are a stumbling block to Me; for you are not setting your mind on God's interests, but man's." 

Here is the link between these two stories. Christ's response alone should be proof enough that Peter was not the greatest of the disciples. He refers to him as Satan. Peter is speaking purely from the flesh and is not considering the kingdom of God at all. Does Peter have the keys to the understanding of the kingdom of God that Jesus said that He would give him or is he simply having a weak faith moment? Obviously we don't know for sure but we do know Peter is not walking with Christ even though he is walking beside Christ at this moment. There are certainly times in my life when I merely walk beside Christ instead of walking with Christ. Often when I do, I say and do some pretty stupid things. Peter's name may have meant rock but no man could be the foundation for Heaven. Peter was not the rock but his understanding that Jesus is the Christ the son of God was the rock and that bedrock does not waiver, does not second guess and is the only way into heaven.

Right after these two stories are when the events occurred that we looked at last time.


Now we are going to simply list some of the events that occurred where at least one of the these three are named. In some of these cases, some of the disciples are singled out. The ones singled out are singled out many times to witness a miracle to strengthen their faith and sometimes to allow us to see them pull their foot from their mouth. Also, as you read these verses see if the person sounds like someone who is walking closely in spirit with Jesus and listening to His teachings or more like someone who is walking in the flesh. Also notice if Jesus' response sounds like a rebuke.


Matthew 18:21-22
Then Peter came to Jesus and asked, "Lord, how many times shall I forgive my brother when he sins against me? Up to seven times?"
 ²²Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you, up to seven times, but up to seventy times seven. 



Matthew 19:23-27
²³And Jesus said to His disciples, "Truly I say to you, it is hard for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven.
 ²⁴"Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."
 ²⁵When the disciples heard this, they were very astonished and said, "Then who can be saved?"
 ²⁶And looking at them Jesus said to them, "With people this is impossible, but with God all things are possible."
 ²⁷Then Peter said to Him, "Behold, we have left everything and followed You; what then will there be for us?"

Mark 10:35-37
 ³⁵James and John, the two sons of Zebedee, came up to Jesus, saying, "Teacher, we want You to do for us whatever we ask of You."
 ³⁶And He said to them, "What do you want Me to do for you?"
 ³⁷They said to Him, "Grant that we may sit, one on Your right and one on Your left, in Your glory."


Jesus then tells them that they do not even know what they are asking for and says they are not prepared to undergo what He will be undergoing.  He then goes on to explain that He is not the one to assign who will sit on His right and left. His words are so harsh that after this we read verse 41.


⁴¹Hearing this, the ten began to feel indignant with James and John.


Luke 9:46-50


⁴⁶An argument started among them as to which of them might be the greatest.
 ⁴⁷But Jesus, knowing what they were thinking in their heart, took a child and stood him by His side,
 ⁴⁸and said to them, "Whoever receives this child in My name receives Me, and whoever receives Me receives Him who sent Me; for the one who is least among all of you, this is the one who is great."
 ⁴⁹John answered and said, "Master, we saw someone casting out demons in Your name; and we tried to prevent him because he does not follow along with us." 


Obviously John is still focused on who is the greatest, but now it is the 12 being greater than any others.  So Jesus responds.


⁵⁰But Jesus said to him, "Do not hinder him; for he who is not against you is for you."



Luke 9:51-56


 ⁵¹When the days were approaching for His ascension, He was determined to go to Jerusalem;
 ⁵²and He sent messengers on ahead of Him, and they went and entered a village of the Samaritans to make arrangements for Him.
 ⁵³But they did not receive Him, because He was traveling toward Jerusalem.
 ⁵⁴When His disciples James and John saw this, they said, "Lord, do You want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?"
 ⁵⁵But He turned and rebuked them, and said, "You do not know what kind of spirit you are of;

 ⁵⁶for the Son of Man did not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them." And they went on to another village.

Luke 22:8-13


 ⁸And Jesus sent Peter and John, saying, "Go and prepare the Passover for us, so that we may eat it."

 ⁹They said to Him, "Where do You want us to prepare it?"

 ¹⁰And He said to them, "When you have entered the city, a man will meet you carrying a pitcher of water; follow him into the house that he enters.

 ¹¹"And you shall say to the owner of the house, 'The Teacher says to you, "Where is the guest room in which I may eat the Passover with My disciples?"'

 ¹²"And he will show you a large, furnished upper room; prepare it there."

 ¹³And they left and found everything just as He had told them; and they prepared the Passover. 


It appears the whole point of this story is for the benefit of Peter and John to see the miracles that Jesus performs and His command of future events.


John 6:45-46


 ⁶⁴"But there are some of you who do not believe " For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were who did not believe, and who it was that would betray Him.
 ⁶⁵And He was saying, "For this reason I have said to you, that no one can come to Me unless it has been granted him from the Father."


Notice this verse said that Jesus knew from the beginning who they were, plural, more than one, who did not believe.  Jesus has just told many of his disciples, more than the 12 only, that unless they eat His flesh and drink His blood they will have no eternal life. Several found this statement troubling and left Him as a result. It was after this that Peter made his confession of Jesus being the Christ the Son of God that we talked about earlier. Peter makes this confession but we still do not know if Peter has made this a personal confession or merely a statement. But we will know for sure in our next lesson.



Luke 8:41-42, 49-56



 ⁴¹And there came a man named Jairus, and he was an official of the synagogue; and he fell at Jesus' feet, and began to implore Him to come to his house;
 ⁴²for he had an only daughter, about twelve years old, and she was dying. But as He went, the crowds were pressing against Him. 


⁴⁹While He was still speaking, someone came from the house of the synagogue official, saying, "Your daughter has died; do not trouble the Teacher anymore."
 ⁵⁰But when Jesus heard this, He answered him, "Do not be afraid any longer; only believe, and she will be made well."
 ⁵¹When He came to the house, He did not allow anyone to enter with Him, except Peter and John and James, and the girl's father and mother.
 ⁵²Now they were all weeping and lamenting for her; but He said, "Stop weeping, for she has not died, but is asleep."
 ⁵³And they began laughing at Him, knowing that she had died.
 ⁵⁴He, however, took her by the hand and called, saying, "Child, arise!"
 ⁵⁵And her spirit returned, and she got up immediately; and He gave orders for something to be given her to eat.
 ⁵⁶Her parents were amazed; but He instructed them to tell no one what had happened.


I find this story especially interesting because Jesus singles out the three disciples. Raises a child from the dead and tells them and the family not to tell anyone. Yet, in the story right in front of this one Jesus casts out demons from a man in front of all the disciples and tells the man to go tell everyone. I believe that Jesus wanted the three, Peter, James and John in this story to see this extra miracle but also knew that they were still not ready to follow Him completely. Their witness of this event was to help strengthen their faith. The family members of the little girl obviously were going to talk because the whole town knew that she had died. It had already been told in the streets, verse 49. How could they not talk about it. So the warning about not telling anyone appears to have been directed at the three disciples. I have just always wrongly assumed that Jesus was talking to the parents since it was in the same sentence.


John 13:5-11


⁵Then He poured water into the basin, and began to wash the disciples' feet and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded.
 ⁶So He came to Simon Peter. He said to Him, "Lord, do You wash my feet?"
 ⁷Jesus answered and said to him, "What I do you do not realize now, but you will understand hereafter."


Peter does later come to understand the symbolism and importance of Jesus being the one who served. 


 ⁸Peter said to Him, "Never shall You wash my feet!" Jesus answered him, "If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me."


If you don't let me do this then you really still don't get it and will not get it.


 ⁹Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, then wash not only my feet, but also my hands and my head."
 ¹⁰Jesus said to him, "He who has bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you."
 ¹¹For He knew the one who was betraying Him; for this reason He said, "Not all of you are clean."


John 13:36-38


³⁶Simon Peter said to Him, "Lord, where are You going?" Jesus answered, "Where I go, you cannot follow Me now; but you will follow later."
 ³⁷Peter said to Him, "Lord, why can I not follow You right now? I will lay down my life for You."
 ³⁸Jesus answered, "Will you lay down your life for Me? Truly, truly, I say to you, a rooster will not crow until you deny Me three times.

It was Peter James and John who went deeper into the Garden of Gethsemene with Jesus on the night of His betrayal and it was these three that Jesus rebuked for sleeping.

It was Peter who cut off the soldier's ear and Jesus rebuked him and told him to put his sword away because did he not know that Jesus could call a legion of angels to defend Him. How could Isaiah 53:7 be fulfilled if He had allowed His followers to fight?

It was Peter who denied Christ three times before the cock crowed.

It was Peter and John who went to the empty tomb.


It is interesting that Peter, James and John are usually the ones listed throughout scriptures. It is just as interesting to note the scriptures go out of the way so as to not name some of the other disciples? Here is one example.

John 18:15-16

¹⁵Simon Peter was following Jesus, and so was another disciple Now that disciple was known to the high priest, and entered with Jesus into the court of the high priest,
 ¹⁶but Peter was standing at the door outside. So the other disciple, who was known to the high priest, went out and spoke to the doorkeeper, and brought Peter in.

Overall this lesson should gives us a huge amount of reassurance that Jesus has a tremendous amount of patience with us, as we struggle on a daily basis.  We struggle with unbelief that God is not able to handle our little problems and our constant struggles with our own personal sins. Praise God! He never gives up on us no matter how much we hurt Him. We can always come back to Him.

We all grow in our faith. The instant we are saved we are given all that we need as Christians. Our faith, however, grows within us as trials and tribulations come and God gives us a little more faith to trust Him each time. For some reason these three seemed to need a little something more and Jesus took the extra time with them to make sure they completely understood who He was. We will look at them one more time next time as we look closer at the three denials of Christ by Peter and of Christ's reappearing to the disciples at the lake. It is easy for us to look at these three and for that matter all of the disciples and say, why did they not get it. In reality we do the same thing when we doubt God's ability to handle our little problems, when we forget to treat Him with the honor and respect He deserves, when we neglect to study what He teaches us, when we refuse to grow because we are happy with where we are. But God in His infinite wisdom sends trials our way to force us out of our comfort zones to grow our weak faith and draw us closer to Him. As a result we talk to Him in prayer and study His word becoming more like Him. We are just as bad about not "getting it" as the disciples and for me many times even much worse but Jesus is just as patient with me. If you have ever struggled with feeling like you have hurt God too much to be saved, take heart and read these verses again. Some of His closest followers hurt Him often and His patience with them and His desire to see them have true fellowship with Him never wavered.

Feeding the 4000

Instead of making a whole new post I simply added a paragraph to the feeding of the 5000. It actually fits better there and I should have put it there to start with.