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The Apostle Peter, a man of faith, courage, and humility? After all, Peter was the one to walk on water but sank because he, according to Jesus, had little faith? On another occasion, Peter elegantly professed that he believed Jesus to be the Christ, the Son of the living God and then later on after Jesus was arrested denied that he knew Him. Admittedly, the apostle Peter was an impulsive man, with his words and his actions. ... However, at the same time we can also characterize Peter as a submissive man…a humble man. Speaking only for myself, I identified with this apparent contradictory picture of Peter. Studying the life of Peter is an encouragement because what I have realized that Peter stumbled and fell, coming up short of God’s ideal but he never failed. Recently, I read somewhere that Peter’s perceived failures were human frailties. This is not to excuse any of Peter’s behavior or actions but helps to understand him and ourselves better. However, whether or not you believe them to be failures or human frailties God used all of them to mold Peter into a man of deep faith, bold courage, and godly humility.
We have a limited time this evening so my plan is to focus on two major events in Peter’s life. Within the context of those two events, we will look at Peter’s attitudes and behaviors that led to those events. ... Upon closing, we will briefly look at 1st and 2nd Peter to gain further insight into the man called Peter.
First, I want to provide you with a brief bio of Peter. Before the call of Jesus, Peter was called Simon; he was a fisherman by trade. ... He changes it to Peter, which stands for rock or stone in Greek.
All that we know about Peter’s family (besides his brother Andrew) is that his father’s name was Jonah or John depending on which gospel you are reading. ... We know Peter was married (Mark 1:30, 1 Cor. ... As you can see, scripture does not have a great deal of information about Peter before his call. With this background established let’s move on to one of the major events in Peter’s life, his confession of Jesus as the Messiah. ...
First, the Matthew account is the only passage that records Jesus’ response to Peter’s confession. Jesus says in c 16, v 18 that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church. Discussing what this means is beyond the scope of this presentation but I think it is significant to note that Jesus is not at this moment changing Simon’s name to Peter. ... Jesus is reaffirming the call of God on Peter’s life. Peter was chosen from the beginning, based on God’s choice not based on any special works of Peter. ... But, suffice it to say that when Jesus first changed Simon’s name to Cephas and then to Peter when He chose the 12, it signified the transformation taking place in Peter’s life whether he realized it or not. Peter’s course was set and from that day forward her had a predominate role in Jesus’ ministry and was the leader of the group.
Approximate Word count = 2712
Approximate Pages = 10.8
(250 words per page double spaced)
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