Matthew 26

⁶⁹ 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.” ⁷⁰ But he denied it before them all, saying, “I do not know what you mean.” ⁷¹ 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.” ⁷² And again he denied it with an oath: “I do not know the man.” 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.” ⁷⁴ Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, “I do not know the man.” And immediately the rooster crowed. ⁷⁵ And Peter remembered the saying of Jesus, “Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly.

Mark 16:7 has an interesting little element in it that has caused no little comment over the years. The chapter begins with Mary Magdalene, Mary the mother of Jesus, and Salome going to the tomb of Jesus on Sunday morning. The stone has been rolled away. They go in and they see “a young man” sitting in there “on the right side, dressed in a white robe.” He pronounces Jesus’ resurrection in verse 6 and then, in verse 7, says the interesting thing. The English Standard Version renders it like this:

⁷ But go, tell his disciples and Peter that he is going before you to Galilee. There you will see him, just as he told you.”

Have you ever noticed that: “…tell his disciples and Peter”? Commenting on this, Russell Saltzman notes that some render the phrase in question as “tell his disciples, even Peter…” But “even Peter” is probably not right. Even so, writes Saltzman, there may be reason to see something in “the young man’s inflection when saying and Peter to the women, as if expressing some small but not unnatural hesitation over words he is commanded to speak.” Saltzman writes further:

Knowing just a little about Peter as reported from the gospels, even Peter is the more sensible approach. Can you hear the young man? “Go and give this message to his disciples . . . [long pause, heavy sigh, a reluctantly mumbled] . . . even Peter.”

Other translations put this as (long pause, resigned heavy sigh) including Peter. A contemporary paraphrase renders it as and don’t forget to tell Peter, which leads me to wonder if the young man may have worried they might not. That line—I can hear it spoken in the voice of the anhedonic stuffed donkey, Eeyore.[1]

That is indeed interesting, no? “But go, tell his disciples and Peter…” Why is he, Peter, the lead disciple, singled out when it comes to the good news of the resurrection? Perhaps because, outside of Judas Iscariot, Peter had the most colossal collapse of all the disciples. He denied Jesus three times. So maybe the “young man” is nodding toward Peter’s denials with his strange “and Peter”…but, then again, maybe he was grinning when he said “and Peter” and was thereby nodding toward God’s grace! Who knows?

Yes, there is shame in Peter’s behavior…and there is beauty in God’s grace to Peter. But let us consider first Peter’s ignominious denials.

Sin as ever-hardening.

Let us first note the ever-hardening nature of sin evident in Peter’s three denials. The denials are in verses 70, 72, and 74, and all are issued in response to being confronted by a girl, then a different girl, then “bystanders,” respectively.

Peter’s first denial of Jesus feigned ignorance. It was perhaps the most muted of the denials, but it was a denial, nonetheless.

⁷⁰ But he denied it before them all, saying, “I do not know what you mean.”

Craig Keener calls Peter’s denial in verse 70 “evasive” and says of it, “‘I do not know what you say’ is the standard form for denial in Jewish legal texts…”[2] In this, Peter sins, but perhaps he phrased it in such a way as to be able to claim technical innocence: “Well, I did not technically deny Jesus…” But sin is not a matter of technical definitions. It is a matter of the heart. And, here, as Jesus prophesied, Peter denied Him.

His second denial is more explicit.

⁷² And again he denied it with an oath: “I do not know the man.”

We have moved now from evasiveness to a plain denial. “I do not know the man.” As the pressure is ratcheted up, so is the explicitness of Peter’s denial. And what is the pressure he felt? The pressure of saving his own hide in the midst of a dangerous situation.

With the third denial, Peter breaks and offers his strongest wording.

⁷⁴ Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, “I do not know the man.” And immediately the rooster crowed.

Commentators note that this does not mean he used what we would call obscene language. He was not cussing, we might say. Rather, Peter swore an oath, something like, “If I am lying then let me die” or “let me be judged.” This is what it means to say that Peter “invoke[d] a curse on himself.”

Notice the progression of sin. The more we sin the more hardened we become in our sin. Peter’s three denials demonstrate this principle perfectly. Juan de Valdés wrote that “in the first instance, he denied simply; in the second he denied with an oath; while in the third he denied, adding curses to the oath.”[3]

Interestingly, the same increasingly-hardening nature of sin can be seen in Psalm 1, there too in a threefold movement.

¹ Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel of the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers; ² but his delight is in the law of the Lord, and on his law he meditates day and night.

Do you see?

• Walk
• Stand
• Sit

If you walk through sin, you will eventually stop and stand in it. If you stand in sin, you will eventually sit down in it.

Sin numbs us. Sin weakens us. Sin takes ever more and more control of us.

See the sin of Peter and tremble, for in the sin of Peter we see our own sin. Our hearts are hardened by it and we become more and more numb to it.

Sin as witness-destroying.

There is another element here that we dare not miss and it is one that perhaps we do not think enough of in our consideration of this infamous episode. I am talking about the accusers and how, because of Peter’s denials, they did not get to hear the gospel. Sin is witness-destroying.

⁶⁹ 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.”

Iain Duguid refers to this “servant or slave girl (Gk. paidiskē)” and says that she is “perhaps twelve or fourteen years old.”[4] Peter had the opportunity to present the gospel and speak the name of Jesus to a child who needed to hear it. But he did not. And again:

⁷¹ 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.”

Another unnamed child. She too confronts Peter. She too needed to learn the gospel. She too needed to hear the name of Jesus not from His accusers but from one whose life had been forever changed by Jesus. But, again, this does not happen. Peter does not bear witness. Another child does not hear the good news. And a third time:

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.”

Now we have a crowd, “bystanders.” They can tell that Peter is part of Jesus’ group because of his accent. Keener notes that “Galilean accents differed from Judean accents; Galileans were careless with their vowels and failed to clearly differentiate the various guttural consonants.”[5] That is most interesting. Because of this, they correctly identify Peter.

Peter—yes, at possible risk to his own life—has the opportunity to bear witness to this crowd, and he does not. So Peter fails here to present the gospel to a number of people, including children.

Sin always destroys witness. What a tragedy!

The world needs Jesus and the world needs the words of Jesus. And Peter knew this. In John 6, after some who were following Jesus had left him, we read:

⁶⁶ After this many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him. ⁶⁷ So Jesus said to the twelve, “Do you want to go away as well?” ⁶⁸ Simon Peter answered him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life, ⁶⁹ and we have believed, and have come to know, that you are the Holy One of God.”

If Jesus has the words of eternal life, then we dare not be silent about them. And we certainly dare not deny the one who is life itself! But sin destroys witness. Sin turns us inward and, like Peter, makes us consumed with our own selves. Sin causes us to forget the world’s great need for Christ.

Sin as self-condemning.

And sin condemns. It is self-condemning. The one who sins condemns himself or herself. Peter’s third denial is instructive here.

⁷⁴ Then he began to invoke a curse on himself and to swear, “I do not know the man.” And immediately the rooster crowed. ⁷⁵ And Peter remembered the saying of Jesus, “Before the rooster crows, you will deny me three times.” And he went out and wept bitterly.

Again, these are not cuss words. This was an oath containing a curse against his own self. And, indeed, all sin does curse us. Sin is a curse and its wages are death.

The condemnation of sin is bitter. “And he went out and wept bitterly.” Scot McKnight renders verse 75:

⁷⁵ Petros remembered the utterance Yēsous had spoken, that “Before the rooster voices you will deny me three times.” Exiting outside, he wailed bitterly.[6]

Sin is terribly destructive, and it must not be downplayed. Attempts to soften Peter’s denials do not do anybody any favors. So when, for instance, in the 4^th century, Hilary of Poitiers says,“It is true that Peter denied the Lord, though this was not sacrilege because he had been the first to recognize him as the Son of God (16:16),”[7] a serious and damaging mistake is being made. In fact, Hilary’s point is completely wrong: It is because Peter was the first to recognize Jesus as the Son of God that His denials were even more tragic and wicked.

None of this is to pile on Peter. My point, rather, is that our own sin must be owned in all of its diabolical ugliness. Sin is pernicious. Sin is terrible. Sin wounds. Sin is self-condemning. Let us recognize that so that we might repent rightly—as indeed Peter did when he “wailed bitterly”—and flee sin.

Sin is not to be winked at. Sin is not to be giggled about. Sin is to be hated and fled.

Peter’s wailing is an apt depiction of the regret the believer should feel when we fall, when we sin. It should grieve our hearts, as it grieves the heart of God.

Even so, God loves us, sinners though we are, and God forgives us through Christ. Romans 8:1 is a powerful word we dare not miss: “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.”

There was condemnation. There was judgment. There was bitterness. There was wrath.

But not now. Why? Because of Jesus.

There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

Now.

No.

Condemnation.

Peter knew the self-condemning ravages of sin. But, as John 21 shows us, Peter would also come to know the sweetness of the mercy of God in Christ.

¹⁵ When they had finished breakfast, Jesus said to Simon Peter, “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Feed my lambs.” ¹⁶ He said to him a second time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” He said to him, “Yes, Lord; you know that I love you.” He said to him, “Tend my sheep.” ¹⁷ He said to him the third time, “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter was grieved because he said to him the third time, “Do you love me?” and he said to him, “Lord, you know everything; you know that I love you.” Jesus said to him, “Feed my sheep. ¹⁸ Truly, truly, I say to you, when you were young, you used to dress yourself and walk wherever you wanted, but when you are old, you will stretch out your hands, and another will dress you and carry you where you do not want to go.” ¹⁹ (This he said to show by what kind of death he was to glorify God.) And after saying this he said to him, “Follow me.”

Do not deny the Lord Jesus. He is life itself.

But have you denied? Then flee into His loving and forgiving arms! You will find mercy there.

 

[1] https://www.firstthings.com/web-exclusives/2016/04/sure-tell-peter-too

[2] Keener, Craig S. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament (IVP Bible Background Commentary Set) (p. 118). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.

[3] Lee, Jason K. and William M. Marsh. Matthew. Reformation Commentary on Scripture. Gen. Ed. Timothy George. New Testament I (Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2021), p.352–53.

[4] Duguid, Iain M. “ESV Expository Commentary: Matthew–Luke.” Apple Books.

[5] Keener, Craig S. The IVP Bible Background Commentary: New Testament, p. 118.

[6] McKnight, Scot. The Second Testament (p. 34). InterVarsity Press. Kindle Edition.

[7] Williams, D.H. Matthew. The Church’s Bible. Trans. and edited by D.H. Williams. (Grand Rapids, MI: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, 2018x ), p.497.