Today, we begin a brand new study in the first epistle written by the Apostle Peter to believers in the Lord Jesus Christ who lived during the first century in what is known today as modern-day Turkey. These believers were victims of the Dispersion which was a term that Peter used to describe the fact that these first century believers in Christ had been dispersed from their homes. They were under intense pressure and persecution in a world that had been turned upside down by the teachings, death, burial and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ.
Before Peter was known as such, he was known as Simon. Fifty times in the four gospels, he is referred to as Simon. This name is derived from the Hebrew word which means "reed" which is a tall, slender-leaved plant of the grass family. It grows in water or on marshy ground and it is a symbol of weakness. This epistle was written by a man who from birth was named Simon which means "reed that is easily broken." Brokenness is high commodity in the economy of God. Our brokenness is a product of our fallen humanity. And, along with our brokenness comes great hurt. And, hurt people hurt people. However, when the broken come to the God who masters at fixing our brokenness, He has been known to through our brokenness bring us to the place where we experience His tremendous love. And, loved people love people. God uses broken people to help broken people, and we are all broken.
As I am sure that you already know, the Lord Jesus renamed Simon to Simon Peter. The additional name of "Peter" was given after Simon acknowledged the Lord Jesus as the Christ of the Living God in Matthew 16. Peter means rock which is always a symbol in the scriptures as a refuge or a strong foundation. He was one of the first four followers of the Lord Jesus. The Apostle Peter was a pebble who put his trust in a boulder and taught others how to build on a solid foundation.
Peter's life teaches us the secrets of God which render a man a leader. These secrets are easily unrecognizable, because they are not found in the many success books that we would find in our local bookstore. A year after meeting Peter, the Lord Jesus called him to "Come and follow me and I will make you a fisher of men." For the next three years, Peter, along with several others, followed the Lord Jesus. At the end of those three years, Peter failed miserably by denying that he even knew the Lord Jesus. In fact, the third time he denied having a relationship with Jesus, Peter dropped what was the equivalent of the "F" Bomb.
Peter's life illustrates that failure is not the opposite of success with God. As we will discover in this great book, Peter experienced his failure so that he would be able to speak authentically into the lives of hurting people each day. Then, some 40 days after his failure, on the Day of Pentecost, Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, is used of God to lead 3,000 people to faith in Jesus by preaching the Gospel in Jerusalem.
Peter realized life-changing power because he experienced so much trouble. As is clear in this first chapter, Peter's powerful faith was the product of his many trials. Thirty years after he began to follow Jesus, Peter became a great leader, who was hardly recognizable from the fisherman become failure. This is the secret of God for becoming a great leader: great trials create great faith. We must be wise to welcome the unwanted, knowing that it is through the unwanted God does His greatest work in and through us.
According to Mark 1, we know that Peter was married. He had a wife, and, he had a mother-in-law who lived with he and his wife. And his wife is also mentioned in 1 Corinthians 9. This throws a wrench into the idea that Peter was the first pope. He was also a leader among the twelve. Every time there is a list in the New Testament of the earliest followers of Christ, Peter is always listed as number one on the list.
The Lord Jesus spoke more often to Peter than to any other of His disciples. Sometimes He spoke to him in praise and sometimes He spoke to him in blame. No disciple was so pointedly and directly reproved by the Lord as Peter. And, not one of the disciples ever ventured to reprove the Lord but Peter. No disciple ever so boldly confessed and outspokenly acknowledged and encouraged our Lord as Peter and he repeatedly did that. And no one ever intruded and interfered and tempted the Lord as repeatedly as Peter. All of this explains why we love Peter so much. He was the most authentic and human of all of the disciples. This is why he was so equipped to be the leader of the twelve.
Again, we like Peter because he was in many ways like us. He was impulsive, impetuous and strong willed. He was the guy who when they came to arrest the Lord Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane, he drew his sword and cut off the ear of a guy named Malchus, the servant of the high priest. Peter was the guy who said, "Lord, we have left everything to follow you." And when the Lord Jesus tried to wash Peter's feet, he said, "You're not going to wash my feet." It didn't take long to recognize He said those words due to his pride.
The many lessons that Peter learned from the Lord Jesus will become obvious as we work through this book. Peter died around 67-68 AD. And most of you know that he died upside down on a cross. He felt like he was unworthy to die in the same manner as the Lord Jesus, so they took and turned the cross upside down, and that's how he died.
