Knowing Our Enemy's Tricks - Peter

Satan is a pretty nasty guy and was going to try everything to stop people from believing in God's plan. He was going to make it as miserable for Christ and others as much as possible. He knew what his destiny was and he knew the only thing you could do was to bring people down with him. We need to remember those times when Satan tried in his own power to prevent others to know the will of God in order for us to be more aware of his tricks in our own lives.

The next three posts I am going to be asking three questions in order to focus more on the "opportune time" according to Luke 4:13 that Satan sought to "mess" with God's plan:

1) Who or what Satan used?

2) How does Jesus respond?

3) What is applicable to me?

 

 

1) Who or what Satan used?

Peter- Read Matt 16:21-23, Luke 22:31-34,54-62, John 21:15-19

Peter had a bold personality and sometimes allowed his emotions and desires to get the best of him. Satan could see that used his emotions and desires to mess with Jesus.

In the Matthew passage, Peter rebukes Christ telling Him that He wasn't going to die. What is crazy how just a few verses before, Peter tells Jesus He was the Christ, the Son of the living God. But Peter put his guard down telling Jesus that He was the Messiah but He couldn't do His Messiah duties. Peter was clearly leaning on his own understanding. As Christ said he was thinking in fleshy terms and not in the ways of God.

Peter also talked a lot before he spoke based off of his emotions. This is not bad but when pride or anger creeps in then it does become bad. In the case in Luke 22 verse 33, Peter had became self-righteous and prideful. I think Peter had good intentions wanting to stand with Christ but once again he was over confident and lean on his own understanding. In result as we all know Peter denies Christ 3 times. Satan really knew how to mess with Peter and his emotions.

2) How does Jesus respond?

In Matt 16:23 Jesus calls Peter out in a very serious tone, telling him that he was allowing Satan to mess with his thoughts. He reminded Peter that he was seeing and believing in human terms and not God's. Jesus knew that Peter cared about Him but knew Peter's struggle with his emotions and heart and not having them dictate what he believed.

Jesus actually warns Peter that he was going to deny Him in the Luke 22:31-32. Satan had his eye on him but Jesus prayed that Peter would have a strong faith. Jesus had his back and wanted Peter to know that.

Of course after Peter denies Christ 3 times and Jesus dies on the cross and rises from the dead (John 21:15-19), Jesus seeks after Peter, meeting him and the others for breakfast by the sea. He asks Peter 3 times if he would feed His sheep. Jesus forgave Him for all three times Peter denied Him because He knew his heart. Peter was sorry and Jesus knew that. This interaction showed the love Jesus had for Peter and how He still wanted to use him to do God's work. Jesus even takes it one step further by telling Peter of his death showing him that He was going to use Peter for His glory.

3) What is applicable to me?

Peter's personality was a bold and sometimes irrational and overconfident in himself. No matter what types of personalities we have we all at one time or another leaned on our own understanding. Each one of us have personality traits that are not necessary bad but could lead us to doing something bad when we don't have the mind of Christ. For Peter and for me, our emotions leads us to get to this point and when it actually comes to the point of doing something right, these same emotions allow us to not glorify God. Whatever that personality trait is, Satan could use it against us to get angry or fearful or self-righteous.

But what is awesome, unlike the Pharisees and Judas, Peter with his bold personality was used by God to bring about the church. There is hope for those who seek after God. There is hope for those who have a repentive heart. The Pharisees, Judas, and Satan were used by Satan to mess with Christ, but because of Peter's heart and his desire to follow the ways of God, despite his personality that he allowed to not please God, God was able to use him big. It is all about the heart!

Satan wants to mess with our hearts. He has the hearts of those who do not have a repentive heart but for those who have accepted Jesus and His good news, he doesn't have theirs. He is going to try to stop us by using these tricks from being used by God. He knows that if we are faithful to God he will loose more hearts. We need to remember that those people we know of that need Jesus, need us to fight and pray for their hearts. Satan is going to try to stop us but because of God's great love we can press on and fight for those people. That is my prayer for you and for me.

I hope you enjoyed this series. If there is anyone that you want me to pray for that isn't a Christian, just leave a comment or email me. I too have someone that I am fighting for.

If you want to check out the other parts of this series, check them out here, Jesus' temptation, the Pharisees, and Judas.    

Linking up with Jenifer #tellhisstory and with Holley Coffee for your Heart