by Carole Lynne Haines
54 Having arrested Him, they led Him away and brought Him to the house of the high priest; but Peter was following at a distance. 55 After they had kindled a fire in the middle of the courtyard and had sat down together, Peter was sitting among them.
56 And a servant-girl, seeing him as he sat in the firelight and looking intently at him, said, “This man was with Him too.” 57 But he denied it, saying, “Woman, I do not know Him.”
58 A little later, another saw him and said, “You are one of them too!” But Peter said, “Man, I am not!” 59
After about an hour had passed, another man began to insist, saying, “Certainly this man also was with Him, for he is a Galilean too.” 60 But Peter said, “Man, I do not know what you are talking about.”
Immediately, while he was still speaking, a rooster crowed. 61 The Lord turned and looked at Peter. And Peter remembered the word of the Lord, how He had told him, “Before a rooster crows today, you will deny Me three times.”
62 And he went out and wept bitterly. (Luke 22:54-62 NASB)
I cannot imagine the grief that Peter must have felt in his heart after Jesus, His Lord whom he claimed to love, turned and looked at Him directly after the third denial. The word for bitterly in Greek means violently, bitterly, with poignant grief. Have you ever cried like that over a sin you have committed? I sure have. It is as if Jesus has turned and looked directly at me too, and I fall under the conviction of the Holy Spirit weeping violently over my own sin.
But more often, I sense a callousness in myself toward sin, and that scares me. It should scare me to my knees before Him because I never want to forget all that Jesus has done and is doing in my life. Do you feel as I do, like we take Him for granted far too much? Let’s sit before Him in this time of reflection on the sufferings of Christ, and let Him examine us and draw us closer, restoring our zeal and passion for Him as He turns and looks at us. Thank you, Jesus, are words that just fall too short!
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